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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Mridul Wadwha and the thought police

465 replies

IamSarah · 03/02/2022 17:58

Great article in Spiked Online about Mridul Wadwha's latest shenanigans:

www.spiked-online.com/2022/02/01/the-thought-police-are-here/

To briefly summarise:

  • Mridul was born male
  • Mridul is legally male with no GRC
  • Mridul is the CEO of Edinburgh Rape crisis
  • Mridul claims women who want female only rape crisis services are bigoted and should 'reframe their trauma'
  • The CEO of a domestic violence charity Nicola Murray stopped referring women to Mridul's rape crisis service due to Mridul's misogyny
  • Mridul reported Nicola Murray to the police for committing a hate crime
  • The police actually visited Nicola Murray to question her thinking
OP posts:
Thread gallery
6
barleybadminton · 06/02/2022 11:15

@N0Name

Perhaps if we all repeat it until it is answered?

What kind of mind can deny that right to request a female examiner to a shaking, traumatised woman on the worst day of her life when that person is also the CEO of a rape crisis centre?

Society does that to women. 40% of investigations are carried out by men because of a lack of female investigators. That's the real issue - that's what organisatoons working with rape survivors wanted the debate to be about and that's why they were angry that it was hijacked and turned into yet another proxy war on the 'trans issue' and hypothetical but currently non-existent trans examiners. As I said, I'd have paid it no heed personally and let them have the amendment but I understand the frustration of groups like Rape Crisis Scotland and their anger at the damage that the gender critical movement is doing to organisations which work with survivors of sexual violence.
334bu · 06/02/2022 11:17

Society does that to women. 40% of investigations are carried out by men because of a lack of female investigators. That's the real issue - that's what organisatoons working with rape survivors wanted the debate to be about and that's why they were angry that it was hijacked and turned into yet another proxy war on the 'trans issue' and hypothetical but currently non-existent trans examiners. As I said, I'd have paid it no heed personally and let them have the amendment but I understand the frustration of groups like Rape Crisis Scotland and their anger at the damage that the gender critical movement is doing to organisations which work with survivors of sexual violence.

Bullshit.

barleybadminton · 06/02/2022 11:20

[quote vivariumvivariumsvivaria]So, what now? Mridul's partner is part of Sarco? Who get funding from the government to run refuges in Lanarkshire, as long as they accept male people? Which is why the single sex refuges in Lanarkshire shut down.

Gosh.

grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/mridrul-wadha-sacro-and-the-14-million[/quote]
Blaming a woman for the actions of her husband now? How very feminist.

Except we don't actually know if it is her husband. And he left around the time the contract was awarded so wouldn't personally benefit. He might even have left because he disagreed with it. But none of that matters because establishing the fact seems to be of little importance when rumours and incomplete information can be used to attack a trans woman.

334bu · 06/02/2022 11:20

If they had wanted to centre the lack of female examiner's they would have demanded that the word sex was used and not gender and thus kept the focus on what is wrong with the system.

Monitaurus · 06/02/2022 11:28

What is the complete information you would like us to knowBarley? Frankly we have heard enough to be able to say with certainty that it is not the gender critical movement that is doing damage to our women’s sex specific services. How dare you.

Monitaurus · 06/02/2022 11:29

And MW is not nor has ever been a woman

Helleofabore · 06/02/2022 11:38

That's the real issue - that's what organisatoons working with rape survivors wanted the debate to be about

Please link up where this debate has been pushed for outside of the discussion on this bill. Please link up the numerous discussions had outside parliament by people like the CEO of Edinburgh rape crisis centre about the push to have more female medical examiners that has been across mainstream media.

Or was it used as a tactic to silence Johann Lamont and others discussing the future negative implications of a bill. Knowing that this would be an issue before long. Particularly when transitioned males have taken roles stated clearly were meant for women already.

and that's why they were angry that it was hijacked and turned into yet another proxy war on the 'trans issue' and hypothetical but currently non-existent trans examiners.

You still haven’t said why anyone who is professing to care for females would not support clarity of intention for a poorly written piece of legislation? Regardless of who suggested the tightening of the language.

And by the way, debating a bill before it is passed means debating EVERY aspect and implication of the bill. Only someone so entrenched in their political agenda that conflicts with that of protecting females would continue to assert that a debate was hijacked when it did in fact mean a bill that was clear in its intention.

