Category Archives: Current Assaults on Women

Violence: the Primary Tool of Male Domination!

Since the 1980s we’ve lived on forty acres of lesbian land. I’ve always wanted to post signs declaring it LESBIAN LAND to make clear our boundaries. The threat of male violence prevents me from taking this bold action. My desire is trivial in the larger picture. I mention it as one tiny example of the invisible barrier to action: our fear of male violence.

The threat of male violence surrounds women and girls as a daily reality. Today in the US, books are banned. Assault weapons are not! Mass shootings are regular occurrences we can anticipate as part of daily life. Male shooters are the norm. Male violence is the central tool of dominance.

In 1979 Andrea Dworkin wrote, “Women of supreme strength who have lived in creative opposition to the male cultural values of their day have been written out of history – silenced.”

Today, we are the “women of supreme strength who are living in creative opposition”! Many of the male dominated institutions of patriarchy have joined the march toward the “elimination of female Self-centering reality”, as Mary Daly warned in Gyn/Ecology, 1978. Currently, academia and medicine are leading the march in silencing anyone questioning the idea that men can be women if they so choose. Much of the media and many politicians agree with the new dogma that centers the demands of males. As Susan Unterberg said in 2018, “Men in power support men in power, and they want to see men in power.”

Why is this new, and strictly enforced, dogma useful to patriarchy and to men? Daly again helps us unravel the convoluted reality we are facing.

“Male propagation of the idea that men, too are feminine – particularly through feminine behavior by males – distracts attention from the fact that femininity is a man-made construct, having essentially nothing to do with femaleness.”

Male-defined femaleness is false and is only useful in the scheme of male domination of women and girls.

Who gets to define “woman”? Who gets to decide? We live in an era where “woman” is disputed territory! Respected British Professor Kathleen Stock, who is a lesbian, wrote, “Controversial and difficult ideas need to be tested in the public square, we need to think about them properly and we also need to enable discussion of ideas that seem attractive to people because if you try and shut it down there will be massive public resentment.”

Stock was forced to resign her faculty position in October of 2021 after a barrage of intimidation and threats, and having to live surrounded by body guards. The threats have continued.

However, in March of 2023, Kathleen Stock, Martina Navratilova and Julie Bindel started The Lesbian Project https://www.thelesbianproject.co.uk/ to “highlight and champion the experiences, insights and sensibilities of lesbians in their diversity”. Stock further explained “Lesbians will always exist but we’re in a crisis in which young lesbians don’t want to be associated with the word. Some of them want to describe themselves as queer and some of them prefer not to see themselves as women but as non-binary.”

“Allow women and girls to speak on sex, gender and gender identity without intimidation or fear” UN expert in a recent press release

Did you see headlines or hear news stories three weeks ago when the United Nations documented this reality? The press release (below) clearly describes the hostility, intimidation and violence directed at women and our allies for expressing our own political opinions and views. https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/05/allow-women-and-girls-speak-sex-gender-and-gender-identity-without

This valuable report, written in clear language, documents the realities of threats and violence we as gender critical feminists face! Early in the report law enforcement is named, as it at times fails to protect and safeguard our right to assembly and to speak. Read this valuable overview. Share it with friends and family. Our powerful voices must be heard. We understand that to replace biological sex with gender designations will only serve patriarchy.

GENEVA (22 May 2023) – Threats and intimidation against women expressing their opinions on sex and sexual orientation is deeply concerning, said Reem Alsalem, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls in a statement today.

“In the context of disagreements between some women’s rights activists and transgender activists in a number of countries in the Global North. Alsalem warned that violence against women and intimidation against people for expressing differing views.
Discrimination based on sex and sexual orientation is prohibited in international and regional human rights law.

I am concerned by the shrinking space in several countries in the Global North for women and feminist organisations and their allies to gather and/or express themselves peacefully in demanding respect for their needs based on their sex and/or sexual orientation.

Law enforcement has a crucial role in protecting lawful gatherings of women and ensuring women’s safety and rights to freedom of assembly and speech without intimidation, coercion, or being effectively silenced. It is clear that where law enforcement has failed to provide the necessary safeguards, we have witnessed incidents of verbal and physical abuse, harassment, and intimidation, with the purpose of sabotaging and derailing such events as well as silencing the women who wish to speak at them.

I am disturbed by the frequent tactic of smear campaigns against women, girls and their allies on the basis of their beliefs on non-discrimination based on sex and same-sex relations. Branding them as “Nazis,” “genocidaires” or “extremists” is a means of attack and intimidation with the purpose of deterring women from speaking and expressing their views. Such actions are deeply troubling, as they are intended to instill fear in themshame them into silence, and incite violence and hatred against them. Such acts severely affect the dignified participation of women and girls in society.

