Riot Women sums up everything wrong with the BBC

[IwantToRetire]

Riot Women, by Sally Wainwright, is not the first drama to challenge traditional gender roles in the name of female empowerment, but it really seems to hate men. The six-part series is ostensibly about how five menopausal women come together to make music and inspire each other to rise above the difficulties they face. But another way of seeing it is that it is six hours of prime-time television in which every male character is portrayed as (at best) hopelessly ineffectual and dishonest or (at worst) a psychopathic murderer and rapist, with not much in between.

what it does tell us is that, five years after being appointed as Director General, Tim Davie’s BBC is still, fundamentally, a place that sees such dramas as suitable for mainstream viewing, and that the ideas it promotes are essentially incontestable and inoffensive. Wainwright’s world view is indistinguishable from the BBC’s because they originate from the same set of values.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/riot-women-sums-up-everything-wrong-with-the-bbc/ and at https://archive.is/iEEB9

I find it extremely offensive to have a Spectator article given such approval on Mumsnet OP. Perhaps you've mistaken this forum for the English League of Misogynists?

Well, the puff in the Spectator did its job - I am watching the first episode. I suspect a TiM in the plot called Miranda (can do without TiMs) but otherwise fine so far. Mind, I have been in tears in staff rooms and no-one has ever got moaned at but me. Not sure where the right-on woke head is coming from at all. And new teacher is bloody lucky she has a HoD who will pick up the pieces when she forgets her worksheets (horrible idea anyway) because mostly if you forget the worksheets you have pandemonium and it's all your fault. Still, can't expect everything to be real? Also found suicide attempt awful, my brother did this and how Beth behaves is - but ofcourse, a woman would answer the phone as it might be something more important than hanging oneself.

Yes. It's fiction. A degree of artistic licence is to be expected.

I find it extremely offensive to have someone come on a FWR thread and then post something that clearly shows they haven't read the comments with various responses to the tv series.

Its just insulting to those who have bothered to post.

ie hardly any, if any, support the article.

But have commented on the show itself.

I know mumsnet / FWR is thought to be an important source of feminist comment, but never understand those who seem attracted to it for that reason then start by insulting those on it.

Why not read the thread and post a comment in response to other who have taken the time to comment.

I agree. And while I understand the feeling of not wanting to give time/clicks to media that has historically been unhelpful or hostile to women, and would once have agreed entirely and certainly not have clicked the link, these days I'm increasingly of the opinion that purity spirals and (social) media silos and echo chambers are a very large part of what has got us into this mess; not just the gender ideology mess, but the general inability to have a serious conversation about almost anything without first deciding on the baddies and goodies and then disavowing the former and applauding the latter, WHATEVER THEY HAVE SAID.
Edited for annoyingly persistent typo!

I agree re trans issue, it's set in Hebden Bridge and therefore likely to be TiMs around. And I have liked the first episode. What gets me is that a woman is in a supermarket with a knife with which she attacks a police officer. She is not in custody despite committing a knife crime. Police officer also cuts the woman's mouth but there is no sign of doing anything about this either. Said woman then goes and trashes ex-lover's car (don't blame her for that, good on her) but nothing happens.
Many years ago I watched Wainwright's 'Last Tango in Halifax', which had a similar mix to this. It was good, however, it suggested that you could get a reliable DNA test over the counter which I didn't think was the case (but it might be, so, ok). However, the couple got married. They did so in a registry office 2 weeks after arranging the marriage and having banns put up - banns must be up for 3 weeks but no mention was made of a special licence, which would otherwise be needed. And no reason the gap shouldn't be 3 weeks (lucky to get a wedding dead on 3 weeks after visiting registry office to arrange the wedding but I did it once, in London, so not impossible). However, at the end of the series the couple have a proper wedding at a hotel and this is described as their real wedding and the heroine's (sorry, object to erasure of women by only using male term 'hero') brother came from Australia. But in England and Wales you cannot marry the same person twice without getting divorced in between so this was not a 'wedding' it was some sort of blessing and a party. But it wasn't, it was in a venue licensed to conduct marriages and treated as their marriage.
So I come back to why was a knife-wielding mentally unwell woman not in some form of custody after attacking a police officer and having a supermarket emptied?
I know Hitchcock said that if we expected plots to make sense then no films would ever get made, but sticking to a few basic facts of the law would be nice? Or set your story where these things are not the law?

