Page 9 | What's going on with Genspect?

MalagaNights · 2023-11-12T17:51:11+00:00

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?

Original poster

MalagaNights · 13/11/2023 21:35

MalagaNights · 13/11/2023 21:21

What are the reasons men would want to wear dresses?
I can think of:

it's transgressive and exciting.
I'm an edgy fashion student.

And I know the way 1 & 2 look would be very different.
1 would be a parody or cos play of women.
2 would be a mixing of styles to create something interesting.

What other reasons are there?

I do not believe that wearing a dress is essential for anyone yet some men insist it's so important to them rules must be changed. Why?

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would be I'm playing with new fashions within youth culture.

2 & 3 feel healthy and positive to me.
But still shouldn't be the norm for school and work, that kind of self expression is for social times.

We're not getting that kind of fashion experimentation anymore though we're just getting 1) the women parody and cos play and having to pretend it's not about kicks and power.

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RhymesWithOrange · 13/11/2023 21:45

That's what I mean @MalagaNights. Knowing that sex is real and that it can't change is such a universal concept that it can't be used as a comprehensive ideology.

People coined "gender critical" because it was deemed offensive to call us TERFs. We didn't call ourselves GC. I certainly don't identify with it although I will agree with most of what people accuse me of. Then GC was adopted by the media because it othered us and our willingness to call a spade a fucking spade, instead of accepting it as a mainstream view. Oh, those controversial GC feminists are at it again they say, when what they mean is "my mum agrees with every fucking word".

As someone said, everyone's a terf. We all just have different boundaries. For some it's "relationship purposes", for others it's procuring a surrogate. Even GRA2005 is a bit terfy when it comes to religious organisations and hereditary titles.

Original poster

MalagaNights · 13/11/2023 22:17

RhymesWithOrange · 13/11/2023 21:45

That's what I mean @MalagaNights. Knowing that sex is real and that it can't change is such a universal concept that it can't be used as a comprehensive ideology.

People coined "gender critical" because it was deemed offensive to call us TERFs. We didn't call ourselves GC. I certainly don't identify with it although I will agree with most of what people accuse me of. Then GC was adopted by the media because it othered us and our willingness to call a spade a fucking spade, instead of accepting it as a mainstream view. Oh, those controversial GC feminists are at it again they say, when what they mean is "my mum agrees with every fucking word".

As someone said, everyone's a terf. We all just have different boundaries. For some it's "relationship purposes", for others it's procuring a surrogate. Even GRA2005 is a bit terfy when it comes to religious organisations and hereditary titles.

I think we've got a very different understanding of gender critical @RhymesWithOrange

It comes from gender critical feminism and is absolutely not just about sex reality but is about women's oppression and the role of gender in that.
It wasn't coined by the media it comes from a branch of feminism.

Matt Walsh types are not gender critical at all even if the mainstream press might wrongly uses that term for his type of view. They're sex realists and gender positive. Feminists are sex realist and gender critical. Matt Walsh types think gender is linked to biology and should be reinforced. Feminists think it's a social construct and shouldn't exist as it's oppressive.

GC doesn't just mean sex realist.

But I'll accept we're seeing this differently whilst still probably agreeing that sex is real and important and women and children's safety is paramount. Whatever we think GC means.

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JanesLittleGirl · 13/11/2023 22:43

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 20:57

I don't know about a bad person but yet that's lazy thinking. It's pretty silly to imagine you know the internal sexual nature and motivations of every individual member of a huge and disparate group, just because of how they dress.

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I encounter several men who present as women in the course of my daily life. I don't have any idea what their motivation is. However, I do have a working relationship with three transwomen, each of whom I meet at least twice a week. They are all very keen to tell me how liberating it is to wear stockings or how much they enjoy feeling the wind blowing up their skirts. AGP much?

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 22:54

So that's three then...

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 22:56

And would anybody observing them without prior introduction - say, at a conference or something - be in a position to tell which ones are the transwomen and which are just the "men who present as women"? Surely there is no difference, to the external observer?

JanesLittleGirl · 13/11/2023 23:01

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 22:56

And would anybody observing them without prior introduction - say, at a conference or something - be in a position to tell which ones are the transwomen and which are just the "men who present as women"? Surely there is no difference, to the external observer?

