What's going on with Genspect?

[MalagaNights]

I've seen Stella O'Malley tweet about being unfairly attacked.
I've seen a weird exchange from James Lindsay about feminists trying to take down Genspect.

But I can't work out what's happened or who is fighting with who.

Any ideas?

Couple of great observations on there. Like this:

"I love how it's simultaneously "just a dress" and we need to stop clutching our pearls, but it's also so deeply essential to certain men's identities and psychological well-being that we must seek a deeper understanding these men and their dresses."

And this:

"Orientations are stable. (They can be repressed or denied, but they're stable.) But paraphilias always escalate.
Can you imagine an orientation that always escalates? That demands more and more high-risk behavior to achieve the same sense-of-self? That needs to be mirrored back in ever increasing degrees to feel authentic?
That doesn't remotely sound like LGB or het orientation. It does sound something like a personality disorder or an addiction."

This is why they need to understand that they can't opt out of safeguarding and that doing so has consequences

Rex, you picked two opinions I thought very insightful too. Thanks for copying and pasting them; it didn’t occur to me to do it 💐

Aww Utopia!

She's saying that you shouldn't police what people wear in that tweet, which used to be uncontroversial in feminist circles. She's got Sarah Philimore's support, which I regard ad the highest praise.

It's fine not to agree with some of what HP says (I don't either) but she's not the enemy.

Noone has told you that you must do anything. Genspect is an organisation set up to promote a nuanced and evidence-based approach to gender, so part of that is naturally going to involved exploring things like AGP which it will share with anyone who is interested.

"Orientations are stable. (They can be repressed or denied, but they're stable.) But paraphilias always escalate.

But they don't. That's just something somebody made up.

Paraphilia is a term that was popularised by John Money, who wanted it to replace the earlier term 'perversion'. He succeeded in his aim, and I retain a dislike for the word because of its association with him. But know full well using the older term would result in deletion if not banning.

Money also popularized 'sexual orientation' as a replacement for sexual preference.

Jon Uhler is good on this. So is Helen Joyce:

https://x.com/uhlerjon/status/1749163474674938017?s=46&t=WHoOZZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

Just saw this video by Jon Uhler, a US psychologist who worked with hard-core male sex offenders for 15 years and his analysis of Genspect and that controversial conference opened my eyes.
He's great as he explains everything in plain language . He's devoted to protecting women and children. Please watch this...

I heard John Uhler on somrbjng before. Agree, he was interesting, what he said was really disturbing

Interesting. Benjamin Boyce interviewed Uhler a while ago (link below) and was very respectful of Uhler's knowledge and take, I believe (I would need to re-watch- but it came to mind as soon as I saw this).
Am I right in thinking BB was pretty disparaging of women raising this issue during conference-gate?
If so, I wonder if he will come across this new interview with Uhler and have any pause for thought?

Thanks for the Boyce-Uhler link, I'm going to watch it.
Uhler mentions all the main characters at the Genspect conference and tells you what is really going on based on his experience.And what 'being kind' is really abetting. Shocking.

Boyce was incredibly disparaging of women voicing concerns and had a great time on Twitter auditioning for the role of henchman/sidekick to James Lindsay who was even worse in his attitude towards women making their worries and objections known to Genspect. But of course, both of them would take these points seriously if a man made them - they’re so obviously sexist but refuse to acknowledge it.

I wish that Sasha & Stella would interview Emma Thomas on "Gender a Wider Lens". I heard Emma Thomas speak on Meghan Murphy's "Feminist Current" podcast. https://www.feministcurrent.com/2024/03/06/emma-thomas-father-came-out-as-trans-when-she-was-nine-now-she-fights-to-protect-kids-like-her/

Emma Thomas is very articulate about her father's behaviour and the way it affected her. She recently started a campaign writing to NHS health authorities about their polices on transwomen (and other males) "breast feeding" their babies. As young peoples' therapists themelves, Sasha and Stella would find what she has to say very interesting.

And what she says casts quite a light on some issues that Genspect have avoided or finessed so far.

