Maya’s response to Radical Notion’s GC divisions

[HiccupHorrendousHaddock]

I thought this was a very interesting answer to the recent issue of RN.

Shout out to the vipers and their Mumsnet Feminism within!

mforstater.medium.com/on-gender-critical-disputes-db2e456ad9cd

They also say we should share the word ‘woman’ and be grateful to retain ‘female’.

Seriously? Well, fuck that.

Imagine these three scenarios that a child might say to their mom:

"Mom, I don't know who she is, but there's a woman outside my window"

"Mom, I don't know why, but there's a unicorn outside my window"

"Mom, I don't know how he is, but there's a man outside my window."

We all know the scenario that drives the most fear in our hearts. We deserve to know who the men are and to name them.

So true

A slightly exaggerated paraphrase on my behalf but yes!

If I could find my reading spectacles I would get you a screen shot (the online magazine is artsy and hard navigate on a phone!)

I've seen this same "compromise" suggested in my neck of the woods. That female can be for the biological types but "women" should be a broader umbrella.

It's like no one talked to the editors or the linguists or the biologists. It's the inadequacy and lack of specificity of "female" that gets me. Why should bovines and horses have a distinct name for their reproductively mature females but we human females don't even rate so high? Not that mares and cows aren't supreme creatures but so am I!!!

Someone who considers themselves Mumsnet feminist royalty popped up in the Radical Notion thread to tell us all off in bizarre ways. It was a trip.

None of us took her particularly seriously, she was clearly just after attention.

This is where I was in the run up to the GRA being introduced. At the time there were women who argued that it wouldn't be enough and the word "female" would also be co-opted. They also argued that by ceding the word "women" we would lose the ability to frame discussions around "women's" rights and needs. Frankly, I thought they were batshit crazy.

I was very, very wrong.

I’m an academic and would describe myself as a radical feminist in many ways, but I also still don’t like purity coteries and who’s-in-who’s-out stuff — too playground for me.

We’re all in it for results on this gender shit — we don’t have to agree on the niceties of theory or party political stance, and that’s perfectly normal and healthy.

It used to be completely normal to have friends, and people you have common cause with on issues that cross political divides — what happened? It seems to me that purity spirals are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

It all reads like terrible, cringey, DARVO tossed around in word salad.

I only started using ‘Head Girls to describe this finger waggy, condescending clique when they called us ‘Domesticated Zombies’ and Posie a ‘PoundshopLePen’

They seem to love making lists of women who’ve committed wrongthink!

Will come in very handy for the gulag guards I’m sure.

Frankly, the wrong think lists are lists of women who are making the most sense!

I agree with Maya. Budge up on the Shire wife bench, please.

We are talking counties and not carthorses, aren't we? Otherwise it'll have to be a very big bench.

Here’s the link to the whole issue. It’s just pages and pages of naming and shaming women they don’t like, basically.

theradicalnotion.org/gender-critical-disputes/

Thankfully the Hobbits are small.

Yes, we are supposed to fight for trans people according to RN. Well, they can FO with that. They have human rights already and that is enough. I'm not enabling transgressive men. WE WANT OUR STUFF BACK.

See my previous message.

From the same piece.

Dunno about my fellow domesticated zombies but I’m neither capable of doing everything for everyone nor willing to everything for everyone.

This feels like an old fashioned appeal towards female socialisation, yet another round of ‘Be Kind’ and for what? So we can go back to stuffing envelopes for Labour?

Fuck. That. Shit.

I’m assuming I’m a shire wife of Farage too (shudders). I do actually live away from academic spires in the countryside and I’m married to a man who I think is rather nice as is my DS. Can’t stand Farage though.

I haven’t got the brain power left at the end of the day or end of the week to wade through pages of academic navel gazing and I left the school girl who’s in who’s out club behind in the playground. I don’t have to agree with anything KJK, Maya or anybody else thinks on other issues (except JKR because, well, JKR) for me to agree with them in this and as a pragmatist (I’m a medic and we tend to be) I don’t see the need for everyone to agree to be allowed in the club.

Tribalism is the death of any movement because no one is ever 100% ideologically pure and as others said I think it’s the height of privilege to have academic discussions about who counts as good enough to be the right kind of feminist when there’s males in women’s safe spaces as we speak. Imprisoned women can’t theorise their way out of sexual violence.

While I've certainly critiqued Posie for her lack of understanding of US politics, and while she may have a populist following in a broad sense of the term, and I personally see that some women get a bit too defensive when it comes to 'professional feminism', in no way, in absolutely no way in hell, is she anything like Trump nor does she employ his tactics. That man is a narcissistic, long-term grifter, harasser of women, and has zero understanding or care for women's rights. FFS, Trump never lets anyone speak if he's got a stage - the opposite of "Let Women Speak!" The man picks whatever cause d'jour will get him exposure and his favorite cause is himself. I AM an American, on the left, and unfortunately for my own mental health, I'm well versed in Trump, and no. Just. no. They may both speak off the cuff, but that's the most I've got.

Also, 'USian ears' - I've never heard this used to describe my people. It's weird.

I think we should consider rebranding to The Real Shire Wives of Mumsnet - can’t cope with Farage’s name coming up this frequently!

People's Front of Judaea vs the Judean People's Front. Life of Brian on purity spirals and infighting four decades ago

What a great article.

"By contrast, what might be called “Mumsnet feminism” focuses on the messy material reality of mothers, fathers (good and bad, present and absent) and children, who need care and protection. It may be low on theory but it can see gender ideology and queer theory for what it is; an attack on the social structures that protect children (many of which are derided as part of the patriarchy by those who see the world this way)."

And as far as mocking people I don't really have an issue with it, especially after it was pink leggings penis rapist's photo that peaked all of Scotland.

I want activism that achieves change, we need a hoard of women (and men) to get change. I've very much in the Maya and Helen camp.

So we should work for everyone. But not for anyone on the right. And the primary purpose of feminism is not to overturn the patriarchy, or to improve the lot of women, but to be noticed by socialists.

Eh?

I really liked this article. The academic theoretical purity spirals some feminist theorists spout have a similar impact on me that queer theory gender crap does - it's a total turn off. I'm strongly feminist but I'm also an extremely practical person who likes to solve problems - if that makes me a shire wife then so be it. Budge up on that bench.

I also agree that there are many in the trans movement who warrant mocking. Maybe that makes me a bad person, I'm no longer sure I care.

David Beckham in a sarong? Harry Styles in a ballgown and blazer? Crack on. I have zero issues with people wearing whatever makes them comfortable. But there is a hard to describe yet very perceptible line where it switches from wearing women's clothing to dressing up as a woman; where it goes from fashion choice to insulting mimicry. That same line is where it transitions from confident rule breaker to worthy of ridicule. It's also the line where it often becomes creepy.

We're going to need a bigger bench.

I just stumbled across Stephen Whittle’s
Reddit account.

Whittle has been writing what seems to be Terf themed fanfic and as it mentions some of the women mentioned on this thread I will put the screenshots here:

www.reddit.com/u/1955Stephen/