How do you deal with the loneliness?

[RadandMad]

I'm in the creative industry and recently joined an online group for other creatives. There's a post in there criticising JK Rowling with people talking about terfs and how awful they are and how hateful it is not to believe TWAW. These are intelligent, normal people who a few years ago I would have had a lot in common with.

It just hit me how far I am now from mainstream views since I started getting into GC feminism. I feel like I'm on another planet to these people, for all we have in common now. And I go through this endless cycle of asking myself, is it me? Is there something wrong with me for no longer being able to believe people literally can change sex, or no longer being blind to the clash of trans rights with women's rights?

I feel horribly lonely. Most of my friendships are conducted online, and I feel very isolated. But I can't see any way to put the genie back in the bottle and go back to thinking the way these people do. Just wondering how other people cope? How do you find other people you can interact with if you can't risk giving up your anonymity, or admitting what you really think?

Outside of some sorts of bubble, your views are entirely mainstream.
Here on FWR there are lots of women from all sorts of backgrounds, all sorts of jobs, who believe in women's rights ... women's right to have women's rights.

I sympathise. I feel like that a lot in regards to some of my views, particularly but not exclusively in regards to the issues you raise.
It is lonely. But reminder we are not alone. And I remind myself that I too held similar opinions to the woke masses not long ago.

Remember that the counter side isn't online because it is silenced. I do think the GC view is main stream. Just the platforms of online communication ban it.

I’ve been thinking about this too. I’m an English speaker living in French-speaking Canada so I was isolated already, doubly so by the inability to talk to anybody about an issue I really care about, triply so by the pandemic!

I tried to talk to my only friend about it and we had a massive argument. Then we agreed to stay friends and never to talk about it again. Now we’ve decided that we can’t be friends WITHOUT talking about it, because it’s such a huge issue hanging over our heads. But we both have to be super careful about what we say. She gets really genuinely hurt and distressed by what she perceives as transphobia, while I am genuinely hurt and distressed by absolute batshit craziness of everybody around me, which makes me feel like a fucking alien. I mean yesterday I was reading about the transwoman who wanted to simulate labour and induce lactation and was annoyed that her ex-wife was being uncooperative and wanted to know if any women would lend her their baby to breastfeed and I was thinking This has to be a joke. (Maybe it was? I didn’t read the full thread about it). But the fact that the responses from actual women were mostly sympathetic and supportive, acting as if her request was completely fine and normal, when she is so clearly fucked up... I just wanted to scream WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON.

The trans lobby look like a majority because they’ve captured the media. Also, by piggy-backing on the gay rights movement, they’ve persuaded those who have heard of it that they are harmless. Most people know nothing about the GRA, but when they find out they think it’s insane.

I think a lot of people would be surprised of the echo chamber they live in regarding this issue. Like when people were completely baffled that Brexit happened because their Facebook friends fed and social media analytics fed back that it was just a small group of crazy right wingers. It's like that now. Nobody GC can say shit without being suppressed, and then IRL they won't say shit either because they think that they'll get called a TERF because that's what happens on the internet.

Yeah I read that blog too about the breastfeeding TW. She has such serious issues. Really sad to read but also incredibly noticeable in the way she writes that the only thing that matters is her affirmation and other people needing to agree all the time. Never mentions the baby's needs. The people in her life are viewed as either for her or against her, rather than maybe having a variety of opinions. Strange how if sex is so fluid, her views of the world are so binary.

Middle class folks who live in more alternative areas and work in the arts often live in echo chambers that have fuck all to do with the people effected worse by misogyny. They don't see the necessity of feminism, because in their bubble it seems to have paid off. But that's class that's protecting them, not sex, not gender, social class

I do struggle generally with people think I am radical and political about all kinds of issues where i think it's just common sense though. So I've had a life time of practise for when to bite my tongue and pretend I don't have an opinion. Which is shit too

You aren’t alone
Or wrong

It’s the noisy ones keen to be seen to say the right thing
Had similar on a work WhatsApp recently with much of the same stuff and like you I felt really awkward and alone. One woman then messaged me directly with ‘you’re quiet’ and i realised she hadn’t contributed either. So I replied ‘so are you’ and it gently gently went from there before we both felt we could say to each other I’m GC, that’s all shit and how sad we can’t contest any of it.
Now when I see her at work we have a little smile.

Luckily for me, all my Gen X female friends are of the same mind, so no loneliness there.

I do understand how lonely it is in creative industries, though. Many shallow thinkers, once outside their practice.

I think, for your own sanity, push back gently where you can. And longer-term, look for some more diverse and IRL friendships.

