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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Depressed about everything

33 replies

Fargoer · 13/12/2022 14:59

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this board and educated me over the years

Does anyone ever just feel utterly depressed and like there is no hope?

I need some encouragement.

OP posts:
waterwitch · 13/12/2022 15:10

It’s not been a good day has it.
It will improve xx

JacquelinePot · 13/12/2022 15:14

Some days I wish I didn't know all this stuff was going on. Then I remember that it's ordinary people like us not knowing that meant the extremists were able to make so much progress. In secret, behind closed doors. Those days are over and I expect the news from Scotland will cause a mass Peakening.

If it's too much, have a break, there's plenty here to keep things going until you're ready to come back.

nilsmousehammer · 13/12/2022 15:17

Yes, in a way it has been a good day. This is not about individual battles; this is a long term goal and we're working in terms of years, not months.

Today is the day the first real nail went into the coffin of the GRA. It has needed to get this bad and our point proven to this extent for people to realise and for groups to see that instead of merely talking about 'really the GRA should be repealed' to 'right, now comes the purposeful campaign to that goal'. And a lot of MPs will be seeing this.

filphone · 13/12/2022 15:22

I sadly believe repealing the gender recognition bill in Scotland is impossible

It is a Scottish law so I believe Scottish Parliament would have to be the one to rappeal it - I sadly don't see that happening anytime soon.

I don't think Westminster is allowed to just remove laws in Scotland as much as I wish they could

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 15:34

I think it was a Mumsnetter called Barracker who once posted the below. Her contributions were always very insightful.

“They literally stopped recognising every actual single woman and girl, every female person. And they told us that we were now all an identity instead of a sex a psychology instead of a physiology. That was what female now meant. So that men could say they were women. And they did, hundreds of thousands of them did. There was no single word for actual females. We weren't allowed one. Our word was reallocated to men. We had to talk about ourselves as people with cervixes, or menstruators, and we had to agree that biology wasn't the real difference between the sexes, identity was. One by one, every reference to biological sex was replaced in every law with references to identity, until the law had erased any connection with female biology from pregnancy, childbirth, motherhood. Everything became something that applied to both men and women because it was forbidden to have real references to sex. Stating that only females were women was enough to lose your job, or even be charged with a crime.
Failing to agree with a man that he was a woman was enough to be ostracised, censored or threatened with legal action. Men took over women's sports, institutions, groups. Men represented us in every level of society, calling themselves women. There were no words to distinguish ourselves from these men. Everyone could see the female sex were becoming unspeakable people, unspoken of. You weren't allowed to acknowledge our separate existence from male people. Men committed crimes and society said women did it. You could never escape a man because he could follow you into any public space by identifying as female. People were very, very afraid to tell the truth. Many hundreds of children lost their reproductive organs trying to become the other sex. It was a very dark time.”

CountZacular · 13/12/2022 15:39

Yes, very much so.

I'm pregnant and my emotions are running high, but I'm also so worried I'll have a daughter although I would love one. It's not just the issues here, but the treatment of women in general. I feel like girls right now have a choice of being hypersexualised and thrust into Only Fans or Sex Work is Real Work mantras or being told they are boys instead. A case of display your body or change your body. I know many posters share that their daughters are empowered and strong young women, it's just feels like fighting a battle a losing battle right now from all fronts.

I believe this lunacy will come to an end and we'll be watching a Pararama-esque show about the horrors of women being beaten, raped and murdered; children being given life long medication and made infertile - but when, I just don't know and it worries me that we may have to see so much more damage until that day comes.

nilsmousehammer · 13/12/2022 15:39

filphone · 13/12/2022 15:22

I sadly believe repealing the gender recognition bill in Scotland is impossible

It is a Scottish law so I believe Scottish Parliament would have to be the one to rappeal it - I sadly don't see that happening anytime soon.

I don't think Westminster is allowed to just remove laws in Scotland as much as I wish they could

Give it a few years.

And remember the arrogance that Brexiteers would never get anywhere, that they were just a small group of bigoted nuts, and how that ended.

Scolding, ignoring, building up anger, resentment.... it does not get the populace steered in the direction you'd like.

