Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Conflicted about LibDems and Thursday

76 replies

crosstalk · 09/12/2019 22:58

I was somewhat surprised to find they'd ditched a candidate because she insisted that sex rather than gender was an issue. I questioned this and got (diced down) this response from the party

"We are further concerned at the tone of a misleading campaign run across the media over the past couple of years which unfairly conflates issues. It seeks to present trans people as a threat to women but does so without evidence. We support the rights of all women to justice, dignity, and equality.

Trans rights are not in opposition to women’s rights, and trans women have used single sex facilities for decades without a problem. Behaviour in those spaces is covered by public order offences, meaning that any individual causing concern in those spaces can be removed."

Before Thursday I'd like to get back to them before casting a vote.

OP posts:
Doyoumind · 09/12/2019 23:02

Just don't vote for them. They have made their stance very clear.

AnotherNightWatering · 09/12/2019 23:05

I was somewhat surprised to find they'd ditched a candidate because she insisted that sex rather than gender was an issue.
Which candidate? I hadn't seen that.

ahumanfemale · 09/12/2019 23:06

Of all the parties, the Lib Dems have been the clearest on this issue. You're not going to get them to change their mind by having a think in order to respond to you.

The leader has compared violent males to lesbians.

Black women are a sub category of female just like trans women. Again, the leader's view.

You'd maybe be better off seeing what your other local options are.

The Lib Dem leader can't even define what a woman is.

What else is there to say!

SirVixofVixHall · 09/12/2019 23:09

Then there is the million and a half that they have received from the makers of puberty blockers.

BarbaraStrozzi · 09/12/2019 23:13

I guess it's a straight choice, revoke article 50 or stand an outside chance of retaining women's rights. Only you can decide which one to go for.

(Personally I'm not in favour of unilateral revocation so it's not a dilemma I'm faced with, but I know for a lot of people that is going to be a real and deeply felt dilemma.)

Uncompromisingwoman · 09/12/2019 23:23

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.

Anti democratic, anti women, homophobic / lesbophobic, misrepresenting the law, undermining the safeguarding of children......

Ereshkigal · 09/12/2019 23:48

This is their stock response, almost word for word what Helen Belcher said to Posie Parker at the Cheltenham hustings last week.

MissLawls · 09/12/2019 23:51

I will be spoiling my ballot because of this. I had planned to vote Lib Dem but I just can't now.

dayoftheclownfish · 10/12/2019 00:18

There must be another party you can vote for, literally any other party listens to women more than the Lib Dems.

crosstalk · 10/12/2019 21:19

@SirVixofVixHall citation please or link?

OP posts:
crosstalk · 10/12/2019 21:25

@dayoftheclownfish

Not doing Labour because of antecedents, not LibDem because of their stance on women, no Greens here, one Independent (will check but he's short on info and is more a local councillor.

Tories have rowed back on the question of trans rights despite the fact it was Maria Miller who introduced the whole debate at parliamentary level.

Oh Lord.

OP posts:
Justhadathought · 10/12/2019 21:29

The Liberals are the absolute worst when it comes to this issue. They do not recognise women as a class/group, or have any type of structural analysis. Liberalism arose from the upper/middle class males seeking to do as they pleased, without interference from the state.

SirVixofVixHall · 10/12/2019 21:31

Jean Hatchet (@JeanHatchet) Tweeted:
Total donations by @ferring since 2012 (the pharmaceutical company manufacturing Triptorelin - used as Gonapeptyl to block puberty in female children) to @LibDems .... £1,454,258.27 ..... all right there.

£1,454,258.27 t.co/ga6oPbtywh

crosstalk · 10/12/2019 21:34

@AnotherNightWatering Sorry, heard it on radio 4 and can't refine google enough. So ignore this but I'll keep searching tomorrow.

if it's fake news I'll let you know.

OP posts:
Knewmee · 10/12/2019 21:35

If the Lib Dems get any influence at all in the next Parliament, any, bang go women’s sex based rights and spaces. No women’s changing rooms, public toilets, refuges, hostels, sports or prisons. In with self Id and gender ideology in schools, in with men in changing rooms with teenage girls, out with women’s privacy and dignity and safety.
And in with the silencing of anyone who disagees.

It is important to realise that if the Lib Dems are in a position - because of parliamentary influence - to make demands, this is very likely to be at the top of the list. It is a very woke agenda, so easy brownie points from their supporters, and from the point of view of other political parties it’s a cheap and easy concession. So yes, any influence, and this is coming.

It’s your choice. Of course it is. But you shouldn’t deceive yourself - the cost of revoking Articke 50 without a second referendum is women’s rights: privacy, dignity and safety. And medication of children whose bodies don’t conform.

Do you think we’d ever get our rights back again? I really don’t. Unpicking self id, once legislated for, will be virtually impossible, because it would involve changing legal status that has already been granted to individuals. The legal problems in doing so would be insurmountable.

