"You didn't do your job"
One woman answers Ayesha Hazarika and The Fawcett Society, by Anonymous
The trans debate is horrible. When I first realised that I did not agree with the Stonewall side of things, and in actual fact (to my horror) agreed with the dreaded t*rfs, I set up an anonymous account to try & explore the issue further.
I was already terrified of men I knew on the TRA side - men I had been friends with, and who I saw bullying gender critical women on here. But once I started to get involved with gender critical conversations, I also found myself blocked or accused of being a sock puppet by GC accounts, for asking questions, and my notifications would pile up in that way that most Twitter users dread.
I stopped using the account fairly quickly, but I was still worried about the issue and kept reading. Then I set up an account again, this time in my own name with my own photo, and carefully started following gender-critical accounts that were good at discussing things in a civil, balanced way. And there are lots of them.
When I started tweeting about it I was so anxious I felt sick. I remember the first gender critical tweet I ever liked, I got up at 3am to unlike it. I muted accounts that I knew would likely give me grief - a guy I knew who quote-tweeted his own sister-in-law with the hashtag 't*rf' because she dared say that lesbians had a right to talk about how this was affecting them. I stopped using my work account, I'd seen what had happened to some other women with small businesses, how they'd been hounded via their work, and I knew I couldn't cope with that. I'm lucky that I could afford it if being openly GC cost me sales, many women literally can't afford to speak up.
What I've been able to contribute is practically nothing - I've researched & written some articles anonymously for GC websites, I've written and been ignored by former friends in politics. I've lost friends over this, some work, the ability to just post my artwork when I feel like it. I've been smeared and lied about and Ireland's a small place so that matters. But I took all that on board and knew it was likely because I'd seen it happen to other women and some men. I don't have a seat on the board of a woman's organisation.
I'm not paid to take any responsibility for what's happening. The women who are furious at the Fawcett Society, and all the other groups that have either stood by or denounced us - we're angry because of what we've been through, because you didn't do your job.
Julie Bindel’s piece is also scathing. To see her actually use the word ‘traitors’…
“In failing to speak out about the Forstater case and its wider, positive implications for women at work, Fawcett failed to do the one job it is mandated to do. In a climate of unbridled misogyny, it let women down. As such, it ought to disband and let actual feminists take over.”
I try to remind myself, when I see influential women who should be protecting our rights actually siding instead with gender identity ideology, that the movement has been very clever in its stealth and appropriation.
I genuinely believe that for most people, their default is to be kind and not hurt others, and that's how so many liberal-minded folks got ensnared. They've been conditioned to think that questioning the mantras is violence, it's mean, trans people will DIE if you don't chant TWAW, etc. It really is like Stockholm syndrome, they're sympathising with their "captors".
The number of supposedly intelligent women who've been taken in by this guff can be disheartening. But the tide is slowly turning, big players are walking away from Stonewall, more women are speaking up, gathering courage from heroes like Maya, JK Rowling, Marion Millar, Graham of course 😁, Magdalen Berns, and so many others.
I think it's time for the M. Berns society or the Forstarter or the anyone who actually gives a fuck about women.