How can feminism in the UK be more inclusive? Striving for equality for all women

[isequalityamyth]

I have spent 40 plus years pushing, fighting, scrapping at times for equality, fair pay, calling out sexism, even the every day minor crap...if you call me girl I’ll call you kid all day long (apparently that is really annoying). & no I’m not sitting on your lap or taking a ride in your "fuck mobile".

The reality is though that I’ve been fighting from a very white privileged middle class standpoint. I had the privilege of having a feminist father who encouraged my education, encouraged my promotion.

When I went for entry jobs post graduating I was met with a phew by the male interviewers. My name and hobbies are not necessarily reflective of how I look. I got told once in an interview they were relieved I wasn’t a heffer, I looked and sounded english (seriously yes this was stated). This was the normal.

Yes I’ve fought my way up through the glass ceiling, but I was given a ladder.

I'm not demeaning my own battle nor those of others, I am just conscious that I had help, I had a tool set, I had support, I had the right skin colour, I had privilege.

How does one take a different perspective, not all women are the same, we all have different experiences. We are not starting from the same position, as a white Middle class woman I definitely had a head start in the equality stakes.

So my long winded question - how do we make feminism more inclusive? Not so white MC centric. As surely feminism needs to be more inclusive and it doesn't feel that way right now.

Not entertaining a debate as it will derail the thread, there are "eleventy billion threads" for that conversation if you're wanting to bleat about your anti-trans agenda

BabyBee93, are you suggesting that we on this board somehow don’t support the campaigns against FGM etc?
Nothing could be further from the truth. I can vouch that I donate to charities in those fields, and I know other posters on here have asked for and been given lots of advice on which such groups are worth supporting.
It seems to be your perception of us as middle class self serving intellectuals that is in error, rather than our priorities!
My own parents grew up in slums with outside toilets and lost four siblings to disease in infancy, so hardly a “privileged” background.
The only criterion for getting our support on here is to be female. So that includes transmen, (female bodied) but excludes transwomen, (male bodied). Hence our campaign for women’s single sex spaces. And that affects ALL women, black, white, rich, poor, whatever.

I am genuinely sorry if anyone has felt excluded from feminism.

I actually don’t think this board is very MC. I think the language is policed to an extent that posts need to be very carefully worded and therefore appear quite eloquent which can put people off.

The board is also trolled to a massive extent and many women here are very fed up with trolls. If someone is suspected of being a troll, there can probably be some unkindness, especially if a valued poster just has been goaded into a ban.

I have said before and I do believe that the trans issue affect middle class white girls - and prisoners/patients/sufferers of domestic violence. This is in my opinion due to MC parents being “kind” and MC people working with TRAs to set guidelines and laws. In that way it is a “privileged problem” until you are extremely unprivileged or at your most vulnerable. The women here are fighting for other women and girls who cannot fight for themselves.

I do think the trans issue is less likely to affect the Muslim community. For the record, we are in a very diverse area, have many Muslim friends and none of my friends are oppressed by their husbands. Girl guiding isn’t big here, but any trans woman or trans girl who wanted to change with the school girls would meet a massive parental opposition. We have a swimming pool with communal changing room and most Muslim women never swims (unless in full modest swimsuit and that is very few) but they do take their children swimming. Any trans woman coming into the women’s changing room would be seen off quite promptly by the women or by their teenaged sons if they couldn’t manage. I don’t think that the thought even would occur to many of them that penis people would “feel” that they belonged in the women’s spaces, but if it happened, they wouldn’t be “kind”.

The problem comes when these Muslim children become more integrated into the mainstream English society. My friends are very careful with whom to trust with their children, even for play dates. They worry about bad influences, non-halal food (even some sweets are not halal) and other things. I think typical “English” activities like girl guides, netball etc, is a great way of making friends outside of school, increase cultural integration and generally form bonds between girls. One trans girl may make some that might otherwise sign their daughters up withdraw.

The point about the focus on the trans issue which some ppl have said is a sign of narrow opinion or the 'luxury' of middle-class - once you've really seen the issue you realise that's it's everything, it's all the issues that affect women/girls.

It's about people burrowing away trying to sabotage laws and policies that support women, and institutions like the justice system/police and medical profession prioritising those people over respect and safety for women. It's about contempt/hatred for Women and trying to shut them up because their voices are inconvenient to men's desires. It's about girls wanting to opt-out of becoming women because they can't face what that means in society.

Those aren't separate issues from the ones that affect black women - poor healthcare, injustice, violence, exploitation. They're the same.