You are right. There is no difference to the external observer. We cannot tell. So we have to make assumptions. Three out of three. Feel free to make your own guess.

OldCrone · 13/11/2023 23:04

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 22:56

And would anybody observing them without prior introduction - say, at a conference or something - be in a position to tell which ones are the transwomen and which are just the "men who present as women"? Surely there is no difference, to the external observer?

What do you mean by "transwomen"? What sort of man falls into this category?

What do you think motivates "men who present as women"?

OldCrone · 13/11/2023 23:16

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 21:06

@OldCrone

AGPs aren't tormented by the desire to be a woman though, are they? They're aroused by the thought of themselves as women. I don't think society needs to be willing to accommodate this at all. Any more than society needs to accommodate any other paraphilia.

I'm not clear what you mean by society "not accommodating" it. Do you mean society should tell them they're not allowed to be aroused by the thought of themselves as women? Or that they're allowed to but are not allowed to wear certain clothes - even ones that other people ARE allowed to wear - because it might let other people know of such arousal? Or something else?

I took Blanchard's comment to refer to practical "accomodations" like using cross-gender toilets etc. Somebody going about their life while wearing a dress that covers their private parts to a normal standard of modesty is not being accommodated in anything, or asking to be.

I took Blanchard's comment to refer to practical "accomodations" like using cross-gender toilets etc.

I certainly don't want AGP males in women's toilets. Do you think this is a reasonable "accommodation"? Letting men who fetishise women into women-only spaces?

How much do you think we should "accommodate" males who cosplay at being women and force other people to participate in their fetish?

PencilsInSpace · 13/11/2023 23:36

This is not to do with whether Genspect should have 'allowed' this AGP man into their conference or not, or what clothes men should be 'allowed' or 'banned' from wearing, and in what contexts.

For Genspect as an organisation this is a deeper issue and this is just the latest example.

Their original strapline was: A voice for parents with gender-questioning kids

That's what most people still expect from them because that is how they plugged themselves. That's an extremely responsible role to take on. Any org involved with children and parents must be shit hot on safeguarding, which does not just mean preventing abuse of children by the org itself, it means actively avoiding and preventing anything which might erode the boundaries that keep children safe - such as featuring an adult man in his fetish gear on your social media, complete with a link to his book in which he tells everyone about his fetish gear.

Genspect have never been shit hot on safeguarding. They have always been reactive, defensive and aggressive. Its a terrible look for an org that was set up as A voice for parents with gender-questioning kids.

Less than a year after forming, in the spring of 2022, and with zero fanfare, Genspect's strapline changed to: A rational approach to gender. They no longer mention 'parents with gender-questioning kids' - Why? Who are they a voice for now?

By the following June, they were just 'G' with no strapline.

Who the fuck knows what they stand for now? They remained 'G' until August of this year when they changed back to 'Genspect', but still no strapline.

The recent conference was called 'The Bigger Picture' and Genspect says:

The breadth and variety of speakers at our conference reflect our broad-spectrum approach to countering WPATH. Traditional exploratory psychotherapy for gender-distressed youth must replace affirmative care, of course, and a rigorous scientific method must continue challenging the shoddy evidence base for activist-driven gender medicine; but Genspect holds that much more is needed if we’re successfully to counter the pervasive influence of gender ideology in Western culture.

https://genspect.org/genspect-releases-full-programme-for-denver-conference/

So they want to be 'Bigger Picture' but also to provide support for parents with gender-questioning kids, but these are not always compatible because we know that the 'Bigger Picture' includes various AGP men, associated fetishists and creepy sexologists who should be nowhere near children, or anyone who seeks to make policy for children.

Genspect do a lot of valuable work but they are trying to do two incompatible things at once. That's the problem.

The best thing that could happen now is if Genspect made it very, very clear that they are no longer 'A voice for parents with gender-questioning kids' and have not been for some time.

PencilsInSpace · 13/11/2023 23:51

UtopiaPlanitia · 13/11/2023 17:50

To be honest, Stella’s public output, via her C4 documentary and her podcast, has always showed great empathy/sympathy for men with AGP but not much attention or empathy is given to the wives of these men. So I can see why she might struggle to consider the needs of trans widows (or the needs of other women) in organising the conference. She’s definitely not displaying empathy at the moment in her public statements about the criticism Genspect have attracted.

