@BaronMunchausen
I enjoyed your reply to my post. Also The Adventures of Baron Munchausen is one of my favourite films! :) I owe you a proper response which will unfortunately take me a little time. What I will say in brief is that for all the theory-crafting about what you would expect from the Right based on your perception of our gender stereotyping, the reality is that the trans movement hasn't erupted from the Right. It's been very much more nursed into its current form by the right. When theory and reality don't match up, it is theory that must change. But this may read more confrontational than I intend. Your response was interesting and I want to reply properly to it in a bit. I can't resist pointing out right now in response to your comment about history that back in the day the Spectator was calling for an end to slavery in the USA and boycotting of their goods, whilst the Guardian was writing apologetics for slavery and arguing for its continuance. There were definitely female slaves. Okay, I'll stop myself until I can reply properly but I hope at least it's accepted that "right wing" =/= "bad person".
That leads me onto a more general comment about my own experience. When I was young I recall that I had a vague awareness of how people tended to become conservative or right wing with age (in my mind at the time they were probably the same thing). And I was determined that I myself wouldn't lose my principles like so many others. And indeed I don't think I have. If anything my principles are stronger now than they were back then. But what caught me off guard was not that what I valued changed, but my belief in what actually worked changed. And so my shift to being a self-described right-winger isn't a shift in values, but, imo, a shift in approach.
@Allthegoodnamesarechosen goodnamesarechosen
"Re right wing / left wing : I just want point out that the first woman MP in UK was elected on a Conservative ticket, selected and promoted by the party (not dissimilar to the first Jewish Prime Minister) ."
When Thatcher became leader of the Conservative party all the Labour members in the local council office were celebrating - quite literally celebrating. Because, word for word: "Britain will never elect a woman as prime minister". Alice Weidel leader of the AfD in Germany, the prime minister of Serbia (name escapes me) - both strong female leaders and right wing.
@lady69
"Truly “right wing” are the equivalent of anti-fa on the far left."
Hardly!
@Binturongs
Great post. Gave me a couple of things to think about. Regarding this bit in particular it reminds me of something: " think it's very easy to fall for the idea that because feminists[1] tend [2] to be left wing, then the left wing must be feminist. Which is very much not the case - the left as a whole has always had a strong strand of misogyny and 'after the revolution, love'. Sure, we'll look at women's rights - once the important things have been fixed."
For a little time in the USA the Progressive Left courted the euphoric atheists. Which was far more of an American thing than UK but people will recall lots of Richard Dawkins on TV, "The God Delusion" in bookshops, etc. Well given the influence of religion in the USA and its entwinement with the Right (not actually always the case in the USA's history - the alliance came later), this seemed like a good recruiting and media base for the Progressive Left. Which it was for a very brief period before they realised that whilst the Euphoric Atheists certainly did lay into the Christian Right in America, they were also equally enthusiastic about laying into Islam, talking about Mohammed's nine year old wife, etc. And they were promptly dropped from the Progressive Left like a hot potato. Which is not a tiny part why their movement vanished as abruptly as it appeared. My point is that there's really a couple of Lefts. There's the well-intentioned and there's the, well, other side. And I feel they use women's rights in exactly the same way. And that actually ties right back into the topic at hand because they're not getting the mileage out of that they used to. Oh, some. But not as much as they get from the new hotness of trans rights. Much like these people did a quick bit of maths and said: "Making ourselves the party that speaks for Muslims gives us more power than a bunch of atheists in fedoras", they now, I believe, make the same calculations that they can ride along on the trans movement more than they can on the women's movement which is why women are getting the worse end of the stick in any conflict between the two. It's cynical but most powerful people are powerful people first and whatever else they label themselves as second. (And that applies to any 'wing'). Plus the trans movement knows which side its bread is buttered. It's dependent on its powerful backers in a way that women simply are not. That makes them loyal.
(Footnote, I don't think anybody ever asked Muslims - who are mostly pretty conservative people - whether they wanted Left Wing politicians and talking heads to be their voice, but c'est de la politiques).
Okay. I am self-described Right Wing. My own bias is probably showing in this post and whilst I will happily debate Right vs. Left in great detail, to do so would detract from what actually matters here - that people of different general political backgrounds can come together and deal with what we all know is wrong. There will be differences - Right Wing feminism is much more focused on individual rights and old school equal opportunity. Left Wing feminism is more focused on equity and changing society. But I think some things are so basically essential to women's rights that there should be no barrier to co-operation. And I'm really pleased to see this happening more and more. All sorts of things are used to divide us because if we're fighting each other we're not fighting Them.™