Conservative landslide - how are we feeling as feminists?

[Cwenthryth]

I feel very mixed this morning. So worried about what this means for public services, policing, NHS, social care, mental health services, housing, in-work poverty... all of which disproportionately affects women, either as those needing these services or picking up the pieces when dependents cannot access what they need. We now have an openly misogynist prime minister (we did before, but now he has a secure mandate), who won’t even acknowledge all of his children whilst slagging off single mothers, and has had the police called out due to neighbours fearing for the safety of his partner from what they could hear through the wall.

But there’s a tiny silver lining of it seeming that it seems very unlikely that self-ID would be brought in under this government, at least in the form the Lib Dems were touting for, so we are probably more secure on retaining sex-based rights than we would have been with any other result.

To be honest it’s not really much comfort to me right now.

One stat I remember from Caroline Craido-Perez's book is that the more female MPs a party has, the less likely the leader is to be a woman. Labour has had better percentages of female MPs than the Conservatives for quite a while, but always a male leader. I really can't see that changing.

More men making decisions about women and for women.

Opposition irrelevant in this parliament

New Labour leader will be female I think. The point about not having a female leader is one which bothers Labour members who will be voting for the leader.

The mistake that's likely to happen is mistaking a lack of female leader as the problem for the party rather than Labour's problem with small town versus metropolitan centres. It's the social justice warrior issue which fails to bring along people and instead imposes ideals and values.

Labour members will vote in their own image for a leader which is why someone less woke is unlikely to win a leadership election.

That's ultimately going to be an issue.

The self id issue is reflective of a wider problem of failing to recognise the problems of working class women and instead favouring authoritarian top down virtues.

I'm devastated. Labour are unelectable, at a time when a win for a more moderate and humane government should have been easy,

And its been this government that has pushed for self ID.
Self Identified rapists are in women's spaces including prisons, and included in crime statistics; ts been enabled by this Govt.

Gilead here we come.

Mixed feelings. I ended up voting Labour on the basis of my local MP being good. There wasn't any one party that jumped out as being 'home' for me.

I hope that a comfortable majority means that Boris can stop pandering to the ERG and the extremists.

I'm glad to see that more female MPs have been appointed, and I am hopeful that there will be sensible clarity about gender vs sex. I sincerely hope that Penny and Dawn stay far, far away from women's rights, on the basis that they don't seem to understand what a woman is.

I am worried about the impact to social care and the NHS. However there's a clearly appointed Government which can stand and fall on its own merits, without being able to cast blame on a lack of majority.

I am hopeful that Labour will stand back and listen to what people really want, rather than shouting down those who aren't woke enough or ideologically pure. Corbyn needs to go, pronto, if they are to start rebuilding any credibility.

Agree with the point about Johnson being a populist not an ideologue. Blair has shows how dangerous that is in a leader who can sway with the wind and make major national decisions on the basis of 'I BELIEVE' (a lack of argument, evidence and reasoning that would earn a Year 1 undergraduate a justifiable fail). When a gargantuan ego recieves a large majority it's never good news for the country.

As for Jo Swinson, the loss of her seat is one of the few bright spots I can see on a very day. For me, it's the attitude to women under her leadership that decisively lost them my vote. But because that's a 'women's issue', I'm not under any illusions that a 'fuck off out of my party if you don't believe TWAW' stance is responsible for their overwhelming defeat. That women should move over and be quiet is sadly almost a default stance that only people like us seem willing to question.

This was a Brexit election. In effect, it was the second referendum. Labour suffered catastrophic losses in their heartlands; the core Labour vote there went blue because these are the people who overwhelmingly voted for Brexit. The Lib Dems wanted to do away with Brexit entirely. I'd have voted for that, but it seems my compatriots felt otherwise. I don't think there is any mistaking that this election was a ringing endorsement for the national catastrophe that is Brexit, and many other important issues and consequences will have taken a back seat because LEAVE MEANS LEAVE.

If the majority still sits in the leave camp after seeing at first hand the serious implications, logistical issues and divisiveness that have manifested themselves since 2016, the country will get exactly the future and the government it deserves. Pity that they have to drag the rest of us down with them.

Kicking self-ID into the long grass is a very small silver lining, as is the opportunity of building a new and stronger opposition without the myriad difficulties Corbyn and Swinson brought to the table. In the meantime, it's going to be a long five years.

