In support of Amy Dyess

[AllNaturalWoman]

Title says it all really. Amy has publicly disagreed with the detransitioners representing lesbians at Manchester pride and has been called out for being 'unsupportive' rather than a recognition she has a right to hold the views she does twitter.com/amydyess/status/1166114175367532545?s=21

Whilst I've been glad to see a public retraction from the 2 desisters and I am sure doing that Pride being booed this time will not have been easy I see Amy's point that if they are bi they don't speak for lesbians and in particular they shouldn't go from speaking for the trans movement to speaking for lesbians. I'm bi, my life experience is very different and considerably easier than being lesbian. As a bi woman I don't have the right to speak for lesbians and just as most of us here don't feel LibDems women can give away our rights and identity as women to transwomen neither bi nor lesbian women have the right to give away rights and identify as lesbian to anyone who is not.

Amy is principled and consistent so I do tend to stop and take notice when she's calling behaviours out.

There should be room for Amy's principled stance at the same time as feeling Charlie desisting publicly is encouraging. Why the need to convince Amy she's wrong?

I respect Amy and she has a right to her opinion.

I'm glad Charlie and others feel more comfortable with who they are and are desisting. I think desisters need to be seen and heard so people see that it happens, see that its ok to desist, to try and stop young people being pushed down a dangerous pathway to medicalisation and mutilation.

Yes, having read her (Amy's) timeline, I agree with you.

I'm v glad detransitioners are coming forward, but a person like Amy is entitled to her opinion.

I'm glad Charlie and others feel more comfortable with who they are and are desisting. I think desisters need to be seen and heard so people see that it happens, see that its ok to desist, to try and stop young people being pushed down a dangerous pathway to medicalisation and mutilation

So am I and yes, it is.

But this does not negate Amy's point.

There are many groups of vulnerable women and all must be properly heard and none must speak for others - our own enthusiasm to support destransitioners, needed though it is, mustn't end up further invisibilising lesbians.

I think we probably may need to stop recoiling when a woman expresses anger.

(When I say vulnerable, I mean to genderism, not to imply weakness on the part of the women.)

I think we probably may need to stop recoiling when a woman expresses anger

Very much this

I've read her twitter feed but I don't fully get what the argument is about tbh.

With a huge amount of the people working publicly as GC activists or in GC activist groups I constantly feel like there's a back story I don't understand. I do my best to post here when I can, stay up to date, write to my MP etc, but I'm very much a fringe character. I'm late to the party in that I only delurked a few months back, I'm not on Twitter or Spinster, and I don't know about any of the dramas until they spill onto FWR.

I appreciate that the "leaders" and the big names in the GC movement are strong characters with clear but often very different visions. I think we need all of those conflicting opinions to keep the movement fresh. Amy's vision is clearly that she centres lesbians above all else in this battle, and that's a great thing because those voices will get lost without people like her. Other's centre detransitioners because they want to encourage more people to break free, and that's important too. It's all important, but not everything can be centered all the time, so conflict is inevitable. We need people to call each other out and challenge each other to keep the movement honest and focused. But as a fringe character in all this, it is alienating to hear about the various dramas without understanding the back stories. It definitely feels a bit "in group" at times. And personally if I was a bit vaguer on what's actually going on politically, it would also make me question the credibility of the movement to see so many dramas being played out so publicly so often. I see these storms raging on twitter, and then out in the real world I see nothing, no change, no sign anything's wrong. If I hadn't also read things like the Get The L Out report and the heartbreaking stories of detransitioners and the terrible things going on in places like prisons and crisis shelters, I'd question sometimes whether it's all just lots of noise online.

I also really dislike being involved in any group drama as I always seem to get forced into a mediator role and end up performing lots of emotional labour in those dynamics, so it definitely limits how active I feel willing to be about going to protests/ meetups etc. Anyway I'm just rambling now. I think everyone should be able to say what they want and speak their truth, be angry, offend people, whatever. I'd never try and tell people to behave differently, be nicer, swallow their feelings etc. But the constant dramas do make me personally want to take a step back and be more of a lurker than a contributor.

I respect and support Amy. She unapologetically centres lesbians. She has a right to define her own boundaries.

I also respect and support the young detrans women and what they did.

GC feminism is full of female-socialised people. Many of us are very uncomfortable with conflict. We want everyone to “be nice” and “get along.” We want people to put their individual needs behind what is best for the group as a whole.