NonnyMouse1337 · 13/12/2022 16:18

It's a marathon, so definitely expect this shitshow to take years to clean up. There will be ups and downs, wins and losses.
But as another poster said, this is the first firm nail in the GRA coffin.

The gender zealots have fucked around and they are going to find out they have been very foolish in their extremism. Women are determined and we are resourceful. The GRA will be repealed.

ArabellaScott · 13/12/2022 16:52

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 15:34

I think it was a Mumsnetter called Barracker who once posted the below. Her contributions were always very insightful.

“They literally stopped recognising every actual single woman and girl, every female person. And they told us that we were now all an identity instead of a sex a psychology instead of a physiology. That was what female now meant. So that men could say they were women. And they did, hundreds of thousands of them did. There was no single word for actual females. We weren't allowed one. Our word was reallocated to men. We had to talk about ourselves as people with cervixes, or menstruators, and we had to agree that biology wasn't the real difference between the sexes, identity was. One by one, every reference to biological sex was replaced in every law with references to identity, until the law had erased any connection with female biology from pregnancy, childbirth, motherhood. Everything became something that applied to both men and women because it was forbidden to have real references to sex. Stating that only females were women was enough to lose your job, or even be charged with a crime.
Failing to agree with a man that he was a woman was enough to be ostracised, censored or threatened with legal action. Men took over women's sports, institutions, groups. Men represented us in every level of society, calling themselves women. There were no words to distinguish ourselves from these men. Everyone could see the female sex were becoming unspeakable people, unspoken of. You weren't allowed to acknowledge our separate existence from male people. Men committed crimes and society said women did it. You could never escape a man because he could follow you into any public space by identifying as female. People were very, very afraid to tell the truth. Many hundreds of children lost their reproductive organs trying to become the other sex. It was a very dark time.”

Well, thanks very much, that's cheered me right up! 😃

Ramblingnamechanger · 13/12/2022 17:00

Feeling utterly dejected after yesterdays wonderful news. In Spain, it looks as though self ID will be passed the day after it is debated in Scotland. Interested the law hasn’t been used by individuals in Spain, so it is a bit different. Normal channels in politics just haven’t worked and won and feminist voices are ignored. I still don’t understand why.

grafittiartist · 13/12/2022 17:10

I feel overwhelmed by it too. And have a daughter who becomes quite upset at the lack of boundaries pushed by all this. Rightly.
Solidarity.

ShamedBySiri · 13/12/2022 17:16

It’s not been a good day has it.

I expect the news from Scotland will cause a mass Peakening.

this is the first firm nail in the GRA coffin.

Sorry. At work off internet all day. Can someone enlighten me what I've missed please?

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 18:10

Sorry, ArabellaScott, I didn’t mean to cause upset. But women wiser than myself have long said that things will have to get really, really bad before the majority of people will wake up. We’re further along that path today.

I also miss Barracker. Few could put things as lucidly and directly as she, so if she’s still around, I’d just like to let her know how appreciated she is. MN removed many of her posts, including the one on ‘preferred’ pronouns lulling us into a false sense of safety.

ArabellaScott · 13/12/2022 19:16

Ah, it's fine, it's only accurately putting into words what we all know anyway.

Jackiebrambles · 13/12/2022 19:22

It has been a really shit day. I've even been Twitter banned for a really inoffensive post which was in response to a hand wringing tra about JK Rowling's new venture.

But this is a long game.

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 19:29

Yes, my fellow HuFKAFs (humans formerly know as female), it is a long game.

KatMcBundleFace · 13/12/2022 19:49

Doesn't matter what legal fictions they push. They will never be women. That's impossible.

bellinisurge · 13/12/2022 19:52

The one good thing about the omnishambles of that legal decision is that is all sunlight. The Scottish government's lie that this is just a little administrative change is being shown up for all to see.

But yeah, it's a bit fucking depressing

nilsmousehammer · 13/12/2022 20:14

HuFKAFs works for me.

Said while staring people straight in the eye. Because this is fucking shameful.

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 20:47

Would be funny if HuFKAF caught on … maybe Posie can print it on one of her jumpers?!?

