Jenni Murray: What is the point of women in Parliament if they're too scared to say what a woman is?

[Abitofalark]

Good question, Jenni.

She has written a blistering piece in the Daily Mail expressing her bafflement at the Dodds, Cooper, Sturgeon trio and hands them a lesson in history of women's struggle: "Why then do female politicians, who owe their place in the corridors of power thanks to the efforts of thousands of women who campaigned for their rights, appear unable to define what and who they are?"

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-10600455/JENNI-MURRAY-point-women-Parliament-theyre-scared-say-woman-is.html

There's also an amusing coda to the piece, in which various female writers give their definition of what a woman is.

Who shall answer Jenni's question and call to arms? Not those three, nor her old radio programme either.

I'm going to email my MP and ask her if she'd be willing to say what a woman is, in Parliament. If I get an answer I'll get back.

Brilliant by Jenni.
D Thomas was married to a woman and fathered children before transitioning in middle age so is an example of why transwomen are transwomen and have different experiences. D Thomas proves Jenni's point

Absolutely re liz Jones. My bf is a film and comic fan boy and can chat about Batman till the cows come home. My late dh was a massive gossip who rang his mum for a long chat every day.

Delighted to have it confirmed that Jenni left because reporting a GC pov was deemed unacceptable by the BBC. I've never known quite what to think about Jane Garvey, but she seems to have gone along with it and showed sod-all sympathy to the GC women she interviewed.

When is the inquiry into how the BBC was taken over by a political dogma that is damaging to half the population going to start? We need it now. We need Jenni and Justin from Today and Emily Maitliss to be up there telling us who axed the articles questioning trans ideology. Who prevented them from reporting what urgently needed to be reported?

@IcakethereforeIam

I'm going to email my MP and ask her if she'd be willing to say what a woman is, in Parliament. If I get an answer I'll get back.

Actually, I may ask my rather pompous, yet known for table dancing, male MP if he will too.

Jenni was brilliant. The definitions underneath looked more like they were defining women by their male-ascribed functions or designed to titillate their masters.

@Pluvia

Delighted to have it confirmed that Jenni left because reporting a GC pov was deemed unacceptable by the BBC. I've never known quite what to think about Jane Garvey, but she seems to have gone along with it and showed sod-all sympathy to the GC women she interviewed.

When is the inquiry into how the BBC was taken over by a political dogma that is damaging to half the population going to start? We need it now. We need Jenni and Justin from Today and Emily Maitliss to be up there telling us who axed the articles questioning trans ideology. Who prevented them from reporting what urgently needed to be reported?

We need Jenni and Justin from Today and Emily Maitliss to be up there telling us who axed the articles questioning trans ideology. Who prevented them from reporting what urgently needed to be reported?

I wonder if Emily Maitlis will have more freedom to speak now that she is leaving the BBC. I thought she did very well on trans issues on Newsnight on the whole, but obviously still constrained by the BBC in many ways and could not be as active on Twitter as she used to be. Still, it is a shame to lose someone like that, as Newsnight at least used to provide decent, in-depth coverage that got some of the issues across, unlike the brief headlines on the other news, the apps etc.

Perhaps we should all ask our MPs, what's a woman, would you be willing to say that in Parliament/public.

Going to see The Batman tonight. Must remember not to enjoy the action sequences or the plot of the gadgets and focus on the costumes and swooning over a young man I am old enough to have given birth to. In fact I'm probably old enough to be his granny. Am I not doing woman right again?

There's also an amusing coda to the piece, in which various female writers give their definition of what a woman is.

And there's some proper cringeworthy rubbish in there.

This little gem doesn't appear below Jenni Murray's (very excellent) DM article, but presumably it's an answer to the same question and I thought it deserved a little airing here (having spotted it on Jean Hatchett's twitter.)

Richard 'Alan Partridge' Madeley airs his immense expertise on the tricky issue of what is a woman. I think this clears it up once and for all - we can all stand down and go back to cleaning the bathroom now laydees. (Only us xx chromosome laydees, obviously. The interesting xy ones are going out to toss their hair and simper at lovely inclusive chaps like Richard in wine bars.)

mobile.twitter.com/JeanHatchet/status/1502183131247489025/photo/1

The replies from Milli Hill and Emma Hilton are a joy.

