Margaret Atwood

[MummBRaaarrrTheEverLeaking]

twitter.com/MargaretAtwood/status/1450429768067846145?t=8q-A8MlvzZsx6pt4Vu1_LA&s=19

Has retweeted an article from the Toronto Star "why can't we say woman anymore" and bloody hell are they coming for the latest witch burning in the comments!

Ranging from disappointment to the usual sweary abuse. I thought oh how long till the capitulation begins, turns out I didn't have to wait long!

She's following it up with retweets about 'we can say people when it's accurate and inclusive' and then defending the article because the writer isn't "a terf"???

Not really sure what she's trying to achieve here, anyone?

Hmmm. She's still using language like "terfs" and talking about trans rights being human rights.

She's not quite twigged yet that she will forever be a "terf" to a lot of activists - or that "terfs" don't really exist, they're just people who question the narrative even a tiny bit.

I’d say she’s still on the fence…. I think she sees herself as the only reasonable voice in the room atm

Sadly, I think this is true. She’s now working very hard to keep transactivists onside and prove her reasonableness. No idea whether her being doxxed is causing her to backtrack, but I get the impression she’s still thinking there are two extremist viewpoints, and if we all (both sides) could only be kind and work together, it would all be much better. She’s also obviously not understood the UK situation, which is no surprising, given the media situation in Canada that others have referred to on this thread.

@teezletangler

I'm stunned that she has to look up GC. It suggests to me that she is not really aware of this issue. Maybe she genuinely did think JK Rowling is a raging transphobe because she hasn't looked into it before? Or she's playing dumb.

I suspect that up until recently she's obeyed when she's been told not to read stuff written by "TERFs". So genuinely has no idea what the other side of the argument actually is, she's at the stage where she thinks she's the first person to put forward a reasonable argument and if only other women had been less mean and bigoted we'd have got our points across and solved all this. I don't think she's quite reached the stage where she realises that anyone who dares speak up, no matter how reasonably and kindly, will be labelled a witch and burned at the stake.

Well, she’s still throwing it out like it’s an insult... which it is if you don’t know what it means...

Covert messages over the veg like in the Handmaid's Tale, maybe?
Maybe they rearrange the cucumbers and potatoes with a knowing look at each other?

@KittenKong

Well, she’s still throwing it out like it’s an insult... which it is if you don’t know what it means...

Yep. I see lots of tweets telling her not to look up GC, so wonder if she will, or if she'll look it up but only read explanations from "approved" sources.

Just catching up on this. My god.

The problem is what version of GC she is looking up.

A long chat with Maya is needed methinks.

she's at the stage where she thinks she's the first person to put forward a reasonable argument and if only other women had been less mean and bigoted we'd have got our points across and solved all this. I don't think she's quite reached the stage where she realises that anyone who dares speak up, no matter how reasonably and kindly, will be labelled a witch and burned at the stake.

Yup, this is what's happening to individuals constantly, snowballing into swathes of populations.

The address is still up there. God twitter - what the hell?

twitter.com/infiniteecho97/status/1452106799755243526?s=21

“You literally posted an article in which multiple trans women were referred to as men.”

“The op-ed? Not once are trans women referred to as men.”

“Multiple times, actually” shows photo

I don’t even know what to say!

She doesn't get it, does she? I hope she does look up GC. She needs to realise that there's no such thing as a "terf". But she seems to be trying to appease the TRAs more than anything else. It won't work, Margaret! You're on their list now.

There's lots of heavy incentives not to get it, unfortunately

It looks as if she's thinking clearly and explaining herself without being defensive but why she's bothering to appease the likes of these people - who see anything that isn't trans centred as wishing them all dead - is a waste of everyone's energy. See also the silly fool whining to her that there's "no safe spaces for trans people in the UK" etc etc Hysterics.

I think some of them really really believe they're on the cusp of being genocides.

How on earth will they ever come back from this?

I don't know much about the laura Bates book - was there any analysis of the GC / trans perspectives?

She's trying very hard to be a centrist in a binary argument.

When it boils down to science, biology and law, you can't appease both sides.

@WarriorN

She's trying very hard to be a centrist in a binary argument.

When it boils down to science, biology and law, you can't appease both sides.

As a life-long fence sitter, I'm sympathetic - but while she's still happy to accept the thinking that people with GC views are evil t---- who literally want trans people not to exist, she's not quite there is she.

@BraveBananaBadge

It looks as if she's thinking clearly and explaining herself without being defensive but why she's bothering to appease the likes of these people - who see anything that isn't trans centred as wishing them all dead - is a waste of everyone's energy. See also the silly fool whining to her that there's "no safe spaces for trans people in the UK" etc etc Hysterics.

I'm not sure if she gets that the vast, vast, vast majority of 'terfs' are that third side. Women like Germaine Greer, JKR, the lesbian groups who protested Pride in 2018, concerned mothers with long left/liberal histories like so so many of us here, Kathleen Stock, etc. We've been here on this third side, wanting to make things fair and safe for everyone, for years.

@WarriorN

I don't know much about the laura Bates book - was there any analysis of the GC / trans perspectives?

Laura Bates gave a wishy washy response to GC / trans in this mumsnet webchat www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_live_events/4016668-Webchat-with-Laura-Bates-founder-of-the-Everyday-Sexism-Project-and-author-of-Men-Who-Hate-Women-Tuesday-8-September-at-12pm?msgid=99827683#99827683

Absolutely, trancepants

Laura Bates has a huge blind spot on this. I can't believe she can't see the misogyny, she just can't bring herself to acknowledge it.

I don't think she's thinking clearly at all. She tweeted,

So I got attacked for a while from "the other side" for Tweeting pro-trans rights... maybe the two sides should consider their common opponents: those who hate all kinds of women?

That's such a diabolical mischaracterisation of GC voices, as shrieking "TERFs" who were "attacking" her for being "pto-trans rights."

She's using every rhetorical trick in the book to paint herself as reasonable, appease the unappeasable, and still demonise the women who have been fearless enough all along to point out the emperor's lack of clothes.

I find it hard to believe this is the same observant snd sharp-minded woman who wrote The Robber Bride and Alias Grace. Although, come to think of it, she has always adored a female villain...

I'd say she just tried not to kick the hornets nest.
Probably just tried to duck it in order to get her central message out

Sorry ^ talking about Laura Bates there.