Babdoc no - nothing in my post said that no one is supporting those causes. They were examples of how feminism needs to address issues that are not about the "patriarchy" in the traditional men vs women context

Notice how you're outraged that you've been accused of not caring about FGM and no mention of the disproportionate mortality rates for black mothers? You also say that your socio-economic status doesn't make you privileged - privilege comes in all shapes and forms. Perhaps read up on that and you'll understand some of the answers on this thread a little better

As an aside - why are you willing to advocate for transmen but not transwomen? Your transinclusion is either all inclusive or it's not. The second you begin to eliminate groups from your inclusion, it ceases to be so

As an aside - why are you willing to advocate for transmen but not transwomen?

For the same reason as it isn't my responsibility, as a feminist, to advocate for transwomen.

As an aside - why are you willing to advocate for transmen but not transwomen? Your transinclusion is either all inclusive or it's not. The second you begin to eliminate groups from your inclusion, it ceases to be so

Why are you talking about "your transinclusion" in relation to feminism? Some trans people are not female. Feminism includes transmen because they are female. I don't include males in feminism. That would be an act of self-sabotage.

I am so confused, why wouldn’t we argue for trans men? Most issues (FGM, rape, child marriage, pregnancy complications, maternity discrimination) is because people are of the female sex?

Nobody here hates trans people, we respect them and wish them well. We just focus on issues which impacts biological women, no matter how they identify.

If there is a clash of rights between biological women and biological men, we are on the side of the biological woman. No matter how they feel or how they identify. Why is this controversial?

Feminism includes females. That's it. It doesn't have to be inclusive of everyone, it just has to include women and girls. That's what I care about. It doesn't make it any less possible to support Transwomen with their struggles. They're just not the same.

The struggles of both groups are not the same that is

@BabyBee93

Not entertaining a debate as it will derail the thread, there are "eleventy billion threads" for that conversation if you're wanting to bleat about your anti-trans agenda

Sorry I thought you were looking to engage. I won't address you again.

It’s interesting that there’s another thread where I’ve posted that men can’t be feminists and had someone reply that I should “get over myself”.

QED.

Trans issues have nothing in themselves to do with women's rights or feminism, but female people who fall under the trans umbrella are included due to their biological sex. There is also a disproportionate amount of young female people who seem to want to identify out of their sex based oppression rather than acknowledge that they are female, so that's clearly an issue for feminism and this board. Hope that helps, BabyBee.

And of course we understand why they would want to identify into the privileged class, but it's not that simple, is it?

It's the middle class Libfems who are all about opening prisons and DV shelters to men - the sort of places they'll never find themselves in.

Completely agree. Very magnanimous of them.

I think feminism is exclusively for women/females, but equally I don't own feminism and other people have different views. I figure it's a broad church and should include a diverse range of people and opinions. But whilst I think a man can intellectually 'get' it, he can't really experience it in the same way.
I think the point made upthread about language on this board was very astute - there are some very eloquent posters, which does give rise to it seeming a bit forbidding, but language and tone is very heavily moderated and that also makes for very carefully worded posts to avoid accidentally saying something that will earn a deletion.

it's not simple at all. One of the things is to stop judging women who make the decision to take a job or profession that is traditionally occupied by women. I was a childminder for 10 years and the judgemental comments and looks I got from other women ('I'd never do that job, you are changing other people's children's nappies for a living' etc.) is very demoralising. It's not always about 'class', it's about education, and the perception of class.

Strangly, men never made negative comments about my choice of job, only women. I felt that I was excluded from being a feminist because of my choice of job (which I loved, by the way!).

My problem with even well meaning male involvement in the direction of feminism is that many women are socialised to flatter and defer to males, and they find themselves elevated to a decision making/leading capacity even without trying to. This happens in GC circles as much as anywhere else. Of course, if they do want to control the narrative for their own purposes which aren't in the interests of women, it comes easily.

@Worknoplay

it's not simple at all. One of the things is to stop judging women who make the decision to take a job or profession that is traditionally occupied by women. I was a childminder for 10 years and the judgemental comments and looks I got from other women ('I'd never do that job, you are changing other people's children's nappies for a living' etc.) is very demoralising. It's not always about 'class', it's about education, and the perception of class.

Strangly, men never made negative comments about my choice of job, only women. I felt that I was excluded from being a feminist because of my choice of job (which I loved, by the way!).

Would you describe the women making denigrating remarks about your job as feminists though?

