Advice please: Dreading TRA friend's visit

[BetsyBobbin]

My husband has a friend from school who's coming to stay in our city this bank holiday. Although I'm friendly with her she was never my actual friend so I never knew her well.

She'll be here for four days and is staying with a gay couple whom she's friends with and who are very much part of the blue hair/alphabet soup brigade as far as I could see (she created a WhatsApp group and included all of us in, some brief conversations have been had). Outings as a large group have been organised.

She started following me on social media recently and I followed her back just to be gobsmacked by what I saw. Yes, you can guess, all the TWAW stuff.

Now, this woman is an educated person, works as a public defender and has an eight year old daughter and I just don't understand for the life of me how can someone who who works in law and has a daughter could be so captured like that (I do have theories but never mind that now).

Now, I'm staunchly GC. Having said that, I don't want to cause any drama and I'm hoping that those outings will be finished sooner than you can say "JK Rowling". BUT, if anything remotely TRA related is brought up I don't trust myself to remain silent.

I'm obviously not changing anyone's mind in a brief conversation but is there anything that I can say that could at least plant a seed of doubt in her head? I really don't want to get into long arguments trying to explain autogynephilia and what could happen to her daughter in a changing room but like I said, I don't trust myself to be quiet either.

I'm dreading this whole situation, send help please.

Men who knowingly transgress women's boundaries are doing it for kicks.

OK, first of all, what the hell has kiwifarms got to do with the people you are calling "TERFs"?

You know that's not a feminist forum, right?

Why do people on here refer to it lots then, talk favourably about it and how it holds people to account etc and have many long running threads about it?
If it's nothing to do with feminism

Well exactly. It’s inadequate men bullying women. That’s why we need women’s rights in the first place, and why so central to women’s rights, is the right to exclude males.

I've literally never seen anyone on here refer to it favourably.

But if you have even the vaguest idea about what feminism is, you know full well it has nothing to do with feminism.

Do you understand what feminism is?

Er, is this a trick question?! As it's clearly just a different opinion to your own. 🙄

Are people just that unused to seeing different views to their own now or something

TBF we have had threads supporting KF's right to exist because of what the attempts to close it down say about the suppression of free speech, and discussed why certain parties are so desperate to get rid of the receipts that KF does undoubtedly hold which those parties would much rather disappeared (along with jokes about its owner's scrappy nature in being determined to keep KF functional). It does require the ability to see nuance though, to understand that you can be relieved somewhere like KF exists while also finding the edgelord language used there unpleasant or distasteful and choosing not to post there oneself, and we know nuance can sometimes be in short supply.

People refer to it and talk about it because the people that said 'Mumsnet is next' were doing all they could to get it shut down.

Some people love it, some hate it. Just because some people who know about it and who read it also post here just means...and you may have to take a seat for this...that some people read a range of things some of which you approve of and some you don't.

Luckily you are not the arbiter of all the things that people who post on FWR are allowed to read and comment on.

Posts like this just make me go and check up on the Farms and see what Jersh is up to. Otherwise I'd rarely read it.

It's probably the second one.

"Could you not call people TERFs please. It's a misogynistic slur."

JK Rowling uses it often and even has advertised mugs that have "TERF" on them.

well, @Christinapple in case you hadn't noticed there is a wide range of views, and nobody voted JKR as our queen - we are not a monolith. I agree that "TERF" is often used as a slur. and i don't accept slurs in my direction so i will call it out every time.

I find it really interesting that since I asked @Christinapple the very simple question below she completely disappeared from the thread 😏

So, did anything happen?

Of course not. Millions of us manage to go about our day to day lives with different opinions and views every single day without incident.

this is a mountain out of a molehill event with someone who is apparently so sure of their views they need to ask the internet how to respond to a potential theoretical situation about said views.

The whole 'reporting back' element with the OP and involved participants is so puerile. Somebody has a different opinion to you. Big deal.

😂😂