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’m not interested in a point scoring exercise.

And yet, it looks exactly as if that's what you're interested in, by banging on at length about Jean not googling retcon, as if this was an issue of any consequence at all.

I’m not pointing out Jean’s hypocrisy in order to ‘win’, only to help WPUK understand why we’re all so bloody angry.

And we’re all so bloody angry because WPUK can’t be arsed to listen and understand, and would rather make ‘jokes’ about not knowing what words mean.

Just chiming in not to reiterate familiar points but to send support to @TheClogLady: you, and many, many, women are being heard, believe me. 💛

Surely, Jean, you can see the gaslighting of being told there is no elephant in the room when we can all see the elephant all over social media.

It is extremely disingenuous for anyone to claim that just because KJK and others weren't named that they weren't relevant to the session. WPUK are still writing blogs about KJK. Katherine's film starts with a montage which includes KJK FFS! Dani and Ali have made their positions on KJK very clear. The 'actual gender critical left' FB group, which is made up of WPUK supporters, is a swirling hotbed of conspiracy nonsense around KJK and WoLF, and now WDI and pretty much every group opposing the gender identity juggernaut. This hatred of other women (and it does read as hatred) underpins what they think and do, and that matters. I had hoped that Ruth leaving WPUK would mean a fresh start and an end to this nonsense, but clearly the tactics go deeper. And I find that frustrating as I am sure this can't be how Judith and Kiri want to be seen.

This nonsense needs to stop. Women can choose how they draw their boundaries and how they choose their priorities, but the socfems need to stop shunning and monstering women who do things differently and have different boundaries and different priorities.

Womens energies need to go into doing the thing, not wasted on stressing how everyone else is doing the thing wrong.

@TheClogLady

What hypocrisy? Not
Googling something is hypocrisy?

Womens energies need to go into doing the thing, not wasted on stressing how everyone else is doing the thing wrong.

Exactly.

@YarnosaurusRegina

I can see that women aren't interested in a dialogue about the dangers of the extreme right. Gotcha. Not even a dialogue. Gotcha. Because that was what happened in that room. And you clearly don't want any of it. Gotcha.

So what happens then?

So what happens then?

You attract more flies with honey than vinegar.

Your suggestion to call in and speak with KJK sounds like a good start.

Not taking 5 seconds to understand another woman’s post is hypocrisy when you are here asking that we all pay attention to what you post is hypocrisy, yes.

🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻

Although if Jean comes to any sort of understanding with Posie (which I would personally welcome) Jean is then at risk being cast out of the WPUK fold in the inevitable ensuing purity spiral!

@TheClogLady

What do you mean by "understanding"? That I capitulate on my principles? Or that we discuss our positions? Honestly why all this tribal all or nothing stuff? You seem determined to keep everything fractious no matter what I say so I can't see the point and I'm going back to my dog.

I dunno, just not slagging her off?

Is that too much to ask?

@TheClogLady

Not taking 5 seconds to understand another woman’s post is hypocrisy when you are here asking that we all pay attention to what you post is hypocrisy, yes.

I don't think you understand hypocrisy. I didn't know what the term "retcon" meant. It isn't the crime of the fucking century.

@TheClogLady

"I dunno, just not slagging her off?

Is that too much to ask"

I have very deliberately gone out of my way not to do so. Even when I wrote about the Brighton event I was even and balanced in my representation of her and the event.

🙈

I personally don’t think anyone needs to capitulate on their principles to come to an understanding. Probably just a sense that ‘I can see where you are coming from, I vehemently disagree about some things which are important to me, but I can still see the value in a lot of what you say and do’.

A bit less of the black or white thinking, a bit less of ‘I will be forced to renounce all I hold dear in order to be polite to you’.

Seriously Jean? That's your take here?

Women want to address the problems on the left & instead have to deal with overactive imaginations on the prevalence of far right threats as a means to distract from actually talking the place most of us would have expected support.

At the very least, it's an embarrassment that the 'original sin' here that kicked things off was 1 man & 1 women in the SFW crowd filming the event to stream to a far right wing audience that were not in the least bit interested in listening to women talk while being screamed at by TRA. That's genuinely embarrassing for everyone who went full pelt in on this as though the far right Armageddon was imminent as a result of those 2 people doing absolutely nothing illegal while the TRA went nuts.

Personally, I'd like to know why this pivot from WPUK corners has happened. I want to know why WPUK supporters are hell bent on applying the fascist/nazi/bigot label with zero basis in fact on women, knowing how that plays out for women who are not fascist/nazis/bigots. WPUK supporters have fed the TRA narrative for weeks now & there's still no let up. Someone asked earlier cui bono? That's what I'd like to know & how so many women have been persuaded to adopt the exact same narratives S extreme TRA. The accusations made have been identical to what I've experienced from the likes of lunatics like Fiona Robertson in the SNP, and various Scottish greens with a tentative grasp on reality.

Who benefits from framing everyone not accepting WPUK's diktats as right wing bigots who now 'mace kids'?

You want to talk about the threat of the right? I want to talk about the threats coming from the left. We could try and address both, but right now, there's an awful lot of whataboutery going on to stop the discussion I'd like to have. Especially with those claiming to be in delicate negotiations behind closed doors with zero mandate to talk for women.

So let's talk. Who benefits from all except WPUK being framed as far right bigots?

@TheClogLady

Let it go ffs.

And that’s what we’d like all of WPUK, their panellists and associates (and apologists) to do.

Stop calling Posie a ‘pound shop le pen’ or worse than dogshit.

Stop calling us ‘domesticated zombies’.

Stop saying that feminism belongs to the left or that left wing women are all skint and anyone with a tenner for crowdfunder must be a Tory.

Stop pretending to not be talking about Posie when she’s right there in the presentation slides.

All of this has been mentioned over and over on the thread.

Let WHAT go?

Excuse the typos 🤦🏻‍♀️

It's not about not being interested, it's that the 'extreme right' alliance and infiltration talk is hyperbolic nonsense, which, to me, means it's not actually worth taking about, and that it's a distraction from what actually matters, that is, protecting, preserving and reinstating women's rights. All women, not just the ones we like.

You want to talk about the threat of the right? I want to talk about the threats coming from the left. We could try and address both, but right now, there's an awful lot of whataboutery going on to stop the discussion I'd like to have. Especially with those claiming to be in delicate negotiations behind closed doors with zero mandate to talk for women.

Yes.

perhaps time all of these things were thrashed out, tbh.

Many women have been angry for quite a long time, over all those casual slurs and name-callings. We've stayed quiet to avoid harming the movement.

It can only last so long, though.

It's exactly this sort of snippy attitude that turns people off in droves.

No-one here, absolutely no-one is unaware of the dangers of the extreme right. We don't need a fucking lecture on it.

It's not just the extreme right that WPUK consider persona non grata is it? That is the point that is sailing right over your head and the heads of WPUK.