For women, this election is vitally important, because of Jo Swinson’s willingness - eagerness- to remove our rights. It’s a shame this choice has been posed, but we have to be realistic - it has.

I feel really frightened about the prospect of her having any influence on legislation and Government policy. I don’t think she is safe for women.

SirVixofVixHall · 10/12/2019 21:41

Yes. The Lib Dems have swiftly become the mist dangerous party for women.
It is all so bleak.
Everything predicted on FWR years ago, which friends of mine said “don’t be ridiculous, that will never happen”, is on the cards if the Lib Dems hold any sway.

merrymouse · 10/12/2019 22:01

Behaviour in those spaces is covered by public order offences, meaning that any individual causing concern in those spaces can be removed

I think that would settle if for me.

It's just so stupid. Who does the removing?

Have they also been relying on this magical removal squad to remove Article 50? Maybe we all just need to clap and really believe and Brexit will go away?

merrymouse · 10/12/2019 22:04

crosstalk who contacting you - is it the party or your local candidate?

RufusthebewiIderedreindeer · 10/12/2019 22:05

Ive said before that i am voting how dd wants me to

She wants green

And youve no idea how pleased i am about that

They are so far behind in my constituency that they don’t even get their deposit back (although i know they are similar to lib dem Sad)

user44423 · 10/12/2019 22:07

I am in a marginal lib dem seat. I have voted for them at every election for my whole adult life. I used to be out leafletting for them at weekends until Lynne Featherstone made it clear that people who asked questions about this were not welcome in the party. I was still going to vote for them on Thursday because a Boris majority and Brexit seemed the greater evil. But...

In the past few days I have decided that I cannot vote for them this time. The final straw was listening to Jo Swinson and the Woman's Hour interview. To be precise it was the point at which she said that she'd never been asked for a birth certificate to go to the toilet. That made it abundantly clear that she is in an echo chamber and had not made any effort at all to understand the situation or the worries that people have. She is planning to tear down the social conventions that protect women and children, to remove women's ability to object and to assert boundaries but she doesn't seem be able to understand what she is doing, let alone defend it. Her only answer is some cheap jibe about birth certificates, which has no bearing on the concerns that people have and bears no relation to the solutions that are being advocated. It is abundantly clear that she has given no thought whatsoever to this.

I cannot vote for the party. It is not only the substantive issue of women's spaces. It is the authoritarian way in which they are imposing their naive view of the world without taking the trouble to listen and understand the opposing side. Indeed they have made a virtue of refusing to listen. I simply cannot vote for such illiberal lightweights.

The only decision now is whether to spoil the ballot or to vote for the moderate tory candidate who is the only other contender here.

madeyemoodysmum · 10/12/2019 22:17

I’m Tory this elections I can’t possibly vote for the erosion of women’s rights. Thank god for this board and it’s education!
I can’t abide Corbyn and labours spending spree so tory it has to be.

user44423 · 10/12/2019 22:17

Behaviour in those spaces is covered by public order offences, meaning that any individual causing concern in those spaces can be removed

Yes this is another example of the flimsy response with no attempt to engage or understand. It makes me so angry. If a naked 'woman' with a penis is towelling down herself down in the communal changing rooms next to the teenage girls then what offence has been committed? Surely on the TWAW approach she is not dong anything different to any other woman and it would be the action of a bigot to try to have her removed. They appear to have no understanding of the power dynamics involved, the behaviour of predatory males or the impact on women. I would have much more respect for them if they understood this and openly addressed it when defending their view. I cannot understand whether they are utterly naive or are putting on a faux act to avoid dealing with the issues. I am not sure which is more worrying but I do not want them anywhere near power.

TheLevellers · 10/12/2019 22:26

It is important to realise that if the Lib Dems are in a position - because of parliamentary influence - to make demands, this is very likely to be at the top of the list. It is a very woke agenda, so easy brownie points from their supporters, and from the point of view of other political parties it’s a cheap and easy concession.

I'm not sure it will be the cheap and easy concession it might have been at one point, so I'm less worried about that than I would have been at one time. I do think the tide is turning.

AnotherNightWatering · 10/12/2019 22:28

crosstalk Thanks. I've already decided I'm not voting LibDem this time. I normally would - I did as usual in the local election a few months ago - but the revoking with no vote made me question. Then the email saying GC women weren't welcome in the party meant I wouldn't vote for them this time. But that car crash interview (thanks Anna from Warwickshire) makes me think I'll never vote for them again. Sad

Jeanhatchet · 10/12/2019 22:29

@SirVixofVixHall I can understand why some are saying "citation citation!!" Because is it is hard to believe ... but the donation figures aren't hidden. They are from the electoral commission and the drug itself and the research the company have supported with an unrestricted grant to evaluate its efficacy as a puberty blocker are also clearly evident or I wouldn't risk saying it.

Swipe left for the next trending thread