Only someone who doesn’t support females having clear laws to protect their interests would continue to attempt to minimise the effect of having such ambiguity.

I look forward to the links of the very loud campaigning done to get more female medical examiners by Mridul Wadhwa. Or maybe some people believe the only place that discussion should be had was in parliament at that particular moment. And that all discussion should have been on that issue and nothing else discussed.

Ie. Force only discussion on that aspect of the legislation (that could be discussed far and wide before, during and after the bill passed) and allow ambiguity to be left in the bill because any discussion of that aspect was hateful. Of course, only a fool would think that the discussion about tightening the language to make it robust could be had AFTER the bill had passed.

But nice distraction tactics.

Look!!! A squirrel!!!

What kind of mind can deny that right to request a female examiner to a shaking, traumatised woman on the worst day of her life when that person is also the CEO of a rape crisis centre?

Waitwhat23 · 06/02/2022 11:41

'Wadhwa claimed in the podcast that those worried about policy at local centres should “reach out to them and ask those questions”. Yet, what happens when the women are told that they cannot be guaranteed female support? In advance of the Forensic Medical Services (FMS) Bill debate and Johann Lamont’s amendment to ensure that survivors could request the sex of the examiner, Mandy Rhodes of Holyrood Magazinewrote“Last night I spent an hour on the phone with a heartbroken mother of a girl who was raped by a number of teenage boys and who did not get the support she needed because she was told that a woman counsellor could not be guaranteed. She developed PTSD.” As one woman who attended a meeting with the CEO of RCSwrote: “We reached out to be told that TW are not only women, but female too. The damage that meeting caused us. For so very long. The woman who should have helped us rode all over us. For men. And a fucked up belief in queer theory. What utter bastards. The lot of them.” Why is it so difficult in services that,accordingto Wadhwa, were “set up with the blood, sweat, and tears of women” and whose “workforce is reserved for women only” to guarantee that a female will be a counsellor if needed?

The reaction of the service to the FMS Bill amendment explained much. The amendment was so small, yet so significant. It was born from the single most important request of the survivors, that they be allowed to request (in the understanding that it might not be guaranteed) the sex of a medical examiner. Surely, we thought, this was such an easy but important way to grant survivors a measure of autonomy and a reassertion of control over their bodies? The reaction of RCS was to fight it. Theyclaimedit was irrelevant, that no examiners were trans so it was immaterial, that it would never be an issue, that more important things were at stake. Perhaps. But if so irrelevant, why not concede a small but vital piece of reassurance? Because, of course, it wasn’t. Because to campaigners like Wadhwa this was, again, a denial of womanhood of those who chose to self-identify into it. Wadhwa’s reaction to the passing of the amendment was to leave the SNP and join Patrick Harvie’s Scottish Greens, a party who – with the honourable exception of Andy Wighman – hadrefusedto sign motions condemning violence against women.'

From this piece - forwomen.scot/10/08/2021/the-real-crisis-at-rape-crisis-scotland/

Goatsaregreat · 06/02/2022 11:49

BINGO - again.

their anger at the damage that the gender critical movement is doing to organisations which work with survivors of sexual violence

Classic example of DARVO right there!

What kind of mind can deny that right to request a female examiner to a shaking, traumatised woman on the worst day of her life when that person is also the CEO of a rape crisis centre?

vivariumvivariumsvivaria · 06/02/2022 11:57

This reply has been deleted

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barleybadminton · 06/02/2022 11:58

@Monitaurus

What is the complete information you would like us to knowBarley? Frankly we have heard enough to be able to say with certainty that it is not the gender critical movement that is doing damage to our women’s sex specific services. How dare you.
It might be convenient for you to believe that's not the case but it is true unfortunately. Talk to anyone who actually works in the sector and they will tell you that funding, not trans women is the biggest problem facing VAWG organisations - and efforts to raise funds are being hampered because of gender critical abuse. They can't use social media properly to get there message out because of the relentless abuse, their reputations and the work they do is being repeatedly slandered based on misinformation and rumours and worst of all an entirely false picture of what's going on is being presented which is likely to prevent some women from seeking the help they need. And I cannot imagine what it is doing to staff morale, who do some of the hardest work in society - work that takes a real emotional toll - to see their colleagues and the organisations they work for accused of being misogynists and rape enablers by people whose only contribution to actually helping survivors of sexual violence seems to be abusing trans women on twitter.

