Is MH just an echo chamber on FWR?

[NarcissasMumintheDoghouse]

Article in the New Statesman shows women's rights not a voter priority (and elsewhere in the publication they predict Labour would get more votes that the Tories).
sotn.newstatesman.com/2022/03/sotn-what-issues-matter-most-to-voters/

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

In real life, people I know care about the cost of living, the NHS, education, Brexit (particularly as I'm in NI), the recovery post pandemic. I have never met anyone who considers anything to do with transpeople, gender ideology etc a pressing issue. The feminists I know believe TWAW and treat them as such. The few who express doubts about trans rights also have dubious views on those of other ethnicities, LGB people etc.

MN is absolutely an echo chamber.

I think you become an echo chamber if you exclude other viewpoints or pretend they don't exist or pretend that the whole world agrees with you

Twitter or Reddit might be an example of this, where some viewpoints are deleted or the poster banned to prevent discussion or those viewpoints being seen.

I'd say there's evidence right here on the thread that MNetters are perfectly capable of politely disagreeing with each other and explaining why as they put their case.

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

What absolute rot, all opinions are welcome here and we embrace healthy debate.

It's just the TRA's are shown severely lacking when they try 😅😅😅

The few who express doubts about trans rights also have dubious views on those of other ethnicities, LGB people etc.

If you bother to read a few threads on here you'll see that most of us believe that transgender people should have the same rights as everyone else. What we don't believe is that male people are women just because they say they are.

In order for someone to be a 'transwoman', they must be male. A woman is an adult human female, therefore a 'transwoman' (male) is not a woman. People can't change sex.

You have the right to believe that people can change sex, just as you have the right to believe in a flat earth. What you can't do is force others to hold the same beliefs.

@JenniferBarkley

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

In real life, people I know care about the cost of living, the NHS, education, Brexit (particularly as I'm in NI), the recovery post pandemic. I have never met anyone who considers anything to do with transpeople, gender ideology etc a pressing issue. The feminists I know believe TWAW and treat them as such. The few who express doubts about trans rights also have dubious views on those of other ethnicities, LGB people etc.

MN is absolutely an echo chamber.

I know people in real life too. Feminists one and all who are absolutely incensed about what is happening. All left wing. All "right on" in every way possible.

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

Except that's not what happens is it? 'Trans inclusive feminists' are asked to back up their arguments with questions they cannot answer and then they flounce because there is 'no point in engaging'. It happens all the time on here.

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

I take it you include men in this feminism of yours so at what point does a man change into a woman enough to include him in your feminism?

I genuinely would love to know. I'd like you to explain and won't shout you down. I guess asking you this though is in your opinion 'shouting you down' even though I'm asking you to explain?

@AlisonDonut

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

I take it you include men in this feminism of yours so at what point does a man change into a woman enough to include him in your feminism?

I genuinely would love to know. I'd like you to explain and won't shout you down. I guess asking you this though is in your opinion 'shouting you down' even though I'm asking you to explain?

This won't get an answer - I think this is an example of the 'shouting down' that these people always complain about

I have never met anyone who considers anything to do with transpeople, gender ideology etc a pressing issue.

This was said on another thread today too.

How wonderful that you have not met anyone who has a teenager or a young child who is being impacted by this. I have several friends who are deeply impacted for instance, by that potential conversion therapy ban bill. I have many friends who have been impacted because their children are now trans and they are looking frantically for help.

I also have friends whose daughter's are about to move into adult sporting teams or who have to face male competitors in their sports.

I also have quite a few who are involved in Girl Guiding, here and internationally.

While you don't seem to have met anyone, I know many! But, sure. Do also try to shame others for their concern about things that also directly impact their lives, and not just those you mention.

Must be tough to think that women have limited capacity to fight on multiple fronts that posters keep trying to direct us where we should be spending our time. It is a well deployed distractive technique. Look.... there is a squirrel ....

[quote NarcissasMumintheDoghouse]Article in the New Statesman shows women's rights not a voter priority (and elsewhere in the publication they predict Labour would get more votes that the Tories).
sotn.newstatesman.com/2022/03/sotn-what-issues-matter-most-to-voters/[/quote]
I couldn't find the specific survey on the IPSOS site, so I don't know if the questions are open-ended or if respondents pick from a list of topics.

Either way, what the results might actually show is that voters (assuming sample can be statistically generalised) do not prioritise trans rights. Most people are not aware that women's rights are threatened, but they are probably more aware of the current debate about trans rights.

Many journalists write about the latter as if they don't affect the former, so it's difficult to say if voters would prioritise women's rights if they realised they are threatened.

Is anyone else really hacked off with the typo x typos of the title of this thread?

Can the grammar police at @MNHQ please fix it?

I think it should say: "Is Mumsnet just an echo chamber reflecting the views on its FWR Board?"

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

We are interested in a debate. But "trans inclusive feminists" don't like being disagreed with, as if we should pretend they are right so they don't feel "shouted down"

MH should have been MN, sorry.

@ServantofthePeople

Is anyone else really hacked off with the typo x typos of the title of this thread?

Can the grammar police at @MNHQ please fix it?

I think it should say: "Is Mumsnet just an echo chamber reflecting the views on its FWR Board?"

My apologies

This won't get an answer - I think this is an example of the 'shouting down' that these people always complain about smile

Asking people to speak up, in upside down world, is shouting down.

