Will Gender Ideology influence how you vote?

[Heylo]

Hi, new to Mumsnet. Full disclaimer I have no kids yet but will start trying March 24 (lesbian with some embryos in the freezer!). I decided to join after the hilarious responses to the Dawn Butler debacle over the weekend.

I’ve historically been a Labour voter but I’m voting Tory next year because I’m concerned about women’s and children’s rights in relation to Gender Ideology. The lesbian scene especially has been culturally bulldozed by the new additions to womanhood & a lot of us (in our 30s) now self - exclude based on some of the militant trans rights activists (TRAs) pressuring women into taking on trans women as partners and socialise more closely with them. (Only media reporting on this is Telegraph & The Daily Mail. There has been a media blackout on this at the BBC and The Guardian). Actually a couple of women have tried to run same - sex speed dating nights but TRAs have sent them threats, doxxed them to their employers and called the venues to get the nights / events shut down. You can read more about that here: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12401009/amp/Lesbian-speed-dating-event-sparks-transphobia-row-organisers-insist-adult-human-females-attend-popular-weekly-event.html

Anyway sorry for the segue, my question is to anyone who is interested in answering- if you are historically a Labour voter would the Gender issue sway you to voting conservative?

its a big topic at the moment in Gender Critical lesbian and bi circles. Everyone is usually a Labour voter but we’re all worried about what craziness Keir Starmer is going to introduce re erasing women’s spaces. I was curious what Mumsnet users think as outside of lesbians you are the next group (parents) who are most affected by this.

Your middle class comfy lesbians wanting social clubs might argue that their main interest is retaining being able to be homosexual thanks.

And the people suffering most in the economic circumstances of the UK at the moment we know are going to be heavily women, the disabled, the minority groups, the ones being excluded and disappeared from public life by gender ideologists and identity politics .

It's important to step aside from the tribalism, and to stop falling for the comfortable cover lines and fig leafs - which largely silence and dehumanise the groups that identity politics likes silenced and dehumanised - and start listening to what women are saying about this.

I am someone who believes in actual left politics as opposed to a group identifying as left who believes in some really bloody scary things.

No way Rachel Reeves is buying into all the gender nonsense, and she will be a key player in future government.
I agree she's likely to have a key post which is why I'm keen to learn what she might have said. All I can recall is her fumbling badly a couple of years ago when asked whether only women have a cervix. Have you seen anything else?

I will vote not vote for an MP that supports gender ideology. That means in my constituency I will vote Tory. If I was in Caroline Nokes’ constituency I would vote SDP or some weird fringe party as a protest.

And the people suffering most in the economic circumstances of the UK at the moment we know are going to be heavily women, the disabled, the minority groups
Yes, and I would add the poor/ not wealthy of both sexes, including all the children trapped in poverty to this list.
the ones being excluded and disappeared from public life by gender ideologists and identity politics.
If you mean people like Rosie Duffield, yes, I agree, gender dissenters are being excluded. It's wrong. But so is what is happening to the country as a whole.
It's got absolutely bog all to to with tribalism, at least from my end. I don't have any left/ right identity and vote based on what is ultimately going to cause the least pain to the largest number of people. I have A LOT of issues with Labour, not least how patronising they are to working class voters and how unsupportive of social mobility. . It's a sad state of affairs, but I can't throw the majority under a bus by allowing the current government back in. Anything has to be better than this, even if it's just a bit less shit.

All I can recall is her fumbling badly a couple of years ago when asked whether only women have a cervix. Have you seen anything else?
Re Rachael Reeves, no not publicly, just comments from people who know her a bit.

Can you share any of them?

Yes, this is a key voting issue for me. I have ruled out voting Labour, Lib Dem or Green because of it. Don't yet know if I can bring myself to vote Tory but I won't do anything to help prevent the Tory candidate from winning.

I would not be voting against anyone who supports gender ideology just for gender ideology’s sake though. Those who support it support censorship, discrimination, lies, indoctrination in schools and anti scientific nonsense. And they support totalitarianism. There is no other way it can be enforced on us. Gender ideology is just the canary in the coal mine.

Just for the benefit of anyone reading, this poster is a trans woman.

I think from my point of view, Labour and the Lib Dems' stance on gender issues isn't just a single issue, it's what it says about their mentality in all sorts of other ways.

We know that both have benefited from substantial donations from shady organisations with a vested interest in promoting gender ideology. We know that both are prepared to say that black is white if it benefits them in some way, so we have to assume that they would lie about just about anything else too. We know they have contempt for women and ordinary voters, dismissing people raising legitimate concerns as stupid bigots rather than listening to them. And we know that they have displayed alarmingly authoritarian tendencies (see Nadia Whittome's comments, for example) suggesting that not only are they prepared to pretend to believe absolute nonsense, they may indeed make it illegal not to pretend to believe.

Those attitudes have no place in a democracy. I don't believe they could be trusted to run a bath, let alone a country.