And for what? Because as caring and compassionate workers they don't want to have to turn away someone who has been raped and desperately needs support on the grounds she is trans. They don't want to be forced to ask a shaking, traumatised woman intrusive questions about her gentials should someone who looks like Mridul present as a service user rather than a worker. And they know, because they actually do this work, that the number of trans women presenting for help is tiny and is not impacting on other service delivery.

Even if you disagree with their policies it is unconscionable the way some people are behaving towards some VAWG organisations on social media and it is causing real damage to the sector - and now a bunch of right wing men have joined in who are often celebrated and encouraged by so-called feminists it is even worse.

vivariumvivariumsvivaria · 06/02/2022 12:00

[quote Waitwhat23]'Wadhwa claimed in the podcast that those worried about policy at local centres should “reach out to them and ask those questions”. Yet, what happens when the women are told that they cannot be guaranteed female support? In advance of the Forensic Medical Services (FMS) Bill debate and Johann Lamont’s amendment to ensure that survivors could request the sex of the examiner, Mandy Rhodes of Holyrood Magazinewrote“Last night I spent an hour on the phone with a heartbroken mother of a girl who was raped by a number of teenage boys and who did not get the support she needed because she was told that a woman counsellor could not be guaranteed. She developed PTSD.” As one woman who attended a meeting with the CEO of RCSwrote: “We reached out to be told that TW are not only women, but female too. The damage that meeting caused us. For so very long. The woman who should have helped us rode all over us. For men. And a fucked up belief in queer theory. What utter bastards. The lot of them.” Why is it so difficult in services that,accordingto Wadhwa, were “set up with the blood, sweat, and tears of women” and whose “workforce is reserved for women only” to guarantee that a female will be a counsellor if needed?

The reaction of the service to the FMS Bill amendment explained much. The amendment was so small, yet so significant. It was born from the single most important request of the survivors, that they be allowed to request (in the understanding that it might not be guaranteed) the sex of a medical examiner. Surely, we thought, this was such an easy but important way to grant survivors a measure of autonomy and a reassertion of control over their bodies? The reaction of RCS was to fight it. Theyclaimedit was irrelevant, that no examiners were trans so it was immaterial, that it would never be an issue, that more important things were at stake. Perhaps. But if so irrelevant, why not concede a small but vital piece of reassurance? Because, of course, it wasn’t. Because to campaigners like Wadhwa this was, again, a denial of womanhood of those who chose to self-identify into it. Wadhwa’s reaction to the passing of the amendment was to leave the SNP and join Patrick Harvie’s Scottish Greens, a party who – with the honourable exception of Andy Wighman – hadrefusedto sign motions condemning violence against women.'

From this piece - forwomen.scot/10/08/2021/the-real-crisis-at-rape-crisis-scotland/[/quote]
@Waitwhat23 I remember the Olden Days when it was all fields round here and the Green Party were interested in fields.

Why on earth are they so focussed on trans issues?

OldCrone · 06/02/2022 12:13

Talk to anyone who actually works in the sector and they will tell you that funding, not trans women is the biggest problem facing VAWG organisations - and efforts to raise funds are being hampered because of gender critical abuse.

I'm pretty sure there are women on here who work, or who have worked in this sector, and they disagree with you. So you don't mean 'talk to anyone who actually works in the sector', you want us to talk to someone who agrees with you, even if their own experience is different.

And what is this 'gender critical abuse'? Can you give examples? Or is it that gender critical feminists are raising awareness that these organisations which used to be exclusively for women and girls are now also for any male who wants to use them and therefore exclude women who need a single-sex environment?

OldCrone · 06/02/2022 12:18

as caring and compassionate workers they don't want to have to turn away someone who has been raped and desperately needs support on the grounds she is trans. They don't want to be forced to ask a shaking, traumatised woman intrusive questions about her gentials should someone who looks like Mridul present as a service user rather than a worker.

So fundraise for your own trans organisations to help transgender people. Then when the women's organisations are contacted by such a person they can be directed to a specific trans organisation which will be able to help transgender people who have been raped. Wadwha could help to set this up.

And they know, because they actually do this work, that the number of trans women presenting for help is tiny and is not impacting on other service delivery.

