Late night surprise about reputation of FWR

[IwantToRetire]

I was on Site Stuff to report back on ongoing freezing and noticed another thread about whether Mumsnet should apologise about deleting threads about ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

And there were some comments about there being a border line between legitimate criticism of Israel's policies and anti semitism. And it is this last that get these threads deleted.

So was surprised to see some comment on this thread saying it was as bad as some threads on FWR, and those particularly at fault are thos with a GC view point.

(Funnily enough AI suggested a title for this thread along the lines of "Are FWR debates judged differently ..... " but now it has hidden its suggestion, just when I was going to use it.)

Oh its come back

"Are sex and gender debates on FWR judged by different standards?"

No - she had every right to say what she wants and unlike other other sites like Reddit, opposing views on gender ideology are not banned

she has no right to control how her posts are responded too and as long as the responses don't breach site rules, they can stand

I’d say that sometimes FWR posters can sound/be ‘aggressive’ especially after hundreds of more polite requests for clarification are completely ignored and/or experiences of women’s trauma are mocked/belittled or ignored. A recent thread illustrated how genuine questions are determinedly ignored.

But I’m really struggling to understand why a poster saying “perhaps you’d like to post links for those posts?” is wrong or aggressive or hateful.

FWR is accused all the time of being anti trans and hateful bigots, but thread after thread are filled with posters saying everyone is happy for a transwomen to live their lives as long as they wish as long as that is respecting single sex spaces which, as a biological man, they should not and do not have access to.

How is any of that hateful is beyond me. But robust discussion, yes. Asking for evidence and specifics, yes. I value those aspects as they have honed my originally vague thinking.

If FWR receives post after post saying that the women there are aggressive, hostile, hateful etc etc then that could feed into a general perception that this is what this section of Mnet is like.

It's back to 'both sides are as bad as each other'. And if people take those allegations at face value, without actually bothering to read the threads, and find out what is actually being said and by whom - rather than how it is represented, perhaps for ulterior motives - then, referring back to the ItsNotOrwell [ironic?] comment:
All these tactics certainly are not encouragements for anyone to return or remain on FWR allow FWR to keep going, are they?

And because the GC side is based on scientific evidence, not opinion and belief.

if there’s one thing FWR posters do frequently is back up their claims with many, many links to evidence.

All this stuff comes down to whether you see trans women as a particularly vulnerable subset of women, or whether you see them as a group of aggressive, misogynistic men with a sexual fetish.

There isn't really any compromise between those positions. Obviously people in group A are going to be horrified and upset by comments, however politely worded, from people in group B.

Apologies, I didn’t see this excellent post, when I posted the same sentiment.

She has every right to say it.
She has no right to control anyone else.

The opinion is on mumsnet, the only place she can voice an unfavourable opinion and it is left standing without moderation.

Posters disagree with it. Some like you agree. So be it.

But you don't get to tell us to be silent if we disagree because too many disagree. You also don't get to dictate what form that disagreement takes.

Here women talk.

Go to reddit if you want to hear women be silent.

The term “misgendered” is the give away innit

These people frequently quote their small pool of fellow thinkers. Astroturfing this weird idea that the feminist board on Mumsnet is singularly awful compared to other much more hostile corners of the internet. It’s not even worse than AIBU or the Doghouse.

Can someone post the link? Didn’t see that thread.

Heres the thread
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5514277-5514277-feminism-or-transphobia?reply=151598151&utm_campaign=reply&utm_medium=share

I haven’t read the thread you mention so not commenting on that, but I think in general there’s a fair comparison between the misuse of both the terms transphobia and antisemitism. In both cases there are ‘real’ examples of this happening, and there is also a lot of misuse of each term, as an attempt to stop discussion, avoid scrutiny, and smear.

You don't have to see it as A or B, or as an argument about empirical truth.

You can see trans people as people who have adopted a particular set of beliefs, and associated customs, whilst being neutral about what they 'really mean'. The issue then being how to accommodate all of that whilst respecting the rights of people who have different beliefs and customs.

The problem is that the above, secular, approach is characterised as hateful, because it does not advocate for everyone to be forced to share the beliefs and customs of trans people.

I think that there is actually quite a lot of hateful posting on this topic, not so much directed to other posters but onto the pro-TRA people in the world at large.

I can understand it, to some extent: The gaslighting and sheer irrationality of gender ideology, and its capacity to add rocket fuel to misogyny is exhausting and infuriating.

