Devon Rape Crisis advertising for "self identified' women

[SunsetBeetch]

Oh God. Oh fuck this!!!

Are you a self-identified woman?
Are able to commit 3 evenings a month to volunteering?
Are you passionate about gender equality & ending violence?
If you’ve answered yes to all of the above we want to hear from you.
Full details; t.co/wdu0gtsNm5 t.co/HjdfybH1Gd

twitter.com/DevonRapeCrisis/status/1164568521336115200?s=19

This absolute sheroe in the replies though:

You guys really helped me a few years ago. My handle is my real name - I’m sure someone there will remember me and the work we did together in Torquay. My rapist now identifies as a woman and would fucking love this job. He’s still in Devon so it would be a perfect fit.

Isn't that sex discrimination to exclude women from applying?

I don't normally call for people to lose their jobs but whoever said managing that twitter account is in the wrong job

When did being a woman become divorced from....being a woman...

What is a self identified woman.

Is that a guy ?

Or a woman who identifies as a woman
Or a guy who identifies as a woman 3 nights a month
Or a woman who self identifies as a woman 3 nights a month on on th3 other nights is just a woman

Just a man, any man who chooses to apply. For some reason we have lost the right to define ourselves, yet we continue to exist. We exist and are used. Everyone knows who the women are but it's so... much... fun to pretend we don't. My heart is breaking that this wave of misogyny is enabled by some women.

In itself, this is not as awful as it sounds because transwomen will also need help if they suffer abuse or rape, and may well prefer to be counselled by another transwoman who understands their specific needs.

But in employing a transwoman to counsel transwomen, then is it acknowledged that a woman would rather talk to a woman, not a man or transwoman? As long as this is the case, I think this is a very positive step.

However, with funding being cut to these services up and down the country, I very much doubt the end result will be suitable and appropriate counsellors for all..... hmmmm.....

..... and would the recruitment process be robust and transparent? Unsuitable candidates would quickly be weeded out anyway, I assume? Again, if this was truly the case then this would be a great step I am in favour of

But again...... I think it won't work like that.....

There's a charming thread on AIBU with - and you'll never guess - two people playing tag team and belittling the women who want single sex services.

This is disgusting. I will be sending an email. Grrrrrrrh!

Very unclear as to whether they are specifically trying to recruit a male who identifies as a woman, or whether they're using super Woke new fun language to imply that the only acceptable definition of a woman is someone who calls themselves a woman, so biological males and females free to apply. Thus excluding 99% of biological women who have no idea what this ridiculous shit means and will say they don't identify as a woman, they are one.

So essentially yes, open field for males to apply as much as females.

The plan really is to change the language and force this on women long enough and hard enough to hope that they just give in and get used to it and after a bit of fuss it all settles into a bliss where men and women get to be women side by side and patriarchy skips into the sunset in a Laura Ashley frock.

Note to govt: You're going to be very fucking disappointed.

FFS

This is so depressing

One less safe space for women 3 days a week

And also, in specifically asking for transwomen (I assume that that is what the linguistic gymnastics in that as means!) are they actually acknowledging that transwomen are not women? If so, then they must acknowledge that throughout their whole provision and keep transwomen separate from women, yes? A risky strategy in this day and age.....

God help the poor transmen are also often victims of rape. Where will they go? Who can they talk to?

Bottom of the heap again. Noone even thinking about them .......

Why exactly does someone working in a rape crisis centre have to be 'passionate' about gender equality?! Can they just be passionate about helping women who have been raped, maybe? 😡😡😡

The advert says they will be helping women. But what does women mean to them?

devonrapecrisis.org.uk/support-us/get-involved

I am genuinely confused about what, exactly, is meant by "self-identified woman". Is it:

(a) anyone who believes themselves to be a woman (i.e. by virtue of being either female or a transwoman)
(b) any male who identifies as a woman, or
(c) more narrowly, a male who identifies as a woman, but does not have official recognition of this (GRC) only self-identification.

I feel like language is becoming increasingly obfuscating.

Don't want to be too explicit but I live locally to this, and a GP colleague told me informally that a related service (deliberately vague) employs a TW. Apparently with that service, a substantial proportion of clients request to see a woman. And end up seeing the TW employee, as TWAW, you know.....

He said several of his female patients he's referred end up upset and won't engage with the service.

of course they do
I appreciate the need for confidentiality but somehow your colleagues experience needs to be amplified

Fuck this shit.

It is as awful as it sounds - because it will mean some women won't access the help they need from this and other services.

I know I would not contact a rape crisis centre if I knew there was a chance I would be counselled by a male, particularly so if there was a risk to me that in objecting to a male counsellor, I would be treated as the problem.

I know I'm not the only woman who would make that decision. So for the sake of the validation of a tiny % of males, who knows how many women must be shut out of a service for women.

It's disgusting. Men who identify as women can volunteer for a million and one good causes - I mean, fundraising for a trans rape crisis service would be one! - they don't need to access rape crisis for women and girls.

But heartening to see all the 'WTF???' comments on Twitter. Wonder if the org responsible will ever reply. Woke morons.

Shall we all email them and tell them the
good news that the Equality Act specifically allows for exemptions such as this case?

JohnnyMcGrath that is so upsetting.

I swear my name must be Cassandra because I was worried about this eventuality earlier this year.

Idea: we all pay regularly into a crowdfunder and the money is given to rape centres that maintain the single-sex exemptions when hiring counsellors. If they renege on that, they don't get our money any more. I recognise that rape centres these days have to assist transwomen victims (and I hope would assist transmen victims of rape as transmen are female), but they can at least ensure that the voice answering the phone is a female voice.

Whoever up-thread said that TW might want to speak to TW, that's makes a lot of sense. TW are free to set up a service where TW offer a listening ear and counselling to other TW and I'm sure that women's services would share best practice and lessons learned. Being raped as a female is physically different from being raped as a male and the societal and cultural context of cross-sex rape is different from same-sex rape.

It will affect staff too, I've worked for Rape Crisis and other women's organisations, and a lot of us are there because of our own experience of abuse. If staff feel unable to talk about this in clinical supervision because of the presence of a male it will affect their mental and emotional health and the service provided. I wouldn't stay if there was a male on the staff, and nor would others I know, so you'd end up with staff in these services without lived experience of the issues.

I wonder if my life would be less stressful if I didn't teach "dystopia" as a topic in A Level English Lit and thus have the horrendous experience of seeing, year on year, how terrifyingly well both Orwell and Atwood in their different ways understand the human condition.

I might just as well be teaching current affairs these days rather than trying to pretend that these are works of fiction.

Utterly appalling - but I am encouraged by the responses on twitter which pretty universally condemn this.