What do people get from coming here to 'scold' us?

[CassOle]

My first (not completely serious) thoughts are: their arse handed to them and screenshots.

However, is there more to it?

Why do some long term posters come back again and again with the same arguments that haven't worked before? Do they think that it might work this time?

Then there are the 'my Trans friends are lovely' scolders. Do they really think that we should forget safeguarding, biological reality, single-sex provision etc. becuase they have lovely friends?

Lastly, the thread ploppers. If we are lucky, they might even reply. The one last night might have been getting sexual kicks from it, but we have had other ploppers who just appeared to want to tell us how mean and nasty we are.

None of these (that I have seen) have brought good, well reasoned arguments to back up their points. Maybe that is what causes people to scold and run, or plop and run, as when the arguments cannot stand up to scrutiny (or they have the screenshots), they stop posting.

This then brings me back to the long term posters who are TWAW. I would not like it if they were driven off this board, as it is a public board and as long as the T&C are kept to, they have every right to post. It must be hard posting against the main opinion on any matter, so they must get 'something' from it. Maybe Chris et al will be kind enough to explain this from their point of view?

I'd say most fall into this category.

The Dunning Krueger effect is strong here. They've given it very little thought, but assume that because it's the 'progressive' position, it's right. They can't cope with even basic arguments and consideration of the impact on women, so they back off quickly.

Indeed:

thecritic.co.uk/trans-activism-is-progressive-mans-manosphere/

Dopamine hits. They have substantially more engagement than most other posters. They are encouraged in their me-railing and can redirect any number of threads into being all about them.

I suspect some of them are regular TRA monitors who occasionally pop up on a thread to tell us why we're wrong.

Some are relatively long term posters who just want to derail every damn thread with the same argument that didn't work on any previous thread - they aren't interested in debate.

Some are just men come to tell women why they're wrong.

All of them are as mid-witted as they are tedious. They certainly aren't here for a debate - look at all the many times they're asked to substantiate or provide a citation for a statement, and how few times there's actually a response.

Thanks for the replies.

I guess the ones that are most perplexing to me are the 'my lovely trans friends' group. I have no doubt that their friends are lovely and possibly quite vulnerable in some cases (I think the biggest victims of this whole thing are girls with ROGD and also young homosexuals of both sexes). It's the complete lack of looking at the bigger picture which flummoxes me. They seem completely unable to do this.

They assume that because it's the 'progressive' position, it's right.

Yes. To quote from Tom Harris's article posted on another thread:
"(a) trans people are a minority, (b) fighting for minority rights is A Good Thing; and therefore (c) if you demand minority rights you are On The Right Side Of History."

They have no need to think further than that. Box ticked, job done.

"I suspect they think "Right, I'm going to sort out these stupid Mums/Karens/bigots!" they turn up with some demands thinking they are right, then find out they can't handle the level of argument and back out?"

I think that this is true in many instances. Where someone plops into a thread and berates and demeans posters who they see as ignorant only to find that it is they are the ones who seem ingnorant because they only have emotional reasoning to support their opinions. That they have nowhere near the depth of knowledge to defend their arguments.

Sometimes they don't even care about truth or accuracy. Just look at the thread recently that appeared in trending and posters who hadn't even bothered to check which board the thread was one jumped on and told everyone how they need to fucking stay in their box and stop posting their transphobia all over the site. And when it was pointed out that the thread was in S&G, they doubled down and said it must of been moved. Then when it was pointed out that it was only ever in S&G, they threw around more accusations and flounced.

Who does that but someone who lives on the ideal that they are righteous and feel better denigrating those who they decide are not.

On very rare occasions, I feel a bit sorry for a poster who seems to be genuine about 'why can't we all be nice to each other, there are lovely lovely transwomen who have just been living their lives doing no-one any harm..' etc, and I wince slightly as I hear the rattle of plates being prepared for her arse to be handed to her on..

That kind of poster then goes away convinced that we are all horrible to her, and to her lovely, lovely trans friend..

The TRA kind of poster is undoubtedly here to cause trouble, reinforce their prejudices, get screenshots when poster lose patience with them, get a buzz out of scolding women, and I guess they too go away with their believe that we're all horrible transphobic bigots reinforced. QED for them.

I've encouraged totally ignoring them in the past, but somebody always wants to reply, either because they can't help themselves, or because they feel that it's wrong to let trans nonsense stand unchallenged, in case a newcomer to the board reads it and thinks we have no answer.

We engage, often humorously, so we have a bit of fun even if they don't

I often think of my ex, who had a great deal of vulnerabilities and difficulties and was later diagnosed with two different personality disorders, who when having a bad day and especially on a bad night, would go looking for a forum on which to start a fight. They didn't particularly care about what or with whom, it was just to be able to get the buzz of anger and conflict and troublemaking, and to fill the hours, they were quite frank about it.

