Writing from Twitter prison!

[Glinner]

I've received a twelve-hour ban from Twitter so I thought I'd take the chance to say hello lovely mumsnetters! Thank you for all the support and kind words and very proud to be on your side.

I'm not deleting the tweets because I stand by them and there's nothing offensive about them. See for thyself, fellow witches!

Well, Glinner, maybe we got it all wrong and Twitter has been taken over by mods that are white supremacists, who can’t have you bash white men...
Now that would be a twist. Or maybe not.

Glinner, thank you and Jonny for standing up for women. I hope you pop in again soon.

For me the very first time I came across this stuff was in the early spring of this year. I idly clicked on an active MN thread about the Swim England guidelines on transgender and changing rooms. I began following the formation of Man Friday and started reading more and more on the FWR board.

The first 'real life' instance came quickly after that. I realised that my professional association had extended its 'Woman of the Year Award' to include any member of my profession who 'identified as a woman'. I wrote to complain.

They responded at great length but despite my pressing were completely unable to explain their definition of 'woman' or what they meant by 'identifies as a woman'. The responses, from a man, were peppered with 'cis' and it was the first time I had directly encountered 'wokery'. I was shocked, really shocked. It seemed so STUPID and blind. And all the more so because the nature of the profession lead me to expect some precision of thought, some analysis, some intelligence.

That was when I realised the impact of this ideology isn't just on safety and dignity of women in changing rooms and toilets. It has men elbowing women off the bench and pushing them down and taking their places in all sorts of insidious ways.

I can't go without thanking you for the laughs. So many Father Ted 'isms' are woven into the everyday language of this house. .

I’m in Oz. Peak trans moment for me was Hannah Mouncey wanting to smash into women and the Guardian going along with it. Then the cotton ceiling stuff. Just disgusting.

Favourite Father Ted moment is when Ted reveals to all that it was Fargo Boyle as the criminal mastermind behind Chris’s anxiety and the crowd murmur disbelief, with someone, possibly Glinner himself ending it with “Fucking Hell!” Gets me every time.

^On Sundays I do the Weetabix and banana thing, thereby pissing off everybody.)*

Repulsion is not the same as pissing me off

The Guardian has a lot to answer for enabling male violence against women - where has their moral compass gone? Southwards it would seem, along with their critical thinking

PS is that being south-phobic?

Ten years ago The IT Crowd showed a trans character with unchanged personality and preferences contrary to gender norms with also unchanged biological strength.

(The Elders of the Internet have always known April is not from from Iran)

Thank you Glinner

Actually may I ask if you would have written April any differently if writing the character today please and thank you @Glinner

Hello Glinner. I've been thinking for a while it's about time you got here - we're way more entertaining than those eejits on Twatter (not to mention way more clever too).

I work in a women's refuge and all the focus groups we've conducted around the issue of trans women being residents in the refuge have resulted in a resounding "no - this is a place for women and children". They don't want a trans woman to be their Key Worker either ("what would he know?" has been an answer in the focus group).

Some women in the refuge hide when our landlord sends maintenance men to fix things because they're scared of men in their home. They don't want to have to live in the same house as men - even those who think they're women/female - or those who are pretending to think they're women/female.

Women can tell a man from a mile away - it doesn't matter how well he's performing femininity - and I suspect most men can too. Women can tell for reasons of safety and self protection..... those women already abused more than most. And yet women in prison are expected to tolerate the presence of a male amongst them? Women in refuge? Why is this?

I have loads to say about this but, for now and thank you.

Where are the grown ups knocking these kids heads together? How have Government and the Police and Scientists and Doctors been absorbed into this? It's incomprehensible. How aren't people joining the dots? Seeing the safeguarding issues? Just giving short shrift to extremists?

This^^

You start being bemused. Then shocked and incredulous. And finally scared.

Reading the unmitigated shite being pedalled in schools by Stonewall, Mermaids, Allsorts and GIRES is frightening and infuriating in equal measure.

Seeing the GIRES propaganda being endorsed by the CPS takes it to a whole new level of fear.

Btw - GenderTrender? Bloody hell. Taken down by a litigious transwoman who wants to help 10 year olds with their tampons?

