Lesbian social group under attack

[thatdamnwoman]

I occasionally attend a lesbian social group that meets at a couple of local venues each month. It was started a few years ago by a woman who invited a group of friends and acquaintances and has grown to several hundred women. Maybe 20-50 meet at any one time and it's mainly word of mouth or the occasional 'How about meeting at XX? on Thursday?' type stuff via FB.

So far it seems, barring one odd encounter, to have been lesbian and bi women only, with the odd attention-seeker asserting themselves as non-binary and being tolerated with a lot of eye-rolling. Now a couple of those who attend once in a blue moon have gone on the attack and demanded that transpeople not only be permitted to attend but that the woman who started the group and administers the FB page add T to the description of the group and add a statement welcoming transpeople.

You're here on Feminism Chat, so you can imagine how it's going. Three lesbian TRAs telling everyone who doesn't agree that they are stupid and terfs, half-a-dozen non-feminist women saying 'Let's just be lovely and welcome anyone/everyone who turns up to our lesbian event' versus a couple of older radfems with nothing much to lose saying what we say on here every day. And then 300+ lesbian women sitting at home watching this play out in dismay and wondering whether they next time they turn up for an evening with the lezzers at the pub they're going to have to sit next to someone with a beard who wants to talk about their new life as a woman.

The TRAs are saying it's illegal under the Equalities law for lesbian women in a friendship group that meets in public places to exclude transpeople. I am sure it isn't but when I turned to a couple of people who I thought knew more than me, they started saying 'Ah, well... it's a grey area' and then seem to tie themselves into knots.

Is it? Is there any reason a bunch of self-selecting people who use the title* 'Xtown Lesbian and Bi women's social group' and meet voluntarily in public places are legally required to add T to their title?

But my question is still hanging. Is it legal for a group of women who meet in an informal and voluntary way to seek to exclude people who say they are women, even though we don't regard them as as such?

Yes. Or the Leeds Lesbian March wouldn't have been able to happen, and that was more official and formal.

No-not a hate crime. It is not a criminal offence to say those words in that context. There is no criminal offence that would cover what is said above.

Yes, you're right. I worded it badly.

The point I was trying to make is that this is the only piece of legislation that can be used to realistically bully people.

Humberside police tried to argue that Harry Miller had no case because it was logged as an incident and not as a crime. Harry's counsel argued that intimidating calls from the police make it irrelevant for most people if it is an 'incident' or a crime - if the police are using 'incidents' to bully people.

Some people are trying to argue that the equalities legislation is sufficient to protect women's rights. But when a poorly-defined identity like 'transgender identity' becomes enshrined in law then this is going to be the case over multiple pieces of legislation that can contradict and counteract each other.

For the moment it is the threat of hate incidents that is spreading fear and confusion and tying people up in costly legal cases.

People then will capitulate in the face of a theoretical or perhaps even illusory legal threat.

Stand firm. I'm not same-sex attracted either, but like Tinsel I absolutely support your right to choose who you include in your private friendship group. I am more and more appalled by the erosion of our rights and freedoms by this vociferous shouty lobby and the cravenness of our politicians and police and other institutions which should bloody well know better.

I think stating the group is 'under attack' is a little bit of an exaggeration

Too late. There was a massive pile-on, mainly from lesbians who have never attended the group, many of them from out of the area. All trans allies, all making accusations of terfery and hate-crime and denouncing any woman who isn't trans-inclusive. A few GC lesbians trying to ask the obvious questions (how do you define a woman, how do you define a lesbian, why can't women set boundaries?) in the face of a gale of woke sloganising and threats.

The woman who started the group decided to fold it and frankly I can't blame her. She organised it out of a desire to ensure there was somewhere lesbians could meet up socially. The page has gone from FB and there has been a formal announcement elsewhere that that's it – no more meetings, no more group. No way, unfortunately, for so many of the women who got to know each other to arrange to meet up via that group page. Let's hope loads of people swapped numbers.

And this is how it goes. I dare say the handful of woke lesbians who kicked the destruction off are feeling thoroughly pleased with themselves.

That is such a shame. I'm sure it's happening all over the place too

I've seen this happen with multiple women's FB groups.

That's terrible, OP. I hope someone from the group who understands what words like 'woman' and 'lesbian' actually mean will be able to salvage another group from the ashes but it will probably have to be a secret group with strict entry requirements.

