Second Shelf London

[lionheart]

Anyone been watching this drama played out on the Twitter?

jaded millennial
@MillennialJaded

'A women’s bookshop I was interested in visiting is now openly ‘anti terf’ & they publically shamed someone they were following for tweeting an article on sport & trans. FFS this climate is chilling',

A little snippet from the shop itself (one of many on the issue):

'The Second Shelf
@secondshelfbks
·
19h

'We want to be clear, we are uninterested in the transexclusionary feminist position! We understand there is discomfort w/ the acronym TERF. But this seems to be because the negative connotations don’t sit well with the position holder? Maybe it’s evidence of a terrible stance?'

Thanks for that info, really interesting! Do you know his twitter handle?

It's @fredsargeant

"2/I'll save you time here. There are none.

Rivera wasn't at the first night of riots, a fact determined by gay historian David Carter.

I told you that this was a trick question and you responded with the expected answer.

There were a dozen or so drag queens there and..."

twitter.com/FredSargeant/status/1216590784927031296?s=19

The revival of this thread has been fascinating, though I am so over being lectured by clueless straight twits about lesbian and gay history when they clearly know nothing about it.

Lol I ain’t a bookshop owner, Im just some 20 year old who thinks that trans rights are human rights 💫💫 go ahead and report me for breaking rules,, I don’t need some community to validate my shitty opinions 💖

We all have the same civil rights as citizens of the UK. What rights do you think trans people are missing? Is it that you want additional rights for trans people -over and above what other citizens have?
Or is it that you think that trans rights and access to desired spaces are more important than the equivalent for women? Genuine question.

Everyone being given dignity and respect but excluding trans people from that is not giving dignity and respect to ALL. I’m fkn 20, I should not have to be telling grown adults that what’s in people’s pants does not effect how you should treat them

Firstly, it is not necessary to use expletives to communicate a point......

And secondly, " what is in people's pants" does to a certain extent ( lesser or greater depending on precise situation) modify the services and provisions that people require...and also can have major impacts, not only on their life experiences, but also their treatment in society.

Sex, and the consequences of that are real.....as much as we are all human beings beyond that fact.

When I was your age I was a single parent - and I knew full well what my sex implied for my life and its material conditions.

I am not the oracle on it all BUT I would class lesbianism as a women (person who identifies as such) having attraction to another woman regardless of the genitals involved

Don't be daft! Sex is real. biology is real. Lesbians are attracted to other women. As homosexuals are attracted to other men. You can get yourself in a right old state by trying to contort yourself into ridiculous and unnatural positions, purely in order to avoid speaking plain facts.

If you class lesbianism as an attraction to vaginas or relate all motherhood to it then you have a hyper focus on genitalia

How utterly crude......Sex is about far more than genitalia........'sex' is registered on unconscious and well as conscious levels, but also relies on physical/biological/hormonal/psychological clues.

I’m fully expecting my account to be gone by tomorrow morning but that does not mean in anyway that you are right or that you are validated

Don't worry! We are a fairly tolerant bunch and not prone to excessive reporting or policing of speech.......unlike.......

Katie Alcock (Psychology Lecturer Lancaster University) published an interesting article:

'But HOW CAN YOU TELL'
I was privileged to attend Maya Forstater’s employment tribunal last month which was incredibly interesting and also gave me some helpful pointers for my own legal case.

Sadly members of the public are not allowed to stand up in employment tribunals and say “Please sir, please Mr Judge, I know the answer” but I was sorely tempted to give it a go. Maya had persuaded the barrister for her ex-employer to stop saying that sex is “assigned at birth” but rather is observed from a baby’s genitals (and, rarely, if necessary, through DNA testing).

The barrister went on to ask how Maya could tell that someone is male or female without having been present at that person’s birth. Happily the rest of us live in the real world where it is pretty easy to work out whether someone is male or female: and no, it doesn’t depend on whether they have highlighted cheekbones and manicured fingernails.

So, how do we tell whether someone is male or female? Well, we are very good at it and — like a lot of human cognitive skills — we base it on a number of cues (pieces of information). In fact, we’re very good at it from the time we are tiny babies.

One of the best ways to tell a male body from a female body is gait — how you walk. You don’t need a whole body in front of you, or even the outline of a body, to tell male from female bodies. A nice little point light display will do the trick. Adults and babies aged 4 months or older can tell male from female in this type of video" (continues)

medium.com/@katieja/but-how-can-you-tell-7901324d0919

I don’t need some community to validate my shitty opinions

I’m fully expecting my account to be gone by tomorrow morning but that does not mean in anyway that you are right or that you are validated

These must be two of the most hilarious and simultaneously sad comments simply due to the utter lack of self- awareness😆

Who. Are. You. Kidding? the whole concept of "validation" from others makes up a core chunk of TRA ideology why else would TRA's label misgendering as 'literal violence'??? Why would males who "identify as women" and are attracted to women constantly whine that lesbians (homosexual females) don't want to date them? Even though logic would dictate that as males attracted to females they start off in a potentially bigger dating pool but they purposely 'identify' into a group with a smaller dating pool? It couldn't possibly because amongst other things the fact that a lesbian is a female that is exclusively attracted to other females would make for the ultimate validating experience if they could gaslight them into hooking up with them right? Same thing with Trans men and the gay male community but on a slightly smaller scale.

