Here's to the Mumsnet Terven - Roll of Honour

[TheHereticalOne]

I've only just made it to Mumsnet after the decision this morning and wanted to congratulate to the marvellous Mumsnet Terven.

This has been years in the making and every one of you has resisted, in her own small or large way, the relentless gaslighting, bullying and Kafkaesque bureaucracy that tried to bully you out of saying or believing what you knew to be true and just.

I've seen Magdelen Berns rightly name-checked on X but I wanted as well to take a moment to acknowledge and thank the wonderful, clear-sighted, stiff-spined women on here who have tirelessly and patiently contributed to these boards over many years. Some are on the tip of my tongue (below) but I wonder if people would share the usernames that have stuck with them over the years. It seems like a good moment to reflect.

I'll begin with two stand-outs for me: Datun, RandomMess, LangCleg:

You have been a light for me (and I'm sure many others) in dark times when I would otherwise have felt shipwrecked alone on an island of sanity. Your logic and clarity have been a bulwark against a sea of insanity that I sometimes thought would lead me into madness.

And thanks to Mumsnet who steered a tricky course, especially in the early days of this when we had to behave like the bloody French resistance to avoid being sued to oblivion. Moderation was frustrating and we didn't always agree about the parameters but you doggedly kept the lines of communication open between us all here and I am so grateful.

Thank you.

Giant gins all round.

There really are names too numerous to mention.
So I’ll add some who’ve been here but also ‘out there’, heads above the parapet - IAmSarah, Kiera Bell, Katie Alcock ….and of course others.

I'm not sure, I think so. There have been so many articles.

https://unherd.com/newsroom/labours-embrace-of-womens-rights-is-too-little-too-late/

LangCleg in the comments here a few days ago if names can be believed!

Late to the thread but wanted to add my gratitude 🥂to all the amazing heroines of MN FWR - names already mentioned by others, but also everyone else who quietly lurked because it really is scary putting your head above the parapet.

Agree with all the names mentioned on this thread. I’m mostly a lurker but the women on this board have shaped and helped me articulate my thoughts on this issue over many years. Just last night I had a challenging conversation with a friend who was devastated with the outcome of the SC and is very much TWAW and calls herself an intersectional feminist. She said I was angry and fearful and compared the situation of trans people to those living under apartheid in SA. Thanks to this board I was able to stay calm, articulate and measured. Huge thanks to all of you brilliant women!

❤️ 💐

I remember her from some platform, maybe Twitter. Sad to hear this.

Tell Helen the good news. Whether at her grave, if that feels right for you, or to yourself at the mirror, because it's so obvious from your loving words that your beloved friend Helen will always be with you

Agatha I am so sorry for the loss of your dear friend Helen.

@AgathaMystery not daft at all. Go tell her.

Would like to add @mrsOvertonsWindow who has taught me lots.

I am so delighted, it is just beginning to sink in.

I am pretty sure many are here 😉

Thanks all. I’ll tell her tomorrow.

I can’t believe this has happened really. All those nights of vigils and meetings in dodgy pubs and being shouted at in the city centre and being ‘told off’ by friends and be this seeming vindication for us all. It’s fabulous.

I've had to wait 24 hours until I could post as I rejoined yesterday after a break. And what a wonderful day it was!!
I'd also like to say a huge thanks to all the wonderful women on here- and elsewhere- who have campaigned to make this possible- and will continue fighting.
You're all bloody amazing!

Hello! I'm a long term lurker and alterer of NHS signs.

I would like to thank all on this board for educating me. Not in opinions really, I've had those for a long time(!), but in facts. As we know, a lot of media outlets, especially left-wing ones, are completely biased in their reporting, and I have got a lot of my information through the vipers here. It means that when this issue comes up in real life (including when I was doorstepped by 2 election candidates) I know my facts - something which the other side invariably doesn't!

Mostly lurking, occasionally ranting since late 2017 here.

I was never TWAW and was astonished that anyone could be on the day I discovered FWR. I recall sending an outraged message to my (adult) philosophy-hobbyist DS, with whom I discuss politics all the time, without realising that this could have been a massive error. Fortunately it wasn't. He’s a Kathleen Stock fan, as it turns out.

Sadly I can’t name all the posters who have influenced me because I’m rubbish at names, but there have been many, and occasionally one of them has liked one of my outbursts. Wow!

But I will shout out to littlbrowndog who just nails it for me.

Cheers m’dears. Here’s to those of us radicalised by and radicalising on Mumsnet. 🥂

Back atcha! I love to see signs reprinted correctly and replaced and no one properly notices because the original cognitive dissonance has gone but no one can place what’s different about it.

What, only one mention so far for IWantToRetire? I'd also like to shout out to Helleofabore, ArabellaScott, Ereshkigalangcleg and many others, not forgetting the men who've been on here supporting us - for starters RapidOnsetGenderCritic and RealityFan (wonder where he went?) and of course the legendary Glinner.

Oh, and RealFeminist for giving us all a good laugh.

Lol that's hilarious!

Heartwarming thread, thanks OP.
Totally agree with @VeraWangTea I'd love to share my views at work but too scared for my position

I've only dropped in and out but @barracker @arabellascott @nauticant still stick in the mind.
MN definitely helped peak me years ago now.

Onwards and upwards

I was never TWAW and was astonished that anyone could be on the day I discovered FWR.

I remember reading a discussion about it and realised that I had been implanted somehow with this idea that a trans person "is really" the opposite sex. But that it had never actually been explained to me how that was supposed to happen. When I thought it through, it fell apart very quickly. I'm always amazed at how many people seem to be unable to (or refuse to) apply pretty basic logic/critical thought to this claim, and yet are convinced it's true – even though they can easily understand that it's not true for other things, like ethnicity or age - even things that ARE a spectrum. It's bizarre.

@WhatterySquash I remember years ago, probably the 80's, I and others would say things like 'he/she had a sex change. What we probably meant was that they wore dresses and/or had bottom surgery but never actually meant they had changed biological sex. But if you say something enough times you end up not really questioning it. Just like people.would (and still do) talk about hermaphrodites. Seems many people still believe there are people who do have 2 sets of functional male/female genitalia and this is what DSD 'intersex means'
I'm so grateful to FWR for the knowledge I've acquired on these matters and a little embarrassed it took me so long.

@boiledbeetle and the Under the Duvet of Darkness contributors. Here’s one for you all.

Women:
Went to court to prove a truth,
Went to court to save our right,
To challenge the lie, in plain sight,
It cost a lot to say the truth,
It cost a lot to fight this fight,
Through the darkness, to the light

This has been a great refresher of people who were vocal over the years- and I’m sure there are many whose username wasn’t as memorable, or perhaps name changed more often.

Thank you to everyone ever.

One of the great privileges of having hung out here, is being able to sigh dismissively at the bollocks arguments that get trotted out all over social media. I may have fallen for it, had it not been for you guys. As it is, I roll my eyes and ignore as it’s just drivel.

Lang is fine.