I have a theory that therapists/ psychologists/psychiatrists find their patients so intellectually fascinating (and thus empathise with them strongly) and this prevents them from seeing the harm that paedophiles and men with sexual fetishes/paraphilias cause to the people in their lives and society in general.

I get this sense when I listen to Blanchard, Bailey, Cantor, Burgo, as well as Stella and Sasha. At times they seem almost naive in their ability to intellectualise these fetishes as sexual orientations that need societal sympathy and understanding. At least John Uhler is honest and blunt about the escalating nature of paraphilias and the need for strict safeguarding - he’s just not popular for expressing these facts.

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All of this.

Be wary of those who find men's sexual behaviour 'fascinating'. The etymology of that word is all to do with being bedazzled by dick.

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PencilsInSpace · 14/11/2023 01:06

EatMyHead · 13/11/2023 18:12

Has anyone here read Illy's book? Genuine question - I haven't.

I think I'm just not convinced by the one dimensional and simplistic narrative of him "performing his fetish". I'm going by hearing him on the podcast, where he described how sex was only one part of it. He dresses in women's clothes full time, it's not like he only does it when he wants a sexual thrill.

Some might argue with this but I think really, if the fact that "he's written a book about it" is going to be used as an argument, one should probably have a reasonable idea of what that book says. I suspect it doesn't say what people think it says.

A lot of people saying how he's "forcing" them to participate in his fetish by being shocked by it. Isn't the simple solution to that to not be shocked by it? It's only a dude in a dress. And here I was thinking this is the country that invented panto. 😀

We had decades of feminists painstakingly dismantling the idea of boys' and girls' clothes. He's certainly not the first transwoman to apparently resurrect that idea through the striking juxtaposition of opposites, but it's entirely up to us whether we want to buy into it or not.

I Haven't read this man's book but I have read other autogynephiles' books. Nothing I have read so far makes me think that this man's book is any different from any of the others.

It doesn't matter if sex is 'only' one part of it, it matters that sex is a part of it.

A lot of people saying how he's "forcing" them to participate in his fetish by being shocked by it.

No, not shocked. He is forcing people to participate in his fetish by observing him and encountering him socially. Nobody is shocked by this any more.

People are forced into either pretending he's a woman and giving him the nod, acknowledging he's getting a sexual thrill out of pretending to be a woman, and still giving him the nod, or reacting with disapproval.

Any of these reactions gives him a hard-on. There is no way to react to these men without increasing their thrill.

Everyone knows the difference between a feminine man and a man who dresses 'as a woman' / 'wears women's clothes', even if they can't quite put it into words. People with an interest in men's 'fascinating' sexual lives will forever smerge the difference.

PencilsInSpace · 14/11/2023 02:06

MalagaNights · 13/11/2023 22:17

I think we've got a very different understanding of gender critical @RhymesWithOrange

It comes from gender critical feminism and is absolutely not just about sex reality but is about women's oppression and the role of gender in that.
It wasn't coined by the media it comes from a branch of feminism.

Matt Walsh types are not gender critical at all even if the mainstream press might wrongly uses that term for his type of view. They're sex realists and gender positive. Feminists are sex realist and gender critical. Matt Walsh types think gender is linked to biology and should be reinforced. Feminists think it's a social construct and shouldn't exist as it's oppressive.

GC doesn't just mean sex realist.

But I'll accept we're seeing this differently whilst still probably agreeing that sex is real and important and women and children's safety is paramount. Whatever we think GC means.

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GC does not come from a branch of feminism. It was coined less than ten years ago in response to the media asking any woman who knows men aren't women, 'If we can't call you T**Fs then what should we call you?' It has never meant feminist, particularly. Everyone knows men aren't women just like everyone knows water is wet.

'GC' now has a legal meaning, thanks to Maya Forstater.

If you believe that there are two sexes, that human beings can't change sex, and that in some situations sex is important, then you have gender critical beliefs and you are protected from discrimination because of your beliefs under the Equality Act 2010.

This is not a feminist belief, even Matt Walsh would agree with it He is GC according to the UK legal definition but of course he's not a feminist.