Its ALL about external validation for the modern day trans movement and because you're all so obsessed with this one particular concept you think that every one else thinks like you do with all this immature "even if you delete me ur not valid!" crap😃😃😃

Kid, you're only 20, hopefully as you grow up, gain some life experiance and see that a well rounded adult who is confident in themselves isnt constantly craving (demanding?) validation from others to live their life. Quite the opposite in fact, basing your existence on the validation of others will bring you nothing but misery and put a huge strain on your mental well being.

I like to check in with mumsnet from time to time, to see if it's normal my kid has a fever though he's been on antibiotics, or to pull hair at daycare, etc. I was shocked to learn it's actually a haven for anti-trans sentiment. I have created a mumsnet account purely to attempt to intervene here.

As a scholar of art and literature I can assure you that the organisation of the genders into male and female has been called into question for at least a century in the west. If anything the trans and non-binary movement is a way of helping women to liberate themselves from the patriarchal, essentialist views that yoke women to their biology. We should all be trans. Perhaps then we'd find a way away from the toxic masculinity that you all seem to think trans women secretly harbour.

But I find it deeply offensive, as a cis-woman, that you would stand against trans women in this way. Why the actual fuck, if you'll pardon my french, would someone sitting on the mountain of privilege that is masculinity want to become a woman - it's such a social demotion for all intents and purposes - unless they truly identified with being one? Trans women are more likely to be poor, abused, and killed than the average cis-woman or man. Where are you getting this stuff about trans women making spaces unsafe for women? Have you actually met any trans people? Why does their freedom to be who they want to be bother you so much? I think you need to refocus your anger where it belongs - on the men who commit acts of violence against women.

I stand with the trans community and shout CHAPEAU at the top of my lungs to The Second Shelf.

'As a scholar of art and literature I can assure you that the organisation of the genders into male and female has been called into question for at least a century in the west'

Do you mean gender or sex.
If sex, then I'd have thought that science was more relevant than the view of a person with an arts background.

If you mean gender then you're not going to get any argument here against gender being an oppressive social construct.

Genders are masculine and feminine. (Along with the 57 other personality types.)

Sexes are male and female.

If aren't able to see this right from the off your scholarship doesn't seem to be relevant to this discussion.

Sure, we can all fall under the trans umbrella and be labelled as trans. However, that has no effect on whether we are male or female.

Lol at lily 😂😂😂

Them mums not just checking on their kids temperatures

It is half term isn’t it 👋👋

Here's a from me at a 'scholar of art and literature' saying Pardon My French.

I find it deeply offensive that you use Cis as a descriptor of woman but hey-ho. Swings and roundabouts and all that.

Why is THIS zombie thread suddenly catnip for interestingly named newbies?!

It's not even that contentious. Small independent bookstore behaves like a nob on twitter several months ago whilst purporting to be feminist? Meh.

If I was a TRA I'd be loudly shouting about why I agreed that rapists should deffo be in jail with women, that being actually in the news & everything.

Our educators & monitors are weird...

It's so we can be told off for wrong think, Purple. I don't think they realise what they look like when they do.

Take you misogynist term elsewhere, thanks. Or in your own parlance - you are a 'hateful cicphobe'.

And as a scholar of art myself - thrrrrrrrppppppppp.

Gender is essentially a load of misogynist bollocks tied to sex-role stereotypes. The idea someone’s personality and presentation governs whether they’re a woman or a man is as sexist as it gets.

I think we should ditch the concept altogether, use female / woman / girl and male / man / boy as biological sex descriptors, segregate by sex when women are likely to be vulnerable and otherwise, just let people be who they are.

I get the telling off bit, Bringback, I'm just wondering if a klaxon has gone off somewhere - 'quick! Distract the nasty terfs with a load of pompous wanksalad about an insignificant & outdated Twitter spat! Or they'll keep talking about RAPISTS!'...

Choosing to be a woman rather than a man is 'social demotion'?

Women, know your place...

Here's a from me at a 'scholar of art and literature' saying Pardon My French

Same here. From an actual qualified, published, employed academic in this field, not a self-identifying one. A scholar would immediately see the issues with that second paragraph.

I think they believe that their marvellous reasoning and skilful arguments will bring us round to the new world order view.

I also believe that that there has been a lot of light has been shone on gender ideology recently and this is causing people to panic as the more insidious side of it cannot be hidden anymore.

@PurpleCrowbarWhereIsLangCleg