3 questions for GC women

[ChirpyFinch]

As the title says, three questions for the women in this chat.

1. Do you think the majority of people are gender critical, and why/why not?

2. Globally, the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. They are also far more likely to be regressive on a range of women’s issues like abortion and anti-gay. Why do you think they agree with GCs on this one issue but disagree on so much else (if you think they do?)

3. How many trans people do you estimate there are globally?

How does a thread make its way into Classics?

I think usually by lots of people reporting it & asking for it to be added.

I haven't tried to answer the OP's posts, but have enjoyed reading the thread. It's more fun having a lively thread where lots of people participate and contribute, than an earnest but ill-informed discussion about someone's pet theory. I cannot agree that the cake posts were there for "derailment". They offered some entertaining and even useful asides, such as in a real conversation. I have made notes ... both from answers to the OP on the "definition of gender critical", and also a couple of cake recipes.

I joined mumsnet specifically because of the Feminism: Sex and gender discussions, and although there are a few other interesting boards, this one is consistently interesting - and as you said earlier, it's one of the few places online where such discussions can be had. Kudos to the mumsnet "we" for keeping it going. Discussions can be both educational AND silly. But if the cake recipes hadn't persisted, I might have given up with the discussion sooner, because they provided a small break from endless explanations, and in my opinion, they moved the thread along.

That makes sense! So we need to report en masse!

And as a little cherry on top as I'm already posting the above I may as well use this post to multi task and post a cake recipe that @GailBlancheViola once posted that got deleted in much the same way as the earlier posts on this thread were deleted.

It was a rather nice cake when I made it so the recipe deserves an outing:

Cherry Cake

8 oz Glace Cherries halved
3 oz Plain Flour
3 oz Self Raising Flour
Pinch of Salt
6 oz Butter softened
6 oz Caster Sugar
Grated Rind of 1 Lemon
3 Eggs beaten
3 oz Ground Almonds
Milk to mix

Set oven to 350F/180C or Gas 4
Grease and line a 7 inch round or square tin
Rinse cherries, dry well on kitchen roll and toss on a little of the flour
Sieve together the flours and salt twice to mix thoroughly
Cream together the butter, sugar and lemon rind until light and fluffy
Add the beaten egg a little at a time beating well between each addition, keep the mixture stiff by adding a little flour if it shows signs of curdling
Fold in the remaining flour, cherries and ground almonds with sufficient milk to make a fairly stiff dropping consistency, this helps to keep the cherries suspended evenly
Put in tin and bake for 1 hour 20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean
Leave to cool in tin for 5 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack

Just to say that, since tagging @MNHQ on here doesn't bring issues to their attention I have emailed them this morning (yes, I should have been working...) here's the email. Now going to nominate this for classics

Dear Mumsnet,

I am contacting you to express my concern at recent deletions from the FWR board.

I have been a member for many years and a Premium member since you first launched the scheme. I read posts regularly and stay almost entirely for FWR (having arrived for AIBU).For many years FWR has been a place where women can express views anonymously and discuss issues that would get us attacked on other forms of social media. We are very grateful to Mumsnet for supporting this space.

Unfortunately, recently the moderators (bots?) have been particularly unreasonable. Posts on cake have been deleted and deletions for courteous criticism have become commonplace. We know that FWR attract many ill-intentioned critics who do not engage in discussion but instead use Mumsnet moderators to delete posts they disagree with. This mirrors the coercive control that many Mumsnet posters have experienced in outside relationships. It does not surprise me that some activists wish to silence women, it does surprise me that Mumsnet’s automatic reaction is to obey.

To raise a number of points:

1. Cake.Posts were deleted and, apparently, one poster was banned, for posting about cake. FWR suffers from many drive-by scolds. Posters who do not engage but who start threads with notionally wide-eyed (now ‘wife-eyed’) questions, presumably expecting responses saying ‘yes, we are baby-killing fascists’ that they then post elsewhere.FWR used to use Bunbury tactics, now many posters will post cake recipes in defence. This is intelligent, amusing and usually a good read.Human conversation is normally discursive and meandering, it fits well with Mumsnet traditions (who wouldn’t want to ask Gordon Brown about biscuits?) and it is often amusing. Apparently it also confuses large language programmes so it has many advantages. Many posters do engage, sometimes in good faith, sometimes rather more cynically, with the OPs so threads are informative, but we all actually like the derails – and derails are widespread on every Mumsnet thread, indeed many derails contribute to getting threads into Classics. Becky@Mumsnet has criticised us for not sticking to the OP’s point, but this is not only a stilted method of communication which would see Mumsnet die a death within 12 months, because who wants to join dull chats online, it also ignores the fact that the OP does not engage with any of the posts made. Let us be clear, Mumsnet does not, and should not, penalise OPs on these threads, why do you penalise contributors and penalise them disproportionately?