But I'm also noticing something more than that. All online discussions on any challenging topic are subject to the polarising dynamics of online talk. That's true even within a forum, but when that forum is constantly fed from Twix and other algorithm-driven platforms it does tend to get worse and worse. I think that we develop callouses as we speak angrily online. We get battle-hardened, we post scathing stuff, perhaps going a little further than we feel we ought to have. Then we feel a bit defensive and rush to justify our harshness, so we double-down on it and take it further.

People online get a lot of gratification from posting something angry and righteous, and they develop a kind of 'tolerance' for angry discourse -- 'tolerance' in the sense that we use the word in relation to drug addiction. We need a stronger and stronger dose to get the same hit.

I have noticed a change in the tone of trans-related threads over the last couple of years. Partly it has coincided with the arrival of right-wing voices among the generally lefty MN GC voices. But it certainly isn't just that. It's more to do with the entrenched and deepening habits of hostility and tribalism. You see it in the Conflict in the Middle East threads. They don't actually have the character of political discussion at all. They are just flag-waving for a team and they exploit the drama of atrocity in order to experience a more compelling form of chat than you can get by talking about gardening or or baby weaning or dogs.

It's nothing to do with GC people or feminists being horrible in some way, but equally, GC people and feminists certainly have not escaped this horrible trend.

'Feminism and Women’s Rights' - this is what this board used to be called it was renamed 'Feminism: Sex and gender discussions, and 'F&GD' never caught on.

It's confusing because it doesn't seem to relate to anything, hence questions like yours. However, even I sometimes use FWR😒I'll stop. F&GD it is for me from now on.

I agree with PPs that F&GD is notable for its use of evidence and stats and facts and figures from verifiable sources, and that's clearly very irritating for people who are trying to argue inaccuracies and impossibilities e.g. sex being a spectrum, or people being able to change sex, or public opinion being in favour of mixed sex toilets or other claims that are easily refutable.

It irritates the heck out of them and they frequently respond with 'you're all hateful bigots!' because they can't come up with cogent arguments.

Or, a slight variant: you're all old and therefore by definition hateful bigots.

I would love to be wrong on this topic. I would love it if someone could post a coherent argument as to how gender ideology makes sense as a framework.

Because accepting that humans can't change sex and gender ideology is without foundation leads to the consequence of also accepting that our politicians consistently lie about it (women can have penises, some men have cervixes etc) and children are being irreversibly harmed for a cause with no basis.

I genuinely wish that wasn't the case. It's horrific to think that our society has been duped so fundamentally.

But unfortunately I can't get past the fact that humans can't change sex and that sometimes we need to categorise and separate by sex for the protection of women and girls. Single sex spaces cannot be single sex if you allow even one of the other sex in.

Coming on FWR and calling us bigots, telling us to be kind does not alter these facts. If posters feel rejected and upset by being faced with the fact that they've been sold a pup, I can empathise. It's a hard pill to swallow. But don't shoot the messenger.

I didn't read it like that tbh although mis-sexed would be more appropriate but there is definitely a weird trend here of accusing GC women of being men if they post anything nuanced or more left wing adjacent. It's weird because there's a large number of known male posters on here who don't openly advertise their sex in their usernames that many are comfortable with and some not, but the same posters who are comfortable with these men inserting themselves strongly into women's discussions will accuse a female poster of being a man / hating women / supporting the harm of children if for example she posts anything nuanced about balancing her GC beliefs with her wider political beliefs. I think this mostly happens because debate on Mumsnet has become so divisive that people are looking for enemies in people who actually ultimately agree with them.

Where did I say I agreed with her? And I’m not telling anyone to “be silent”. (Also - I couldn’t be bothered with Reddit.)

If you’re attempting to sneakily call me a man, that’s typical FWR behaviour and exactly what I’m talking about. There’s no need for that, particularly when so many men are actual accepted regular posters.

No i was not suggesting you are man. I thought you were saying that we should not call a trans identifying man he.

if i misunderstood i apologise

Oi, @MarieDeGournay
"Or, a slight variant: you're all old and therefore by definition hateful bigots."

You forgot something. We can be old and ugly and hateful bigots, thank you very much.

That’s exactly as I read it. Anyone who uses ‘misgendered” as part of an accusation of hostility, obviously has at least some opposing views to the majority posters on this board and therefore, will disagree with the regulars on the nature of the posts.

Thanks for posting OP. It’s back to the same old misrepresentation of our views and the way that we express them.

Very quick to jump on “typical FWR behaviour” I see

Maybe online discussion is becoming more assertive.
But there's also a growth in the number of posters who really can't deal with being disagreed with.