DOROTHY BYRNE

President of Murray Edwards College, Cambridge University

A woman is a troublemaker who never does what a man tells her to do. And I believe a woman is a person who self-identifies as a woman.

——

Toe the party line, academia.
FFS.

WinterTrees - the truly cringeworthy definition of 'woman' from Richard Madeley was at the bottom of a very good article by Suzanne Moore in yesterday's Telegraph

www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/did-woman-become-hardest-word-define/

It's behind a paywall but may have been archived.

This woman in Parliament was willing to say it Jenni!

Dorothy Byrne, a woman never does what a man tell her to do, TWAW.

Is this irony....serious question?

Okay so my definition might be: A woman is a genetic female characterised by a womb, breasts and a vagina. A very small number of women are born into the wrong body as men and then transition. Do you think this would cover it?

Yes Dorothy. A woman never does what a man tells her to do! Unless he’s telling her to agree that he is a woman and must be allowed access to all women-only spaces and services. Then she must acquiesce immediately or else she is a hateful bigot.

@Brainwave89

Okay so my definition might be: A woman is a genetic female characterised by a womb, breasts and a vagina. A very small number of women are born into the wrong body as men and then transition. Do you think this would cover it?

the female/ male brain theory was debunked years ago and is as bad as eugenics.

@Brainwave89

Okay so my definition might be: A woman is a genetic female characterised by a womb, breasts and a vagina. A very small number of women are born into the wrong body as men and then transition. Do you think this would cover it?

What does being born into the wrong body mean?

What are they transitioning from and to?

@Brainwave89

Okay so my definition might be: A woman is a genetic female characterised by a womb, breasts and a vagina. A very small number of women are born into the wrong body as men and then transition. Do you think this would cover it?

Nope.

A woman is genetically female, XX chromsomes, the half of the human race that bears children. A woman is an adult human female and can be any damned thing she wants to be, except for being male. Just as no male can be female.

Ah I love the "born in the wrong body" nonsense

It's like some people think we are like the beginning of Soul, and some get dumped in the wrong flesh suit. You are your body, you can't be in the wrong body. Are disabled people in the wrong body? Could they identify out of that?

Of course not. Don't be so stupid

To be fair, it hasn't been all that long since "Born in the wrong body" was just a kind way of saying that someone wanted to be seen as male or female. We accepted it as a euphemism for decades. It's only the current bobbinsness that insists it is, and then again is not, literal!

@Brainwave89

Okay so my definition might be: A woman is a genetic female characterised by a womb, breasts and a vagina. A very small number of women are born into the wrong body as men and then transition. Do you think this would cover it?

But your brain is your body.

If you are born into the wrong body, you therefore must have been born into the wrong brain too because every cell of that organ is coded with your biological sex.

As your brain controls all your sensations, your movements, your behaviour, and produces your thoughts, any sensations of dysphoria are a product of that biological sex-coded brain. If you are biologically male, they are male brain thoughts. If you are biologically female, they are female brain thoughts.

A transwoman's dysphora is the product of a biologically male brain. A transman's dysphora is the product of a biologically female brain. There is nothing outside of this physiological system that is sexed differently.

The only way to make the concept of being born into the wrong body make sense is if you either start advocating for the existence of the soul, which is a religious belief, or you talk about personality -- and we don't make laws on the basis of people's personalities.

Transgenderism is fundamentally a phenomenon where someone wishes to present, behave and be treated as an individual of the opposite sex because they believe themselves to be so -- but that belief is religious. You have to believe that there is something about the self that is "other" to the physical body and its mechanisms, and the "other" is somehow sexed in an opposite way. However, if this "other" has no material, physical existence, it cannot be sexed at all for it has no cells by which to sex it.

Asking people to accept these beliefs and their impact upon public and civic space is comparable to demanding that everyone convert to your religion.

I think I was born into the wrong body. I'm sure I was supposed to be born a koala.