So despondent today.

This was clearly coming.......Labour has fractured, and has lost many of its traditional voters. The tendency is to suggest that the Labour party knew what these voters actually wanted and needed more than they did themselves. I reckon that was Jeremy's thinking, anyway.
And Losing Scotland has cost them dear.Difficult to imagine Labour winning without Scotland and Wales.

Since Jeremy Corbyn selection as leader there has been two Labour parties in parliament. Momentum Labour - and those they seemingly despised, and that were referred to as 'the Blairites'. A culture of bullying and intolerance has grown at grass roots levels - that has seen many MPs and other party members forced out. Revenge and hatred have poisoned the debate.

Gender critical women, and everyone else in the party, was not permitted to speak out openly...and the debate around Self Id and its implications were never taken to the party or the public for debate. dissenting voices were silenced. It took one Tory Mp, David Davies, to be brave enough to speak out on the issue. No senior Labour MP spoke out. Dawn Butler is just awful in her role as women's & equalities spokesperson - she has no credibility and little capability.

For me, the best scenario that it is now possible to see, is that the tories are now going to have to start representing the many disadvantaged and desperate communities it now represents. It can't all be about Brexit now. Hopefully a more 'one nation' sort of Toryism is the best we can hope for. Infrastructure projects, investment, building up public services. that remains to be seen, though.

I’m depressed. The things that matter to me, social and affordable housing and a having working adult social care services, they are going to be forgotten and pushed under the carpet, until we hit breaking point, which we have, then the government blame demand on services on the people who need, demonising the poor and those who have the audacity to live to long and need care. I wanted more affordable housing built and a proper social care service to be set up for people in desperate need. I don’t give a fuck about Brexit. Or renationalising the railways and free broadband. I just want someone in power who cares about the most vulnerable on society. And those people are usually women.

The mistake that's likely to happen is mistaking a lack of female leader as the problem for the party rather than Labour's problem with small town versus metropolitan centres. It's the social justice warrior issue which fails to bring along people and instead imposes ideals and values

Exactly! What is needed is quality and capability; people prepared to listen and to represent - not just candidates who tick intersectional boxes. Unfortunately, some good people MPs have now been lost, or forced out.

just want someone in power who cares about the most vulnerable on society

The Tories are going to have to listen now. They represent many of these people for the first time ever. It can't all just be about tax cuts now.

The Rother Valley result is good (that tweet really does encapsulate it).

I fear Momentum have got such a stranglehold on Labour that we'll have another unelectable far left candidate in 5 years time.

Will there be a new contingent of the Tory party that has previously not really been heard from much - the working class Tories - with all these new northern MPs? That could be a good thing.

Will there be a new contingent of the Tory party that has previously not really been heard from much - the working class Tories - with all these new northern MPs? That could be a good thing

Yes, but the thing is they are not really tories at heart - but now the responsibility for their neglect is going to lie at the tory door.

Dominic Raab is a total dim-wit. He seems to think they voted Tory because they were 'aspirational working class communities'. That's not it at all. They are simply desperate for change.Labour governments have not delivered it to them, either.

The underlying problem is that the First Past The Post system doesn't allow the electorate to vote for the party that most reflects their views. And it also leads to small wins being translated into a large number of seats. Neither Conservative nor Labour are principled enough to seek genuine improvement in this area.

I voted Labour as the least worst option because I felt the Tories would be an economically polarising disaster for so many of us. Now I feel scared at what’s coming for us all with Boris speeding us towards Brexit. Just when we need a strong opposition, Labour and the Lib Dems will now be focused inwardly on their party.
I am happy to see women on here planning activism within the Conservatives grassroots because we really need to moderate their policies as far as possible but I fear that will be just a drop in the ocean of what would be needed.

As a side note, I feel that FWR as the place for non party political feminist discussion action and organising may change, given that the previous solidarity between a lot of us of being in a state of ‘political homelessness’ has now diverged into all of our different responses at the GE.
I really hope I’m wrong about that and we can stay focused on our issues and not factionalise on here.

The only inspiration I am taking from this (personally) deeply depressing outcome is to note how leavers in the Brexit Party put their single issue before party loyalty to get their issue through. We will need to do the same and all actively get the new government and the other parties on board with issues affecting women.

