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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

Labour canvasser today

610 replies

SirSamVimesCityWatch · 15/07/2023 10:59

I'm in one the constituencies with a by-election coming up.

Just had a labour canvasser (woman, mid/late fifties) knock to ask if I was voting. I said yes I would be.

She asked if I knew who I was voting for. I asked if she knew what a woman was. I told her I was a single issue voter and that was the only issue that was going to decide how I voted.

Her response: "I believe a woman is anyone who believes themself to be a woman".

I told her in that case I have nothing else to say to her, and closed the door.

I would have loved to have actually put some of the issues to her (rapists in prisons, assaults in mixed sex spaces, including schools, destruction of women's sports etc) but my heart was already racing and I knew it would be like talking to a brick wall anyway.

But anyway - at least that's a clear pile in the eye for the whole 'it doesn't come up on the doorstep' nonsense.

So, I'm either voting Tory or SDP.

OP posts:
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AgathaSpencerGregson · 18/07/2023 12:33

SunnyEgg · 18/07/2023 10:13

Yes I agree with you. Especially here due to ridiculous media storms which whipped people up even more. And it was annoying then to see people not able to look forward at all.

But I also think the swing to the right in Europe is migration related. The societal fracturing that people talk about will happen and has already started.

Some posters on here confidently stated the HoL would not pass the recent bill. They were wrong. What’ll be interesting is after Starmer says it’s evil etc is whether he change much at next election.

Maybe he’ll be like Aus Labor and just keep policy as easier

Anyway one thing that unites Covid, gender and migration is people do not look forward enough and they do not consider context enough

Show quote history

Agree re migration in Europe. There needs to be some honesty there and here about the incompatibility of current international human rights obligations enforced by an activist court (which is what we have in the ECHR) and effective migration control. Or we don’t control it and take the consequences.

morningtoncrescent62 · 18/07/2023 12:38

I'm a Labour member. My constituency is about to choose its candidate for the next election, and all the potential candidates have been phoning around. I've asked them all where they stand on women's rights. Some have gone straight onto how oppressed trans people are, not even mentioning women. That's a no. Some have talked about 'traditional' women's issues and when faced with a follow-up ("great, you want to address women's unequal pay, how will you define 'women' so that you can measure the extent of the problem and the success of any policies") have said anyone who identifies as a woman. And two have talked about traditional women's issues, then gone on to the importance of having a stable category 'woman' and being able to have the discussion in the Labour Party. So it was between these two for me: both are OK on our issue, so I'm choosing the one who's closest to what I want on other things.

And that's why I stay in the Labour Party despite everything. If we're there, we have a voice. If we're not, there's no way of influencing what will likely be the next party of government. I'm not naive, but I think those of us who can, have to try.

nonman · 18/07/2023 12:49

Join the Labour Party to influence candidate choice but if a TWAW one gets in, you can always vote for another party

Rudderneck · 18/07/2023 12:58

This is not 1997, when there was cash awash in the economy, and the best possible circumstances for Labour to transform public services, and Blair's iron grip on the Left (rolling over Clause Four totally castrated his internal critics).

Starmer certainly doesn't seem to have Blair's grip on the party.

But it's worth remembering, with regards to finances, that Blair really kicked the can down the corridor. They did not have the necessary money to pay for the NHS. It's being paid for by taxpayers today and is a significant burden on the health system. Anyone looking at what has happened in the last year with the struggle to make it viable should keep that well in mind.

RealityFan · 18/07/2023 13:02

morningtoncrescent62 · 18/07/2023 12:38

I'm a Labour member. My constituency is about to choose its candidate for the next election, and all the potential candidates have been phoning around. I've asked them all where they stand on women's rights. Some have gone straight onto how oppressed trans people are, not even mentioning women. That's a no. Some have talked about 'traditional' women's issues and when faced with a follow-up ("great, you want to address women's unequal pay, how will you define 'women' so that you can measure the extent of the problem and the success of any policies") have said anyone who identifies as a woman. And two have talked about traditional women's issues, then gone on to the importance of having a stable category 'woman' and being able to have the discussion in the Labour Party. So it was between these two for me: both are OK on our issue, so I'm choosing the one who's closest to what I want on other things.