I am also concerned by the way in which provisions that criminalise hate speech based on a number of grounds, including gender expression or gender identity, have been interpreted in some countries. Women and girls have a right to discuss any subject free of intimidation and threats of violence. This includes issues that are important to them, particularly if they relate to parts of their innate identity, and on which discrimination is prohibited. Holding and expressing views about the scope of rights in society based on sex and gender identity should not be delegitimised, trivialised, or dismissed.

According to international human rights law, any restriction on freedom of expression should be carried out strictly in accordance with the human rights standards of legality, necessity, proportionality and to serve a legitimate aim. Those disagreeing with the views of women and girls expressing concerns related to gender identity and sex also have a right to express their opinion. However, in doing so they must not threaten the safety and integrity of those they are protesting against and disagreeing with.Sweeping restrictions on the ability of women and men to raise concerns regarding the scope of rights based on gender identity and sex are in violation of the fundamentals of freedom of thought and freedom of belief and expression and amounts to unjustified or blanket censorship.

Of particular concern are the various forms of reprisals against women, including censorship, legal harassment, employment loss, loss of income, removal from social media platforms, speaking engagements, and the refusal to publish research conclusions and articles. In some cases, women politicians are sanctioned by their political parties, including through the threat of dismissal or actual dismissal.”

Reem Alsalem is the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences.

I’m closing with the strong language offered by Andrea Dworkin,

“The public censure of women as if we are rabid because we speak without apology about the world in which we live is a strategy of threat that usually works. Men often react to women’s words – speaking and writing – as if they were acts of violence; sometimes men react to women’s words with violence. So we lower our voices. Women whisper. Women apologize. Women shut up. Women trivialize what we know. Women shrink. Women pull back. Most women have experienced enough dominance from men – control, violence, insult, contempt – that no threat seems empty.” Intercourse (1987)

Let’s brainstorm about how we can share this vital report from the UN–perhaps have a Speakout where we read sections and then have women “testifying”. Just one thought! We can’t let this report get buried. Send it to your local newspaper. We have some power here! And powerful voices!

Sources and further readings:
About the UN report:
The Special Rapporteurs, Independent Experts and Working Groups are part of what is known as the Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council. Special Procedures, the largest body of independent experts in the UN Human Rights system, is the general name of the Council’s independent fact-finding and monitoring mechanisms that address either specific country situations or thematic issues in all parts of the world. Special Procedures’ experts work on a voluntary basis; they are not UN staff and do not receive a salary for their work. They are independent from any government or organization and serve in their individual capacity.

More from “Kathleen Stock: Gender-critical academic ‘determined’ to do talk”

Prof Stock rejects the claim her views could be classed as hate speech.
She said: “It’s not hate speech to say that males cannot be women.

“You can believe what you like, and I’m not stopping anybody believing any different, but it’s certainly not hate speech to say that and that’s basically the most controversial thing, I think.”
Prof Stock believes controversial views should be tested in public.
“It’s important younger generations are exposed to ideas they haven’t come across before. Sometimes that will be very challenging to them,” she said.
“Controversial and difficult ideas need to be tested in the public square, we need to think about them properly and we also need to enable discussion of ideas that seem attractive to people because if you try and shut it down there will be massive public resentment.”

https://www.bbc.com/news/education-65714821

The march of mechanical masculinist progress is toward the elimination of female Self-centering reality.“ – Mary Daly, Gyn/Ecology:

Women of supreme strength who have lived in creative opposition to the male cultural values of their day have been written out of history – silenced.“ Andrea Dworkin,
“For Men, Freedom of Speech; For Women, Silence Please” (1979)

The public censure of women as if we are rabid because we speak without apology about the world in which we live is a strategy of threat that usually works. Men often react to women’s words – speaking and writing – as if they were acts of violence; sometimes men react to women’s words with violence. So we lower our voices. Women whisper. Women apologize. Women shut up. Women trivialize what we know. Women shrink. Women pull back. Most women have experienced enough dominance from men – control, violence, insult, contempt – that no threat seems empty.” Andrea Dworkin, Intercourse (1987)

“All human life on the planet is born of woman. The one unifying, incontovertible experience shared by all women and men is that months-long period we spent unfolding inside a woman’s body.
….most of us know both love and disappointment, power and tenderness, in the person of a woman.
We carry the imprint of this experience for life, even into our dying.” (all from pg 11)
Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution by Adrienne Rich, 1976

Green Party National Women’s Caucus Bans Feminists from Discussion

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Two women were banned from the NWC Listserv for attempting to discuss women’s sex-based rights

By Kerri Bruss

Feminists in the United States are increasingly finding themselves politically homeless. Of the two major political parties, one has made clear its intent to enshrine “gender identity” into federal civil rights law via the so-called Equality Act which as written, would completely negate the existing sex-based rights of women, while the other stands in opposition to the Act, though for what many consider to be the wrong reasons.

This dichotomy has led some left-leaning women to seek refuge in alternative parties such as the Green Party (GPUS) which, in addition to its commitments to grassroots democracy, social justice, ecology, and peace, also includes “feminism” among its 10 Key Values.

