Social group Define a Woman

[Sickoffamilydrama]

I'm in a social group that also raises money for charity. Think W.I but not W.I.

We have just had our National council meeting agenda sent out and up for discussion is how we define Woman.

Orginally this group was set up for women because the men wouldn't let them join there's the organisation has never been mixed sex. We do a lot of donations for female based charities and enjoy socialising with just women.

What evidence can I use to argue that we should define Woman as the female sex?

What is funny is straight afterwards they talk about attracting women from diverse cultures, which isn't going to happen for Women of some culture if we are mixed sex.

Last time I raised this we had a brand new member quit because I'm unsafe I wasn't the one shouting or calling people names because I disagreed with donating to a local rape crisis center as they had recently been rather nasty about GC victims, so I am trying to tread carefully as it's never nice to be called a bigot.

Just giving this a bump for the night owls. I could really do with some help forming my thoughts on how to challenge this.

So I think a starting point for this discussion is that people have physical bodies, and they have minds. Some activities / events / things in the world are related to physical bodies and need to be segregated according to the shape of the physical body. That includes sport / medical care / changing rooms etc. Other activities / events / things are related to minds not related to physical bodies, and in general should not be segregated. So that includes things like voting, access to jobs, access to education etc.

The tricky decisions are things like your charity, especially if the physical body is not directly relevant to the work you do. Such things might traditionally be only for women, but is there a strong reason for it? Is there some support that your group provides (e.g. sport / menopause support / counselling) that really does need to be only for people with female bodies. If so, I would argue for that.

If not, you have a harder argument on your hands. One option is to build on the history. So the posh men's private clubs (Athenaeum / Travellers club etc) still don't allow women as members, and that is legal and they justify it based on their history. I think they are wrong, but it is legal.

Thank you parietal I have thought much the same thing there is no reason to keep a single sex version other than history and the fact that there is a group for both sexes so no one is excluded.

Both groups are struggling to retain members so prehaps they need to merge?

It is a shame as actually most of us in the group enjoy the dynamic of being in with a group of other women.

Okay so I have decided to write to the National executive about this as it is a group I have been involved with for about 7 years and i know there are a few of us who feel strongly about this.

I have stolen these words from some of you and online articles if you see your own words please don't take offence I just do not have the brain capacity in between work and general life to say it any differently to how you have!

Does .... really want to get involved in this culture war?

Particularly as the Equality and Humans rights commission has said that it will start to release clearer guidance on this matter.

The reason we have ... is because the women weren’t allowed to join the men’s group, we still live in a patriarchal society, nobody seems to asks what a man is.

The definition of a Women should always be Adult Human Female, full human beings with our own material reality, which is underpinned by our biology: our female reproductive system, so vastly different from the male one, and our physiology that is relatively more vulnerable whether our reproductive system functions or not, whether we use it to reproduce or not. None of us choose to be born in this bodies but this shared biology and the way society reacts to us as women because of this shared biology is what binds us together.

The gender movement has revived and enforced outdated gender roles, or sex stereotypes, that feminists thought had been well and truly buried before the 1980s. Such as how you wear your hair or clothing makes you a Woman or Man, If people want to base their identity on stereotypes that's their issue.

Gender ideology is the enforcement of gender roles, to the extent that if a man doesn't conform to the behaviour expected by men, he must obviously be a woman. And vice versa. It cannot be seen apart from the context of thousands of years of patriarchy and oppression, control and abuse of the female sex by the male sex. This context is absolutely fundamental and crucial, as is the fact that male oppression, control and abuse of female people is very much ongoing in all parts of the world, not just a historical occurrence.

Again and again women are told to be kind, to comprehend and empathise with the suffering of distressed male people; then abused when we don’t. Yet the same expectations are never levied upon male people with regard to us, despite all the myriad ways female people have been hurt across the centuries, are still vulnerable and still being hurt now.
Was ... kind to women when they wanted to join their group, no women had to go form their own group.

Women only won rights when we worked together. How can we be strong together and stand up for our rights when society deems that 'woman' is anyone and no one - if there is no 'woman' there are no 'women's rights '.

Not sure how I will end it at the moment but happy to take any input.

another argument you can make is

• gender is hard to define - there are 100s of genders and people can be gender fluid etc so this is not fixed. it would not make sense to have a group for each different gender
• if the groups are not defined according to physical sex (because history / tradition), then maybe your charity should get rid of separate mens / womens groups altogether and have only mixed groups. That would be fair to everyone.
• it is unfair to have a womens group that only allows some men to join (but not other men).

so you can give the board two options - stick with the trad men / women groups based on sex or abolish the divisions altogether. but groups based on gender is just a muddle that will make everyone unhappy.

