Backlash against female only rape crisis groups

[IamSarah]

This article in The Critic discusses the backlash to my legal challenge. Very grateful to Victoria Smith for highlighting the misogyny female rape survivors face from some 'feminists'

thecritic.co.uk/spaces-of-our-own/

Very good article

Really good article. Very clear and very powerful.

I'm so sorry to read about your case and what you are dealing with. These people have totally lost their minds and humanity. I'm so sorry.

The abuse I experienced as a child lasted until I hit puberty. In my early fifties now and I still avoid sitting next to (or being alone with) men I don't know well if I can. It's not even a conscious thought just something I do. You wouldn't know it on sight, I'm very outgoing but trauma, sexual trauma, echoes on. X

Thank you Sarah, what a brilliant piece. You have my wholehearted support.

Excellent article.

It's horrible that you are getting abuse. If it helps, it only reveals the horrible, limiting sickness at the heart of so much of the current orthodoxies. Women are allowed to be sex objects; smiling, always supportive mothers; cheerleaders.

We are not to talk out of turn. We are not to raise inconvenient truths. We are not to talk about our own wants, needs, fears, feelings, only validate those of others.

Otherwise, we get the mob.

I'm sorry. Here with you. xxx

Oh this. So, so much this.

Great article. I'm rooting for you Sarah.

As so often before, Artichoke, that was brilliantly put - thanks!

Thank you for your work, Sarah.

I think the mistake they are making is to assume that only women who have been raped care about this issue. But we all know it could just as easily have been us. I do not know a single woman above the age of 25 who has not been sexually harassed.

Thank you Sarah.

@Artichokeleaves brilliantly put.

Gardening needed for Sarah.

Trowel at the ready

This is absolutely infuriating. The same people make memes about religious people and how they don't want abortions but shouldn't enforce their restrictions on others, and yet then turn around and do the same to others. They don't want female only spaces, but then also vehemently want to prevent others from having them.

The fact that there are facilities provided for men and for transwomen, but they still insist on using those intended for women, makes it very clear that this is about breaching women's boundaries. It's about invading women's spaces. Just as rape is about invading women's bodies.

The fact that there are facilities provided for men and for transwomen, but they still insist on using those intended for women, makes it very clear that this is about breaching women's boundaries. It's about invading women's spaces. Just as rape is about invading women's bodies.

Even if it's a small percentage of males who do this, it's still too many.

I have no idea how service providers can separate trans women in need of help from predatory males who want to get off on breaching female boundaries.

Well I do have an idea actually, offer the option of a single sex space for women who need it.

Well said Sarah.

Well done Sarah. Your fight for this basic right is so important. How could anyone go out of their way to deprive rape victims of this simple request? To access a women/female only support group where they can feel safe? And we are supposed to believe that trans rights are not at odds with women's rights? Well they clearly are.

Excellent article. I support you @IamSarah. I'm so sorry for what you've been - and continue to go - through.

This, in absolute fucking spades.

@IamSarah I am sorry for everything you've been through and for the ongoing shit that's thrown at you.

Well I do have an idea actually, offer the option of a single sex space for women who need it.

Just this!

When did we lose that option? Who could have thought that a mixed -sex group - oh just a few, just a very few who are bound to be nice harmless people who are just as nice as women and you really wont notice a difference and if you do then shame on you - is a good idea?

Someone else has written a great article for the Critic

thecritic.co.uk/we-are-failing-rape-victims/

Thank you for the link.

That is a very well explained article, I agree with every word.

I'm astounded by the ugliness of the comment of the individual from the Victorian Women's Trust, who would appear to be someone traumatised female type women should not have to be exposed to. Furiously, vitriolically screaming about compassion - but only for males, and the pathology that starts to emerge towards females makes the sheer misogyny and lack of any real values of compassion or understanding of rape become painfully apparent.

It really is the case that anyone passionate about this ideology should not be allowed anywhere near female only services. I could compare other groups who come up with this kind of violence and threats to the populations they dislike; anyone responsible and capable of balanced thinking would certainly not tolerate one of those groups being handed the control of a service for that population.

Yes, that's a very good article. Let's all keep gardening for you, for all our sakes.

Thank you for the article which is very well argued and, among other things, searches out some particularly pernicious thinking disguised as concern.

Thank you for going through so much on behalf of other women who need the sanctuary of male free rape groups. By exposing this trend to prioritise some men’s need to dominate, by allowing them into the very space where women need to heal away from them, you will open this practice to scrutiny.