Eleanor Scott article, 'Did Mumsnet Just Hand Penny Mordaunt Her Arse?'

[R0wantrees]

'Did Mumsnet Just Hand Penny Mordaunt Her Arse?'
(extract)

“Don’t you worry about getting back to us, Penny dearest. Mumsnet only has ‘14 million unique users’ a month ... Just you sit tight and eventually get one of your minions to post some anodyne rhetoric about valuing diversity and it’ll all be fine.”
— Mumsnet poster, webchat with Penny Mordaunt 14/3/19 13.55pm

It takes a certain set of tools to turn a golden opportunity to engage with hundreds of thousands of women on International Women’s Day into an unmitigated PR disaster, and Penny Mordaunt MP has somehow managed to pull it off. I’ve met Penny Mordaunt a few times in Portsmouth over the years while I was on Council-related business, and she has always seemed perfectly likeable and pleasant. But future Prime Minister material? Not unless courting disaster is now seen as prerequisite rather than unfortunate happenstance." (continues)

concludes:
"The Mumsnetters who had asked their questions in such detail, and with such courtesy - posters have to abide by Mumsnet’s fairly stringent ‘Talk Guidlines’ - were left disappointed and, frankly, pissed off, especially regarding the unanswered points about children’s safeguarding. But they weren’t leaving the webchat meekly. ‘Disappointed but not surprised’ wrote one poster. ‘Completely disingenuous’ wrote another. Of her apparent ignorance around the issues raised concerning children’s safeguarding, a poster wrote, more in sadness than anger, ‘This is unforgiveable. You were given all the information. All of it. Spoonfed it. You haven’t bloody well read it.’ And one of the most damning comments so far: ‘Either Penny, or Penny’s SPADs are not up to par on the reports coming out of the Tavistock’. (Click here if you want to read the Mail’s report about the potentially brewing scandal, or here for a BBC snippet. It’s worth digging deeper if you’re interested.)

And finally, can the Minister for Women even define what is a woman? On this showing, the answer would seem to be No. The actual Minister for Woman apparently doesn’t ‘get it’, doesn’t want to ‘get it’, and seemingly can’t be bothered to ‘get it’. That’s a lot of women’s votes that have just been lost, whichever way you look at it. Post-modern, philosophical ideologies of feelings, and misunderstandings of the difference between sex and gender, should never, ever compromise the safeguarding of children. People who raise red flags about safeguarding deserve to be taken seriously and to have their voices heard. If we’ve we’ve learned nothing else during the past decade, surely to God we’ve learned that."
eleanorscottarchaeology.com/els-blog/2019/3/14/the-day-that-mumsnet-took-down-penny-mordaunt-mp

thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_live_events/3523984-International-Women-s-Day-Q-A-with-Penny-Mordaunt-MP-Secretary-of-State-for-International-Development-NOW-CLOSED-TO-NEW-QUESTIONS

Do HQ normally close webchats after, when they are not live? Are they not the same as normal ones, where a follow up question is allowed? Would have thought the format would be the same really. Ask questions, they answer (eventually..in this case) the follow ups, and they answer those.

This summing up is fantastic.

AWA on twitter are gleeful that Penny has basically just said 'fuck you' to real women, in favour of male ones. I had higher than usual hopes for those answers, I wish I hadn't now as it was so disheartening to see the purposeful dodging and passing the buck to others.

@EleanorScott Please write more!

Penny can't give a definition of the word "woman" when directly asked (several times) - but is happy to tell us the legal definition of mother - causing, it seems, even more upset to women here.

She has denied the existence of women who are not mothers, and told adoptive mothers that they are not really mothers. That's a hell of a lot of women to piss off in order to placate a few men who think they have a ladybrain.

I'll get my coat.

You've pulled! Oh, wait. Both of us are straight.

And the irony of pissing off 'mothers' on Mumsnet of all places seems to have passed her and her spads by.

What a

Ahhh...but mothers aren't allowed to get pissed off. We must be sweet and kind and motherly to all, not just our own children. Isn't that why TRA get so angry at us.

We don't fit the mould that society has burdened us with. Thank fuck for that.