This is an excellent thread @Sickoffamilydrama, you've had some great answers. I can only think it's not had much traction / traffic because it's in the feminism chat board and not the feminism sex gender.

I wonder if you moved it you may have better luck?

I can't add an awful lot as under pressure re work but watching with interest.

Thanks posted it whilst tired so didn't notice that @MNHQ can you switch me to the right board?

Thanks 😁

I don't think putting @MNHQ does anything, you probably need to report your post to ask them to move it.

You could also point out the idiocy of other definitions of woman.

A woman is anyone who identifies as a woman, is quite a common one. It’s not a definition because it is circular. It completely destroys the logic that underpins language. It would also make it very difficult to track memberships because it allows for people to switch between ‘genders’.

I’d point out that it is sensible to go with the definition in the Equality Act.

Maybe have a look at the case that For Women Scotland brought against the Scottish Gov re representation on public boards. It was about the definition of woman/women.

If including women from diverse cultures is an important aspect for your group, it might be worth mentioning that such women could be excluded if males were included.

I would point out that if they are struggling to define a woman, that’s a reflection of the conceptual vacuum at the heart of the ideology that are trying to align with. If gender ideology had any coherence they would have formed a clear definition of ‘woman’ long ago. They haven’t. They haven’t because they can’t.

You're right that many 'hard to reach' and vulnerable groups of females will be excluded by making the group mixed sex.

Essentially the first duty of a female-only space is to be inclusive of and be accessible to all females. It is not possible to have a mixed sex space that will not exclude some females. It's fundamentally incompatible.

It's merely about deciding whether meeting the needs of vulnerable males are a higher priority to the group than meeting the needs of vulnerable females. And then asking with interest, why this is.

The emotive anecdote is also something often that well intentioned women have in mind. These are used a lot by TQ+ charities and publicity. It may help to provide evidence to balance this and put names and faces to the females who would not be able to benefit from the group if it were mixed sex. Those stories and faces and therefore the empathy has not been balanced out in society. Yet.

Rephrase (because my feminine socialisation influenced my previous post):

If including women from diverse cultures is an important aspect for your group, it might be worth mentioning that including males excludes under-represented women from
minority cultures and faiths.

Found this thread, @Sickoffamilydrama

Muslim women and trans policies in the workplace www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4175451-muslim-women-and-trans-policies-in-the-workplace

Also:

Some Jewish women
Some Gypsy Roma Traveller women
Some Autistic women
Some disabled women
Some CSA/DV/DA survivors

These being the women with actual legal protection, there is the more fundamental issue of females being allowed to group by themselves as females wishing to share the unique experience of being female, without the presence of male people. Issues such as in groups, male people inevitably speak most and dominate the conversation and females give way to them: I've been seeing this one first hand recently, where two men in a group of 30 did 90% of the talking. Female participation is affected, this is a known thing. Women need the option of a mixed sex group OR a female only group. Without judgement and harassment by what is essentially a faith based group.

Thank you so much everyone.

I've had a busy few days at work including a broken website so apologies for the radio silence.

We had our meeting of the local group it then gest passed onto the national group.

So our meeting went well (I knew it would these women are amazing) it started with one of the others pointing out that the national president has already written something about we are open to anyone who indentifies as female 🤦‍♀️

I then explained my thoughts and no one disagreed.

Another thing to add is the group has an age limit then you go onto another "sister" group so I'm always a little surprised at the cognitive dissonance between age and gender identity.

Also the first time this was brought up they had a document that was saying it is illegal to have a sex based group. So I think they are worried about the law (not sure why age discrimination doesn't worry them). I haven't found anything yet saying a social group is allowed.to be single sex.

I should point out we are a social group not linked to anything (not religious or a hobby) just somewhere to meet new people, do activities and charity events.

Oh and have written everything I posted and we have added to our minutes to pass on but I will add about women who want single sex spaces due to religion.

I have just found the advice that will probably help me!
www.equalityhumanrights.com/en/advice-and-guidance/what-equality-law-means-your-membership-association

Track down the source of the information misrepresenting the law and Equality Act to remove and disadvantage females to the benefit of males, and I will bet my hat on it coming from a political TQ+ lobby group.

The organisation has been manipulated, as have many others, with an agenda strongly based in misogyny.

Oh yes I can almost guarantee that Boudica they will also be the type of person who is conditioned to be kind and won't have really thought about the wider implications of allowing self ID, they will be picturing tortured souls who need to be validated by joining a women's group.