And that's why I stay in the Labour Party despite everything. If we're there, we have a voice. If we're not, there's no way of influencing what will likely be the next party of government. I'm not naive, but I think those of us who can, have to try.

Were the more "reed in the wind" candidates male or female, or a mix?

How did they react to you pushing your line? No debate, exasperation, indignation, felt you were a phobe and the "wrong sort"?

How did you feel about them? Why do you think they've ended up this way? The party machine, trans prevalence in their politics and social circle? Full on indoctrinated?

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 13:31

BaronMunchausen · 17/07/2023 21:28

Tory MP Mike Freer is at it again. "Human rights" (by which he means trans "rights") "really are not debatable". Once again he likens women's concerns about males in their safe spaces to male homophobia in the eighties.

He has previously condemned the "horrible debate on body parts" (ie being concerned about transwomanly penises) as dehumanising people.

This totalitarian misogyny is a cross-party affliction.

This is why it is so important to check the views of the individual candidates. "At least the Tories know what a woman is" has always been a lie, put out by Tory spin doctors and spread by handmaidens of the Tory party and believed by people who didn't check the facts.

nonman · 18/07/2023 13:52

I know what my Tory MPs take on it is, fortunately I won’t be voting for him as he is standing down in the next election, I’m optimistic that his successor will be supportive of women’s rights and I will be voting for her/him

AgathaSpencerGregson · 18/07/2023 13:54

I think it’s more likely to be true of Tory than lib dem or Labour candidates but I’d put it no higher than that.
mike Freer should fuck off to the Lib Dems and take that appalling nokes woman with him.

RealityFan · 18/07/2023 13:59

AgathaSpencerGregson · 18/07/2023 13:54

I think it’s more likely to be true of Tory than lib dem or Labour candidates but I’d put it no higher than that.
mike Freer should fuck off to the Lib Dems and take that appalling nokes woman with him.

Broad church here means the church and the God damned car park outside.

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 14:02

nonman · 18/07/2023 13:52

I know what my Tory MPs take on it is, fortunately I won’t be voting for him as he is standing down in the next election, I’m optimistic that his successor will be supportive of women’s rights and I will be voting for her/him

Optimim isn't going to cut it, you need to ask and get an answer.

dcbc1234 · 18/07/2023 14:12

AgathaSpencerGregson · 18/07/2023 13:54

I think it’s more likely to be true of Tory than lib dem or Labour candidates but I’d put it no higher than that.
mike Freer should fuck off to the Lib Dems and take that appalling nokes woman with him.

This yes agreed and the rest of the TWAW lot too. We have to have at least one political party in the UK where it is considered the norm to accept the constraints of biological reality.

morningtoncrescent62 · 18/07/2023 14:18

Were the more "reed in the wind" candidates male or female, or a mix?

Almost exactly half and half.

How did they react to you pushing your line? No debate, exasperation, indignation, felt you were a phobe and the "wrong sort"?

I didn't pick up any "you're a transphobe" vibes from any of them. Some of them sounded vaguely exasperated that I was asking them to talk about something a) they didn't think was important, and b) they knew they didn't know about. One asked for feedback, and asked me what would have been a better answer (which I got the impression he would use with anyone else who asked a similar question, anything to get votes). No-one went in hard with TWAW-there-is-no-debate, although with the ones who went straight into telling me that trans people are the most oppressed ever I didn't bother pressing them - I knew they'd lost my vote in a single sentence.

How did you feel about them? Why do you think they've ended up this way? The party machine, trans prevalence in their politics and social circle? Full on indoctrinated?

I think 'no-debate' has a lot to do with it. This issue does take some serious thinking about, and talking about in order to land somewhere sensible. Most Labour candidates have had no chance to talk through the complexities, and so they don't realise that there's a conflict of rights which Labour has no way of addressing at the moment. They simply hear the rhetoric, they hear that only nasty Tories could possibly think trans women are men, and in a cost of living crisis they decide to focus on something else less fraught and (apparently) more urgent.

nonman · 18/07/2023 14:20

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 14:02

Optimim isn't going to cut it, you need to ask and get an answer.

Show quote history

I have asked which is why I know that my current MP is TWAW and one of his potential successors is GC

RealityFan · 18/07/2023 14:28

morningtoncrescent62 · 18/07/2023 14:18

Were the more "reed in the wind" candidates male or female, or a mix?

