How many gender critical feminists are actually 'out'

[PurpleBugz]

I've been gender critical ever since I learned what is was. But I've not been able to come 'out' on my social media until the posts this weekend and in preceding weeks showed me I really must. I have a now or never feeling about it.

I have the privilege of knowing I can't loose my home or my job by speaking up. If either could be threatened I'd never be able to out myself. As it is I fear what will be said of me as a parent for holding these views. I'm sure I'm about to loose many friends and family.

How many of you strong women are out as gender critical? What's your experience of it?

(Oh the cousin is more GC than I am tbh)

I am out to my husband and extended family and they’re cool with it. Then again I am Texan so I have that advantage. I’ve been slowly coming out to my friends one by one. Two of them stopped talking to me and blocked me on all of their accounts. A few of them are pretty cool with it. Considering a couple were pretty mad I think I might have to come out all at once to the rest of them because it’s likely if they aren’t already gossiping about what a dirty transphobic traitor I am they will be soon. Lol

I can see why you would see TERF as a slur. I remember the first time someone called me a TERF I literally cried. I remember realizing I was gender critical and being terrified of who would call me that. Then was a point though when I came to accept myself for my new feelings and viewpoints and then I kind of started owning it and then I wasn’t afraid of the word anymore and I actually started thinking it sounded kind of cool and rebellious. Lol

Now I’m not saying that your feelings should change about the word or that it’s any less unpleasant when TRA’s are calling us that. But I thought I would share this increasing perspective and relationship I have experienced with this word.

I guess it’s kind of like the difference between a cruel man calling a woman a slut and your best girl friend endearingly calling you a dirty slut for scoring a hot date with a good looking guy and winking at you. One is demeaning the other is teasing and friendly.

I'm only out to some of my friends, and totally out in my karate club.

The karate club is the most refreshing- all straightforward-thinking people, who can't be doing with the outright lies. It can lead to deep discussions such as would s/he put on a chest guard for sparring? Or a groin guard? S/he should put on the former, but I rather suspect they'd want to don the latter. I'm given to understand that a kick in the knackers is rather painful, while I know from experience that a kick in the ladygarden makes one wince, but no more than that.

Out at work but I’m in education so I have to sit on my hands when the very very kind people start talking. I have allies there but it’s still hard at times. I want to shout from the rooftops and I think I might start quite soon…

Not on social media.

Am getting to the stage where I don’t want to be friends with people who think human beings can change sex. Thankfully, most of my friends are politely bemused by their offspring and we shake our heads about them when they’re not there. To be fair, I bet they shake their heads about us!

I can see why you would see TERF as a slur. I remember the first time someone called me a TERF I literally cried.

It's not about fear of the word as such it is simply that it does not describe my position and it is a word foisted on me/us and not one that I care to reclaim.

I guess it’s kind of like the difference between a cruel man calling a woman a slut and your best girl friend endearingly calling you a dirty slut for scoring a hot date with a good looking guy and winking at you.

My best friends would not do that in a million years.

@YetAnotherSpartacus

“My best friends would not do that in a million years.”

You missed the point completely but that’s okay.

For me it is not an “in group” term or one of endearment. The best parallel is SWERF and I don’t think anyone has tried to reclaim this in the same way.

I’m out and most people agree

On Facebook since I first heard about Lily Madigan and couldn't quite believe what was happening. Then seeing LGBTQ (not yet the whole alphabet) posters around school. I didn't often visit FWR in those days but came to see if there was a view and there was.

I haven't lost any real friends. I have argued online with ex-colleagues about JKR. But importantly several people made DM contact to tell me about their own experiences and I have been able to signpost struggling parents to The Bayswater Group and to Genspect. So I was "out" before all the back lash became huge or before I was aware of it. Just before Maya's sacking. No point going back now. Have thought about these issues for a long time. The challenge as the western world changes around us is how to hold on to sanity at all! Every out GC person is a blessing, not only to others, but to those youngsters who really need to hear about reality. The more of us the easier it will become.

I would lose my job and friends.

Still missing the point. I’m not going to try to explain it to you. I just need you to know that you are just very far removed from what I was saying. Just forget that I even shared the comment. I’m sorry that I brought it up because you seem to be trying to make a point that is not relevant.

I'm out and have been for years. I've yet to meet anyone who disagrees with me.

I am quiet about my views except in the company of people who I know agree with me. This is because I am part of a fairly small arts community where I live, which is wholly captured by gender ideology, and where one influential person has a child with a transgender identity. Before I started reading and finding out about the whole trans issue, I posted JKR's essay on FB because it made sense to me and was flatly told that TWAW and #nodebate. If I want to be part of that community (which I do) I have to keep my head down. This is cowardly, I admit. I tend to stick to asking "innocuous" questions.

Totally out. Don't particularly raise the issue unless it is relevant but make no bones about it. Call me a TERF. Don't care. Call me a bigot. Don't care.

But I am elderly and of a generation who always understood biology but did what we wanted anyway.

I was the archetypal 'tomboy' as a kid. Into cars, motor racing, sports etc. Still am. But never, even at the age of 7, did I think I was really a boy. Why not? Because even then I understood biology.

I was genuinely progressive as in "I will like what I want to like and do what I want to do." It has nothing to do with gender, or sex as we called it then.

