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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Invisible Women - WITS

78 replies

thereplycamefromanchorage · 26/07/2020 10:05

So WITS, who appear to be a Women in Stem organisation in Ireland are saying their choice of Invisible Women for their bookclub is 'problematic' because of its lack of inclusion of transwomen and non binary people.

twitter.com/WITSIreland/status/1285980180784336896?s=20

They describe the irony of a book called Invisible Women sidelining transwomen - whilst being completely unaware of the irony that the premise of the whole book is how biological women's needs and safety has been sidelined and ignored in favour of men.

Twitter replies are heartening though.

OP posts:
WhereYouLeftIt · 26/07/2020 20:56

"So ask questions like: ... Or "how much of the problem is rooted in female social conditioning and how much is direct discrimination"? And they will fall apart and just parrot the latest woke mantra (even though it makes no sense)."

This. See the problem. Identify the cause/s. Don't just unthinkingly go with the latest fashion.

nepeta · 26/07/2020 21:14

This would be so hilarious if I watched it from far away. As things are, it is awful, because feminism has its lips sewn shut if it can't talk about the impact of living in a biologically female body has.

serenada · 26/07/2020 22:13

@MadamBatty

I really dislike teh way those older women were treated - I think of my grandmother, pregnant at 48 - and the choices they had in the 30s and 40s.

I'm particularly offended by the idea that was prevalent in the UK growing up that it was better to abort children with Downs - something Ireland never took on due to the religious nature of the country I suppose and value for all life.

Those older women were not stupid - far from it. They knew poverty, hardship, heartbreak, real sacrifice and yet, on balance they made lives for their families. I think people forget how poor parts of England and Ireland were.

ScrimpshawTheSecond · 26/07/2020 22:16

Sad Shock Gin

nepeta · 26/07/2020 22:32

It is particularly hilarious because every single anti-feminist explanation for the scarcity of women in STEM fields is based on supposed innate differences between biologically female and biologically male people. None of them have anything to do with gender identities.

In the gender theory world the problem can most easily be fixed by many men already in STEM transitioning. But that would have nothing to do with the actual problem, though we couldn't talk about this.

OvaHere · 26/07/2020 22:40

This is ridiculous, I'm truly embarrassed for them. It's a brilliant book and as PP said it actually reveals that even TRAs don't really believe TWAW.

Besides even if the book were 'problematic' isn't the point of book clubs to read something and then critique it? Surely if anyone had points to make about trans inclusion they could do that after actually reading it.

It's almost like the aim is just to shut women up about absolutely everything that might be relevant to us.

Aesopfable · 26/07/2020 23:15

It is particularly hilarious because every single anti-feminist explanation for the scarcity of women in STEM fields is based on supposed innate differences between biologically female and biologically male people. None of them have anything to do with gender identities.

Surely the scarcity of women in STEM fields is because STEM is a male-gendered thing so any females interested in it must actually be boys/men? Isn’t that what all the woke training teaches?

nepeta · 26/07/2020 23:26

Aesopfable, I stand corrected! You are right and there should be no such organization as WITS in the first place!

I love doing gender theory.

JellyFishSquish · 27/07/2020 00:07

Irony poisoning. I'm done for.

Aine82 · 27/07/2020 08:42

Where are all the “cisgender feminists” now??? “TERFS out” in their bios etc. Delighted with their victory for their “trans sisters” no doubt.

Meanwhile actual adult human females can’t talk about matters that affect 51% of the population.

ScrimpshawTheSecond · 27/07/2020 08:46

Agreed, it's just actually embarrassing.

littlbrowndog · 27/07/2020 08:56

Yeah the WITS scored an own goal there. They don’t belive TWAW are women otherwise the TW would automatically included in the book
🙌🏽

StephanieRang · 30/07/2020 10:15

Hi, I was interested in this thread as I think the book is very important. There has been an update on the book club meeting :
twitter.com/WITSIreland/status/1288475963030994946?s=19

SecondRow · 30/07/2020 10:46

I really wonder how many ordinary WITS members outwith the executive committee took part in the "great discussion". They're awfully quiet on Twitter, whoever they all are. I was hoping against hope for a tell-all live tweet thread of the book club zoom Wine

nepeta · 30/07/2020 10:47

[quote StephanieRang]Hi, I was interested in this thread as I think the book is very important. There has been an update on the book club meeting :
twitter.com/WITSIreland/status/1288475963030994946?s=19[/quote]
It reads about the same as the previous letter they wrote?

The contested area here is, of course, whether possessing a female body (which well over 90% of those who identify as women do) and what that means plays any important part in feminism.

The letter stresses that not all women are equally oppressed, not all women have the same life experiences and so on.

And that is very true and feminism must pay attention to those differences.