RaininginDarling · 13/12/2022 20:58

I miss Barracker. Thanks for the reminder of her thoughtful posts. I used to stalk these pages back then. Now I'm angry and actively pushing back against the madness.

I too believe this particular development will be the beginning of the end for the GRA.

TheirEminence · 13/12/2022 21:05

I‘ve kept another Barracker post. Enjoy.

”We need to start from first principles once more and demand a Sex Discrimination Act all over again. Written properly for our sex, to recognise and protect our sex properly. A law written for female people that recognises the reality of being female. A law with no opportunity within it, none at all, for the preposterous Trojan horse of identity to allow men to claim to be women or to punish any woman for refuting that lie.

Let our law reflect the reality before us, and let it serve the humanity it is designed to protect. No law ever created to sustain a lie will prevail in a humane society.

Men remain men, male from birth to death, in every last cell of their bodies, whatever proclamations they make, whatever certificate they obtain, and whatever lies they compel others to recite. Male. Men. All of them. Without exception.
And the days of men believing they can use the words of our sex to mask their own sex are numbered.

This farce is going to end. I'm never going to stop until it does. And I'm only one of many, many women. And if I don't get to see the conclusion, my daughter will grow up, take up the banner and she will carry it forward. The monstrous injustice done to women by granting men the right to have our sex as their identity is going to be torn down piece by piece by female hands until it's rubble and dust.

Female is not your identity, woman is not your identity, we are not a feeling, a status, an idea.

We are the female people they will never be, the female sex they will never know, the female bodies they will never have. We are female. We will not be owned, we will not be their costume, we will not be their human shield and we will not be a tool of their validation. Men planted a flag in female and claimed ownership of it as if it was inert ground in the Wild West there for the taking by any claimant who fancied it. But female isn't earth to be claimed. No certificate grants you ownership of what isn't yours and what cannot be owned. We are people, and we're rejecting your claims. You can't have us and you can't be us. Female IS us.

It's ending. The end has already begun. This era was always destined to crumble and it already is, visibly and loudly. For every woman fatigued by this fight ten others are standing up, joining it and saying, enough now. Enough.

One day, before too long, this men's movement to claim our sex as their own, will tip, crumble and slide into oblivion. It has been obvious for some time that the end has already begun. People are now talking, thinking, refusing to comply. And all the desperate buttresses men are creating to try to hold it all together won't be enough. No hate crime law can stop this movement ending. No censorship of women's words will be enough. No escalation of violence will stop it. All this hatred of women we're seeing, all these lobby groups that maneuvre, all the millions pumped into campaigning to keep it going? The threats, the coercion, the constant bombardment of everything women have ever built? All are blatantly desperate attempts to draw out the dying process which is already happening before our eyes. These are death throes of a movement that is already dying. Even if it takes years, and aggressively lashes out as it dies, its death is inevitable, and it has already begun.

Men are not women. They never will be.

Nothing, nothing in the world will ever be enough to sustain this lie that men are women. There isn't enough force in the world to overpower the truth for anything but a fleeting, transitory moment in time. We're the ones living through that moment. But we'll see the end of this. It's already happening.”

Barracker, MN, 13 March 2021

BananaBan · 13/12/2022 21:10

Fargoer · 13/12/2022 14:59

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this board and educated me over the years

Does anyone ever just feel utterly depressed and like there is no hope?

I need some encouragement.

Nah fuck that, I'm not having it and neither are you and neither will our daughters. Muscle up, women get stuff done and this is no different, it's the same fight just with different labels and we are not going to wheesht.

This week;

Rowling Rules

Man speaks up

RaininginDarling · 13/12/2022 23:47

Thanks @TheirEminence 😍

TheABC · 14/12/2022 00:00

It's like that three month moment with a newborn baby. You are tired beyond breaking point, your nipples are bleeding, they won't go down...and you need to keep going.

I've lived through that. Millions of us have. I've not gone through that 3am shit just to see my daughter pushed aside on the podium or in the boardroom or because a man LARPing as a women wants her changing room.

Fuck that. One way or another, it's going to end.

On a lighter note, once we've got this sorted, I think we need to take over the CSA and give it the same attitude as the HMRC towards non payment.