Dear god.

Never accepted that transwomen are women, it always seemed ridiculous to me, and reinforced gender stereotypes rather than challenged them. But thought it was such a marginal issue I didn’t really care a lot. Then came the massive increase in referrals to Tavistock and the revelation that a high percentage of those children are on the autistic spectrum. Enough was enough.

I read the Fallon Fox stuff and that scary movie about TSs the got feted at Cannes
That was weird but it felt circumscribed
Then came back to story after story - the sheer stupidity, sheep/sleepwalking into totalitarian Doublespeak, reminded me of history's worst excesses (middle ages religious purges, as so brilliantly fictionalised in The Name of the Rose and Luther Blissett's Q; stalinism and especially the Chinese Cultural revolution).
Am dismayed that as I looked up anti Brexit ppl I found more and more TWAW dogmatics too.

In my own background is, politically, the continuous sadness about the left being innately splintery, tribalistic and self-righteous, and socially I realised I've always questioned the man-in-drag trope, which seems to me to be very often antiwoman. Awareness of both of these makes me self-question a lot...

"Thankfully" whenever I wonder if I'm becoming too intransigent some TRA pipes up and I'm reassured that their ideology is pure evil and hurts everyone in a liberal society, regardless of how they see or live gender

Mumsnet radicalised educated me, and im sooo grateful. Before i thought everything was fiiiiine and everyone could be who they wanted to be and that was lovely. The implications of self id never occurred to me, not even on my radar.

Two things changed it:

• the furore about lesbians refusing to sleep with transwomen. I couldnt believe this!? A) ppl should be able to choose who they have sex with. This objection seemed very rapey! Quelle surprise. It was men wanting to force their penises into women...b) NO ONE EVER asks straight men to do the equivalent!! They wouldnt DARE. Gay men asking straight men to stop being so fussy and take it up the wrong un like good boys? No way. So that made me fume.

• challenor. The 10yr old girl, and influence over aimee and politics. Someone upthread said 'then you get scared'. Yep. I suddenly saw i was naive to think no one would use these rules for their own ends, and we NEED women-only spaces.

Then theres the sports issue and awarding women awards to a disproportionately large amount of transwomen. It feels like having your cake and eating it, it makes me want to puke.

So I hear you’re a transphobe now Father.

Thank you so much for standing up for women. Ive been reading your stuff on Twitter. I can’t believe that those two tweets got you put in Twitter jail, when rape and death threats are fine.

It’s nog even being anti-trans. It’s about saying “hang on a minute” let’s have a look at what’s happening here.

Hi Graham!

I realised it had all gone way too far when one of my students reported my colleague and I for asking a trans man (in a clinical setting) when their last period was.

I have only read to page four so far.

It was the police turning up at your house or similar Glinner that peak transed a male colleague of mine.

Rosa Freedman being shouted at by a student and called a Nazi and threatened with rape which brought it to the attention of another male colleague.

A WPUK podcast by Heather Brunskell-Evans, I think, about what happened to her which caused another colleague to bring it up.

And these colleagues are progressive, liberal, educated and shocked to find out what has happened to free speech on the issue. And I should add, women’s rights - the idea that these can so completely be eroded - but mostly, being educated and liberal, the fact that one cannot talk about it for fear of abuse, job loss, police presence.

The thing is, all three raised it with me. So people are talking about it in a way that was not apparent a year ago. All of the incidents and speaking out which have happened have brought it to people’s attention. Horrible for the people concerned who have suffered abuse, job loss and police presence but a massive gain for bringing the issues to the fore. Thank you

I peaked a few months ago. It was a combination of watching The Handmaid's Tale and the Mumsnet FWR posts that wouldn't go away. They kept appearing on the 'Active' page, so thanks for your tenacity MNetters. I ventured over to Twitter and my jaw hit the floor.

But IRL my aunt's (by marriage) brother in law identifies as a woman. He had a mid-life crisis in his 40s and is in his 60s now.

About 10 years ago my mother, who had known this burly, very 'butch' man for years, made the mistake of misgendering and deadnaming. The husband went mad at my poor, unsuspecting mother and she doesn't see him now.