Women's minister hides and refuses to stand up for women because she's scared of saying no to some angry men with beards. This government is an incompetent joke. FFS.

The public would be outraged if all the facts were discussed publicly, like is happening with sports. It could be a masive vote winner, making Labour, Libdems and Green look looney left. Yes the BBC Woke Blokes might squeal at first but the facts are so overwhelming, the people get it pretty damn quickly, as with sports.

Taking up the cause of protecting women and girls on the basis of their biology could make the Tories look like the party of common sense. They desperately need to look like the grown ups in the room given the Brexit debacle.

Sports, Karen White, Webberly, Tavistock, Challenors. So much springboard is right there right now. Yet Penny's hiding under her desk scared of the big boys when she could be taking them apart.

What I'd like to address in MN Handed Penny Her Arse II is the issue of Penny Mordaunt and veracity.

For example, in the midst of the webchat she answered the question about her comments to Andrew Marr on Turkey and the UK veto (comments which even David Cameron said to Robert Peston were not true). (It's all archived on You Tube.)

She gave, on Mumsnet, an 'evolved excuse'. This is significant.

If anyone has any other veracity-based observations, that would be grand.

Yet Penny's hiding under her desk scared of the big boys when she could be taking them apart.

There are a number of different groups of 'big boys' Penny Mordant is working with some, courting others and no doubt understimating some.

Not so concerned with women (adult human females)

*So Penny Morduant is happy to throw the door open wide for all the KW's who have not been caught to have free and unfettered access to their potential victims in toilets, changing rooms, sporting associations, children centred associations such as Girl Guides, hospitals, refuges, prisons, etc., etc."

Perhaps Penny ought to reflect how David Steel's inaction and minimisation of Cyril Smith's hideous actions has come back to bite him - the same will happen to you Penny, your name is inextricably linked to this disaster waiting to happen, your minimisation of the risks, your acceptance that any risk is just something to be borne by the victims, is all documented for future reference. You will not be able to obfuscate and hide from the inevitable fall-out.

This. But I'd be happier if Penny realised the impact her loss of interest in safeguarding women's and children's rights might well have before we get to the 'lessons must be learnt' stage years down the line.

EleanorScott Yes, I'd be very interested in a Part II.

“Mother” in legal terms therefore has a specific meaning – it means carrying and giving birth to a child."

Yes, why go off on this tangent.

I'm beginning to think it's so the word woman can be detached from the word mother.

"Do HQ normally close webchats after, when they are not live?"

I don't think so. Justine Greening once promised that Robert Goodwill would come and answer questions that were raised about childcare. He never bothered, of course, despite MNHQ badgering them.

Every time I popped back to check, I left a message and a link to another report on how their childcare policy was failing: I was able to do so for months.

I'm beginning to think it's so the word woman can be detached from the word mother.

Some excitable TRAs from WPATH have probably told Penny that womb transplants for men are just around the corner.

*implants

“Mother” in legal terms therefore has a specific meaning – it means carrying and giving birth to a child."

Oh great.
What have I been doing for the past 12 years with my adopted DCs?

Seriously considering writing to my (female, Tory) MP saying get a woman who knows what a woman and a mother are in post.

call me a bit over suspicious if you like, and why wouldn’t I be, but is anyone else slightly perturbed that Penny, or whoever wrote those answers on Penny‘s behalf, jumped straight in with the analogy of the surrogate mother, given that we already know there are potential changes in the laws pertaining to surrogacy in the pipeline? it’s almost like surrogacy was already in the mind of whoever wrote those answers.

i’m in no doubt hear that what we are witnessing is the wholesale dismantling of the rights of women.

Penny has made it very plain that she is interested only in women with penises, so naturally will want to separate the word woman from mother.

She was unable to answer or face the question of what do we call all the voters with female biology in common, with health care needs in common, you know, half the species. It was at this point she had disappeared so far up her own bottom that I wasn't able to understand a word she stood any more.

She's lost all contact with the fact that 99% of the electorate not only have no difficulty knowing the answer but think this is too insane to waste time on.