The drop by ones such as our guest last night, needs to do something with his box of Xtra Large Kleenex. I always find the ones who get a thrill from disgust and scolding particularly repulsive, as there is no response you can as a woman make that doesn't in some way provide the sex toy experience you're being used for. Attention, validation, anger, disgust, its all wibbly thrills. The only thing you can do is hide the thread and go away, ignoring is the only disliked experience, but it means as a woman you're not allowed any defense or reciprocation, or to stand up for yourself. We used to switch here into discussing cake, which achieved both that self respect defense, and spiked the guns of someone looking to use women here for their own jollies as they really didn't like that, but it was called 'not in the spirit', and was banned.

And then you just have the truly stuck and the performative, who usually have a Reddit or Bluesky thread open at the same time, and are rushing in to drop the Hail Marys and then rushing back to go 'I told 'em, I told 'em!' and get lots of pats and reinforcement. (The categories often mix and several happen at once - for example a few posters who will periodically drop in, take over a thread and re run an argument/article already debunked a hundred times and want to Groundhog Day the experience all over again.) What you say to a poster like that is irrelevant as they will not read it or be able to process it - as the MPs at that disgrace of a WEC meeting this week demonstrated, many of whom had not even read the judgment they were meeting about, never mind understood it. They had downloaded the pictures of their thinking and just held them up, set to 'broadcast' rather than 'communicate'.

But these conversations can be eye opening for lurkers, journalists and many others in these parts. The last night one was a live action demonstration of exactly why women need to be able to prevent all men of any identity in their space.

But when you think about it, I reckon that they can't look at the bigger picture. They cannot look at the collective issue vs the individual. Because if they develop an understanding of the harms collectively, then they understand that they will have to live with the dissonance of their unconditional support of their lovely trans friends

That is, that if they develop an understanding of the collective harms, they can never look at their friends and family as being completely harmless again. Unless they can hold these concepts as completely disconnected in their head.

I wonder now whether Linda Bellos and KJ Went are friends. Or has so much been said and done that they no longer have their amicable discussions.

Yes, this.

YY. Some of them have been doing the same thing for the last 8/9 years then come to say how “confused” they are by the views on FWR.

Some of them have a genuine metaphysical belief, which is still weirdly widely shared within society. They hope to persuade lurkers that such belief is normal, and that the GC way is not the only way. And they try to claim concessions for believers on humanitarian grounds, which may also sway some lurkers whilst making us look paranoid or hard-hearted.

The belief itself is irrational, but they sometimes have good arguments eg about the law. We should pay attention because it tells us what tricks they might try next.

Really the most key information is to consider, do women who want their legal right to single sex spaces spend time dropping into transactivist and GI forums to scold, lecture, virtue signal and tell everyone they're revolting, etc?

I wonder why not?

These people haven't given it a seconds proper thought. But they have this wide eyed confidence in their position, because society (I guess) has told them that their lovely friends matter more than women.

"I told the horrid TERFs why they were wrong, why haven't they just blindly accepted what I wrote?"

My, you think highly of yourself 😄

When I pop onto an anti trans thread to voice support for trans people i know the chances of changing anyone's mind are slim to non-existent. So I post for three reasons:

1. to show anyone who is trans reading that not everyone here is against them and that they're accepted for who they are
2. to mitigate the echo chamber just a little
3. because not every feminist agrees with you and alternative viewpoints have as much right to be expressed on this board as yours - this space is not 'owned'

It certainly isn't to "scold" anyone 😆

Conversely, the aggression with which posters pile onto any post expressing support for trans people proves many of you to be hypocrites on this point.

😂

The irony.

Precisely. Over and over and over.

Even when they are female themselves... I just find it illogical.

That's probably a 'me' issue though. Lies and illogical arguments just don't sit right with me. It's a lie to say that people can change sex. It is illogical to pretend that they can or to base legislation (and how society works) on lies.

…no one has a trans friend who is abusive, nasty, or a rapist. Every single one is a lovely lovely person who wouldn’t hurt a fly, they just want to pee, and you’d never ever know they were born with bollocks because they genuinely pass as women.

They’re “accepted for who they are” by you, not most people. You’re perpetuating a falsehood. They are legally and in reality the sex they were born, and the majority of the population have limits to how much they will indulge your luxury beliefs.

Conversely, the aggression with which posters pile onto any post expressing support for trans people proves many of you to be hypocrites on this point.

You slipped this line in @L00pyLou so that now when you get challenged and pushback you can present it as a pile on and "prove" that S&G posters are hypocrites. How clever!

Indeed. Perfectly showcasing the OP's point 😆