White supremacist patriarchy to blame for Palestinian deaths, declare Sisters Uncut

[IwantToRetire]

(The Times article headline actual says that this is what feminists are saying, so part of the point in posting is because this headline is sloppy reporting implying all feminists think like Sisters Uncut... and there are no commenting options.)

Explaining its alignment with the Palestinian cause, Sisters Uncut said: “As intersectional feminists we know our struggles are connected; nobody is free until we are all free. The same colonial logic of white supremacist patriarchy that oppresses feminists the world over is murdering Palestinians right now, through isra*l’s [sic] racist apartheid settler-colonialism.”

More recently, the group has campaigned for the rights of transgender people and minorities. On its website, the group describes itself as “women and gender-variant people who live under the threat of domestic violence”.

In July it supported Sarah Jane Baker, a transgender rights activist who told a Pride event to “punch a Terf” [trans-exclusionary radical feminist]. Baker had previously spent 30 years in prison for kidnap and attempted murder. Baker was later acquitted of a charge of inciting violence in connection with the Terf comment.

Other members of the “joint struggle bloc” include Soas Detainee Support, which supports detained immigrants, and the social justice group Land In Our Names. Also listed are the Dyke Project, which describes itself as “a collection of trans, cis, non-binary lesbians and queers of all persuasions”, Queers for Palestine and London Trans Pride.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sisters-uncut-pro-palestine-protests-feminism-oppression-london-32qcf0s5g

Full article can be read at https://archive.ph

So just to repeat I am not posting this to aggravate the really strong feelings the terrible situation between Israel and Gaza is provoking. But because it is an example of how over the years Sisters Uncut, through mounting sucessful media eye catching events, leads to false reporting that they are representative of feminism/ists. The reality is that their political practices is to piggy back on other events, an example being of their gate crashing the peaceful and respectful Sarah Everard event, intentionally to provoke the police now means the media, as in this article, say it was their event. I would have thought the Times would have higher reporting standards than this. Which makes me wonder what their motive is in reporting what seem to be so many supportive articles about women's sex based rights.

Awkward for The Times who uncritically platformed them then.

The motive of the Times in having so many articles about women’s sex-based rights is profit, I would imagine. They know their readership, which is both conservative with a small c and of the demographic more likely to agree with the point of view (I know that people of all ages support women’s sex based rights but there is a perception that it is a generational issue). The articles generate clicks and comments.

I say conservative with a small c because in general I don’t think the Times readers who are still commenting after the name change policy are supporting women’s sex based rights from an equalities perspective because any other article about women’s rights and equality gets a ton of negative comments along the lines of the gender pay gap doesn’t exist, women should try laying roads and physically demanding jobs, there is a reason for different societal roles etc.

The anti women / queer theory obsessed nature of Sisters Uncut is being fully exposed from readers in the comments underneath that Times article.
A while ago the Times acquired a range of "left wing" and feminist readers after the Guardian abandoned ethical journalism and feminists & others cancelled subscriptions and moved there. Most were not disappointed by the range of investigative journalism and (below the line) a fascinating range of posters often fiercely debating issues with knowledge & integrity (along with the inevitable people best ignored). It also means that women's voices get heard and misleading articles / headlines criticised.

Comments are open on the Times piece if anyone wants to write anything. I think it's very very wrong to portray Sisters Uncut as a feminist organisation, let alone representative of the way feminists in general think.

Agree with RoyalCorgi. It’s hard to regard any organisation which platforms a man telling people to beat up women as feminist

women and gender-variant people who live under the threat of domestic violence

What a word salad way to say females and males with special privileges to use females as support humans (although are they included, because statistically do they have any more domestic violence than the average man?!) Have sisters uncut (how ironic, or descriptive) been Transphobic here? I mean only if you apply some reality to the special victim status, but still.

I like my way better. More honest.

What's a feminist besides someone who considers themselves a feminist?

I don't like it when feminists tell conservative women they can't use the word, and I don't think anyone should tell these women that either.

Whether they are "representative" is irrelevant,like all groups of women or men, they represent their own views and that is it. They don't represent women.

I think the article shows what they are pretty clearly and readers can see it. The Times doesn't need to edit it in order to try and send their readers in a particular direction.

It is an organisation along the lines of SWP that through rigorous/ ruthless organisation hijacks and directs ordinary protests.
Again without inflaming or misdirecting, it relies on current populist and shallow sloganeering and ignores the fact that space for secular feminism is wider and deeper in Israel than it is in Palestine and especially Gaza under Hamas. A truly intersectional feminist approach was best typified by the woman who shook hands with her captors as she was freed. I hate the reduction to football team or dare I say it binary right/wrong. But even more that the loudest and best organised are grabbing space and oxygen yet again.
And as someone involved in the VAWG sector, I wonder how many of the Sisters Uncut lot actually do the hard and boring work. It’s not about shouting or sloganeering, it’s about listening

"Nobody is free until we are all free."