Almost exactly half and half.

How did they react to you pushing your line? No debate, exasperation, indignation, felt you were a phobe and the "wrong sort"?

I didn't pick up any "you're a transphobe" vibes from any of them. Some of them sounded vaguely exasperated that I was asking them to talk about something a) they didn't think was important, and b) they knew they didn't know about. One asked for feedback, and asked me what would have been a better answer (which I got the impression he would use with anyone else who asked a similar question, anything to get votes). No-one went in hard with TWAW-there-is-no-debate, although with the ones who went straight into telling me that trans people are the most oppressed ever I didn't bother pressing them - I knew they'd lost my vote in a single sentence.

How did you feel about them? Why do you think they've ended up this way? The party machine, trans prevalence in their politics and social circle? Full on indoctrinated?

I think 'no-debate' has a lot to do with it. This issue does take some serious thinking about, and talking about in order to land somewhere sensible. Most Labour candidates have had no chance to talk through the complexities, and so they don't realise that there's a conflict of rights which Labour has no way of addressing at the moment. They simply hear the rhetoric, they hear that only nasty Tories could possibly think trans women are men, and in a cost of living crisis they decide to focus on something else less fraught and (apparently) more urgent.

Sounds about right. I'm afraid this is par for the course in politics, public life generally.

How much light as opposed to heat have we had on Brexit? Racialised politics? The environment?

I can't think of many politicians or public figures who are really across their briefs on multiple fronts.

And in the No Debate mantra on trans activism, there's almost no need to inform yourself. The party tells you that any dissent is transphobia, that's all you have to parrot to your activists and colleagues.

Except this doesn't work with the public. And deffo not the majority who are at the very least, moderately GC.

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 14:47

dcbc1234 · 18/07/2023 14:12

This yes agreed and the rest of the TWAW lot too. We have to have at least one political party in the UK where it is considered the norm to accept the constraints of biological reality.

Show quote history

I think it's two: SDP and the Communist Party.

SunnyEgg · 18/07/2023 15:07

AgathaSpencerGregson · 18/07/2023 12:33

Agree re migration in Europe. There needs to be some honesty there and here about the incompatibility of current international human rights obligations enforced by an activist court (which is what we have in the ECHR) and effective migration control. Or we don’t control it and take the consequences.

Show quote history

Yes the system we have won’t work much longer.

There’s a lot of people invested in keeping as it is, I was listening to a couple earlier. Climate on the oth doesn’t stop for that.

It’ll be a tussle but it will change.

nonman · 18/07/2023 15:36

I know what my Tory MPs take on it is, fortunately I won’t be voting for him as he is standing down in the next election, I’m optimistic that his successor will be supportive of women’s rights and I will be voting.

nonman · 18/07/2023 16:20

that was two years ago there’s a different PM in charge who is happy to say a woman is an adult human female.

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 16:26

Rudderneck · 17/07/2023 01:58

And look, Jaime Wallis is irrelevant. He is a joke, has no power, will never influence policy. He will be lucky to get reelected. It's embarrassing that he keeps being brought up as a counter to the fact that the LP is almost totally captured, with some of it's best and most prominent MPs saying that male rapists who identify as women should be in woman's prisons - and in fact seem to actually believe it.

Jamie Wallis is already influencing policy. PM Sunak put Jamie into the Women's and Equalities so he could influence policy.

dcbc1234 · 18/07/2023 16:30

TooBigForMyBoots · 18/07/2023 14:47

I think it's two: SDP and the Communist Party.

Show quote history

Okay then if you insist, maybe Alba too but I don't support Scottish Independence.
What I think voters deserve is, at least one mainstream UK political party capable of forming a Government, which respects biological reality and hence child safeguarding and mens and women's EXISTING sex-based rights.

SunnyEgg · 18/07/2023 16:39

It’s obvious Labour are worse on this issue.

Which is why those pp who are anti Tory as anything still won’t vote for them.

nonman · 18/07/2023 16:39

That was when he wasn’t PM
the debate has changed and he isn’t afraid to say what a woman is

Pluvia · 18/07/2023 16:43

Jamie Wallis will be gone in 2024. Bridgend isn't the kind of place where his behaviour is appreciated.

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