1. Activists report well-observed, courteous posts and Mumsnet delete them. If you have automated your moderation I think you need to amend the algorithm to acknowledge the coercive control directed against FWR posters. If posters on AIBU would not get deleted for a particular tone or (frankly mild) criticism, posters on FWR should not. Perhaps you could amend your guidelines to acknowledge the fact that bad actors and non-Mumsnet members complain more than good actors so that moderation is less penal.

1. Finally, please remember that we are now in a post Cass world. All of the ‘claims’ that we on FWR were derided and ostracised for have been justified, a Labour government has (thankfully) stopped vulnerable children being damaged by puberty blockers and the courts have acknowledge that GC is a belief worth of respect. We are no longer the outlaws. Perhaps moderation could reflect this?

Thank you again for all that you do, it is very much appreciated.

I could nearly guess the moderator at times.

Just to add in a report based moderation system we need to just mass report the faux naive threads. I'm tired of going high when they go low. They're not entitled to our time.

Igmum

Very good. Covers all the points.

Lovely igmum. Please let us know how you go.

I have asked several times about a recently deleted post to get non-replies. A tweaked template email. I asked why a post that I was responding to which was a personal attack if my own was to be considered as such, to be told that that poster did not break guidelines. There has appeared a lack of symmetry of late.

Another thing I have found that the team is allowing is the use of negative generalisations against FWR and MN again. Such as the use of ‘anti-trans’. I have queried this too over the past months and I don’t quite understand their reason for leaving such false accusations to stand.

So I look forward to hearing whether you get an answer you are happy with.

Thanks @Igmum

Great post, @Igmum Some years ago I got up a head of steam and produced a carefully-worded but powerful rant that got a lot of support on here and ended up going briefly viral on Twitter. It was visible on MN for a day or so and then bam, it was deleted and I was put in time out and told to promise I'd never do it again, although what exactly it was I'd said that was deletable was never spelled out. I seem to have been deleted on this thread for suggesting there are certain similarities between religion and gender ideology.

This is, as you say, the kind of coercive, chilling behaviour that MN wouldn't support elsewhere. I anticipate being deleted for this.

Thanks Gusty (love the name BTW, I too am a PGW fan). Here's hoping there's no deletions. Don't think I want to go viral on Twitter, just have fewer deletions here and more 🍰

Excellent @Igmum

All those mentions of 'cake' though, kept giving me jump scares 😱 😃

I think moderation here often strongly reflects the personal views of the moderators on duty at the time

I would guess MNHQ has recently recruited

it makes it very difficult when a post that is acceptable today is a banning offence tomorrow.

however I accept that MNHQ own this board and must run it as they see fit. All I can do is regard such an arbitrary approach with the appropriate level of respect

Excellent post @Igmum. The other way of forcing a (public) discussion with MN would be to post it on Site Stuff?

Great letter @Igmum

Maybe we need another 'I am Spartacus' (I wasn't here for the original)

#Iamcake?

If you have cake, you have everything.

I'm deeply moved by your words .

They are so profound.

Let them eat cake

They have layers, sometimes jam.

Theer is no such thing as "GC values". What has come to be termed 'Gender Critical' is simply an understanding of material, biological reality.

Additionally, most women feel that as female human beings they have an inherent sense of female dignity and worth - and that 'gender identity theory' removes this dignity and replaces it with a notion that anyone can be a woman ( what that really means, of course, is that males can become females) which is not only insulting, but also not true.

Understanding the nature of life on earth is not an article of faith which belongs to any one social or political tribe. -so I'm not sure why you might be interested in ascribing it in such a way?

'Both' place women and the specifically female experience ( borne out of the reality and lived experience of a female body/biology) at the centre of their analysis.

Women are adult human females.

To my mind the term Gender Critical came about as a result of trans activists referring to women who resisted the imposition of gender ideology as TERFS.

This, though, has been a spontaneous grassroots movement of disparate people - the main thing ( the only thing, even) they have in common is an understanding that biological sex is real and that it has consequences.

Some of these consequences can be particularly detrimental to female interests, concerns and dignity - and it is understood that the theories and concepts stemming from gender ideology have negative consequences for the interests and concerns of female people; seeing that they centre the interests of male people over and above the interests of female people. -all in the name of 'inclusiveness' or 'being your best/true self'.

Many of us - especially those who have long associated with the Left, see this as a manifestation and expression of late stage american consumerism wedded to the culture of the individual - and don't see it as having anything to do with traditional Left Wing politics at all.

People here have been shoe-horned into a political group identity they don't align with - purely so that those who are really into the politics of identity and intersectionalism can position those who aren't into a space they can locate along one of the intersectionalist hierarchies of oppression. Hence the continual need to analyse everything via a Left/Right - Good/Bad - Oppressed/Oppressor polarity.

Brilliant, @Shortshriftandlethal

Thank you @Shortshriftandlethal for two such insightful posts.

I love this:
Additionally, most women feel that as female human beings they have an inherent sense of female dignity and worth - and that 'gender identity theory' removes this dignity and replaces it with a notion that anyone can be a woman ( what that really means, of course, is that males can become females) which is not only insulting, but also not true.