Stella literally said in the KJK and Benjamin Boyce interview after much prodding that they are actually a lobby group. Also, they are not in any way interested in stopping transition, or the trans lobby, but rather say they want the age of consent raised. i've read a number of disturbing things about Stella in particular, her credentials are shady, and she blocks anyone asking where she got her degrees, as well as admitting to being a lobby group she has threatened to sue 'a slightly twisted female' on her youtube channel for being critical of what she sees with genspec as being a 'true trans' organization (trans is a thing, gender dysphoria is a thing and it must continue. so the pharmacutical companies can make money. its not like they're going to just give up after all this work capturing every instituion in the west) ie/ they are a damage control pro trans group, funded by the same people that funded wpath (they are incredibly opaque as to where their funding comes from , or at the very least incredibly vague). her idea is, and so is karen davis''s, that they are a trojan horse brought in by the same poeple who funded WPATH to relieve the public by attesting to protect children as it was apparent to the trans lobby that they were about to go down due to their child transition policies, so they got ahead of it, and put this group of basically layman who have very little in the way of applicable credentials (in o'malley's case apparently none, or an internet degree), to act as puppets for the same basic function as WPATH. it's also disturbing that they are involved with pedophiles, and open about the fact that they want to include pedophiles who don't want to offend anymore, (hello, if you don't want to then get chemically castrated and then we'll talk) so that is uber creepy. and finally, check out the interview with stella and travis brown i think his name is? inwhich she lambasts feminists to create divides in the movement, it is so obvious what she is doing. if anyone has more information on any of this please share.

That's misrepresenting what she tweeted. She said "If someone's clothing makes you feel icky despite being perfectly standard for the other sex, cope."
Let's critique that. So she's obviously not talking about "bra and knickers", because that's not standard in polite company. Let's say a man attends a conference wearing a suit comprising a polo neck shift dress to just below the knees, a long jacket, with nylon tights and court shoes, long hair in a tidy bob, full makeup.
All perfectly professional- for a woman, but something you can't specify makes you feel "icky".
Now, should you disregard your own "sixth sense"? I would say no.
My personal belief is that it is polite to clearly signal whether you are male or female. It's about courtesy and having regard for the feelings of others.

Stella O'Malley answering the question who funds Genspect:
https://genspect.org/who-funds-genspect/

Waves at Stella.

So in terms of funding, all she say in that article is:

The lion’s share of our income… parents donating to our organisation... few have given large donations to anyone prior to this.

We have run two conferences… charging a fee to cover the costs.

We have recently started offering Continuing Medical Education (CME) certificates to our content as another way to bring in funds... We also have an ongoing GoFundMe.

It should also be noted that no figures were mentioned in that article.

So it would be interesting to know more about the “large donations” they receive, particularly from the few who have given large donations elsewhere before.

I can specify what makes me 'feel icky' about that: it’s a man engaging in a sexual fetish in public. I don’t care what the man wears to engage in the fetish, the part that I object to is the bringing his fetish out into public spaces. I reject the idea that women have to tolerate this behaviour in any way whatsoever.

RoseKnows23 'layman [sic] who have very little in the way of applicable credentials (in o'malley's case apparently none, or an internet degree)

Stella O'Malley has no 'applicable credentials', or 'an internet degree'??

Her biog lists:
B.A. in Counselling and Psychotherapy, an M.A. in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, diplomas in Youth Studies, Psychometric Testing, and Gender Identity Counselling and she is currently studying for a PhD in gender dysphoria among children and adolescents.

I don't know, she may have made these up, or bought them off a dodgy website - or even a reputable website - but I think it's unlikely.

People outside Ireland may not be aware that as well as being a practising psychotherapist, Stella O'Malley was already a well-known broadcaster and author of bestselling books for many years before the trans issue percolated to the surface, or Genspect was formed. I think her first book came out in the mid 2010s. You'd think that somebody would have spotted the skimpy credentials or internet degrees before, wouldn't you?

I think anyone can judge for themselves by listening to O'Malley & Sasha Ayadh on their podcast/YouTube channel. I've listened since they began, and they speak a lot of sense. THey are both extremely perceptive but open-minded. They are highly knowledgeable - it's pretty easy to tell that from the way they approach their topics.

They speak as therapists who work with people everyday; they don't speak as political or newly-peaked feminists. I disagree with some things they say because of this difference.

I have no idea what @RoseKnows23 has against them - there's no sense of any evidence in their post (and it's hard to read a flow of consciousness with no paragraphs or punctuation).

To be fair there are plenty of broadcasters, who have also written bestselling books, with little by way of scientific understanding. Dr Gillian McKeith comes to mind. And her qualifications don’t leap out as offering a robust training in assessing evidence based medicine.

I am a bit surprised that an organisation supposing to offer a sane alternative to WPATH is headed up by a celebrity author with rather thin credentials.