Women in Wales silently protest Drakeford's speech

[fromorbit]

While women were under attack in London and New Zealand in the Cathedral City of St David's Welsh Women carried out a daring silent protest on Saturday. The Welsh government's refusal to listen or meet with women's groups for years is utterly wrong. Glad to see this happen, Drakeford and Welsh Labour can look forward to much more of this over the next few years. #ShesBehindYou!

https://nation.cymru/news/drakeford-speech-marred-by-silent-protest-over-womens-safety/

More from Wales-Women’s Rights Network here including footage;
https://twitter.com/SGResisters/status/1639926549540372480

Brilliantly planned demo !

St David's currently has the first ever women bishop in Welsh history. So it is a very appropriate place for a protest asserting women's right to challenge unquestioned male authority.

Interestingly in attending the Cathedral the protestors trod in the footsteps of the suffragettes - Emmeline Pankhurst, Annie Kenney, Mary Blaythwat and Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence all came to St David's and signed visitors book in 1908 when they were campaigning in a Pembroke byelection against the Liberal candidate because of the Liberals refusal to listen to women's demand for the vote.

Within 20 years of this Liberal dominance of Wales was collapsing in the face of Labour who at that time recognised that women existed and championed their rights. Welsh Labour beware!

That's lovely. It seems the only 'marring' that happened was at the end when they were rushed and had their banners thrown to the floor.

I don't know the reasoning of the woman who did this. Women are abused even when they're not speaking!

This was a great protest which, aside from Nation Cymru, will likely be ignored by mainstream Welsh media. There’s a real dignity and power to it. Very moving and emotional - the historical references to the suffragettes at the cathedral previously by @fromorbit really underline that.

Wales really is a one party state, meaning that the media don’t want to hold the Welsh Govt to account at all as there is no prospect of Welsh Labour losing power.
Welsh Govt are also completely in thrall to gender ideologues and are desperate for the power to bring in self ID. This is Scotland all over again - but with dragons not merkins.
There is a simmering grassroots feminism in Wales and the First Minister is likely to be looking over his shoulder now at all public appearances, worrying that another protest will pop up. And it surely will too! #ShesBehindYou!

Excellent.

The fact that it happened in St Davids Cathedral also sends out a quiet message to the Church in Wales (Welsh equivalent of the Church of England, but with its own governance). The CiW likes to see itself as progressive, which in practice tends to mean an unthinking pro-self-ID stance, and an ignoring of women's sex-based rights.

Anglican Christians tend to assume a 'just be kind' attitude – which of course means 'trans women are women' isn't up for debate.

Bangor recently had a non-binary mayor, and the Bishop of Bangor (now also the Archbishop of Wales) was keen to be photographed with 'them' to show his progressive credentials.

Diolch yn fawr.

Amazing. Thank you, brave women.

Dignified and impactful.

What a dignified and sombre protest

Does anyone know who the disruptor was? Or what they said? She comes across as slightly toddler ish....

Brilliant! I saw on Twitter that the disruptor is a lecturer at Bath Spa

What a dignified protest

this from the very sympathetic Nation piece

Their banners bore slogans advocating for the protection of single sex spaces and sports

what sort of person could object to that?

All very dignified apart from the woman having a tantrum at the end. A lecturer, you say? My word.

Excellent protest. Was any of the applause for the protest I wonder..it wasn’t clear from the footage .

The trouble is when you get a dignified protest like this in a Cathedral, they don't remain as such as we saw from the 'just stop oil' in the UK and anti abortion Handmaid's tale protests in USA Churches, someone else will escalate.

I intrigued to know why a Mosque wasn't considered also?

Church and state are separate. It's a shame they didn't take this to the state.

The protest wasn't in connection to the Cathedral and the church as an establishment. This was part of the "Festival of Ideas" being held in St Davids, and the Cathedral was being used as one of the venues for various activities related to the festival. So the protest was going where Mark Drakeford was, not specifically choosing a cathedral to protest in.

Thank you for the explanation.