A tiny number. And how many women does each of this 'tiny number' of transgender people affect if they are allowed to use services which are supposed to be for women?

Goatsaregreat · 06/02/2022 12:18

Good grief, yet more DARVO.

Even if you disagree with their policies it is unconscionable the way some people are behaving towards some VAWG organisations on social media and it is causing real damage to the sector - and now a bunch of right wing men have joined in who are often celebrated and encouraged by so-called feminists it is even worse

It's not gc women issuing rape / death threats, bawling outside women's meetings, issuing threats of sexual abuse at women speaking out. It's not women trying to dismantle services / resources for women and to centre men in them. Thank heavens for women and men courageous enough to stand up and speak out about the dangers all this poses to women and girls.

Helleofabore · 06/02/2022 12:30

I'm pretty sure there are women on here who work, or who have worked in this sector, and they disagree with you. So you don't mean 'talk to anyone who actually works in the sector', you want us to talk to someone who agrees with you, even if their own experience is different.

I suspect OldCrone that this exactly like the tactic barely uses for the point of view from 'working class women' they continue to progress. Like a self-appointed spokesperson, because.... they know a few working class women.

Being a working class woman (by UK standards it seems) and coming from a whole family of working class women (by any standards), I have to laugh at barely's constant attempts to speak for me and my family and the majority of the women I grew up with.

However, they feel compelled to continue because they think they are 'on to something' and have a method to shame any woman who disagrees with barely.

barleybadminton · 06/02/2022 12:33

So fundraise for your own trans organisations to help transgender people. Then when the women's organisations are contacted by such a person they can be directed to a specific trans organisation which will be able to help transgender people who have been raped. Wadwha could help to set this up.

Edinburgh Rape Crisis worked with just over 650 women in their most recent recorded period. Even if we take the highest possible estimate of trans people in the population that would translate to 6/7 trans women a year - in reality it's probably one or two. It would be impossible to set up a project with such small numbers and ludicrous to divert funding, resources and skilled workers away from the VAWG sector to do so when those women can be accommodated within the existing sector and this is not causing any problems according to staff on the ground.

billydilly · 06/02/2022 12:36

I work in this sector. We have to interact with male-bodied people or we lose funding. Not one of my colleagues wants this situation but we do vital work so we grit our teeth and carry on. It's nightmarish.

Deliriumoftheendless · 06/02/2022 12:36

Single sex services doesn’t mean transwomen shouldn’t get services- it means services for transwomen and other men separate from women. Or mixed plus single sex.

Helleofabore · 06/02/2022 12:37

It's not gc women issuing rape / death threats, bawling outside women's meetings, issuing threats of sexual abuse at women speaking out. It's not women trying to dismantle services / resources for women and to centre men in them. Thank heavens for women and men courageous enough to stand up and speak out about the dangers all this poses to women and girls.

I believe that people regard pushing for answers as abuse.

Goatsaregreat · 06/02/2022 12:37

The power of this miniscule % of the population to dismantle so many of our existing safeguarding structures and resources aimed at vulnerable women and girls is at time breathtaking - until one remembers the toxic power of the patriarchy .

Helleofabore · 06/02/2022 12:38

@Deliriumoftheendless

Single sex services doesn’t mean transwomen shouldn’t get services- it means services for transwomen and other men separate from women. Or mixed plus single sex.
Shhh... Delirium! You are speaking the truth that is inconvenient to some posters on this thread who are pushing the old 'all or nothing' scenario.
RoaringtoLangClegintheDark · 06/02/2022 12:42

When the GRA was passed, it was meant to cater for a tiny minority of people, around 5,000, and about a third of them biologically female. So only about 3,333 biologically male people involved.

Some foresighted people raised objections at the time. These were waved away, and one of the (supposed) justifications for so doing was the tiny numbers involved, how the numbers of biologically male trans people were too small to have any impact on the day to day lives of women.

Fast forward less than two decades and look where we are now. Exponentially greater numbers of biologically male people identifying as trans and demanding access to women’s spaces and services, most of them still clearly and visibly male. The impact on women grows daily, from the shift to “gender neutral” toilets that most women really, really don’t want, to the lack of single sex provision for rape survivors, with so much else in between. The landscape has shifted in ways that weren’t imagined by the lawmakers at the time, and everybody on every side of this issue knows this.

