Glasgow 'UKs first feminist city'

[ArabellaScott]

IDK where they get the energy for the hyperbole, myself, but anyway:

www.scotsman.com/news/people/glasgow-becomes-uks-first-feminist-city-as-town-planning-motion-from-councillor-holly-bruce-passes-3896633

'...councillors backed a motion from Green Councillor Holly Bruce which will see Scotland’s largest city making women central to “all aspects of planning, public realm design, policy development and budgets”.

The passed motion calls for feminist town planning which centres the needs and perspectives of women and could see changes to the city’s infrastructure including wider pavements to accommodate prams, more lighting in parks, and safer travel routes.'

There was similar work on urban planning in Spain, iirc.

'"Walking from A to B can be a bit of a nightmare for a lot of women, for example, disabled women, those who have children.”'

I'm undecided about this, I don't see how it's especially feminist to improve disability access. And the 'non-binary' bit is just utter waffle, of course.

But better lighting, access and safety is a good thing for everyone, so hopefully a net positive. Just mindful that the Scotgov does like a bit of virtue signalling ...

www.scotsman.com/news/politics/councillor-introduces-motion-for-glasgow-to-be-first-city-in-uk-with-feminist-town-planning-approach-3888794

Will it centre woman though or men who identify as woman?

I'm all for making things safer but this does just seem like virtue signalling.

I would have thought reducing the drug problem should be a bigger priority and would also increase safety for woman and girls.

I'm undecided about this, I don't see how it's especially feminist to improve disability access. And the 'non-binary' bit is just utter waffle, of course.

I think it's great, it sounds like someone has read Invisible Women. There are more elderly and disabled women than men, and accommodations that improve life for people with disabilities often also improve life for mothers who are lugging their kids around everywhere. Women are also more likely to be pedestrians than men. But yes the "non-binary" bit is of course 🧇.

There are more elderly and disabled women than men, yes, that's a fair point. I still think this is more about access in general, but it will hopefully be an improvement!

Is grand overlord ‘feminist to my fingertips’ Nicola just trying to detract from the well justified accusation of ‘destroyer of woman's rights’?

@ArabellaScott but given your other thread, ‘feminist’ no longer refers to women & girls. It’s actually about solving the issues of nuclear war and climate change…..Go Glasgow!

Link - it’s worth a read!
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4669793-scotlands-feminist-foreign-policy

I wonder if the improvements will impact on others to such a degree that there will be a backlash and since the improvements are for women does that mean women will be hated? I don't trust anything the Scots politicians do to help women and I don't even live there. There's always an unseen angle.

To explain my thoughts better. Our city has decreed that cyclists should share the pavements with pedestrians. No thought as to how children and shoppers normally meander aimlessly about compared to 20mph straight line cyclists. Somebody will eventually get seriously hurt. The hate is directed at cyclists for not dismounting etc and not the idiotic councillors who will blame the public for the lack of tolerance, for not helping to lessen global warming (cycle instead of cars), and for not being inclusive!

My first thought was Invisible Women, too.

They talked about it on Woman's Hour on Tuesday - www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001dn6b

They’ll be preserving single sex loos then

the evidence that women are safer from violence and voyeurism in single sex toilets is pretty incontrovertible

We had a thread on here on Barcelona, which had a similar project. It'd be interesting to hear how much of an impact it's had so far.

Fantastic! Can we have our Glasgow Women's Library back to centering women now?

I heard this on Womens Hour. Emma Barnett questioning 2 women pretty rigorously. One a green councillor another a town planner. One of whom described herself as 'a white cis woman' so we knew where we were with her.
Living in Bristol (where pixie might be living too) I'm fairly cynical about all this, especially the 'hey, let's give cyclists and pedestrians the same routes' or 'let's close off a few roads for pedestrianisation so the traffic is even more choked up on the remaining roads'.

Am I the only one wondering that "feminist" is a bit of a buzzword politicians etc use when they want to make something more appealing?

*make something sound more appealing I mean.

Probably.

Glasgow became known as a feminist city when, after decades of unequal pay, in 2017 the new SNP administration at Glasgow Council started to settle the claims of around 8000 female employees working in homecare, catering, schools and cleaning, who had shown they were discriminated against under the old Labour council. Their claims amounted to over £500m and were only affordable by mortgaging some of the city’s most famous buildings. They had waited over 12 years for an agreement to be reached.
www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jan/17/glasgow-council-women-workers-win-12-year-equal-pay-battle

Glasgow cannot call itself a feminist city as long as it is a place where men can access women’s toilets, refuges, sports, hospital wards, changing rooms and prisons by saying they are women. This is just another SNP click bait gimmick.

There was an item about this on Woman’s Hour a few days ago. Sounded Ok until the elephant was ignored…

Oops sorry missed the previous comment!

Same city that blocked a female only taxi service , because it excluded males , honestly couldn't make it up