On a lighter note, I had to share this quip a friend put on her Facebook.

“Be fair now ... you Swinson .... you lose some 😂😁🤷🏼‍♀️“

How am I feeling? Unapologetic but wary. And I still feel politically homeless, and hope that the non party political discussion on FWR can continue. Monstering your political opponent is not a winning move.

I wanted to but could not vote Labour or Lib Dem. There were many little incidents that made it impossible for me.

• patiently explaining my concerns to my Lab MP (who pretended to listen) but then being fobbed off with the party line
• actually reading the Lib Dem manifesto
• the treatment of prominent women who carefully voiced their opposition to the idea of 'gender essence' (Jenni Murray)
• being given the silent treatment by 'friends' simply for saying that I thought it was important to see the issue of gender self-ID from both sides
• the institutional capture by unaccountable organisations such as Stonewall, which I saw first hand and so on ...

For most voters, this election was about Brexit, though, and Britain is now certain to leave the EU. This has many implications for women, and the fight for women's interests has to continue. But we have to be clear about what those interests are. They cannot be about denying our own lived realities, in our sexed bodies, and all the consequences that this brings.

Relieved

I feel pretty dismayed - but as a centre-ground remainer in a safe Tory seat there were no good choices for me at the ballot box.

We have a known womaniser and possible perpetrator of domestic abuse in 10 Downing Street, having been given the largest Conservative majority in a generation. Yet it is clear that there was no electoral appetite for the socialist project set out by Corbyn - who, by the way, was my MP for five years and was utterly invisible at a local level. Man of the people he is not.

The NHS, adult and children's social care is on its knees. Schools are struggling. There is a rising tide of violence against women and children. Self-ID definitely isn't the only feminist issue.

I live in hope but am not sure what is next.

If it had somehow been a Labour or a LibDem landslide result today I would have felt scared and down for different reasons. I didn’t really know what to hope for today.

Am I alone in feeling less confident than many here that self-ID is no longer an issue? It wasn't in the Tory manifesto but so far as I'm aware it wasn't in the last one either, or the one before that, and yet the rise of Stonewall and Mermaids, regulatory capture of public bodies and schools and self-ID in all but law have all happened on the Conservatives' watch. Why do we think the next five years are going to be any better, when there are so many other reasons the defeated parties can point to before they get to the opinions of us uppity T*RFs?

I voted Labour but didn't think they would win.
I am glad that the paralysis around Brexit will be broken even though I would prefer Remain. No point crying over it any more.
Perversely I think the large majority that the Government hold could be good news overall. I think the politics around Brexit have been toxic and divisive and going forward there will once again be parliamentary time for other issues.
Labour have tried very hard to make the more left leaning side of their ideology popular and it has failed. A major rethink is needed. Not more of the same.

Labour members will vote in their own image for a leader which is why someone less woke is unlikely to win a leadership election.

Could Lisa Nandy be a compromise candidate, do you think, Red?

Some understanding of town vs city dynamics and neither Woke nor anti-Woke.

Gutted

Am I alone in feeling less confident than many here that self-ID is no longer an issue? It wasn't in the Tory manifesto but so far as I'm aware it wasn't in the last one either, or the one before that, and yet the rise of Stonewall and Mermaids, regulatory capture of public bodies and schools and self-ID in all but law have all happened on the Conservatives' watch.

You're not alone. Boris doesn't care one way or the other about women. Or child protection. He'll kick GRA reform into the long grass because it's clearly not a vote winner, not because he thinks it's a bad idea. And it will be very difficult to persuade the Tories to unpick what's already been done since again, they don't care enough to spend any time on it.

I would suggest anyone with a Tory MP gets busy hassling them so that they are motivated enough to do something.

I dillied and dallied before voting Labour, mainly because I didn't feel I was in a safe enough seat for a protest vote.

I'm relieved that we should now get some breathing space from self ID as it wasn't in the Tory manifesto. But it hasn't gone away and institutions remain captured.

I'm glad Sophie Wilson lost. I think misogyny is misogyny whether it comes from Boris Johnson or Momentum.

I didn't expect Labour to win but I'm staggered at the ineptitude of losing seats like Rother Valley, Blyth Valley, Darlington and Redcar.
I would like to think this would herald a period of self reflection but, as I understand Momentum has a grip on the Labour National Executive, I can't see that happening.