Women's Place UK: Filia event: the elephant ignored yet again

[pattihews]

I attended the WPUK event at Filia yesterday and came out feeling disturbed by what struck me as a very heavy-handed event designed to avoid talking about the elephant in the room. For what it's worth, I've voted Labour at every election since 1979. I imagine 90% of the audience had a similar track record.

Put briefly, we had 90 minutes of:
Feminism=socialism and if you're not a socialist you can't be a feminist and if you're not a feminist-socialist you're the enemy.
The right is sly and will lie and try to draw you in (illustrated with a video from the US about the right-wing origins of many apparently liberal groups, including the Heritage Foundation) and you must resist any temptation to get involved with them.
The way to do it is to join unions and change them from within, hold socialist women's salons to recruit and inform and get involved at grass roots level.

There were also regular warnings about racism, which seemed odd and extraneous because WPUK is all about gender ideology.

And then the penny dropped. Though her name was never mentioned, I suddenly realised that the whole tightly-managed event (no talking unless you're holding the microphone) was a warning not to fraternise with Posie Parker.

At lunchtime I encountered several other women, all of them furious about what they'd sat through. Furious in particular because of course the elephant in the room was the fact that the Labour Party, to which WPUK is loyal to death, is the biggest threat to women's rights in this country. And they'd used PP to deflect from that.

I'm not a Posie fan. Posie's clear she's not a feminist. She says things that make me cringe. I have doubts about her motivation and we wouldn't be friends in RL. But I went to one of her events when she came to my area and she can mobilise women the left will never reach and for that she's important and valuable. When I go canvassing for Labour I meet working-class as well as middle-class women who vote or have voted Conservative. They include aspirational minority ethnic women. They have their reasons, and some of them I can understand.

A woman I've never seen before and may not see again joined my table for lunch and explained why so many women were feeling really disturbed. These are TRA tactics.
The huge issue that concerns so many of us (should we vote Labour?) was avoided and we were instead lectured on how to be good socialists and feminists.

Was anyone else there? What did you make of it?

I will be honest - I prefer a nice clear ad hominem from someone, than a lecture followed by “what did I do” Bambi eyes! I’d much rather someone clearly dislike me than be so bloody disingenuous

Reading the thread with interest, some great posts - shout out to Grumpy and Endless in particular

TBH it's not on a moral basis that I object to ad homs (although it is unedifying). To me it's a sign that there is a deep flaw in the argument of the person making them. They're a distraction, a diversion - a red flag.

This wasn't directed at me and you said you were leaving the thread but in case you're still reading, it sounds like you're now agreeing that this isn't just bickering and factionalsim, but that there are in fact some major tensions between some of the women in this fight?

I'm not trying to score points - if that's what you're saying then I agree. I think there are some very difficult, painful discussions to be had. But I think they're necessary.

I was at FiLiA again, had a fabulous time as always, learned so much, networked and made friends.

I went to the session OP referred to, it was frankly weird and yes, absolutely I knew PP/KJKM was the one being referred to.

I've just cancelled my monthly sub to WPUK, I don't agree with their attitude to other feminist campaigns.

PP is brilliant at what she does.
I have some of her merchandise.
I don't agree with all she says, no, but I don't agree with all other people/campaigns I support say, either.

But WPUK have gone over a line for me wrt PP.

And, I'm a life long left winger, trade unionist member /official, radical activist feminist, Greenham Common Woman, etc etc.
A natural supporter of WPUK, you'd think.

And yet, I've cancelled my support.
Maybe they should think about that? How many other other women were pissed off by that session at FiLiA or all the other stuff WPUK have said?

I'm now totally unable to vote for my natural political home (Labour/Green/Plaid/SNP) because they do not recognise I AM A WOMAN, as a sex class.

I think there are some very difficult, painful discussions to be had. But I think they're necessary.

I agree with this. But they need to be actually had, not presented as done & dusted. We all have a stake in this, we should all have the chance to have input. Being able to speak & actually be heard is vital. When orgs are on blast without receiving, this doesn't happen. And frustrations grow as a result.

It's a real problem at this point when so many want to be the representative for X but never actually canvass women for their opinions/views/experiences.

It is my sense that WPUK may not have been aware of the depth of dissatisfaction. It's been brewing behind the scenes, but women have mostly been seething in private so as not to disrupt the British feminist movement.

Excuses have been made, tongues have been bitten, and deep breaths taken. In fact, I doubt the OP would have made this thread if she'd been fully up to date on the latest round of infighting. She'd have gritted her teeth like so many others have been doing.

But sooner or later, people's feelings have a way of coming to the surface. Women can not be expected to indefinitely hide our resentment behind a bland smile as we type our debit card details into various websites.

It is my sense that WPUK may not have been aware of the depth of dissatisfaction. It's been brewing behind the scenes, but women have mostly been seething in private so as not to disrupt the British feminist movement.

It's highly ironic that that uneasy truce held together through gritted teeth was effectively blown apart in the aftermath of the SFW event - by mostly WPUK affiliates.

🤷🏻‍♀️

It is my sense that WPUK may not have been aware of the depth of dissatisfaction. It's been brewing behind the scenes, but women have mostly been seething in private so as not to disrupt the British feminist movement.

Yes, that seems very likely.

There is a problem with quite a few of the organisations that claim to represent/re-present women's concerns and interests in that none are membership organisations and as a result don't operate under any sort of democratic principles. Ultimately they are the sum of their parts and their parts are few. I do think these orgs that are (so they say at least) doing behind the scenes work and working on our behalf, should focus less on broadcasting and more on receiving. Ignoring, belittling and demeaning your core audience, those you seek to garner support from and to represent, is a mistake.

