Pro Trans Feminists - BuzzFeed Article

[ThinEndoftheWedge]

Interesting article about the views of pro trans feminists.

My Synopsis - Definition of women should include men

-Trans people have the right to define their own identity - but apparently not women.

-Women experience violence, but trans women most of all. No mention/comparrison of groups of women at high risk - female prostitutes (don’t like the term sex workers), homeless women, women in prison, women brought up in care, women with drug and alcohol addictions....

-No mention of transwidows, children, why women are not transitioning.

-White femininity / feminism- Women exclude Black and other Ethnic Minority women. They don’t mention biological sex basis of FGM, sex selection abortion, dire international maternal mortality rates, sex trafficking etc etc. You need to define sex and safeguard sex-based rights to fight these international abominations. No mention of women and girls from various cultural / religious backgrounds who require single sex spaces - they will be particularly disadvantaged by the dismantling of single sex spaces.

• Over hyped fear of sexual violence - Apparently perverts won’t exploit self ID. They don’t explain why the hell wouldn’t they. They state transwomen are less likely than men to be perpetrators and as likely as women to be victims. How would we know if stats are rendered meaningless if men are women and women are men? Just don’t mention Karen White as apparently that’s not fair (no mention of his female victims).

They need to read the ‘it’ll never happen’ thread

• No mention of distortion of data collection, stats and policy planning. I.e. ‘women’ being convicted of rape (UK you need a penis) - no mention of the affect on men and women to be defined as having been raped by a ‘woman’.

-Child safeguarding - nothing to see here... Apparently puberty blockers only after 16 (horse/bolted) and there is supposedly lots of counselling.

• Minuscule rates of detransition - really? Where is the effort to fully research this?

-No mention of the implications of Self ID and young girls (from any ethnic background) being forced to share changing rooms and undress in front of adult males.

No mention of the hard one legal right for the safety, dignity and privacy of girls and women and single sex spaces.

www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/patrickstrudwick/meet-the-feminist-academics-championing-trans-rights?__twitter_impression=true

www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/patrickstrudwick/meet-the-feminist-academics-championing-trans-rights?__twitter_impression=true

Oops - ‘Hard won’ not ‘hard one’.

No pun intended...

Huge chunk co-opting intersex conditions as well, like some sort of Gotcha! see, sex isn't binary, because science! Head-Desk repeat

Wherearemyminions - I meant to include that in my long list of comments but I made an error when I cut and paste.

Yes - completely and the way intersex people have been historically treated.

Sex is still binary - procreation = egg+sperm. Binary

There is still no method in which a human designed to generate an egg can turn into a human design to generate sperm - or visa versa

Won't the feminists concerned be just libfems? You know, the kind that think prostitution is a "choice" that some people make? And all the other shit that centres men...

A full on narrative being pushed aggressively in many quarters to separate out the 'good' women (trans-inclusive) and the 'bad' women (Terf), with women at the forefront of this denouncing. Most media going along with this presentation, including foreign media denouncing virulent UK TERFdom.
I wouldn't be surprised if GC women started to be referred to as 'the enemy within'. It all feels quite scary and sinister.
I am going to WPUK conference, but am a bit apprehensive about arriving and leaving safely. I am still bloody going!! but never thought I would be be made to feel such a way in this country in my lifetime.

Does anyone else find it a concern that on many websites where comments are usually allowed, the trans issue is repeatedly the issue where the ability to leave comments is removed?

Yes. It's rare to be able to comment - except in the Daily Mail. But Daily Mail comments are so stupid and rabid, you would want to associate yourself with it anyway.

I dont know if they block comments because they don't want dissenting voices, or because they are frightened of TRA criticism and push back, or because it's too difficult to moderate - or all of the above.

I do, yes. cf. grauniad pathetic is what it is.

Any of those reasons are a concern. Journalism should not be above dissenting voices from your readers that may not agree with the article. Being fearful of a pushback against TRAs because comments on what their readers have left leaves a Charlie Hebdo-like taste in my mouth and they don’t have trouble moderating comments (in fact, apart from spam, in the case of Buzzfeed, I have never seen a single deleted comment from their website)

But Daily Mail comments are so stupid and rabid, you would want to associate yourself with it anyway.

This is not correct. If you look under Daily Mail articles where you've got some insanity being pushed by the government or some unaccountable organisation you'll find plenty of sensible comments. Alon with stupid ones.

Like every single newspaper in the UK the Daily Mail will produce shit and sometimes do it mendaciously to push a particular agenda. However, I really dislike this "Daily Mail = bad" thinking.

We will have to agree to disagree on that.
I am firmly GC, but not against transgender people per say, or wish to see anyone harmed or humiliated.
There are many many horrendous comments in the DM about TG (including 'having them shot', 'locked-up', 'put in the stocks' etc..) think the problem with DM is the fact that it is completely unmoderated. Anyone can literally say anything, and they do. There is Twitter for that.

That's fine. You stick with your "Daily Mail comments are so stupid and rabid" view and I'll stick with my "although the Daily Mail gets stupid comments, depending on the circumstances Daily Mail comments can actually be sensible" view.

I think the thing about DailyMail comments is that they're what an awful lot of people think.

If you asked a bus-full of people, you'd get daily mail comments - some crazy extreme, most just fairly normal if sometimes unthinking.