Women have been protesting for ages in Wales. Outside the Senedd, online discussions [raise a question and you are thrown out], outside events like hustings, stickers. The problem is getting into a situation where they can do something like this is difficult. The shut down of debate is near total.

Hats off to the women behind this. It is immense to pull this off, and gives hope that the situation can change.

Unlike Scotland where due the different media world and structure of society women's groups have been able to make better headway. Also ironically the greater power of the Scottish Parliament the fact that women's prisons are under their control and they could pass the gender act meant they could carry out drastic crazy acts quickly which resulted in huge blowback.

In Wales we are facing a slow erosion of rights. The TRAs are just as insane, but we have more difficulty exposing their agenda because of wider issues inside Wales. Ordinary Welsh people reject the gender extremism, but it doesn't register as a big issue right now, economic issues take priority. It maybe we will have to wait 5 or 10 years when a bunch of lives are ruined I suspect.

Given that the Welsh government hates Muslims, Lesbians, gays, anyone with questions - the chances of them going anywhere a mosque without tight security is minimal. This online meeting the other day threw out ANYONE with a questioning attitude including a Muslim woman:

https://twitter.com/WRNWales/status/1639218034630877185

https://order-order.com/2023/03/27/watch-womens-rights-campaigners-crash-drakefords-speech/

I saw this on another thread.

Possibly a mosque was not considered because the UK is Christian, at least technically.

I guess Wales is still mostly Christian.

It's currebtly lent for Christians - their most Holy time of year. It's Ranadam for Muslims, Mayor Khan has lights in London to celebrate Ramadam.

Someone ought to do a study on why the Female TRA supporters are so fanatical - it’s fascinating from a psychological viewpoint. Utterly bizarre. Are they carefully targetted and groomed or are they willing supplicants from the get go?

The ‘disruptor’ has put out a very disingenuous tweet
Comment on disruption
It’s worth watching the video coverage - the women carrying out the protest were very dignified. Unlike the ‘disruptor’.
Seen some commenting about why a cathedral was chosen. It’s purely because the First Minister was making a speech there. It could have been any location.
If I was Hannah Blythyn, the Welsh Govt minister who brought in the plan heralding their intention to introduce self ID, I’d be constantly looking over my shoulder for protestors now. Lots did ‘pop up’ in a zoom she had several days ago but were removed one by one as they asked questions.Hannah Blythyn meeting

Easter is holiest, as you say. Seems reasonable to use a Christian cathedral and this one has resonance since Emmeline Pankhurst and Mrs Pethwick-Lawrence both visited in 1908 when campaigning for votes for women. The connection with the Suffragettes is clearly made and purple, white and green now means GC feminists and the fight to retain women's rights. Good choice. God alone knows what the woman lecturer thought she was doing throwing down banners asking that women's rightst be maintained. Does she not want women's rights? Weird. However that is, we need to keep marching for our rights, just as the Suffragettes did.

I find it fascinating too.
I saw a theory that said the younger studenty ones in particular have little memory of society being unequal between men and women. Things are (to them) generally pretty equal nowadays. They don't consider that their rights were hard won by their predecessors and could be taken away at any time. So they're looking for a cause of the "most oppressed" to support.

I don't know if I believe it but it's interesting. Personally I wish they would get really fucking angry about girls being banned from education by the Taliban, for example, or abortion rights in the US. But maybe that's just too difficult, far away and abstract to think about.

Victoria Smith is good on the generational divide her new book Hags sounds good.

It is a huge issue, the more you look the more you see.

Excellent work, women of Wales!

Well done those women of Wales. It seems the violent handmaiden was on a panel discussing the menopause, so presumably she knows what a woman is some of the time. Love the way her disingenuous tweet has been thoroughly ratioed.

I agree, she acted just like a petulant toddler throwing a tantrum! Did she miss her nap time or something?!

Again there were police there who made zero moves to stop the disruptor fucking seriously this was a peaceful protest they didn't even react when she did that it wouldn't have killed them to step forward and do their job