The managed silence of women in politics

[IwantToRetire]

None of this needs a censor’s red pen. It takes venue policies, “values” statements and security theatre – and a legal climate ambiguous enough to chill – to make people police themselves. That’s how self-censorship becomes the house style.

You don’t need prohibitions when you have process. Venue terms. HR protocols. “Dignity at work” rules stretched past their purpose. Security assessments that become vetoes in all but name.

Layer in legal fog – see the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act, with its elastic definitions of “abusive” speech – and the effect is predictable: people trim sentences, swerve topics, decline invitations, and ladle on caveats until the point collapses.

Result: careful words, careful silences, careful disengagement. The oxygen leaks out of debate and everyone learns to breathe shallowly.

... watch where the stage literally disappears – where apologies are issued for a guest’s presence, and “security” is the pretext for cancellation. It clusters around women who speak plainly on sex and gender, or whose faith informs their politics.

For years they were told to take up space. Now the instruction is different: mind your tone, moderate your beliefs, make yourself smaller. That’s not equality; it’s an equal-opportunities gag.
Hard censorship is obvious: a cancelled event, a withdrawn platform, a disciplinary.

Soft censorship is subtler and more corrosive: “we can’t support the impact of hosting you”; “let’s not distract from priorities”; “for unity, could you not raise this now?” None of those measures bans content. All shrink the space where women can contribute. ...

Continues at https://thinkscotland.org/2025/11/censorship-with-paperwork-the-managed-silence-of-women-in-politics/

"No we don't validate feelings over reality, obviously. That would be dangerous for various reasons, among other things

But you do validate feelings ….when they are your own. That reproductive biology should define a social category is a subjective opinion not a fact because social categories rely on associations that need not be biologically rooted. Of course you are entitled to prefer natural over artificial ice cream because it tastes better …to you but that doesn't make it the only ice cream.

We have listened though. We might not always agree, and that's fine. The point remains that women with trans identities remain women regardless of what you call them, and because they are women they are included in discussions about the rights and needs of women, and feminism."

That's not how feminism works tho. Feminists don't get to pick & choose who deserves self determination & who doesn't. Bodily autonomy exists for all individuals or none. Principles usually work best that way…

"Edited to add that "delusion" and "brainwashing" were not words I have used, they were brought into this discussion by Hows... which is interesting isn't it? Especially considering my last paragraph 😂"

Contagion theory & GC ideology aren't exactly strangers.

"*He"
Listening to women eh? Patriarchal habits die hard…

You filling up threads with derailment is an attempt to limit our speech.

"Ok last one I promise."

Peer group pressure getting to you?

"Anyone can say they are anyone online or in real life, doesn't mean it's true. Men are men, women are women."

True of what? Your own subjective opinion?

"Sex matters, reality matters, feelings are not the be all and end all, and we certainly shouldn't organise society or laws on a basis of "self determined feelings" over reality."

Ahh, the ol bait & switch routine. The context was social categories not social organisation. Social categorisation depends on associations while social organisation depends on harm. That we consider a tiger to be of the cat family doesn't mean we treat them the same as a domestic cat.

That GC's can't or won't tell the difference doesn't say much for their credibility.

"Just look around at how society is reacting, and how the law is (finally) starting to catch up with, the complete overreach of gender ideology where TRA's have managed to implement society wide change, incorrectly and obviously unlawfully ignoring the law as somehow behind the times (many workplaces were advised by TRAs to "get ahead of the law" on trans "rights" which aren't actually rights) across multiple countries to place self determined feelings over reality... it would be unkind of me to ask how that's going 😂"

"Everybody in the world is wrong but us!"

Darls, you are a long long way from the law reflecting your opinion. As yet there's actually no legislation interpreting how the new legal clarification should be implemented let alone tested in court.

"If you want to wang on about "social categories" and "self determination" you can start your own thread as has been pointed out to you already. You won't though, you'll just persist in derailing this thread arguing with anyone like me who takes the bait and spends time refuting your posts."

Seriously? 'Why are you talking about something I asked you to explain"
I didn't conjure up these topics from thin air, I'm simply explaining a position I was challenged on. Perhaps start your own thread on unrelated areas you wish to challenge people on rather than challenge them on existing ones if you feel its 'derailing'.

"I, and many other posters have said we'd welcome some actual good faith discussion from TRA posters, we'd genuinely love it! But in however many years I've been reading here (quite a few!), I've yet to see it. Mind you, good faith discussion is not what these types of poster's motivation come here for."

Did you ever consider assuming other people's motivation without evidence is why you conclude they are acting in bad faith?

Firstly, out of all the threads on Feminism, I comment on very few unlike the stalwarts here who frequent &/or dominate ALL of them with mostly repetitive unoriginal unthought provoking' 'content'. Secondly when I do comment I hardly take up 1000 comments even with my regular stalkers chiming in.

And lastly, that you can't bring yourself to simply skip over irrelevant comments as most rational people do on discussion forums really says something about the grandiose entitlement to space mentality here.

Now I'm quite happy to discuss freedom of speech as its one of my 'specialities' so LFG…..

The context was social categories not social organisation. Social categorisation depends on associations while social organisation depends on harm.

If you can't categorise items, you cannot effectively organise them. We have to be able to categorise cutlery as distinct from mugs in order to organise the cutlery into a drawer and the mugs into a cupboard. We have to categorise women as distinct from men to organise the single-sex spaces and services that women need for safety from male violence.