Over Christmas I've had conversations with loads of family members. The word is getting out there. Only my sister is of the woke-kind. Which makes me so very sad and baffled. She has kids, she knows where babies come from, she obviously knows how sex works, yet parrots TWAW.

@shedquarters Not that I’m saying the comments are right or not unkind but why do you think comments on the DM should be moderated and those on Twitter not? I could understand your point of view if you were arguing against the article/journalist saying those abhorrent things, but why do you think “anyone can literally say anything” a bad thing for the DM but not so much for Twitter?

@nauticant I actually replied to your comment but for some reason it hasn’t posted? Just said that I agree with you and sick of the pathetic “sorry for the Daily Fail link” comments when 1) Why are you reading it if you don’t like it? And 2) Why are you sharing the link if you find it enough reason to apologise for its existence? Especially when, despite whatever they will get back, they are the only online news source to regularly keep comments open and also have the highest readership that agree with their stance (50% of Guardian articles have comments - when they are allowed - along the lines of “Wtf? I completely disagree with this”).

The comments on the DM are moderated! I've never managed to get one published. Often there are only two or three comments and it says they have been moderated.

Likewise! I spent a couple of years posting something every now and then and not one single comment was ever accepted. Innocuous stuff and yet I'd look at the string of comments and see plenty of frothing. I gave up ages ago and never tried again.

Won't the feminists concerned be just libfems? You know, the kind that think prostitution is a "choice" that some people make? And all the other shit that centres men...

Sally Hines is among them...

I do look across a spectrum of publications regularly. I don't think it's a good thing to just stick with with your confirmation bias habits, so am famiar with DM, some stuff about it I like, but not really the comments (as described). I do tend to look at them though, to get a sense of opinions, as with all, not just DM.
I have just ran out of my Guardian subscription, and will not be renewing as I am so frustrated with the woke-diet, and the comments/moderation situation. I will just look at the free version, but will miss the crossword
I flit around other stuff too, but I don't look at the redtop at all. It just never occurs to me.
I quite like reading Spiked, but don't agree with lots in it.
Twitter - is at both ends of the scale really funny and interesting, as well as grotesque and disturbing.

I only joined Twitter in December after Maya F and JKR situation (to learn more, and join the GC crowd). I feel like I need to do something about it! I have learned loads, but have also find all the insults/anger/general unpleasantness a bit hard to stomach. It's so easy to get drawn in and involved. I can see why people lose their shit there. It's a fascinating phenomenon. I am not quite sure what you would have to do to get banned there, it feels like the wild west.

Mumsnet is more grown up respite (mostly).
Sorry for the long post, but lots of points to answer.

The question of free speech/moderation/censorship is hard to express. I guess there has to be a balance and boundaries for a civil debate, otherwise its just those that are loudest and rudest (as we can see in general).
Didn't mean to offend anyone about who reads what, we all have different tastes. I will be careful not to dis the DM in future.

If it helps shedquarters a few years back I viewed the Daily Mail as a sewer and wouldn't have been bothered to see it put out of business by the Leveson inquiry. I wasn't much bothered by freedom of speech either.

However, things changed for me on the run-up to the Brexit referendum when I started to get bothered by some of the attitudes on display, when people with the "wrong views" or asking inconvenient questions were dismissed as "fuck 'em, they're bigots".

Then I became aware of this gender identity ideology and became aware that much of the media were avoiding covering it, or were presenting a version that they'd been handed by activists, or were deliberately spreading disinformation to obscure the truth. This was in the context of activists pushing for extraordinary social change and while discussions about changing statute law were going on. With these changes having huge implications for everyone but particularly likely to result in adverse effects on women and children.

Eventually, with enough campaigning work, finally the media (in parts) began to shine a light on what was going on, while other parts where still actively engaged in spreading mis/disinformation. By the time that happened I'd become convinced of the need for a diverse, and sometimes unruly, media. I've realised that right-thinking organisations can become captured and seen the considerable value of there being non-captured parts of the media when this happens.

I am not quite sure what you would have to do to get banned there, it feels like the wild west.

GC women get banned from Twitter all the time. They're quite selective when it comes to enforcing the ToS.

Agree Twitter is awful but unfortunately its also addictive!

Yes see what you mean about media being captured to an ideology. Print and digital. This is what has happened in large parts of our institutions - schools /universities /hospitals. And ones who's specific job it is to protect like the Nspcc. I work with children and am disgusted with the Nspcc.

Note to the future historians
We also have a thread on this same article from 2018 when it was published: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3457855-Patrick-Strudwick-on-why-feminism-should-include-TW?pg=1&order=

chatty

Many thanks - Before my MN initiation. Will read the thread.

I did check the date - but read it as if it was published last month forgetting it was 2020!

Epic fail!

I would be interested if any if the women mentioned in the article have changed their stance since??!!

Wedge just joining the dots hopefully one day all this FWR chat documenting this culture war will be written up.

I would say that things have possibly become more divided in academia over the last couple of years, as the no-platforming shite continues on. Although there have been recent successes against the misogynist authoritarians in academia- like with artist Rachel Ara being ‘re-platformed’ after being unjustly excluded from speaking at a university- but I think it will take a long time to turn this political tanker around and will take a lot of women making their voices heard. Which academic culture seems to currently mitigate against.