Original poster

MalagaNights · 14/11/2023 05:34

PencilsInSpace · 14/11/2023 02:06

GC does not come from a branch of feminism. It was coined less than ten years ago in response to the media asking any woman who knows men aren't women, 'If we can't call you T**Fs then what should we call you?' It has never meant feminist, particularly. Everyone knows men aren't women just like everyone knows water is wet.

'GC' now has a legal meaning, thanks to Maya Forstater.

If you believe that there are two sexes, that human beings can't change sex, and that in some situations sex is important, then you have gender critical beliefs and you are protected from discrimination because of your beliefs under the Equality Act 2010.

This is not a feminist belief, even Matt Walsh would agree with it He is GC according to the UK legal definition but of course he's not a feminist.

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Well I've engaged in many discussions on here about how the likes of Matt Walsh are not GC and how GC means critical of the concept of gender because it's oppressive etc and not just sex realist.

Maya won because GC incorporates sex realist belief not because everyone who is sex realist is gender critical.

I honestly find Mumsnet fwr the most gaslighting place.

I get into discussions on threads over time where the majority argue vehemently for e.g gender being a social construct, or the aim of GC feminism is to abolish gender, or men should be allowed to wear dresses. Whatever.

Then on another thread get told: no one thinks that.

It's weird.

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OldCrone · 14/11/2023 07:11

MalagaNights · 14/11/2023 05:34

Well I've engaged in many discussions on here about how the likes of Matt Walsh are not GC and how GC means critical of the concept of gender because it's oppressive etc and not just sex realist.

Maya won because GC incorporates sex realist belief not because everyone who is sex realist is gender critical.

I honestly find Mumsnet fwr the most gaslighting place.

I get into discussions on threads over time where the majority argue vehemently for e.g gender being a social construct, or the aim of GC feminism is to abolish gender, or men should be allowed to wear dresses. Whatever.

Then on another thread get told: no one thinks that.

It's weird.

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It's not weird, it's just that there are lots of different people posting on here and we all have different opinions and different interpretations of what things mean.

I wasn't aware that GC had a legal meaning due to the Forstater ruling. I have always thought that gender critical meant critical of the idea of gender in a general sense, so I wouldn't describe someone like Matt Walsh as GC. I personally am consistent with that, but I'm aware that some other posters use GC as shorthand for anyone who doesn't believe TWAW.

RhymesWithOrange · 14/11/2023 07:12

No one is particularly disagreeing on gender as a social construct or any of the rest of it. It's just that "gender critical" as a label and a concept does not have a lot of meaning, or agreement about meaning.

Even Maya's organisation, Sex Matters, describes itself as a human rights organisation, not as a feminist one. And Maya was the one who got "gender critical beliefs" protected.

I just resist the whole notion that we actually describe knowing sex is a thing as a "belief". It was never deemed a "belief" before women started to get uppity about men declaring themselves women. Robert Winston didn't need to state that he had a protected "belief" that humans can't change sex live on the BBC. By downgrading facts as beliefs I think you further marginalise women.

Rad fem / Lib fem are better established and understood categories.

Scienceblast · 14/11/2023 07:24

I don't think talking about AGP and trying to understand the different types of transitioning males is incompatible with helping parents. We tend to forget that ROGD affects boys as well, although to a lesser extent. From the podcast, I think Sasha, Stella and others think that there might be a new AGP ROGD, induced by watching porn too much and at a too early age. Maybe my impression is wrong (I listened to them focusing on female ROGD) but there is a portion of parents that also needs help. I cannot imagine the sense of shame the parents may feel. These boys can also be groomed online. On the other end, you are all probably right on Genspect needing to become better in safeguarding. I come from another country and it's only here in the UK that I've seen the concept expressed with such a clarity.

Scienceblast · 14/11/2023 07:27

(I have to say that I would hate Genspect to disappear because, as a parent, it saved my sanity).

OldCrone · 14/11/2023 07:45

He is forcing people to participate in his fetish by observing him and encountering him socially. Nobody is shocked by this any more.

People are forced into either pretending he's a woman and giving him the nod, acknowledging he's getting a sexual thrill out of pretending to be a woman, and still giving him the nod, or reacting with disapproval.

Any of these reactions gives him a hard-on. There is no way to react to these men without increasing their thrill.

