What does Val McDermid mean?

[achillestoes]

“My view of gender politics is you bring people into the tent. Womanhood is a big tent. It embraces me and Kim Kardashian. There’s certainly room in that tent for the trans women I know.”

Translate. Right answers only.

😂

I think Val might still be trying to compensate for this book:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mermaids_Singing

Which I've not read - looks too much torture/grisly violence for someone of a delicate disposition.

This is interesting as I thought she was mates with JKR - in fact I remember reading about an author friend of JKR who phoned her after she went public with her support of Maya, and congratulated her - I thought this was VM.

I guess I was wrong. Or she's been told to change her ways.

I’ve read it, and loved it. But no one, regardless of how GC they are, would write it today.

The Scottish literary set has been extremely backward in coming forward to support JKR. There hasn't been a public peep from any of them- despite JKR having supported VM in the past.

I'm envisaging this tent. Must be pink and frilly, I suppose? And its gotta be a big one to include everyone.

<studiously not commenting on the size of the erection>

I'm with @AmaryllisNightAndDay I think. I tried to read a VM book once and it was so appallingly violent I didn't get past the first couple of pages, but whatever - she's not a stupid woman and she's faced down quite a lot of crap in her time I think.

There is a subset of butch lesbians who feel they've suffered greatly at the hands of women's gatekeeping and (frankly) blind prejudice - Finn McKay (radfem TWAW) talks about the number of time women have aggressively challenged her in toilets.

I can understand how that might lead you to feel solidarity with other people with atypical gender presentation.

I don't happen to agree with either of them, but I respect them as people. Also, and I know this sounds preachy, if we want people to stop dismissing GC feminists as dumb and right-wing maybe we have to also stop the kneejerk abuse of anyone who isn't GC.

I can understand how that might lead you to feel solidarity with other people with atypical gender presentation.

But she knows that this isn't about presentation, it's men climbing into the womanhood tent.

‘maybe we have to also stop the kneejerk abuse of anyone who isn't GC.’

I don’t abuse anyone. I find her position inexplicable but that’s not abuse.

I'm reading it as 'Kim Kardashian is a bloke'.

Amirite?

@GuyMontag

It could be that she finds Kardashian physically ‘masculine’ but perceives her to have modified herself in the way she perceives some transwomen do, to enhance their femininity.

The trouble with the tent analogy is that if some 'women' who were not biological women were allowed in, many other women would self-exclude, some on principle, while others would feel unwelcome, or frightened, or unhappy.
So Val's tent wouldn't be for all women anyway.
(Bet the excluded women wouldn't be allowed to set up their own tent...)

I don't happen to agree with either of them, but I respect them as people. Also, and I know this sounds preachy, if we want people to stop dismissing GC feminists as dumb and right-wing maybe we have to also stop the kneejerk abuse of anyone who isn't GC.

Who is abusing anyone, here? And yes, that does sound preachy. I've never heard anyone dismiss feminists as 'dumb and right-wing' other than various bad-faith posters on here.

Yes, indeed. Val's tent is for only certain women - women of some faiths would be excluded, as may women with PTSD, rape survivors, domestic abuse survivors, some feminists, shy women, women who just don't believe that its possible to change sex and don't wish to be in a tent with males, lesbians who don't want to include the bepenised in their love-life.

In this instance, single sex spaces aren’t even the point (although they’re vital). Even if I agreed that transwomen should have access to women’s spaces, out of sympathy or whatever, Val would still be talking nonsense, because womanhood isn’t a tent that can include males, and that’s not abusive.

The Big Tent argument isn't about logic or facts, though, it's about emotive reasoning. It's just 'be nice and accommodating'. But it falls on that count too, as soon as you start looking at what 'inclusion' actually means in practise - it means 'prioritise the feelings of males over those of women'.

Yes, it begins with “how does it even affect you?” and when we demonstrate how it affects us, it’s “STFU, you fucking Karen”.

But women are people too. We don’t have to give up our rights so other people can have their (legitimate) rights.

I read this at first as being KKK - the Klu Klux Klan - and then realised that actually Val would probably include them as well if it meant more sales.

I'm somewhat disappointed (although not newly so - pretty sure VM has been clear on this position for a while), but I do think:

• it takes extraordinary gumption to not parrot "TWAW" in some industries at the moment, to the extent that even silence doesn't protect women, and
• VM's position is one I see taken by many middle-aged, intelligent, socially engaged lesbians of my acquaintance. PP made an excellent point about some shared experiences of being made to feel unwelcome in lesbian space, and there's also the factor of wanting to be supportive of trans friends - who don't always fall as easily into "old school transsexuals" vs "self ID".

I don't agree with her, but I can't dismiss it as simply having not thought about the issues.

So, McDermid is against rapists in men's football teams but OK with them in women's prisons? Where is she on men in women's football?

Is anyone going to need to get undressed in the big tent?

What happens if you don't like camping and prefer an en-suite with hot shower and flushing toilet? Do you have to share a room with anyone Val thinks suitable?

Oh, I was picturing a circus tent.

That would be more appropriate...

@doilookremotelyinterested

But she says they’re nice people, so I suppose we’ll have to take that.