A vindication of British feminists

[ArabellaScott]

https://alexmassie.substack.com/p/the-vindication-of-britains-feminists

I want to tip my hat to every woman who has signed petitions, attended demos, written letters, responded to consultations, had patient conversations, had enraged conversations, gardened, and kept things moving forward.

Women won't wheesht, and especially not when it comes to the wellbeing of children.

Not sure if it was on a post here or elsewhere but it feels rather apt.

“Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Winston Churchill

Keep fighting the good fight 💪. Oh and permission to shout and be victorious in this win!

I've had only the tiniest influence here, but I'm proud that I took action to safeguard children and protect women's spaces.

Others have done way more and taken the bullets, but Cass wouldn't have happened without the quiet campaigning of the thousands of us who refused to go away and shut up.

I'm not crowing, because hundreds of children have been harmed and I don't see that as anything to celebrate. There is also a great deal of work still to do.

But I'm fucking glad that no debate is over and children will no longer be trafficked onto unsuitable treatment pathways, that they will spend the rest of their lives regretting.

Sorry that I was so gentle. I don't want a golden bridge. I want a golden plank and I want to see all the fuckers that were actively involved or spent their influence handwaving away our proven concerns march over it. All the bien pensants who told us that we were wrong and didn't understand. Fuck you Wes Streeting, fuck you Yvette Cooper, fuck you Maria Miller. You had the same information that we did. What the fuck is your excuse?

It’s a shame @PatatiPatatras post was removed because it made an important point; that we women shouldn’t have to be demure and polite just because we’ve finally got people to listen to us. It smacks of “Yes, we’ve all heard you now so you don’t have to be so shrill.”

Shame on the person who reported it.

This a collective noun - a "vindication" of feminists.

Seconded. I agreed with every word.

Patting anyone on the back is all well and good but they are still blathering on about evidence based. When we know for a fact that kids who are upset at stereotypes shouldn't be medicated or have body parts removed just because they like the wrong toys.

We have to remember that the activist medics will now start to create studies to manufacture this evidence. The fight has only really just begin.

So raise a glass to the ordinary women who did extraordinary things but let's not get punch drunk on this report. There's a long way to go yet.

Here here @ArabellaScott ✊🏽

I truly hope so 🤞

Yep. I have massively weighed in on this. Financially, been on protests, supported others, bought books, taken out patreons.

I've also massively lost friendship groups, been tarred and feathered as it were.

I've also lost my own peace of mind and been suicidal and close to being admitted to hospital with the stress and trauma of it.

I'd do it again too. Started in 2016 for me.

Why was it removed? For disagreeing with the other poster?

A shame that a woman's righteous anger was deleted. I remember reading a conversation between 2 men ages ago about the erasure of women's rights. One of them commented "I'm surprised women haven't burnt the whole place down"
While I'd never promote arson, it was a stark reminder of how our socialisation and repeated demands to be kind, temperate, use the right tone etc hides our righteous anger at something like this systematic abuse of children.

So true and it's always obvious when listening to transwomen speaking that they haven't been conditioned in the same way. I remember watching interviews with Helen Joyce, Sarah Phillimore and others who remained so polite and respectful despite the often aggressive opposition.

Absolutely this.

I love and support my trans identifying child, but I'm so heartbroken that she thinks her autism can be fixed/ made better through being trans.

So no, we won't stay quiet. It may not be a simplistic "us vs them", but it's certainly us vs those pushing a dangerous and harmful ideology.

Yup.

joan12
I think we can all agree it has been an unprecedented, horrific chapter.

But it's hasn't been a horrific chapter because it's not over! The damage and hurt done to these young people is horrific and they are still medicating themselves! Still believing they were "born in the wrong body"! It's far from over for families like us, for our children who will bear the physical and psychological scars of this belief system. For the rest of their life.

I refuse to be silenced.

I will congratulate the Mrs Nobody's and the propulsed into fame for carrying on despite the huge self doubts women are socialised to endure amid the vitriol which was being thrown at them.

I will always tell anyone who tells women as a group, to be more demure and graceful, to do one.

Congratulations ladies and go do one joan.

I haven’t had an inch of what JKR, KJK, Kathleen Stock, Jo Phoenix et al have suffered, and yet evenI- a lowly, run of the mill, grass-roots women’s rights campaigner - have been ostracised, criticised, called a Nazi, a fascist, a TERF, a transphobe and run the gauntlet of TRAs waving pictures of fucking GUNS.

“Just let change happen”? Fuck that. So, so many women have fought for this at tremendous personal cost and we will not shut up now. We are knee-deep in “We fucking TOLD YOU SO” territory and we will have that heard loud and clear.

Same. Fucking preach it!

And YY to a PP who says a 'vindication' is now the collective noun for feminists.

I have no intention to let all the thoughtless, self-satisfied, right side of history, wankers who made snide, belittling and vicious comments about women and men who fought this shit off the hook, ever. I don't usually carry chips on my shoulders for long but I make an exception for this issue. I will not forget.
Alex Massie has been great on this issue for a long time now, also Lucy Bannerman at the Times deserves a mention.

I suspect because it (rightly) told @joan12 to fuck off with the “How campaigners should behave” line.

Backlash from who? I think the general public will be agreeing with us 🤷‍♀️

I forgot a @joan12 translator.
Ladies, I know you're all feeling excitable right now, but please think about the future. How will you ever get husbands if you insist on continuing with this unseemly nonsense?
Now pick up your embroidery or continue knitting socks for the politicians fighting for our country, please. And women of the "lower order" get back to the kitchen where you belong.

Absolutely. The Cass report has already dropped off the front pages, the usual suspects are peddling their own interpretations and women are still being told to to be quiet.
There is still a huge way to go. I listened to The Queens' Speech ( Clive and Dennis) yesterday and thought it set everything out very well.
There has been no public acknowledgement of the sacrifices made by ordinary women.

Christ, it didn’t take long to get told off, did it? @joan12 🤬

It’s been a fantastic week thanks to all women who damn well won’t haud their wheesht 💐

Fantastic