But if we ignore the fact that in the past almost all people in the class 'women' shared one unifying characteristic (the sex of their bodies and the sexism it provoked) it is actually quite hard to see what the people that WITS currently sees itself as serving might have in common. If it is not facing sexism in STEM fields then what is it?

SecondRow · 30/07/2020 10:53

"Not all women live with the same level of privilege" from that second statement. Yes we fucking know - but not the way I think they meant it.

JackiesArmy · 30/07/2020 11:02

fucking hell, that's even worse.

"We can't discuss a book about how women are treated differently, because that would be treating some men differently, and their feelings are more important than ours".

You couldn't make it up.

Siablue · 30/07/2020 11:51

I do wonder what Caroline Criado Perez thinks of this. She has openly supported trans rights and they have accused her of transphobia.

nauticant · 30/07/2020 12:02

It would be horribly risky for CCP to say anything about this. She could speak in terms that contradict her book(s), she could state the reality of female bodies in response and encourage a mob to damage her career, or could try and find a middle way that at some point in the future would come back and bite her on the bum.

Siablue · 30/07/2020 12:12

@nauticant

It would be horribly risky for CCP to say anything about this. She could speak in terms that contradict her book(s), she could state the reality of female bodies in response and encourage a mob to damage her career, or could try and find a middle way that at some point in the future would come back and bite her on the bum.
I think that whatever she says she will get absolutely flamed. Unfairly so.
nauticant · 30/07/2020 12:27

That cannot be the case. There is no suppression of free speech in this area at all. We've been told this so many times* we'd be stupid to think otherwise.

  • Even by Owen Jones!
testing987654321 · 30/07/2020 13:18

She has openly supported trans rights and they have accused her of transphobia.

Because she talks about women's bodies. Same as JK Rowling. Women's crime is knowing what a woman is. That's all you need to be a hateful transphobe.

Vargas · 30/07/2020 13:28

This is so depressing. These are supposed to be scientists and engineers? WTAF.

slug · 30/07/2020 14:03

It's colonisation again.

During colonization, colonizers usually imposed their language onto the peoples they colonized, forbidding natives to speak their mother tongues. ... In response to the systematic imposition of colonial languages, some postcolonial writers and activists advocate a complete return to the use of indigenous languages."
www.persee.fr/doc/cea_0008-0055_1976_num_16_63_2517

Those of us who were brought up in British colonies are well aware of the way the suppression of the native language(s) is used as a tool to subjugate the population.

We see it in the gender wars all over the place. We are no longer allowed to use our language but must bow instead to our colonisers who define reality in a way that benefits them and them alone.

In universities where de-colonising the curriculum is very trendy, this argument goes down like a lead balloon with the blue haired brigade. They cannot claim their language is the oppressed one because terms like "cis", "transphobic" and "pansexual" are new to the lexicon of the native population. Wink

nepeta · 30/07/2020 18:27

@slug

It's colonisation again.

During colonization, colonizers usually imposed their language onto the peoples they colonized, forbidding natives to speak their mother tongues. ... In response to the systematic imposition of colonial languages, some postcolonial writers and activists advocate a complete return to the use of indigenous languages."
www.persee.fr/doc/cea_0008-0055_1976_num_16_63_2517

Those of us who were brought up in British colonies are well aware of the way the suppression of the native language(s) is used as a tool to subjugate the population.

We see it in the gender wars all over the place. We are no longer allowed to use our language but must bow instead to our colonisers who define reality in a way that benefits them and them alone.

In universities where de-colonising the curriculum is very trendy, this argument goes down like a lead balloon with the blue haired brigade. They cannot claim their language is the oppressed one because terms like "cis", "transphobic" and "pansexual" are new to the lexicon of the native population. Wink

I thought about this when I first heard an American trans activist argue that the TERFS are ruling the Land of Women and keeping out the refugees they dislike just like Trump is keeping out the asylum seekers from the US he dislikes.

That was a light bulb moment for me. I realized that the tone of the trans activists is much more that of an invading coloniser.

So we, the original denizens of the Land, are now told that the basis on which one gets citizenship is not having a female body (the old law) but something else. Most history can no longer be taught because it is not inclusive of the colonisers, and this rules out any public discussions about issues having to do with the female body. Language is altered so that it becomes almost impossible to have clarity on anything.

In particular 'identifies as' replaces all other bases for claiming that one is a citizenof the Land of Women so that none of the changes the colonisers institutes can possibly infringe on women's rights because they identify as women and their rights are not infringed.

This is how transgender women are not a threat to women's rights anywhere, from elite sports to single-sex spaces.

When I first thought these thoughts I felt incredibly guilty, because I also have great empathy with people who suffer and who are harassed or treated terribly. But the more I read about these issues, the less guilt I feel. If the trans women were true refugees they would have silently merged into the general population and they would have waited until they have much more experience about the way the country works before they begin to alter all laws on us.

Refugees do not try to ban everything about the history of the country which receives them and refugees do not re-define all women's language for us.