That we consider a tiger to be of the cat family doesn't mean we treat them the same as a domestic cat.

The mouse begs to differ. It is a tasty snack for both the tiger and the moggy.

There's this thing called 'sub categories' that shock horror aren't mutually exclusive in terms of social organisation as in abled/disabled people, gay/straight, poor/rich, young/old, black/white etc etc.

You act as if humans have never heard of competing rights let alone possess the sophistication to manage them.

No wonder so many get peaked by Mumsnet with so many threads demonstrating the poor arguments, bad faith, victim mentality and condescending attitude of gender identarians, over and over again.
It’s annoying, but they do our work for us.

Agreed, and it's a very good example of bad faith posting!

We don't need to assume a motive of bad faith when it's on display for everyone to see regularly.

'When someone shows you who they are, believe them' - Maya Angelou

Ahh, the ol bait & switch routine.

Yes lets talk Bait and Switch Routines. Here's one...

'You never talk about Trans Men'
'Yes we do, they are included because they are women'
'You are erasing them by calling them women'

And remember:

There is a specific style of writing called the Gish Gallop:

The Gish gallop is a rhetorical technique in which a person in a debate attempts to overwhelm an opponent by presenting an excessive number of arguments, without regard for their accuracy or strength, with a rapidity that makes it impossible for the opponent to address them in the time available.

Even more effective when each argument makes zero logical sense [which is the purpose of the wall of prose in the first place].

Add to that random italics to really make a point that is completely incomprehensible and just wastes more time for each reader to ponder what exactly is meant by each individual italicised word choice.

And then there's the 'I'm so much cleverer than youse' with the crying about the 'lack of original thought'...I mean you don't have to think much about why men are demanding to be in women's spaces, it is blatantly obvious to anyone over the age of about 6.

I'd suggest if people that do the above ever had a point that could be made in less than 2000 incomprehensible words, they'd have made it by now.

Ya got anything on topic?

For people who supposedly haaaate 'derailers' you sure do obsess a lot over them…

Oh now you want to stick to a topic? That is almost funny.

There's this thing called 'sub categories' that shock horror aren't mutually exclusive in terms of social organisation as in abled/disabled people, gay/straight, poor/rich, young/old, black/white etc etc

There is no sub category of the category woman that includes men.

Come on now, where's your 'original thought'?

It's not even 7am yet, give me another coffee (is it too early for alcohol?) and I see what I can do.

The one at the top that's the real problem here not 'derailing' as in getting caught out with your fingers in the censorship jar on MN all while playing the censorship 'victim'.

All this gnashing of teeth is just a defensive distraction posture.

See what I mean? This poster is begging for 'derailing' aka clarification. And I'm the bad guy?

Mind you if were someone else who decided to run off on a rant about 'men in dresses' as a response they would be cheered on.

Are you quite well?

I can make no sense of this and I'm not sure you can either.
I'm not begging for clarification btw, I have a very clear idea about what sex categories are.

The point is men, no matter their gender identity, or self determined feelings, should have been allowed to "compete" with women for women's rights, protections, awards etc etc etc.

But well done on to the TRA for saying the quiet bit out loud that trans identifying men are competing with women for women's lawful rights on top of all their own, therefore actively taking away from women 👏Slow hand clap.

It's very simple. You can't expect to use circular reasoning & not be called out for it. You claimed there are no sub categories of women that's begging the question given existence of 'trans women' via their psychological cultural & behavioural associations to cis women.

It is a good topic for a thread, thank you.

I think real life and social media are such different realms.

And we must take care to ensure that the extremes of social media do not impact our real life interactions.

I am not in Scotland so would be interested to learn more about the last few years.

You are talking utter gobbledegook.

No man exists with any 'psychological cultural and behavioural associations' to any woman. Putting sparkly nail varnish on doesn't bestow 'associations' on to men.

Even with no words in which to circular argue your point whatever that is, two classes of human exist. One designed around large gametes and one designed around small gametes.

Even if there was no word for 'ejaculator', not one person who ever ejaculated sperm could ever also produce an egg and carry it to term. No amount of 'original thought' makes this a reality.

@IwantToRetire Again, thank you for sharing such a powerful post about self-censorship, and the chilling effect on women in politics of seeing how gender critical female politicians have been sidelined.

This is such a dishonest movement. It clsims to value honesty and acceptance, yet is too fragile to allow the honest acceptance of female reality or listen to female experience.

It claims to value self knowledge and self identity yet can only exist by denying the self knowledge and self identity of the vast majority of women (original sex based meaning) who know that society does frame us and treat us differently to male people because of our bodies and that this is not something we can identify out of.

There is not a woman (original sex based meaning) here who has not had to decide between stating her truth and risking the witchhunt and staying silent and becoming complicit in our own re-oppression.

Every day we read assertions and statements made casually, thoughtlessly, that demean everything aboit us and how we live, turn the protections that exist for our survival and to give us the space (physical and cultural) to self determine our lives in society into the accessories that allow men to perform their sexist idea of us. Yet if we speak about why thos is wrong we are treated as abherrant, problematic, bad women.

There is a lacuna in public discourse where women are no longer speaking about certain things. Women know it. We feel it. That genderists fail to notice it speaks volumes about how they really see women (original sex based meaning).

And you are 'derailing'. Perhaps start up a thread on 'there are only two sexes' …we've never heard that one before….