Mumsnet in The Economist: Bagehot

[RethinkingLife]

25 years of Mumsnet and how it’s changed Britain 🇬🇧 is covered in Bagehot’s column in The Economist.

Quotation of FWR relevant section.

Mumsnetters have, however, been willing to be called unreasonable. In 2016 the trans lobby was in the ascendant. Slogans such as “trans women are women” were gaining ground; sites like Facebook and Twitter had suspended the accounts of some sceptics. Mumsnet did not suspend them, which caused it to lose advertising and attract insults. One article accused it of being “a toxic hotbed of transphobia”. Ms Roberts didn’t give in.
This was “hugely important”, says Hadley Freeman, a journalist. Some women used “the toxic hotbed” to organise “Man Friday” events at which they self-identified as men, wore fake beards and crashed male-only venues. Others used it to ask whether “aibu to think” that the trans stuff was going “too far”. One reason they resisted, says Janice Turner, a Times journalist who covered it, is that so many were mums. And nothing* *“brings home the fact biological sex is real more than giving birth”.
The trans debate is now ebbing. Mumsnetters are back to posting about the issues that really matter. aibu, asked a recent post, “to despise the word ‘comfy’?” Not much, then, has changed in the 25 years since Mumsnet began. And yet a lot has. yanbu if you think that Mumsnet made some of that change happen.

https://www.economist.com/britain/2025/03/06/how-mumsnet-changed-britain

archive: archive.is/yVJ1m

"The trans debate is now ebbing."

Uh, really?

‘The trans debate is now ebbing. Mumsnetters are back to posting about the issues that really matter.’

AIBU about the sentence after that one?

Maybe the author knows about the Supreme Court ruling?

Translation: There is a risk that ground won by genderism will be lost therefore there must be an immediate cease-fire with everyone accepting the current situation as the status quo.

If only the author had thought to visit FWR to take a temperature check on whether or not the perception is that the issue is ebbing.

Yeah, that pissed me off. But then I decided the author was trying to be cleverly funny-sarky about the "comfy" post, rather than saying that trans issues don't matter.

But they are 100% wrong about the ebbing.

But I DO think the trans issue is ebbing, or at least beginning to. Most people now disagree with the male bodies in women’s prisons/sports/changing rooms etc and more people are willing to be “out” as GC. Employers are starting to realise that “be kind and inclusive” doesn’t mean “shove women under the bus along with anyone who dares speak up”.

I suspect the comment about “getting back to the important stuff” was tongue in cheek, too.

What a patronizing little article!

Interesting, though, that the ONE topic that deserved its own paragraph was trans issues - or as I prefer to say, women's rights.

MN is a "hotbed" 🙄for many other major issues too, from the Middle East conflict to the royal family. But the author zoomed in on the "trans". Why?

Because he hasn’t looked at the site in-depth. He knows most about it from social media. And I reckon there’s nothing than generates more viral posts about mumsnet than if you mention gender.

I'd say it's because of the significant impact and from that real world changes. The campaign against genderism here over many years is a stand out in that regard.

It's not ebbing, it's spilled into everyday life.

Mn used to be the place where you could hint at talking about these things; more so post Spartacus.

Then wrn evolved, Twitter allowed discussion and it became more mainstream.

Ovarit and another site popped up

I feel fewer people post here now that used to, but only because the hot bed has spread beyond here.

Maybe the key point is that the article recognises that some Social Media sites are a force for support and positive change.
The Economist has been pretty solid over the years about the absurdity of some TRA viewpoints
and they still let Helen Joyce hold events at their offices.

Yep.

This was the one hold out when things were very 'no debate'.

Now, we are everywhere. 😊

@SarahPedersen would say that we’ve got a whole army behind us. 😇

I rather like the idea that we’re like Ted Lasso’s Roy Kent.

Sportsball references are outwith my ken, I'm afraid!

If it's ebbing how come the Sandie Peggie case is on thread #23 ?

Fair play to the Economist for mentioning penis beaker tho

Not where I work. Unfortunately.

I found the article so patronising, basically making out that mumsnet is a nice little box for women to have their silly chats in. Thank goodness they’re contained. I was annoyed from early on when he described weaning a baby as trivial. Shows how little he grasps the value of the site. And also all the richness of the support it gives users having a difficult time. Of course it’s easy to see the silliness but the internet is full of silliness. Doesn’t feel like he made the smallest effort to really understand the site. Feels like he just saw a press release ‘imumsnet turns 25’, had a quick look and wrote patronising guff. And saying the trans debate is ebbing, that didn’t ring true at all. Many parents are living that debate and working to support their children.

I think ebbing is the wrong word but I think I know what they're trying to say - in say 2019 it felt like there was a giant unspoken wall which would come down hard onto you and you didn't know if you were the only one who hadn't gone mad. You had to join secret groups which would vet you before you could come to a meeting. You couldn't even write articles with names but avoiding pronouns without being accused of transphobia.

Now you can argue about it over the dinner table and there'll be a range of opinions. It'll probably still be feisty and it depends on your social circle, but if you join a random, say, gardening club you'll probably find a whole lot of people who are happy to just talk about gardening and be friends with you even if they know you have slightly different views.

Isn't there a quote - the most powerful people in society are the ones you're not allowed to talk about?

I can see why the word ebbing is used. It is more like a recognition the tide is turning. Some businesses will cling longer but the majority of people are not with them any more and also won't just go along

Obviously the tide is turning but it leaves a lot of unpleasant flotsam and jetsam behind.

There are three social layers still promoting this stuff:

• Quangos and third sector organisations who are part of the diversity industry. Other third sector orgs are aligned to them because staff rotate between them, copying and pasting their inclusivity policies as they go
• A layer of very noisy, fanatical activists whose principal interest is "trans rights" which is spread across the Labour, Lib Dem, Green and SNP parties
• The most worrying is that it has got an actual foothold in the population among the type of people who believe in horoscopes, healing crystals etc

My usual Cassandra take is that people have been saying, “The tide is turning or it’s ebbing “ for years.

Yet this week, we’ve to wait on the FWS ruling which may effectively abolish women as a legal entity and sex class.

How many ETs or other legal challenges are in progress to defend rights that were thought to be givens and inalienable?

And as for politicians, entire sectors, organisations, ALBs, the voluntary sector-this will persist in what feels like full flood.

The most worrying is that it has got an actual foothold in the population among the type of people who believe in horoscopes, healing crystals etc

Well I believe in horoscopes, healing crystals, homeopathy and the like and I’m as GC as they come. Of my hippier friends, they’re mostly as GC as I am. That said, there is definitely a fluffy Wicca-lite “I’m special” crowd who are into the Be Kind and showing everyone how unique they are shite in a big way. But then I don’t have a lot of time for them generally!