Penny, or whoever wrote those answers on Penny‘s behalf jumped straight in with the analogy of the surrogate mother, given that we already know there are potential changes in the laws pertaining to surrogacy in the pipeline? it’s almost like surrogacy was already in the mind of whoever wrote those answers.

Both surrogacy & the current case re the mother on a child's birth certificate will be key current issues under discussion

I think the fundamental problem with Penny is that she is a classic "kicks down, sucks up" politician. She is bowing to the TRAs because they wield influence in Whitehall.

It's a bit of a tangent, but the posts about the legal case to change a birth certificate caught my attention.

Do you remember the recent thread discussing the theoretical possibility of uterus transplants?

Before heart transplants could take place in the 1960's the legal definition of death had to be changed, from the absence of a heart beat and include brain stem death.

Changing the legal definition of a mother would also have far reaching consequences.

I'm actually terrified that the Minister for Women doesn't understand.

Changing the legal definition of a mother would also have far reaching consequences.

I'm actually terrified that the Minister for Women doesn't understand.

Yes.
Its very very serious.

Its a shame that Penny Mordant MP didn't take the opportunity to consider the important legal content of the Universal Declaration of Women's Rights which is being launched in New York today.

Summary:

'Declaration on Women’s Sex Based Rights

The Declaration outlines current international laws and policies on women’s rights and how they are being threatened by organisations that are trying to change the definition of woman. It reaffirms existing women’s rights and suggests ways that states should promote and protect them. It was drafted with input from women internationally. Launching in March 2019, the Declaration is a clear call to law and policy makers to retain the sex-based biological definition of woman.

The Declaration on Women’s Sex Based Rights is a statement on the importance of keeping the current sex based definition of woman.

Women’s rights, set out in the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and subsequent international agreements, are based on our sex, defined by the UN as “the physical and biological characteristics that distinguish males from females”[1].

In recent years organisations have been quietly trying to replace the idea of biological sex with the idea of “gender identity” in human rights documents; and to include men who say they have a female “gender identity” in the word “woman”.

Many women’s rights are related to our biologically female bodies e.g. the right to abortion, and maternal rights. Other women’s rights are aimed at eliminating discrimination against women in public life e.g. women’s rights to education, political representation, work, equal pay. Further women’s rights are to protect us against violence or harmful practices e.g. rape, and FGM.

A key way women and girls are denied rights is by gender or sex role stereotyping (e.g. girls should help at home while boys go to school). The UN recognises this is harmful and works for “the elimination of prejudices and customary and all other practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women.”[2] The Declaration raises concern that the term “gender identity” reinforces sex role stereotyping because it is only possible to have a “gender identity” by choosing between sex role stereotypes for men and women.

In recent years some governments have been substituting “gender identity” for biological sex in law and policy, and including men who say they have a female “gender identity” in the word “woman”. This enables these men to access spaces and services set up for women and girls. This includes single sex victim support services, single sex sport, women’s shortlists designed to increase women’s participation in political and public life, scholarships and prizes for women, single sex toilets, changing rooms and sleeping areas aimed at protecting the safety, privacy and dignity of women and girls. Using “gender identity” instead of biological sex threatens maternal rights, women’s right to assemble and organise without including men, and data collection on violence against women and girls,. Furthermore, “gender identity” is being used to “transition” girls who do not conform to sex stereotypes."
www.womensdeclaration.com/

It was shared on the webchat, all be it slightly late but on International Women's Day.

As Penny Mordant has the portfolio for both International Development and Women, it should be immediately apparent how significant to both departments this is.

Of course we don't know if Penny Mordant / Penny's SPAD saw the question, it was much appreciated that MN said they would try.

Sadly no follow up opportunities & the question remains unanswered:

"Will Penny MordantMP (Minister for Women & Equalities) and UK government support the Declaration of Women's Sex Based Rights and if not why not?"

threads:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3527477-Declaration-on-Womens-Sex-Based-Rights-IWD2019

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3526970-Declaration-on-womens-sex-based-rights

Any other people, especially women, who do wish to support the Declaration on Women's Sex-Based Rights' can do so via the links above.

I would sign a petition calling for her resignation.

And then I would apply for her job. That's how it works, right?