By contrast, the trans movement is regressive. It turns progressive thinking on so-called gender on its head by pretending that if you are non-gender conforming you have to change your body and not your mindset.

I refuse to "be kind" . Colluding in a lie is not kind as those who do the whole transition will discover when they find they are sterile and anorgasmic with risks of crumbling bones, messed up lungs and blood clots.

And yes, I have stood up to the "I think I pass "- no love you really don't, bloke I encountered in the ladies' loo a year or so back. He stood behind me staring at me in the mirror and smirking so I told him that unless he fucked off my heel was going to come in close contact with a tender part of his anatomy. He left. Guess he didn't fancy an encounter with a woman of the wartime generation with a few decades on the clock and nothing to lose.

I understand that many younger women may be nervous because of historical issues or a nervous temperament and reluctant to act if they are on their own because of the risk of violence. But what I don't understand in the changing room debacle is when a whole team of women encounter a lone AGP is why they don't physically chuck him out. Why be embarasssed? Get mad, bloody mad. If enough women did this it would do a lot to turn the tide. These pervs are targetting women because they think we are easy targets and pawns in their fetish. The sooner we show them we're not, the sooner they will get the message.

I'm out to a few friends and DH. DH is also gender critical but is against me being 'out' in the sense of giving a speech at Let Women Speak etc because he's worried about the consequences for us and - most importantly - our children. This includes direct violence / harassment and indirect things like job loss.

We have a massive mortgage and if either of us lost our job we could lose our home. My company is American and his is an ultra-woke public sector organisation so the fear of being out at work or having a social media / real life visible presence is that we would lose one or both jobs which would throw our children into poverty. I know you can take (incredibly slow, years long) legal action but what are you supposed to live off while that's going on?

Having seen what's happened to women like Kate Scottow and Marion Millar I think we're right to be afraid. I look forward to the day when Maya's judgement really means belief in scientific reality is protected as in so many workplaces it really still isn't. The recent news about Caroline Farrow and the visits of the police to KJK seem to suggest that the police are enabling those who want to use them to harass biological realists. .

I have said to a few people I don't think JKR said anything transphobic and have sent some emails to my MP about single sex toilets in schools and more recently the definition of 'sex' in the Equality Act (the Sex Matters email), but most of my terfery is anonymously.

This is the only issue where I feel afraid to speak out. I feel I could voice my opinion freely on literally any other issue, Brexit (remainer), corruption in the Tory party / during the pandemic, incompetence during the pandemic leading to unnecessary deaths (e.g. care homes), environmental issues, etc It is only this issue where I fear having an opinion, respectfully voiced, could lead to violent / life altering consequences.

I'm a children and young person's therapist and very sadly for me a member of the BACP.

I'm not out to anyone really except DH. I have tested the water with some people by saying things like "why does everyone hate JK Rowling all of a sudden" and most people shrug and don't know/care can't see what the fuss is about.

I have one openly TRA friend who I avoid the subject completely with. She did tell me that when she goes on first dates with men (she's in her 30s) she makes a point of dropping in that she believes that trans women are women then waits for her response.

I get why she does that from a dating perspective as it's such a divisive issue but my mind boggles at her clear understanding that this subject is a matter of faith and yet she cancels anyone who doesn't share her faith

Also to add, I often feel a bit shit about being a coward and have huge admiration for the bravery of KJK and other women speaking out.

Oh, my boss is a gay man who recently posted a 'no LGB without the T' thing on LinkedIn. I like my job (I like my boss, too, I can separate the TRA from the person) so 🤐

Same. I work in a fully captured field (medicine), in a role that gets a fair amount of scrutiny from NHS England. NHS England, the regulators (GMC & CQC), plus my professional bodies (2 Royal Colleges) are all Kool-Aid imbibers. Close colleagues know I have concerns about transitioning children, but not how GC I am in general.

The institutional capture is insane. I bet for every 'out' GC person there are at least 10 who are in the closet and probably another 10-20 who'd agree if they knew more about the issue.

My husband knows and he feels the same as me. My two friends know and agree. My niece calls me a terf but we laugh about it and agree to disagree. My sister knows but doesn’t get it.
my brother in law is a mega terf. I love it. He said “why aren’t more women angry”. Preaching to the choir!
I work for a local council who are up stonewalls arse so I can’t be open in work but I’ve spoken to some friends about it and they get it. Helped by the fact that a sleazy bloke has come out as non binary and on his “femme” days he wears fake boobs into work which everyone thinks is ridiculous

Definitely @dimorphism

I've even out since I peaked about 7 years ago. At the time I was naive and thought it was so ridiculous that as soon as people knew what was going on they'd totally peak too. Silly me. If it's not in the guardian it's not happening in the view of a certain type of person. Others thought it was so stupid it couldn't be happening 🙄

Anyway I am now the wise woman who knows all and people are always coming to me now as they've known I've been involved for so long. All my family and friends are fully GC. Work I don’t discuss it as I'm now remote. When I was in the office I was out though.

Well, sort of.

I don't hide my beliefs, but I also have a general 'no politics' rule on social media. I try to avoid it as I think online discussions can really go downhill quickly. Far happier to talk in person.

I have lost a couple of FB contacts over it.