It can be distressing to see women being (in our eyes) “unsupportive” to other women - to see conflict play out in public. So the nail that sticks up (Amy in this case) gets hammered down.

TRA is dominated by male-socialised people. They have no such compunctions. They also exploit our female socialisation ruthlessly.

You watch - any relatively civil disagreement, will be dramatised by them as GCF “tearing each other part (omg!).”

Meanwhile they merrily rip into non-compliant trans people (“fucking cis bootlickers!” etc) and we don’t comment. We’ve been socialised not to interfere in male disputes (unless doing so will benefit males).

I do see why she is upset. I think Charlie is brave and I think the only way that this mess will be resolved is if people are allowed to hear the voices of detransitioners. But I agree with Amy that it’s only a year since Charlie tried to throw lesbians under the bus publicly. We’re talking about adults here, not teenagers. It would be good if people would do a bit of research, think a little critically and maybe not jump on the idiotic ‘TERFs are Nazi scum and should all die’ bandwagon and use other women as a way of virtue signalling. Same to the droves of academics (nearly overwhelmingly young-ish, white, middle class, heterosexual women) who block their colleagues on social media, often without ever having interacted with them. I have never made my GC views public yet I am blocked by loads of them. But the whole thing is pathetic. Maybe in the future, some of these women will realise that what they did was wrong and misogynistic. I’m not so sure I would welcome any apology with open arms. They can fuck off for all I care. And that’s why I understand where Amy is coming from. At the same time, I think it is good that Charlie spoke out and I don’t want her to feel alienated so that she goes back to being a TRA. But she’s still an adult who made a conscious decision to publicly throw lesbians under the bus last year.

So the nail that sticks up (Amy in this case) gets hammered down.

Yes.

I haven’t seen this debate but to me it comes down to one simple fact: is Charlie as lesbian? If yes then she surely has the right to be part of the lesbian movement. The fact she had been taken in by a cult and only recently broken free doesn’t stop her being a lesbian (if she is one rather than bi).

Birds I think she is bisexual.

For me there are a couple of perspectives from Charlie and Thomasin's POV that complicate this. I do fully agree that Amy's POV is valuable and valid; we cannot have any of these debates if we deny opinions of those central to it all.

Charlie came out as lesbian at school first which is when she began to receive homophobic bullying. This, coupled with being 'gender nonconforming' (aka normal) plus gender ideology led to her transitioning. Later on when older she discovered she was bi.

Another thing I've been wondering about regarding the way detransitioners so quickly become passionate about the GC / lesbian cause is that they've experiences a level of trauma and a common reaction to this is to try to help others.

I had another point but toddler, kids, gah.

I thought Amy's argument revolved around the detransitioners marching with "Get the L out" at Pride.
(Unless I am mistaken and it's about something else).

WRT "Get the L out" and having a problem, I think she's wrong.

Surely anyone can march with a cause they believe in, whether they are of the "class" of people pertaining to the cause or not.

I'm a straight women who supports "Get the L out" because I have empathy with lesbians. She's saying I can't march? Even hold a sign?

I think she's wrong. It's not a good idea to push people away who are allies.

I thought the whole point of pride was people marching together in solidarity for other people. Otherwise why would straight people and children (Pride is often referred to as family friendly) be welcome in the first place?

I've got to wonder if Amy started this thread.

Amy is not being called out for having a difference of opinion. Amy is being called out for being vile to other women.

Charlie joined a Pride protest to hold a sign that said "gender ideology harms lesbians" along with a 19 year old detransitioned lesbian.

Such Pride protests are risky There is huge hostility from TRAs towards gender critical women who dare to speak up. The women protesting always said they were "lesbians and allies" - the ally being Charlie who is bisexual. These women are putting themselves at considerable personal risk and it's up to them who they want to protest with.

I fail to see what it's got to do with Amy, who's thousands of miles away in America and who has proved time and again that she doesn't understand the UK context.

She didn't disagree respectfully - when Charlie engaged with her she said "fuck off imposter".

Her comment to Julie Bindell was hilariously self obsessed. I really can't believe we're reading the same thread!

Amy is a narcissist in my opinion. As in genuinely, I'm not just bandying about insults. She has a massively self inflated sense of importance and manipulates and bullies other women while painting herself as the victim. I'm disappointed to see the usually razor sharp mumsnetters so taken in by her.