The Lib Dems, of course, can be as batshit as they like because they'll never actually have to run the country.

And the Labour front bench is largely made up of people with absolutely no experience in government because the vast majority of them were elected post 2010, including Keir Starmer. So their only real experience in politics is shouting from the opposition benches about how awful the Tories are. Yes, we need to fix the economy and the NHS and all the rest of it. I don't dispute that. But are Labour capable of doing that? No, quite frankly, I think they are a bunch of clowns.

I won't vote Labour, which probably means I won't vote. Though if I were in a constituency with an openly GC candidate I would vote for them even if Labour, Green, Lib Dem. Possibly even if Tory, depending on their wider political outlook.

I don’t disagree with pp’s who dislike the current gov’s influence on the country.

Equally, I can see the damage this ideology has done eg in Canada, Australia and (now being addressed?) NZ. I see anguished posts here from parents of teenagers caught up in this mess. I worry that it will become illegal to name ourselves & claim our rights as women, that there will be women who can’t access any public services.

Even if you believe Labour would make the country better for (some) men (not convinced if you’re the father of a teenager transitioning without your consent, or the husband of a wife attacked in hospital) would it really be better for women & children? What when the next generation is indoctrinated? Is it possible to row back?

That's exactly what worries me and why I won't touch Labour now even though I'd voted for them all my adult life.

Thank you @MargotBamborough (re pointing out the person poster being trans). I know that TRAs strategically place themselves across Mumsnet.

All we need is to listen to the truth (THEIR TRUTH) a few more times then all us outspoken women can fall into line and follow the trail of handmaidens on the way to dystopia

Basically all politicians even the ones who pretend TWAW know what a woman is. They all know so if they’re saying TWAW they either think men’s hurty feels matter more than women (thereby of course showing they know exactly who women are) or they’re prepared to tell basic flat out lies if they think that’s what the party faithful want.

Neither is a good look

If a politician cannot speak out about gender ideology when they are in opposition, they arent going to do so when they are in government. Especially when their party is somewhere between being all in with the ideology and not wanting to talk about it.

Labour woman had nothing to lose for the last 5 years, but still didnt say much. What are they going to say next year they could lose a place in the cabinet?

I'm hoping more tories speak out in the nrxt parliament and be the opposition labour couldnt be.

THIS

The gender question will be a factor in my vote in the next GE. Not the only factor, but a very important one. I do feel politically homeless and have done for a number of years. I'm in Beds, so recently had the joy of the absentee Dorries. Lib Dems really got my back up by campaigning on 'vote for us, we don't think labour can win'. I just want parties to campaign on their policies. And then stick to them! But it really does feel like it's too much to ask. I voted Labour, couldn't vote for Tories who let Dorries behave how she did with no repercussions. If I behaved like that in my job I would've been fired in a heartbeat.

I'm really hoping for some clarity and better policies over the next few months, otherwise I will remain at a loss, and I can't not vote or spoil my paper so I'm not actually sure what I will do.

To all those saying their vote doesn't count, this is the primary reason it doesn't, because you believe it to be so. If you vote, it counts.

So you'd rather have this?

Lobby your Labour MP's, write to Starmer but don't condemn us to another 5 years of this please!

Maybe if you'd bothered to read the thread properly first you'd have realised that there's been a range of views expressed on here.

Interventions that do little other than try to make everyone feel guilty for even talking about it are a good demonstration of why so many of us are so thoroughly disillusioned with the Labour and the rest of the centre left.

I posted earlier on the thread too Flo so I have followed it & I get how strongly people feel about this!

But I am incensed by James Cleverly's comments, he's the Home Secretary! & the fact that Sunak has expressed ' every confidence in him'!

I agree with everything Kemi Badenkch says on the issue but that is the only thing I agree with her on!

I know people are struggling with being politically homeless, so am I but I absolutely know that we can't have another 5 years of what we have had!

I can't bear another 5 years of these fuckers. I live in a safe Tory seat so I'm tempted to spoil my ballot paper - don't know if anyone will read it though.

I'm going to use one of the tactile voting sites & vote for whoever can get them out - I'm in what was a safe Tory seat but with HS2 ripping the town in 2 literally I think there is a chance of getting them out!

Then I will lobby my MP on GC issues! Whichever party they are!

If a politician cannot speak out about gender ideology when they are in opposition, they arent going to do so when they are in government.

I see it as the opposite; MPs are more able to speak out and make changes when they're in power, especially when you've an evidence base.

This has been a uniquely problematic position to take. Normal rules have not applied.

It will influence my vote in that I cannot vote for my local Labour MP - who is full on TWAW and with a Mermaids logo at the the top of her twitter feed. She has refused to meet with her constituents on this issue, and her office manager is horrible.So it will be a spoiled ballot agan for me. If I had a Labour MP I could trust on this issue I'd vote for them. Ex Labour party member.