Surely not?

We are interested in a debate. But "trans inclusive feminists" don't like being disagreed with, as if we should pretend they are right so they don't feel "shouted down

Yes. I believe that is what they want.

Like Maya's employer's. They could not phrase Maya's views in any way that they thought was not offensive. We cannot have discussions here that will not make some posters feel 'shouted down' because to simply disagree is to cause hurt.

@JenniferBarkley

Yes, MN is an echo chamber. Trans inclusive feminists are shouted down and don't bother any more as there is no real interest in a debate.

In real life, people I know care about the cost of living, the NHS, education, Brexit (particularly as I'm in NI), the recovery post pandemic. I have never met anyone who considers anything to do with transpeople, gender ideology etc a pressing issue. The feminists I know believe TWAW and treat them as such. The few who express doubts about trans rights also have dubious views on those of other ethnicities, LGB people etc.

MN is absolutely an echo chamber.

What does it mean to be a trans-inclusive feminist?

Take reproductive rights: Once feminism is trans-inclusive, it is not possible to talk about abortion as an issue for women and girls, because that excludes trans men and trans boys and all non-binary female-bodied people. So then it is necessary to talk about reproductive rights as a general issue for 'people.' That would include male-bodied people, too, and so the name for the demographic group for which abortion access matters is erased.

Or take period poverty. For the same reasons as above, it becomes necessary to write about bleeders or menstruators as some who don't identify as women or girls now menstruate. So 'women' and 'girls', once again must be erased.

And so on. It becomes impossible to explain why girls in Afghanistan cannot go to school as the reason is that they belong to a demographic group which the Taliban's extreme interpretation of Islam leaves almost without any rights. But that group would now be just 'people.'

So how would we now write about the sex difference in rape? In the old language, rapists are almost always men or boys (though most men or boyss don't rape), and the majority of their victims are women or girls?

Are we going to say that it is 'people' who rape 'people?" I have been told that the terminology 'pregnant people' is only incorrect if 'cis women' are not people. This would be a similar example, as it is really some penis people who do almost all the raping and they do it predominantly to vulva people. Identities are unlikely to matter here, but once we insist replacing the old biology-based terms with identities, feminism becomes a joke.

We are interested in a debate. But "trans inclusive feminists" don't like being disagreed with, as if we should pretend they are right so they don't feel "shouted down"

I find it more useful to debate practical policy issues than e.g. answering the question 'what is a woman'. I read threads on here with interest but rarely if ever post because of that.

I don't agree with extremes on either side of the issue tbh but I appreciate the fact that I wouldn't know anything about this if it wasn't for the Mumsnet obsession.

This won't get an answer - I think this is an example of the 'shouting down' that these people always complain about smile

Imagine being scared of us meek women

And so on. It becomes impossible to explain why girls in Afghanistan cannot go to school as the reason is that they belong to a demographic group which the Taliban's extreme interpretation of Islam leaves almost without any rights. But that group would now be just 'people.'

Do you have any examples of this happening? Everything I've seen has said girls.

@Aspiringmatriarch

And so on. It becomes impossible to explain why girls in Afghanistan cannot go to school as the reason is that they belong to a demographic group which the Taliban's extreme interpretation of Islam leaves almost without any rights. But that group would now be just 'people.'

Do you have any examples of this happening? Everything I've seen has said girls.

That is because 99% of the world still use the old biology-based definitions. My point is in the word 'becomes', i.e., if we follow the current trend here, the final result will be a feminism which has no terms for quickly describing the victims of sex-based oppression.

All it can do is to describe each specific instance separately (what affects 'birthing individuals' what affects 'pregnant people', what affects 'menstruators' and so on. This disguises the fact that the people here described are roughly the same demographic group which stands in the intersection of several different forms of misogyny and sexism.

My point is in the word 'becomes', i.e., if we follow the current trend here, the final result will be a feminism which has no terms for quickly describing the victims of sex-based oppression.

I understand this is the thinking but I'm not sure it's what's happening to any great extent. It's like with a letter saying "dear parent or guardian", in the majority of instances that would be addressing a parent. And if it was specific to you as a parent then it would say so. So we haven't lost the sense that in most cases children live with their parents due to language that includes those in different circumstances, have we?

Aspiringmatriarch, Laurie Penny recently tweeted this:

Most extremist groups are misogynist, homophobic AND transphobic. The Taliban are no different. Cis women in Afghanistan suffer brutal state oppression and the constant threat of violence. And Trans and gay people in Afghanistan face the death penalty. amp.dw.com/en/trans-in-af…

So there women are turned into 'cis' women.

I agree with you that it is not happening to any great extent yet, but the frequencies of it happening have greatly increased in the last decade (the time I have followed this online).

Your example of a letter to 'a dear parent or guardian' is slightly different, because the two categories do not overlap. When someone writes about menstruation, say, as an issue for 'women, trans men, and non-binary people' that construction would mean that the three mentioned groups also don't overlap.

But they do if most in the 'women' category define themselves on a biological basis. The new formulation denies that this is happening and turns all the genders into identities which are not based on biological sex. As a consequence, there is then no word for the biological sex to which all menstruators actually belong.

Took 3 pages to get to the question.

The answer is no.

@Nancydrawn thanks for the information