And yet, despite this clear and obvious precedent, we are supposed to believe that we can trust trans rights activists when they say that because there are currently no biologically male people who “identify as” female working as medical examiners, that means there never will be at some point in the future?

It’s preposterous and absolutely mired in misogyny. Women don’t have the right to ask for a cast iron safeguard that female means female, for their peace of mind, because it makes some male people feel bad. Women’s needs are on a scale of priority many orders lower than male people’s feelings.

Oh barley. Are you so convinced of your moral rectitude that you really don’t see how you give yourself away with every post you make? Haranguing women over and over again for our supposed misdemeanours, whether “transphobia” or racism or whatever other mud you want to sling at us, all the while so blithely, supremely ignorant of the crushing weight of bigotry that informs every single one of your views?

You are not a crusader against oppression. You are the oppressor. You are actively perpetuating the oldest, most deeply rooted form of oppression there is: that of the female sex by the male sex. You want to curb our human rights, our right to name and organise against our oppression; you want to demonise and criminalise us for standing up against the endemic abuse we suffer.

You are the apartheid government calling the ANC “terrorists”. You are the fat cat bosses banning trades unions. You are the white supremacist demanding black people sit at the back of the bus. [All these are analogies, just for the sake of clarity. I’m not suggesting you actually would have sided against Rosa Parks, just that you are, perhaps unwittingly, on a par with those who did, in your role in the sex-based axis of oppression.] You want us outlawed, prevented from organising, confined to the back of the bus.

Perhaps that’s why you’re so inexplicably, shockingly bristling with rage at us. Perhaps because you know deep down that what you’re doing doesn’t sit well with your supposed world view, your supposed image of yourself as a noble warrior on the side of social justice and freedom.

Perhaps that’s why you hate us so much, because in speaking truth we reveal to you the truly viscerally unpleasant, unjust, male supremacist oppressor side of your nature, a side you really don’t want to acknowledge, don’t want to have to deal with the existence of. Far easier to demonise the women who show up your failings than address those awkward, embarrassing failings, that sit so badly with the image you want to present to the world, and to yourself.

How tragic to think yourself a strident voice in the movement for social progress, only to be actually on a par with those fine men of the Spanish Inquisition and their determination to root out “heresy” (in terms of attitude only, obviously; not the torturing and murdering part, again, just to be clear).

Men/male people like you hate women because we are a constant reminder of your own lack of humanity towards us. You hate us particularly when we challenge you by wanting to be seen as full human beings, in the face of your desire to treat us as service humans, or subhumans. So you scapegoat us, just as men have been doing since the myths of Eve and Pandora were created. Tell us we’re the problem to make yourself feel better about your own appalling treatment of us.

You might con yourself, barley, but you don’t con us.

VestofAbsurdity · 06/02/2022 12:47

@barleybadminton

So fundraise for your own trans organisations to help transgender people. Then when the women's organisations are contacted by such a person they can be directed to a specific trans organisation which will be able to help transgender people who have been raped. Wadwha could help to set this up.

Edinburgh Rape Crisis worked with just over 650 women in their most recent recorded period. Even if we take the highest possible estimate of trans people in the population that would translate to 6/7 trans women a year - in reality it's probably one or two. It would be impossible to set up a project with such small numbers and ludicrous to divert funding, resources and skilled workers away from the VAWG sector to do so when those women can be accommodated within the existing sector and this is not causing any problems according to staff on the ground.

Oh get real barley, VAWG sector is refused funding unless they include males, this has a detrimental effect on the women who need access to these services as the OP of this thread bears witness to.

A poster on here a while ago was trying to flee her abusive situation at home and when she rang for help was greeted by a male voice on the end of the telephone so hung up and stayed where she was with her abuser.

Don't come on here spouting that including males in VAWG services has no detrimental effect on the women who need those services, it does, there have been many examples already on this thread which you chose to ignore.

Staff of those centres also post anonymously on here and report that it is causing problems, again you chose to ignore this. There is one poster who works in this sector that has managed to hold the line and keep the service women only but has constant battles to do so, you know this you have read this posters contributions.

Your dismissal of the women who need and the women who work in these services says all we need to know about your utter contempt for women at the worst and most difficult times of their lives.

VestofAbsurdity · 06/02/2022 12:53

Excellent post RoaringtoLangClegintheDark.