Sounds like a pile of utter drivel, and so predictable.

Do you operate all of your life on the basis of what's been permitted or banned in your tribe of choice?

There is something I find incredibly stupid and incredibly dangerous because it implies a right to shut down, silence and cancel people based on unspecified feelz. I kinda find it offensive too.

That thing is people implying that their unspecified feelings of offence are worth sharing, or rather worth sharing without further detail.

I need to know what exactly it is about it that you find offensive, and, using facts, logic and reason please explain how the basic principle of free speech almost-absolutism should be abandoned in this case.

IMHO if someone wants something shut down and their sole justification is that they find it offensive, then we need to say it more and more to be sure it is not silenced and to try to force the feelz-based authoritarian to explain all the numerous steps that sit between "finding offence" and "having an actual reason to silence".

@JamieCannister I doubt Serpentooth has read the article or reads the Spectator, but they 'know' the Spectator is 'right wing' and 'anti-trans'. That it might be 'pro women' (I am not sure it is, it just hates the trans agenda) is irrelevant to their 'feelz'. A pretty low level of debate.

Just to add to the mix, have skim read a really silly (media feminist) comment about the series by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown about the series.

First of all she hasn't watched the whole thing and has got some of the story line wrong, but it is all about why is it so mean to men.

So what do you know! Left or right the MSM only published articles about shows about women to then moan about men being denigrated.

But somehow we never see articles about how 99.9% of tv, and worse still films, where women are little more than being part of a man's story.

I wanted to love it, however quickly tired of every single woman being troubled, broken or depressed. Felt like a race to the bottom and very bleak after a few episodes.

As for the man pretending to be a woman, give me strength yet more insanity what would he possibly know about the menopause given that he is a man.

The right wing are fucking odd! Had you not noticed?

I tried watching it being a SW fan but the Miranda inclusion set me off. I just couldn't get a handle on the main characters/whole feel of the Show. Give me Last Tango or gentleman Jack any day instead! I did agree with the Tamsin Grieg scene with her ex boss though..

Isn’t one of the women a man? Says it all really

I loved Riot Women: the intentionally useless or dangerous men, the music, the fab clothes (Kitty’s wardrobe!), the cross-generational bond, the invisibility theme, the squeeze between ageing parents and growing kids, the chaos of dating as an older woman—fun, funny and moving.

But this is why I’m posting: the transphobia in this thread is really disheartening. We can all have all kinds of opinions about the show, but demeaning trans people isn’t debate; it’s unacceptable. We can do better than this and keep this space feminist AND respectful/inclusive.

Oooh do report any transphobic posts won’t you? And why exactly should women be inclusive of men claiming to be women

Has it never occured to you that men dressing up as women because they think being a woman is a type of personality are demeaning women?

Do you honestly, really believe the defining thing that differentiates men from women, the thing that you have in common with all women and not with any men, is a personality trait?

Well, maybe you do. Maybe you think that's a totally fine way to define people. You might genuinely be totally fine with being reduced to a personality trait.

But many women are not, and we do not accept your dismissal of our right to define ourselves based on our own self knowledge.

Our right to say "no, we are not the cariactures that gender believers reduce us to" is not "unacceptable", it is fundamental.

Rather than insulting and dismissing women for having the self respect to say who are who we are, you might want to wonder why you seem to think it's not possible to be inclusive and respectful to trans people without demeaning and belittling women. You might even reconsider whether what trans people expect is really actually respectful or inclusive at all.

I wanted to like it. But it was every bloody social issue squeezed in. Racism, CSE, adoption, depression, menopause, domestic abuse, police corruption, trans, gay. Also I really didn’t warm to the singer woman. The rest of the cast were fab though,