This is the problem with men who get their kicks from dressing in female clothing. It's impossible to stop without enforcing strict dress codes with different requirements for men and women. I don't think any of us want to go back to a time when that was the norm.

How do we solve this problem when there is a group of men who use ordinary female attire as fetish wear and any reaction, or even ignoring them, just increases their thrill?

RethinkingLife · 14/11/2023 07:56

It's not weird, it's just that there are lots of different people posting on here and we all have different opinions and different interpretations of what things mean.

I can't recall who said it, but, "Neither MN nor FWR are a be-cardiganed monolith" (or words to that effect).

AlisonDonut · 14/11/2023 08:17

Quick interjection.

In amongst the madness, I did hear tell that the AGP didn't even have to buy a ticket to the conference. He was given it.

I'd be interested if anyone else heard this. I heard it on a Twitter space, possibly KJK's one. There have been so many this week about this!

I'd be interested if Genspect did indeed not only have his book on their website, promoted it in the twixxes and also invite him along.

Because that would render them captured in my book.

Original poster

MalagaNights · 14/11/2023 08:34

RhymesWithOrange · 14/11/2023 07:12

No one is particularly disagreeing on gender as a social construct or any of the rest of it. It's just that "gender critical" as a label and a concept does not have a lot of meaning, or agreement about meaning.

Even Maya's organisation, Sex Matters, describes itself as a human rights organisation, not as a feminist one. And Maya was the one who got "gender critical beliefs" protected.

I just resist the whole notion that we actually describe knowing sex is a thing as a "belief". It was never deemed a "belief" before women started to get uppity about men declaring themselves women. Robert Winston didn't need to state that he had a protected "belief" that humans can't change sex live on the BBC. By downgrading facts as beliefs I think you further marginalise women.

Rad fem / Lib fem are better established and understood categories.

I share the frustration that 'sex exists' is positioned as a 'belief' & I felt that at the time with Maya's case.

Obviously the lawyers knew the case they had to argue to win and use the protected belief category to do it.

But I was frequently shouting out loud: it's not a belief it's fact!!

On the 'it's weird on fwr' thing, obviously it's not a monolith but I do have a weird experience of often finding myself a lone/ minority voice on a thread (as I'm not GC feminist) with there being a general consensus, only to on another thread be told no one thinks that.

It's only my experience, but that is what I often feel here.

I obviously like it though... I keep coming back!

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AmaryllisNightAndDay · 14/11/2023 10:00

Getting back to Genspect... I think that Sasha and Stella can be a little naive about adult psychology. They are experts and practitioners in children and teenage developmental psychology, focussed on gender. That's their field and their strength. They aren't as aware as they could be of the extent to which therapeutic approaches have at various times and places apologised for and covered up adult male abuse of women and children.

Thinking about the "Gender A Wider Lens" podcast with Cantor, they did seem to accept some of Cantor's more obtuse remarks about the paraphilia-that-must-not-be-named uncritically, though to be fair to them his disability makes it difficult to challenge him on the spot. And to be fair to Cantor he is a usefully incisive critic of the quality of published research, at least when it comes to gender.

I do feel a little confused now about what (or who) Genspect is for. I had thought Genspect was mainly about children and young people, and then it embraced detransitioners, and now I'm not sure. I personally would like some organisation to champion good research and good medical information and outcome information for adults as well.

AmaryllisNightAndDay · 14/11/2023 10:08

I share the frustration that 'sex exists' is positioned as a 'belief' & I felt that at the time with Maya's case

Yes, I felt that same sense of frustration!

I guess it's a bit like "flat earth" versus "solid earth" beliefs. The evidence is for a solid spherical-ish earth, which makes it a "fact" as well as a "belief". But we're allowed to believe in either one. As long as we don't then refuse to use the instruments that fly the plane safely because they're all based on solid earth beliefs!

What I have learned from all the legal cases is that self-righteous bullying is still bullying. Even righteous bullying would still be bullying.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 14/11/2023 10:20

Cantor is a very clever man, but I've always had an issue with him as in the past he's said that he thinks paedophilia is a sexual orientation and we should reduce stigma. The so called "virtuous paedophile" concept.

Be wary of those who find men's sexual behaviour 'fascinating'. The etymology of that word is all to do with being bedazzled by dick.

YY @PencilsInSpace, great posts