I must say I dislike the ‘real lesbian’ vs ‘political lesbian’ debate. Some lesbians have said that they made a conscious choice not to have relationships with men at a younger age. However, Amy and others insist that this means that they are not genuine lesbians and that they are actually bi. Julie has been in a lesbian relationship for over 30 years. Who cares if at one point in her life she had a boyfriend? And so much of what we think is natural instinct is actually socially constructed. So I think it’s dumb to exclude lesbians just because at some point in their lives they dated men. Identities can change over the course of a lifetime.

I thought the whole point of pride was people marching together in solidarity for other people.

Yes, that's right.

Really, what the fuck has it got to do with Amy what a group of 14 women want to do in the UK?

Her issue, as a narc, is to find a way to make it all about her, and here we are helping her do just that.

Also the ‘I can’t help it’ discourse is equally harmful to the ‘I chose to be gay’ one. Why keep pitting them against each other? Does the reason for sexual orientation really matter.

I am not a fan of getting involved in personality arguments when it's the broad political points that are important.

It's great that not everyone gets sucked into the trans ideology, but what gender critical feminists want is to change the minds of those who have bought into it. Criticising those who have changed their minds doesn't seem helpful to me.

testing agree. It’s likely to push them back to the TRAs.

As in genuinely, I'm not just bandying about insults.

You seem very invested: to the extent you join MN to "not just bandy about insults". Is there some personal connection we're missing?

As I said upthread: what we probably need to do is examine our own -often overly hostile - responses to women's anger.

tearing each other a*part

According to Trans-speak, “lesbians” are attracted to female and male persons (provided they ID as women). Charlie considered herself a lesbian until recently.

Recently two men on the GC side disagreed, and went separate ways. No one batted an eyelid. Women seem to be held to different standards.

Been following the discussion on Twitter, and I think I’m in agreement with previous posters. AD is entitled to her opinion and to disagree with the prevailing ‘yay, brave detransitioners’ narrative. She is not entitled to have everyone agree with her or not have a problem with her calling a 19 year old lesbian a traitor, or untrustworthy.

I don’t think every detrans person has the sun shining out of their backside, but I think telling them they’re not proper lesbians (or telling Julie Bindel she’s ‘too gay to handle’ - lol) is out of order.

This is what Julie Bindell said to Amy:

Amy, from one lesbian to another, please don't do this – these women have courage and integrity. They were wrong and they have admitted it, actually I see them as victims of the transgender cult. The last thing we should do is reject & blame them now. We should welcome them home.

And this is what Amy said in return:

You’ve never spoken to me before. You’ve gone out of your way to ignore and not support me. It’s because I’m the real deal. I’m too gay for you to handle. You’re a political lesbian who doesn’t even know what a butch is, so stay out of it. I don’t know you and don’t want to.

Amy's over inflated sense of self importance is very obvious here. Amy likes to see herself as as an important media personality, a journalist and a film maker. However, lets put this into context, she has just 3,300 twitter followers on an account she's been running in her own name, for 5 years. Normally I wouldn't comment on someone's social media following, but for someone who claims to be a content creator, she's not exactly influential. I have a sizable proportion of that number, on a GC account I've been running only a year or so and I'm a nobody! Just another GC account.

Julie Bindell, on the other hand, genuinely is an important media personality. She has a solid history as an activist, writer and journalists. She is a household name among left wingers and beyond. She has 39,000 twitter followers.

In what planet does Amy think it's reasonable to say to Julie Bindell that she's "gone out of her way to ignore and not support" her. Why does she assume Julie Bindell even knows who she is? Pure narcicism IMO. And the rest of the tweet is just laughable. " I’m too gay for you to handle." Seriously?! To Julie Bindell? How can people take this in any way seriously?

Then, someone tweeted Amy I’m a huge fan of yours AND Julie’s, and it really saddens me to see you treating her this way. You are both fantastic , iconic women to me

And Amy responded:

She attacked me. Did you miss that? Everything I wrote to her is spot on. You should go talk to her instead. I’m allowed to defend myself.

Please can anyone explain how Julie's comment is in any way an attack? Is isn't. The tweeter who just said she was a huge fan of Amy's gently pointed this out but got called a troll and blocked by Amy.

So no, I can't support Amy. This isn't about her point of view, which she is entitled to. This is about the destructive behaviour of a self-important bully, and women standing up to her.

These women are putting themselves at considerable personal risk and it's up to them who they want to protest with
Yy to this

I fail to see what it's got to do with Amy, who's thousands of miles away in America and who has proved time and again that she doesn't understand the UK context
And yy to this. It kind of boils your piss a bit when a self indulgent American tells women in the UK who they can or can't march with at Pride.