This means "I'm a doormat who must sort out everything else's shit before I think about my own problems."

If there’s one group Sisters Uncut don’t give a flying fuck about, it’s women.

@TempestTost

What's a feminist besides someone who considers themselves a feminist?

I don't like it when feminists tell conservative women they can't use the word, and I don't think anyone should tell these women that either.

In my opinion, and I don’t know much about this "Sisters Uncut" group so I'm just speaking generally, it does look pretty questionable if feminist groups are taken over and their thinking is being controlled or limited by men (trans women) as that is arguably undermining the very nature of the movement.

Other than that, I would guess that there are some very well established principles of feminism such as right to education and right to vote which you couldn't sensibly contradict and still be in the tradition, but no one today is trying to do that.

You're wrong! I frequently comment under Times articles as I suspect do many other women here. Many of us took out a Times subscription after having given up on the Guardian.

What's wrong with being "conservative with a small c" anyway? Some things are worth conserving, and we didn't struggle to achieve rights and protections only to have them removed and trampled by an undemocratic and radical ideology.

Also some of us realise that sex is real and that there are sex based differences, which 'equality feminism' ignores or tries to suppress.

I expect to hear their statement on the Afghan female refugees being forcibly returned by Pakistan any moment now in that case. Any moment…..still waiting…

@Deargoodness

The motive of the Times in having so many articles about women’s sex-based rights is profit, I would imagine.

Yes, but it's also quite possible that they genuinely agree with the principle.

because any other article about women’s rights and equality gets a ton of negative comments along the lines of the gender pay gap doesn’t exist

In the simplistic way it sometimes gets suggested, like it's 77 cents on the dollar for the same work, that's why people object to it. It's more complex than some of the rhetoric used; but if you admit it's more complex, then you don't have the easy headline.

Janice Turner of the Times has been in this right from the start. I remember sitting near her at the first ever We Need to Talk event back in 2017, when the original venue was bullied into cancelling, Maria MacLachlan was beaten up by transactivists and when we made it to the backup venue, the speeches were made to the background of protesters chanting BURN IT DOWN.

Do Sisters Uncut not realise that Hamas is anti feminist, anti-transgender and anti-gay?

FFS Sisters Uncut. Grown a brain between you

SIsters Uncut are knee-jerk idiots who spout Hamas mantras without any understanding of what they really mean.

I wonder how they feel gay men and women will fare under Islamic rule? In Iran gay men are thrown off buildings to kill them and women are beaten up and a couple have died for not covering their hair. Really ‘progressive’!

Oh I'm sure the progressives will condemn such things, but I'm not sure you will get them out on a march calling for the destruction of Iran etc in the way you can get them out on a march calling for the destruction of the world's only Jewish state.

Toxic woke ignoramuses need to stop applying simplistic American racial politics to foreign countries.

21% of Israelis are Arabs, and around 25% of Israeli Jews are Mizrahi Jews from African and Arab countries. But let them keep wanging on about "white supremacy". Israel is an incredibly diverse modern country, with people of many different ethnic groups, both Jewish and non-Jewish.

Israel is one of the most conquered and occupied corners of land on the planet. Palestinians deserve land rights and a state but they are not native as such, they are merely descendants of prior settlers.

Not that it should matter. Just pointing out how ignorant these screeching "white supremacy" "colonialism" morons are.

I think Sisters Uncut might have got an early Christmas present 🎁

https://dissentpins.com/collections/conspiracy-theory-kits/products/conspiracy-theory-kit

The anti women / queer theory obsessed nature of Sisters Uncut is being fully exposed from readers in the comments underneath that Times article.

Thanks for posting that info. All I could see was the article and no commenting option, but I am not a subscriber.

My comment about why did the Times print so many articles about women's sex based rights and then casually in an irresponsible and inaccurate way label the article as being about what "feminists" do or do not think.

They wouldn't publish an article about the SWP saying or doing something and title it Socialists say or do x, y or z.

I suppose I was thinking in a simplistic way that (if you are bothered!) to email the Times and ask they to change the title as it is inacurate and they are meant to be a newspaper.

Is there an email address for complaints?

@IwantToRetire I think they got SU wrong from the get-go. They went to town over the picture taken at Sarah Everard's vigil and seemed to have done zero inquiry into who they were. No idea why.