Lesbians being pushed underground in 2019 because they attempted to have boundaries. It's awful.

What a bunch of self-righteous arseholes.

If they are so damn welcoming of trans women, why don't these TRAs and allies start up their own fabulous groups and invite all the people they claim to support?

Why harass and bully lesbians who are minding their own business in their own social network? You don't see people going around trying to shut down all the queer groups. If you don't think a group is inclusive enough for you, go elsewhere. There's plenty of woke folk around. It shouldn't be that hard.

I don't blame the organiser for shutting everything down but I think it's a real shame.
Gay men feel no fear or shame in telling trans men that they are not allowed into their groups. It doesn't appear that there were even trans women wanting to join the group, just a bunch of lesbians who have an over inflated sense of themselves and think they can order other women to do their bidding.

I'm so sorry OP.

It is attack. It is destruction. It is ensuring that anyone who doesn't obey has nowhere to go. It is actively excluding women. It is actively oppressing women. And it makes me angrier than I can say here without being banned. Males are not more important than females, and male hurt feelings are not a reason to stamp out the right of females to meet without male supervision and dickpandering. That's insane. Males are not always wanted in every situation. Not every situation is about males, regardless of how they perceive themselves. This is attack. It is harmful. It does damage, to females, to benefit males. Stop minimising it, because that too is about promoting males at the expense of females.

All the young detransitioned women said that one of the main reasons they had decided to transition was because it was easier for them to imagine themselves growing up as a man than it was as a gay woman. They couldn't picture themselves as adult gay women because they have no older lesbian role models.

This this this this this.

It was the kindness of older lesbians and their befriending at the LGB meetings (as it was then) they held that I dared to go along to that helped me most, and this was in the days when I could have been hounded out of my job if it had been known I was gay. Not exposed to someone using words I personally don't feel match my sense of self, or hurt feelinged; actively blocked from employment. Actual discrimination.

Those groups have long since been taken over by the T and almost all those women have slipped quietly away into private friendship groups to avoid males who want to impose and centre themselves, and give not one fuck about the best interests of anyone but themselves. Certainly they give no fucks about females. That's precisely why females need spaces of their own.

That’s awful @thatdamnwoman :(

Why why WHY are there so many women aiding and abetting this. Socialisation has really done a number on us - men come first no matter what

It doesn't appear that there were even trans women wanting to join the group

The other thing that happens sometimes on FB is that female people who identify as "non binary" sometimes will insist on being allowed to join and change the focus of even women's groups which accept MTF trans to "women and non binary people", and insisting on language changes etc. It's all about power and control.

Cake and eat it. If you don't think you're a woman, love, what makes you want to join a women's group?

Seems a bit bonkers that a successful group fell out with each other and then completely shut down over a hypothetical situation that hadn't even happened!

I hope your new group is a success OP.

Seems a bit bonkers

This is the fear, distress, pressure, threats and discord that the TRA ideology brings to female people's lives. That's the bonkers bit.

People enjoying social meet ups and casually running groups for fun in their spare time don't have time for this shit, they don't want the fights and the threats and the invoking of law, they just walk away. Group spoiled. Bravo transgenderism that's another hole where provision for female people used to be, and more females impressed upon that 'inclusion' is not very inclusive at all these days.

Thatdamnwoman
That’s awful. The aggressive bullying behavior directed at women for trying to maintain their own boundaries in their own social group? As others have said, it’s about power, control and colonising women’s spaces. I hope you are able to form a new group but the fact this is happening at all is a grim sign of the times

People enjoying social meet ups and casually running groups for fun in their spare time don't have time for this shit, they don't want the fights and the threats and the invoking of law, they just walk away. Group spoiled

Michelle, this seems to be their modus operandi. Deliberately driving a steamroller through women’s spaces seems to be a fixation.

It's dreadful. So many calls and texts from women who are anxious to keep some form of meeting going.

I will never forgive the women who've done this.

The two who are the worst and who started the whole fire going are bitter types who seem to get a kick from destroying things that give others pleasure. I'm not a psychiatrist but I can't help wondering if it's some kind of personality disorder, this desire to destroy what's good.