Because they don’t sound like feminists to me.

Accept that transwomen are women?

Why would women who support women's sex based rights, and don't believe in gender identity ideology, do this? It's not a reasonable request.

I'm not refusing to accept it just to be difficult.

I don't it because it isn't true, doesn't make any logical sense unless there is a non-circular definition of the words "woman" and "transwoman", and is objectively damaging to women's sex based rights.

I don't accept it because it isn't true

When I hear that something must be inclusive that often turns out to means it must be seen to do everything and do each of the things in an identical way. I believe that often creates an ineffective blob that descends into internal navel gazing discussion of whose approach should be the one message, which ends up being a bland non-message.

I do feminism in the context of who I am, how old I am, where I live and where I work. I will tackle the issues that I see around me in environment. I understand them, I can affect them, I understand the nuance. It's not about slogans and campaigns it is about changes for the better that I can influence.

I am not able to do that for, say, Hibo's FGM campaigns. I don't have the understanding, experience and influence. I am interested in her work. I donate money to her. You won't hear me campaigning day to day for her cause because I'd be LARPing.

People with shallow knowledge jumping on bandwagons to look inclusive or woke or whatever is damaging to causes in the long run.

If you were to look at my timeline on various SM, listen to my real life conversations, I might seem to be not very "inclusive".

You'd witness me mainly engaging with talking about the things I know and can influence: UK, Ireland, Canada, life as an expat, religion, STEM, representation at board level, gender non-conformity in straight women in the UK, domestic violence, coercive control, social acceptability of the man child, codependency, women's rights in UK law, the long term impact on mothers of giving up work when they have their second child.

You'd see my social circle being maybe 80% white (but mostly not British), mostly fairly well off.

I am not going to start playing white saviour or upper middle class saviour so I can say look how inclusive my feminism is.

So, I will give money to groups on the outer edge of my little world, those who I know enough about to trust. I will disseminate their messages. I will try to understand the pressures they tell me they face in their lives and try to see how it is the same or different to mine.

I will not pretend like I am useful boots on the ground for them. I will not tell them they have to do feminism in the same way as me in my life. Nor will I alter my feminist actions to look like I am "including" their feminism.

Each of us is doing good things appropriate to our sphere of influence and knowledge. I do not believe it is desirable to become a one size fits all blob or to LARP at the oppression of others.

the "feminism" I'm seeing, so that does not mean all, just perhaps the more vocal - appears to be very white middle class biased

Or you could look at it another way ...

It's because MC white feminists had the 'ladder' up, that they can use their privileges (such as they are) make change, to make things better for those who come after them. And the MC white feminists (to coin a stereotype) can look out for making opportunities & space for those women who are not white/MC etc etc.

It's what the aristocratic suffragettes did. They could afford to attend rallies, be imprisoned etc. There are several stories of upper class titled women adopting "ordinary" names, being imprisoned, force-fed etc. They said they did this on behalf of all the women who couldn't - because of having to work etc.

@Ereshkigalangcleg

It's the middle class Libfems who are all about opening prisons and DV shelters to men - the sort of places they'll never find themselves in.

Completely agree. Very magnanimous of them.

This.

I'm now middle class and I've always been white. However I'm also a rape survivor so perhaps that was part of what gave me the push to fight for women's rights.

But as it happens, I've ended up working with families who are far, far less advantaged than I am. If you wanted to use intersectionality in an honest way (not as a trick to shoehorn in some male bodied people) you can see with some of the mothers they are physically, financially and sexually abused and controlled by their partners, discriminated against by our systems (especially when immigration status is an issue), racially abused on the rough estates they are housed on, racially discriminated against and far more at risk during maternity care, traumatised and often with additional needs that are not being met, AND then potentially losing their children or even criminalised for failing to protect their children from the very same abuse that they are still suffering.

These women are far more likely to end up in a prison or to need a shelter than I am. They are less likely to have a voice. They are less likely to understand the new woke language forced upon us that removes reference to women and breaks us into body parts.

One thing I have in common with these women is the need to be able to ask for a female HCP. Everything else I'm fighting for is far more about the needs of women less advantaged than I am.

Would you describe the women making denigrating remarks about your job as feminists though?

Because they don’t sound like feminists to me

Isn't that the infamous "no true Scotsman" argument ?

On another thread you've self- identified, as it were , as a feminist but are complaining on this thread that another poster on the other thread, who presumably from her posting history also self- identifies as a feminist, doesn't agree with you and has no right to disagree with you.