The Guardian... Blind Date 23 November

[Backinthecloset123]

I post this aware that I might get a warning.

However!

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/nov/23/blind-date-jen-anna-glasses-fog-up

The woman, a lesbian, Anna (and the Guardian readership) did not reveal that Jen is a trans woman.

The whole thing is gaslighting.
And I may be deleted for that sentence.
There is a good thread on Twitter which I'll link.

"And signed off "Weekend" rather than an actual name"

we all know it was Owen Jones

Though on this occasion I'd give Lil OJ a pass on the grounds that he self-identifies as far too serious a journalist to have anything to do with Weekend.

And this from Anna too:

If you could change one thing about the evening, what would it be?
I’d shoot down the dessert wine idea.

Crappy, shitty thing for the Guardian to do.

Deborah Orr used to edit that magazine, she is sorely missed.

I'm actually flabbergasted.

It's quite possible Anna is actually a woke young thing who is same "gender" attracted but just didn't fancy Jen, who is now smearing her as a bigot and villifying her in a nasty fit of incel rage.

Yes.

Seems fairly clear to me that Anna attempted what every woman on earth will recognise - a staged ghosting because the er... er... rules.... rules.... "person" you went on a date with exhibited sufficient red flags for you to fear the consequences of a blunt no.

Julie Bindel is on it.

Sorry can't get a screenshot but hope this is the thread:
mobile.twitter.com/bindelj/status/1199267597407129600

Never read the Guardian much (too insular and smug). This is fucking atrocious though. They would NEVER set up a straight man with a tw. Or a gay man with a tm!
Maybe Anna was ok with it in theory and just later realised that [what i really want to say deleted by self as would be a strike] she really does only fancy women.

I read the original article at the weekend and thought it was odd they were both described as lesbians when one was obviously trans. The steaming up glasses comment definitely jarred. It was noticably out of step with the date and actually with the entire tone of Guardian Blind Date.

The magazine needs to take responsibility. They can't pretend they arranged a photo shoot and didn't notice.

I bloody love a parquet floor though Bernard. Bigot.

Julie Bindel is on it

That’s great. I really hope the media picks this up and reports it. What a despicable paper. It’s just incredible that this kind of misogynistic homophobic bullying is deemed acceptable.

It's possible to tell from the photo alone

I also read the feature on Saturday and from glancing at the photo it took my unconscious mind about 0.5 nanoseconds to see what the basic situation was.

I'm glad to find there's a thread about this - I was wondering - but not happy that Anna is being harassed. There was no way for her to win here.

True, I don’t know why I’m bad mouthing parquet when I just spent 2 weeks restoring some in my hallway.

I wonder if The Guyliner will acknowledge the controversy. He writes a weekly column about the dates (which is usually better than the original date column) and he was very positive about it. Although I assume, at that point, he would have thought everyone knew all the facts before they agreed to participate.

Thanks Flois

Julie writes: This is terrible. Absolutely shockingly horrible. It brings back every single instance for me when men threatened actually sexually assaulted me for refusing to have sex with them. I am disgusted at the Guardian if this is true.

HUGELY misogynistic of the Guardian. They would NEVER set up a straight guy on a blind date with a TW, ever.

That said, I think we need to respect Anna’s privacy. It’s bad enough that her date has now low-key attacked her on Twitter. We don’t know her sexuality and she deserves our solidarity and support regardless of what it is.

I've just read this on twitter and am absolutely gobsmacked.

Funny how the Guardian chose a lesbian to set up on a blind date with trans women.

Would they have set up a straight man with a trans women without his knowledge? Very much doubt it

And yes I found “I’d like to see her glasses steaming up again” comment quite sleazy, the bottle of wine was interesting too.

Much as I love the Guyliner's writing I'm pretty sure he believes TWAW (therefore there's no problem here) and has used the t* slur in the past. Jury's out on whether he dates transmen.

It's not quite clear exactly what this young lesbian woman signed up for. It sounds as if she wasn't prepared for this outcome but we don't have absolute clarity on this.

Seems that this is possibly reflective of the current pressure young lesbians feel. She might have ticked a box that said she was inclusive of all genders/pansexual etc...not wanting to be accused of bigotry but also not really expecting the Guardian would actually pair her with someone male.

Or maybe she just ticked the lesbian box and the Guardian made a 'woke' decision on her behalf.

I'm so appalled at the pressure young females are under right now.

I think one thing this shows is that if wokesters like the Guardian want to be all inclusive then they're going to have to start having 2 types of lesbians

1. lesbians as we we understand the term - i.e. same sex attracted
2. lesbians by the woke definition, who will have relationships with males (back in my day, we'd have said 'straight' or 'bisexual')

Even then, I don't think any lesbians can safely participate in this column again

the graun has to pretend that when they meet a person that we can all tell is male, they can't tell. so they can't adequately vet the candidates to ensure they don't put another woman in this position again. and we know that there is a subset of males who will tick the 'female' and 'lesbian' boxes, so can't be relied upon to self vet.

it;s mad (but we all knew that)

stillathing I think he's taken his article down. I can't find it and he seems to have taken down the link to it from his Twitter. He may believe TWAW I don't know if he does or not but he may also believe in informed consent. I notice he did comment earlier that on a previous Blind Date, one of the participants was called a lesbian but was actually bi so there may be a pattern of confusion over orientation, at The Guardian.

I saw this at the weekend and immediately saw that it was a trans woman because the Adam's apple is completely visible apart from anything. I read to see if it was mentioned and it wasn't. I wasn't surprised because it was The Guardian but I certainly thought that both parties had gone into it openly and honestly. It's terrible that they don't check up on this kind of thing and that the trans woman didn't bother to tell them. Completely disrespectful and not at all acceptable. I think the woman handled it the best way she could. I feel for her.

It's completely fair to not mention the person's trans status in the article, after all, it's their business, and, surely not the most interesting thing about that person

However, if they withheld the person's trans status from their date, who had stated that she was single sex attracted - well, that's FUCKING HORRIFIC!

If I was the woman, I'd have the Guardian up in front of IPSO.

Fucking misogynistic disgrace.