I'm glad in a way that it's all over so quickly. Less oxygen for the bastards. At least we know who they are and who not to contact when we're forming the new group. If we use FB at all, we won't allow comments or messages or chat. We'll start with a small, closed, motivated GC group of known women and work carefully out from there. It feels like war. Or terrorism.

In part it's the Queer theory thing. If it's there, smash it. Because it's there.

In part it's issues with boundaries. If it's there, it has to go, because no = negative emotions. And the enjoyment of fight and winning. The people who drove this will be gleeful at their win, it's a temporary buzz. They won't comprehend or care about the loss this has caused for others, or the harm done to people who used to be prepared to organise and work for others, and probably won't again after this experience. Challenge them on that and you get the 'they don't matter they're shit if they don't do what I say agree'. There's pathology here.

In part its the endless confusion between female and social worker/ mummy/ therapist. There's always an issue of expecting female people to act as paid professionals would be expected to in centering facilitating, putting first, focusing on the needs of. Never reciprocal, equal social contracts involving two way empathy and facilitating.

In part it's issues with boundaries. If it's there, it has to go, because no = negative emotions. And the enjoyment of fight and winning. The people who drove this will be gleeful at their win

Michelle, I think that’s an accurate analysis. There are some exceptionally unpleasant individuals whose grotesque sense of entitlement is a recurrent theme. They often use accusations of ‘hate speech’ to bludgeon people into submission. The playlist of tactics is always the same

If you don't think you're a woman, love, what makes you want to join a women's group?

Aye there was huge drama on one of the autistic Facebook groups I'm in for women.
Pisses me off no end. Don't want to be referred as a woman? Fine. Fuck off and start your own clique. But no, they whine and wail about how excluded they feel because the damn group title doesn't include non-binary. Odious people.
And women cave into these bullshit tactics because they want to be nice and want everyone to get along. So either the group changes beyond recognition to pacify a tiny proportion of wankers or it gets disbanded completely as the admin / owners are understandably frustrated.

The two who are the worst and who started the whole fire going are bitter types who seem to get a kick from destroying things that give others pleasure

It sounds dreadful. There is something profoundly wrong with people who behave like that. Destruction takes zero talent, just nihilism, but building the group must have taken time and love. It is contemptible.

It feels like war. Or terrorism

I think that’s a great analogy. Because they are deliberately trying to create an environment of fear. Something seriously wrong with the people who do this.

And yet, Michelle, I know that one of them, the one who kicked it off yesterday, will turn up at one of the last remaining lesbian festivals next summer and will expect people to talk to her and will create merry hell if she's ignored or people turn their backs. Or refuse to camp next to her.

I swear a hell of a lot of the answer to this comes down to every woman having access to the Freedom Programme, spending time on the Relationships board, and reading Issendai's blog.

www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/index.html

Its about spotting the dynamic, knowing it for what it is, and knowing how to deal with it. The 'going NC' thing isn't a cliché, any more than grey rock is.

From the Dysfunctional Beliefs section of that blog: (This person studies estranged parent forums in particular but the psychology stretches across life in general)

This is a selection of the dysfunctional beliefs in circulation in estranged parents’ forums. Some of these beliefs are more common than others. Many of them are common outside forums as well as within. For example, “I’m not responsible for hurting you if I didn’t mean to” is ubiquitous throughout the English-speaking world. “You’re still responsible for my emotions after the end of the relationship” is responsible for many a messy breakup. That doesn’t mean these beliefs aren’t dysfunctional. It just means there are a lot of messed-up people around.

“I’m not responsible for hurting you if I didn’t mean to” synergizes nicely with “If I have an emotional reaction to something someone does, the other person is responsible for my emotions” and “emotions cause actions,” creating a beautiful world in which other people make the abuser feel things, and the feelings make the abuser do things, but because the abuser didn’t have volition at any point, she’s not responsible for the damage she did. (Note that the abuser can’t make other people feel emotions. Other people’s emotions are allllll their responsibility.)

People can fall prey to this tempting combination of dysfunctions, but if it doesn’t get jolted out of them in middle school, high-school drama usually does it, and if that doesn’t work, the realities of adult life hit them between the eyes shortly thereafter. It takes special dedication (and a bubble of enablers) to hang onto this set of beliefs well into adulthood.

This is really helpful Michelle, thank you. I agree that understanding Personality Disorders is key.

Yes, absolutely.