How to deal with writing group's lack of support for my GC feminism.

[JennieLee]

I've been in a writing group for over a decade.

In my region it has a reasonably high profile and features a number of published authors. I am one of them. (Small press stuff. Nothing major.) There is supposed to be an equal balance of male and female members.

I'd noted a shift towards the terminology of gender identity politics in recent years. For example a lot of a discussion as to whether someone's character - who was very shy - could be described as asexual.

We're mainly white and most people are middle-aged or older. We had a discussion about trying to broaden/diversify members and in that context a woman (about my age, lesbian) suggested in email that we tried to recruit non-binary' members.

I sent a reply stating bluntly that I didn't believe people were non-binary. There were two sexes and those who identified as NB were self-obsessed and in the grip of a reactionary ideology. I gave the example of a friend's daughter who identifies as non-binary because she likes make-up but is studying engineering - and wants her mother to use they/them pronouns.

The person who wanted non-binary members said I was being anti-gay and ridiculous. She also mistakenly added an invitation to a young, straight, black guy - straight, middle-class academic. Being called ridiculous upset me so I asked the people in charge of running the group for a bit of support that my position was not ridiculous. This failed to arrive.

Meantime the new invitee said he couldn't possibly join the group having read my email. It wouldn't be a safe space for him. I emailed him and said that it was a pity an informal discussion had been forwarded to him. My views were personal ones, not that of the group and that I would welcome any new member and their writing, regardless of my personal views on gender identity.

He wouldn't budge - and at this point I felt the fact that no one in my group was willing to join in the discussion - I absolutely didn't expect people to agree with me but thought we should look at the issues - meant I should resign.

But somewhere it grieves me, because I felt these people were friends and would want to carry on the conversation. I also felt that as writers they would care about language, and want to weigh up ideas.

Any thoughts? Any advice? I have vaguely wondered about trying to set up an online writing group for GC women.

Maybe you might become a bit more open minded...

This always reminds me of the late, great Magdalen Berns....

I'm glad you got called out. Sad that you seem completely unable to reflect on your actions.

“Mistakenly added an invitation to a young, straight black guy”

Why was this a mistake??

@Conniethesensible

“Mistakenly added an invitation to a young, straight black guy”

Why was this a mistake??

She means that the exchange she was part of was added to the invitation.

I think there are two separate things here that some people are conflating in their replies:

(1) who is welcome to participate in the group
(2) how to meet the perceived need to increase diversity within the group.

You were weighing in on strategy for increasing diversity, which is not the same thing as gatekeeping or censoring or barring certain groups or individuals from entry.

There may be differences of opinion within the group about what’s missing: is it diversity of experience and background, or diversity of personality/opinion, or both? That’s a discussion worth having before you pick out specific groups or characteristics to focus on. Realistically, in the UK, most people and almost all women fit the Stonewall definition of non binary. If you set out to include established or talented beginning authors in your area who are non binary, you’ll likely get much of the same demographic that you already have - white, British, middle class - although you may attract a younger group and more women than men.

This doesn’t mean that a non binary person - or anyone else - from a similar background to the majority of your group wouldn’t be welcome and couldn’t be an asset to the group, but the discussion was about increasing diversity. Personally, I’d probably have left the non binary idea alone and suggested some other demographics to target; or ways to get the group more visibility among diverse demographics. Ideally there would have been many suggestions and only a need to speak up if the group as a whole decided to put their efforts into recruiting non binary people only.

I can see how the person who made the suggestion might feel singled out and even attacked, although she didn’t help the situation by attacking back with her own questionable and also slightly homophobic argument. It sounds like the leaders of the group are keeping out of it and probably would have been happier without either your or the other member’s comments. They’re also probably unhappy that the prospective member was cc’d on an internal email.

Have you been asked to resign? If not, I wouldn’t do so as a result of this situation, at least not without giving it a bit more time and thought. The potential new member feels the group’s not for him; he’s made his choice. Also - and I say this as a person diagnosed with trauma and having been through the difficult process of getting it (mostly) under control - if he genuinely feels unsafe in the group based on your email (I’m not sure if you meet in person or virtually at the moment, but either way I doubt he’d be in much danger) he may not find any rigorous and worthwhile writing group a good place for him at this time. And I may be overly vigilant, but this claim of being unsafe with individuals who don’t actually pose a threat is an established tactic now for writers with a new book launching, so I’d be wary of that as well if this individual is even still in the picture. He may be planning to complain publicly about the group at some convenient (for him) time.

I’d privately take this whole situation as a prompt to re-evaluate your own participation. Are you still getting a lot out of the group, this last episode aside? Is staying in something that’s important for you professionally? Do you normally feel unsupported or an outlier, or is it just this one incident? And is starting/leading your own group something you’d otherwise want to do or have time to do?

Definitely be graceful about any departure, there are likely people in the group you’d like to keep in touch with or at least remain cordial if you run across them in the future. If you feel you have unfinished business with the person who called you ridiculous, I’d try to discuss it with her one on one rather than with the whole group/via group email.

Given that sex is binary - we are all either female or male - it is absurd to suggest we should invite writers who are neither male nor female to join us. That is the bottom line.
Many people today believe otherwise, including Im sure some talented writers. I don’t, but I also see how it would be very beneficial to a writer to listen more and accuse less to get a wider perspective on the range of people out there to be better able to write the world.

You were weighing in on strategy for increasing diversity, which is not the same thing as gatekeeping or censoring or barring certain groups or individuals from entry.

I think the problem was, the OP was meant to be talking about the former, but instead seemed to be talking about the latter, saying that NB people were annoying, illogical, and self-obsessed.

If she'd just said that she didn't think that would increase real diversity, or that inviting people because of their diverse characteristics seemed distastful, she might have had less of a problem.

yeah, i don't think you handled it brilliantly op, sorry, and i cant believe you're genuinely upset about the word'ridiculous'

nevertheless i agree with you-
'lets make this group more diverse- lets invite someone who imagines they're not male or female'

of all the things to increase diversity- disability, class, race, sexuality, their first choice was someone with identity delusions?

and i disagree with pps that the belief is as benign as star-signs. framing everyone else as in a gender binary consolidates stupid stereotypes.

i think a half apology note would be a good thing here.

I agree with Helmet and CharleyParley.

You need to apologise for the generalisation and then talk about what is lacking in the group in terms of diversity.

I am sure this can be worked through with a bit of care.

I don't think you need to apologise for your views, just be a bit more tactical.

And obviously you are completely right in your admiration for the great Magdalen Berns.