She said his put upon wife panders to his every whim, that he's a real narcissist, that he dresses as a parody of a woman.

I always read the Trans Widows thread and think of that.

I realised it had all gone way too far when one of my students reported my colleague and I for asking a trans man (in a clinical setting) when their last period was

Fucking hell.

Wow missed all this!

Thanks Glinner, (and Jonny) I only wish it was the likes of Jenni Murray or Jo Brand who was here under their own names. But we know why they can't. And they can't.

Short peak story: mumsnet. In many facets. Firstly the relationships board - it opened my eyes to how DV, coercion, the abuse of women is still such a daily issue. Then I reflected on my own group of intelligent, middle class, university educated friends - 7 the victims of either physical or verbal abuse. From there the feminist boards. Didn't understand Spartacus and needed it spelt out. Then I got it. Peaked and radicalised. Jenni Murray, cotton ceiling, LM.

Longer peak story involves gender stereotypes and how they affect children, and how homophobia is still a backdrop to all this (plus misogyny of course but that's a given now tbh). Plus the issues around safeguarding. I teach children with autism and this area, along with my long held concerns around YouTube / social media / the media in general for vulnerable individuals has made me realise why this is sooooo important.

Having a boy also showed me how sexism affects them too and makes it so hard to be gender non conforming today.

Hi Graham, as I have said many times on Twitter, it is so moving that you, Jack Appleby (apparently now silenced ), Johnny Best & co speak up for women, though you get nothing but hassle for doing so. I am deeply grateful.

Also a huge FT & BB fan; Bishop Brennan is my role model in all things..

My penny dropping moment was Caitlyn Jenner's mag cover, that come hither pose and the very clear insinuation of look at my tits and hair, this is all that makes a woman.

For fellow Glinner fans, can I recommend you hunt down and watch The Walshes. The opening bath scene had me crying with laughter.

The first time I heard someone claim that biological sex is not binary.

I'm a biologist and I'm obviously concerned about the implications for women of a change to the GRA, especially wrt my 14 year old dd (proud owner of a "Have you switched it off and on again?" hoodie) but foremost it is about truth and the attempts to distort it for me. Same goes for my fellow biologist dp.

Guys, would you do me a favour and use this thread to share the moments where you realised something was wrong? Links, anecdotes, experiences of harassment, whatever you have. I 'd like if this became a useful thread for people who are still confused by the issue.

For me it was a few years ago when I responded to a comment in the Guardian's CIF - if I remember correctly it was posted by the academic from Goldsmiths who jointly publishes in both male and female identities. Anyhoo, the comment said women should basically get used to being referred to as cis, I said I didn't agree because no one had the right to impose labels on other people. My comment was deleted for breaking the T&Cs. I stress: I wasn't rude, I didn't use derogatory terms or slurs; I was polite and respectful, but apparently disagreeing about how I should be described made me a terrible transphobe.

Needless to say, the Guardian lost my subscription over that. It also set me off researching this new, weird, aggressive trans rights movement which I now realise is not a trans rights movement at all - it's a stinking mass of MRAs.

My peaking was the Hampstead ponds issue posted about on here . I had seen all the FWR posts in active, but thought that they weren't relevant to me (by their titles). The Caitlyn Jenner thing also didn't bother me, just another magazine picking someone i had little interest or inspiration in for a meaningless accolade (like some other organisation picking Kerry Katona for mum of the year, just another shoulder shrug, yeah whatever, moment.)

Then Hampstead ponds. When I was young and single I would hang out there and read the papers. Lovely outdoor space. Great. Reading about it here and then more widely on FWR after my interest was piqued, made me retrospectively realise that the very reason I went to the Ladies Pond was that it was single sex and a safe space for a single young woman to just laze about. I would never hang out like that by myself in the rest of Hampstead Heath, only ever in a group. The value of the only outdoor safe space available to me became very clear. The penny dropped.

"Actually may I ask if you would have written April any differently if writing the character today please and thank you @Glinner smile"

No, but I would have written Douglas differently. He was very cool when he didn't care that April used to be a man and i should have maintained that. There's a better, classier joke buried in that situation.

Yes I concur.