Rape Crisis NI will be joining trans allies to protest Let Women Speak event in Belfast on Sunday 16 April 2023 1pm

[IwantToRetire]

My Mum co-founded the first Rape Crisis Centre in Northern Ireland. I told her about the below(*), she was shaking with rage and felt physically ill. I got a quote from her for @RapeCrisis_NI,

‘You are not feminists, what you’re doing goes against the ethos of any actual rape crisis in the world, which is about women being there for women and children. There will be true rape crisis counsellors at the #LetWomenSpeak event who have worked in this country for over 30 years supporting survivors of rape and sexual abuse whilst you handmaidens betray women.’

(*) See https://twitter.com/NoraUtd/status/1646874371129069569
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If you read the twitter thread you will see this in one of the responses

The original one that closed due to funding cuts was for women only. The new one that opened years later in 2020 seems to have changed the criteria to all. The previous one lost funding for being too specialist…. Wonder if this was a theme?
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The BBC have written a news story about the LWS Belfast event and planned protests and that The Women's Rights Network was able to show the film Adult Human Female in Belfast.

BBC report here with maybe a bit of a slant?! ie they aren't counter protests as LWS events are protest but freedom of speech for women events https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-65187388

I’m really confused by that poster, because unless I’ve completely misunderstood it’s the Rape Crisis actively taking resources and time from supporting rape victims to try and silence women rather than women actually protesting against the Rape Crisis

youre not wrong, I’ve no idea why that poster is telling people to leave the organisation alone when its the organisation thats not leaving people alone

they didnt have to shove themselves in the middle of it….no one forced them

@FirstFallopians Belfast event is tomorrow

Yeah the reality is that this rape crisis centre has decided to join a protest to actively seek to silence women who disagrees that women need singles sex spaces. Not women who are seeking to remove trans inclusive spaces.

That is the really important thing to remember here. Women are not seeking to remove trans spaces, they are seeking the spaces they set up for women. For female people.

And this poster is truly effectively telling us not to discuss it and to ‘leave an anti-woman rape crisis centre that was likely set up by female people for female people alone’!

Oh the emotive plea! The emotional manipulation. This has been this posters mode of operation all along. It is not new.

Trans Ally sounds so much nicer than Men who want to shout, threaten violence, intimidate woman purely because women want to speak.

Good for them.

Yes. It means that not one woman who needs female only rape crisis support will mistake that organisation as being the one to support them.

Well done NI Rape Crisis.

I think women are more than happy to 'leave alone' a Rape Crisis service that centres men over women.

However, this thread is discussing how said Rape Crisis NI is actively choosing not to 'leave alone' women. Women who wish to speak their opinions and to listen to others doing the same.

Rape Crisis NI are using their time and resources to protest a legal public event, organised by women, who hold different opinions than they do. Alongside and in solidarity with, aggressive men, often masked, with previous form for violent behaviour at such events.

How can any vulnerable woman now view Rape Crisis NI as a safe place to escape male violence, when they will stand shoulder to shoulder with violent men to try and silence speech they don't like?

What a mockery of 'no means no' as the premise that underpins consent. You'd think a bloody Rape Crisis centre would at least acknowledge a woman's right to say 'no'.

I guess it didn't include the kind of hate for other women which trans allies promote either. It's really sad to see how much gender ideology has divided women and negatively affected their ability to band together for the greater good of all women.

If they can't protect single sex (proper single sex, not single gender) then they are not helping women. Most women don't have a gender identity and so there is no reason for them to be in a group with a TW than with any other male. If a woman wants single sex spaces, denying them to her is a very big problem. Did you see what happened to Sarah in Brighton? LGB should be welcome in the spaces for their sex class. So should the T. No-one is denying trans people are attacked and may need support. A TW should be welcome in a group for men or if there is a need for it, a separate group for TW. Saying that these males should not be in a women's group is not denying them support. It's refusing to allow the women to be used as a tool for male validation ...again (because that's what rape is). You need to be clear that many lesbians, bisexual people and gay men do not consider TW to be actual women. So it is not possible to support LGB people unless you use a biological definition of woman. People who don't accept that are not arguing for support for LGBT people. They are arguing for only only for trans identifying people and the very few other people in the world who have a gender identity.

AI is now headed by a transman who is doing everything in their power to promote TRA ideology. Even before this, AI had lost the plot.

I guess the monitors are busy here then.

If a Rape Crisis Centre takes part in the toxic, violent abuse that TRAs rain upon women's rights protestors at these events then they are 100% not fit for service.

What a back to front world we live in.

Just to repeat what was said in the OP:

The original one (RCC) that closed due to funding cuts was for women only. The new one that opened years later in 2020 seems to have changed the criteria to all. The previous one lost funding for being too specialist…. Wonder if this was a theme?

So in fact prior to any trans activism the orginal (women's liberation founded) Rape Crisis centre had its money cut. Because a women's service is never a priority.

Have said this a few times, but needs repeating, long before TRAs started demanding right of access to women's services and huge number of local women's centres, rape crisis centres (Boris Johnson as Mayor had to step in in London to fund local rape crisis centres as no one else would) and refuges lost funding and were closed.

Many have never reopened, and women survivors of rape of domestic violence are supposed to be satisfied with generic support services / mixed homeless accommodation.

So what is strange here is that a new Rape Crisis Centre has been set up, ie money found, but was it those campaigning for a RCC that are all TWAW or was it the funders saying it. Have found this article that talks about when it opened https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-53986798

Oh whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat - posted too soon was trying to get rid of the image (I hate that MNHQ have added that automatic function to please advertisers I suppose - grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... )

Anyway was just going to add that part of the sucess of TRAs is that they are so helpful to the MRA agenda.

On a practical note, someone up thread said they didn't dare check twitter to see what is going on.

Well in fact it is tomorrow, and I am assuming it is the usual youtube link - does anyone know.

Also know does Belfast use BST - I know if it part of the UK, but being that far west it might have a different timezone?!

(Another gripe about forum software - why doesn't a tag come up for the emojis. I am never sure which is which, so tend not to use them in case I commit some social media faux pas)

Belfast is the same time zone

Thanks Coyoacan - sorry to have to ask"

Hasn't had much coverage in MSM but seems that there are women happy that LWS is coming to Belfast.

Lots of tweets using the hashgtag #womenspeakbelfast
https://twitter.com/hashtag/letwomenspeakbelfast

Here's hoping it will be like Glasgow with the police keeping the rainbow coalition (and Rape Crisis NI) at a safe distance.

Tell me, Merlins, how do RCNI "help victims of rape" by attending this protest?

I am assuming this is correct, but check out this graphic showing which other women's groups (8 or 9) are also joining the protest AGAINST letting women speak.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ftvyu6vWIAAMxdB?format=jpg&name=large

Click on the link above to see a large image.

Part of twitter thread here https://twitter.com/Aja02537920/status/1647177552442564611/photo/1

Apart from showing that theirs is not a serious service for women rape victims, of course.

This is what betrayal looks like, a rape crisis organisation throwing women under the bus in the name of BeKind. It’s gone beyond satire now. Wonder if they’ve ever attended a TRA protest before? Will it peak them, comparing the masked, baying mob to the peaceful, ordinary women trying to speak?

By "women" you mean "gender critical women". Correct?

No. Women. You don't have to be GC to speak.

No.