Isn't it just.

The posts on here certainly wound me up good and proper, and made me really explore and interrogate the frustrations I'd been compartmentalising.

‘Twas ever thus.

I can see there are major tensions. But I don't think they're resolvable or, indeed, need to be resolved.

I think it's absolutely OK for some women to support say WPUK and some to support say PP, and some to support both or neither. We are not a monolith. I agree with Dworkin, that 'Feminism is a political practice of fighting male supremacy on behalf of women as a class, including all the women you don't like, including all the women you don't want to be around, including all the women who used to be your best friends whom you don't want anything to do with anymore. It doesn't matter who the individual women are.' I can't be fighting on their behalf and fighting with them at the same time.

I barely have time to read this thread. I certainly don't have time to argue with other women who are also fighting for women's and children's rights and safety, just in a different way. If another woman tries to draw me into a fight on this, I will walk away.

When we've solved stuff, sorted out the major issues then sure, let's plan the details of utopia and what it looks like.

But right now, this is not a priority for me. I think we need to be directing the fight against the right people. Women feministing differently are not the right people. Civility is important. Not wasting the limited time, energy and momentum we have is important. Not giving our enemies threads full of material to attack us with is important.

I do understand people are hurt. Everyone is wounded. Everyone has been through so much. And there's so much further to go.

I don't want to make it worse. I do think the silent majority recognise the differences and factions but don't care. Eyes on the prize.

All I can do is send strength to all the women here and beyond who are fighting the same fight, in different ways and focusing on different bits of it. I'm so very grateful to the lot of you.

@JudeanPeoplesFrontOrPeoplesFrontOfJudea what you say here is what I presume the majority here want too. Unfortunately WP seem intent on creating tensions and factions and undermining other women. Every now and again people are moved to say “FFS WP will you just f-ing stop it, not only are you undermining yourselves, but this carry on threatens the movement as a whole”. And rather than being part of the problem, threads like this are the only means to feed back to this self-important, self-righteous, tin-eared gang. We can only hope that at least one person who has their ear will read it, understand and delicately let them know.

Also she was a Labour voter all her life AND she was made aware of the trans issue threat to women's rights via being a member of a Labour Party online women's group.

Not that it matters whether sister fighters of the cult are left, right or centre. Ths is an emergency so it's "all hands to the pump".

I don't know if anyone has posted this yet as I left the thread and haven't been back. It seems to have become more and more an attack on something few actually saw or heard.

Here is Pragna Patel. This was the level of discussion. It was about the historical roots of black women's struggle against incursions by the extreme right from the seventies. It was global in range. It called for a new autonomous feminist movement.

Go on. Argue with me that Pragna Patel was slashing at any individual woman in this video. It isn't "implied". Or "suggested". Or "no she was really having a go at...". It is what it is. An appeal to recognise the global forces that are assembling against women and our rights.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=prB4-Z0kq3g

But right now, this is not a priority for me. I think we need to be directing the fight against the right people. Women feministing differently are not the right people. Civility is important. Not wasting the limited time, energy and momentum we have is important. Not giving our enemies threads full of material to attack us with is important.

I don't think it's the women here, who have been largely silent for months/years on the issues, while some other women publically sneer and deride us, to whom you need to direct your stirring speech towards.

If you'd read the thread Jean, you'd see that 99% of the problem here is women thinking they can lecture without reading what we have to say. And your first line is just another way of wording "I haven't read the thread (since I left it)"

I am finding these pleas to remain silent and keep on following where other people want us to pay attention to be tedious now.

That any poster who professes to have spent time on this board, who thinks that any form of directing attention, of anything that hints at tone policing is well received is telling us they don’t actually read widely on this board.

Remarkable isn’t it?

So many posts saying the issue is women feeling lectured to, not listened to and made feel unwelcome, and another post made in just that vein. One that seems to be based on assumptions of what has been discussed rather than any attempt at understanding what HAS been posted.

This really is pots and kettles, isn't it? As I have just read through this thread and most of the people commenting were not at the original event, and are not willing to look at the videos to find out for themselves what was said. 🤷‍♀️

Oh, noes, are women not doing as they're told?!

Ali Ceesay is one of the main KJK haters and has been promoting Hearts of Oak/Sophie Corcoran for a couple of months now in her lust for bitching about KJK.

Ali seems so personally enraged by Kellie that she has lost all perspective. I know Ali would consider me to be a racist as I agree with KJK on hijabs as is my freedom of thought and speech prerogative and I am not going to run around denouncing as I find this whole "right wingers amassing on our borders" a bit ridiculous. We are not in a Game of Thrones episode. There's actually Albanians amassing at our borders, I have no idea of their politics or race, only that they are economic migrants.

Ali was a speaker at this event so the idea that it wasn't infused with the attitude that anyone right wing is racist scum is laughable. It's what she says every day on Twitter.

This is why Louise Perry is right. Conservative women are happy to leave left wing feminists to their bogey men.

If you'd read the thread Jean, you'd see that 99% of the problem here is women thinking they can lecture without reading what we have to say. And your first line is just another way of wording "I haven't read the thread (since I left it)

Because the thread has become really long and repetitive. I was simply hoping that women who were commenting that the event was "anti-KJK" (which is nonsense) would look at Pragna's speech with fresh eyes not tinted by a war that wasn't actually there.

I'm not lecturing. But it is fair to look at the thing you're criticising isn't it?

Because the thread has become really long and repetitive.
And that, right there, is why people are pissed off. You say yourself you haven't followed the thread and yet you're so very confident as to what the discussion is about and that it's not worthy of your time. (You are correct that it's long.)