The only way with coping is this board to be honest.

My mum agrees with me on the surface, but hasn't got into the wider debate. JKR etc.

My daughter is ultra woke, so any of our discussions end up with her getting upset and thinking I am trying to force my views on to her.

I'm working from home so no day to day 'what do you think about the shit JKR is getting' etc...

Op I have so much sympathy.

I feel exactly the same. Nobody gives a shit how marginalised they make me feel, it's worth it for the woke tokens.

You aren’t alone
Or wrong

It’s the noisy ones keen to be seen to say the right thing

This is so true.
And yes, it can feel lonely, swimming against the (apparent) stream. I'd suggest reaching beyond the creative community to establish bonds with those more like-minded - wherever you might find them.
I think the "mainstream" actually are GC once you get talking to people - IRL or online - and you let them know what you know.

I'm sorry you feel lonely though, but FWR is a great place to start to remedy that. Courage calls to courage....

OP I feel exactly like you. I work in a creative industry and I'm frankly afraid to give my views which would be frowned on by the 'be kind' brigade and go against my employers policies.

There are an awful lot of people in my experience who don't really know an awful lot about this, just go with the woke orthodoxy, will accept that JK Rowling is transphobic at face value, haven't really thought much about the impact on women in sport etc. I find myself really wanting to share information. However I think that's too risky most of the time - I don't want to be a pariah.

Like @Shedpaint I stay pretty quiet if the subject comes up.

It must be difficult, Harry, but you can't expect your friend to take kindly to your thinking she's "batshit crazy".

In a similar boat. This board keeps me sane. Kind of.

@PumpkinSpiceWoman Obviously I don’t say that to her. I’m just screaming it inside my head.

Loneliness is a problem. But then I see that the letter in support of JK Rowling has over 15 000 signatures and growing, and there is this place and there is Ovarit and the Gender Critical site on Saidit (which is a horrible host site, of course). Also all the official sites defending women's sex-based rights.

The feeling of being gas-lit (?) is probably the hardest part to take.

For instance, that new Guardian interview with the person who calls gender critical feminists a gateway to white supremacy, and the newspaper posts it with no criticism. The feeling that the left has decided to completely ignore sex-based oppression and has also decided to call those who want it not ignored bigots. And the feeling that it is always women who are ignored and who are expected to be nice, especially when agreement with that comes from so many women.

On the other hand, I cannot breathe at all if I try to stay completely silent about what is happening. All I want is a proper respectful dialogue and that not all demands for empathy are one way.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there were others in that group thinking exactly what you are thinking.
Many times when I commented on friends’ woke posts on Facebook I got massively piled on but then a dm popped into my messenger ‘Hi, we don’t know each other, I’m a friend of XY, I saw your comment on her/his wall and just want to say I agree with you but can’t say it publicly / I want to find out more can you help’
That is why no debate was so important for them. By painting us as hateful bigots they managed to silence many, many women. But they can’t silence us all.

I often find playing dumb is a great strategy. Just ask naive questions very politely, ask them for specifics, for explanations and then ‘translate’ it back to them without the frilly language.
And talk about sports first, that is so obviously wrong, and especially men will agree with you.

@BoudiccasBoudoir

I do struggle generally with people think I am radical and political about all kinds of issues where i think it's just common sense though. So I've had a life time of practise for when to bite my tongue and pretend I don't have an opinion. Which is shit too

I have similarly found that y views are unusual enough, seemingly both from the right and left, that I am used to being out of step.

But I do find this is a difficult one because so often it's difficult to talk about without people losing their minds - they really think you are just an awful person and it's more than just a different political view. It does feel a bit isolating.

Same. A friend I admire recently endorsed a stranger’s nasty, silly rant on Facebook about how JK wants to erase trans people, transphobic book etc etc and not a single damn word of it was based in fact. How can otherwise smart people go ahead and trash a woman based on a load of second-hand, hyperbolic lies like that? I was furious, and even more so because I didn’t even have the guts to say so. Too afraid to even neutrally point out ‘hold on, fake news (yuk), nothing in that little diatribe is actually true’. Madness. I’m linked to the arts too and not ready to lose friends and be dismissed as a bigot. Blocked the OP and reported it as false information but that’s hardly the point. It should have been openly unchallenged.

I hear you sister. I started 2 threads recently about being side lined at work because of it.
I work in DV 😟

Got lots of support here, I should add
Like pp I keep quiet on SM and my DD’s get genuinely upset if I say anything. DS and DH get it, thank God.

Openly challenged, even 😂🤦‍♀️