Jerri and Thistle protest at DNC

Yet for those of us who assert that a woman is an adult human female, and hold that women are oppressed based on their sex and reproductive capacity (as opposed to whatever sex-based stereotypes they do or do not adhere to) the GPUS has not been particularly welcoming. I would go so far as to say that we Greens with gender critical views, and even those who take no position in this debate but call for dialogue not expulsion as a preferred means of resolving political disputes, have been met with outright hostility in most GPUS spaces.

In mid-September of this year, I and Thistle Pettersen, feminists and Wisconsin Green Party members in good standing, joined the GPUS National Women’s Caucus (NWC) intending to generate support for the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights, a document which reaffirms commitment to international standards on the rights of women and girls. On September 24, we each responded to a post contributed to the Work List of the NWC which advocated that the NWC host a workshop or panel discussion on what was termed “gender 101.” The workshop would in essence be further indoctrination into “gender identity” ideology, which is in direct contradiction to GPUS’ key value of feminism.

One caucus member diplomatically responded that perhaps a more open discussion that included all points of view on this topic might be more beneficial to the NWC and the Party as a whole. Thistle concurred and asked if caucus members were “familiar with the efforts of WoLF, FIST, and the WHRC USA to protect gender nonconformity while also protecting women’s sex-based rights.” I joined my sisters in their commentary and stated that, “I would very much like to see an open discussion ensue re: the sex-based rights of women and girls and how they are being negatively impacted in the current political climate.”

“I would very much like to see an open discussion ensue re: the sex-based rights of women and girls and how they are being negatively impacted in the current political climate.”

Considering we were contributing to the listserv of the NWC, we assumed that the perspectives of all female caucus members would be valued. We assumed that the NWC’s alleged “respect for diversity” also included respect and tolerance for diverse opinions, particularly in a political party that claims feminism as one of its 10 Key Values, and most importantly in an identity caucus that exists to engage women on issues of personal and political import to them as an oppressed sex class.

We apparently assumed wrong. Co-chair of the Women’s Caucus, Ann Link, immediately asserted that the mere mention of any organization that advocates for the sex-based rights of women “goes against” the Green Party platform plank which states:

“The Green Party affirms the right of all persons to self-determination with regard to gender identity and sex.”

It appears that Link’s stance is that because this particular platform plank exists, and because the NWC has issued a statement “affirming” this principle, (despite the fact that conflicting platform planks also exist that clearly support the rights of women, as well as the fact that the platform is a living document that changes over time), no party or caucus member is allowed to express an alternative point of view without being met with harassment, disparagement, doxxing, threats of violence—or other foul, well- documented, maneuvers intended to silence dissent—and eventual banishment from Green Party spaces, including the National Women’s Caucus.

Our suspicions were confirmed on October 11, when we received notice that Thistle and I had been, “removed from the National Women’s Caucus email list for violating caucus bylaw III.2 – respect for diversity and respect for NWC members.” The email further stated:

“This is because of a series of posts you sent initiating discussion on the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights and similar content, which denies that people should have the right of self-determination with regard to gender identity and sex. This right is supported by our platform and a statement approved by our caucus. These posts have created a threatening environment in our caucus, which should be a safe and supportive place for all our members.”

To be clear, what did not make for a “safe and supportive place” was simply “initiating discussion” on women’s sex-based rights. This is despite the fact that recent poll results show that an overwhelming majority of registered third-party voters support measures that the Declaration calls for, such as protecting women’s single-sex sports, prisons, and shelters.

Women burned at stake for saying men can't play women's sports We were also told that unless we recant our alleged heresy and promise to sin no more, we will not be reinstated to the listserv and would be officially removed from caucus membership—metaphorically burned at the stake. How this provides a “safe and supportive place” for women, lesbians, and those who don’t conform to sex-based stereotypes within the Green Party is unclear.

On October 27, Thistle and I published this open letter in response to our expulsion from the Women’s Caucus Work List. We find the co-chair’s stated position with regard to this matter to be invalid and we request that our full participation in the Work List for the National Women’s Caucus and hence our full participation in the business of this caucus be reinstated without delay and without conditions.

We maintain that defending the sex-based rights of women is not hate and that biology is not bigotry. We further maintain that “respect for diversity” also includes respect and tolerance for diverse opinions, particularly in a party that claims feminism as one of its 10 Key Values, and most importantly in an identity caucus that exists to engage women on issues of personal and political import to them as an oppressed sex class.

We join hundreds of other public signatories calling for “Dialogue Not Expulsion” in response to the silencing of feminist voices within the Green Party of the United States. Their statement reads:

“We ask that all member state parties, caucuses, candidates, and locals of the party take a step back from any suggestion that state organizations or their members be decertified, sanctioned, or silenced for positions they have adopted, or for concerns which they may have expressed on these important issues. We value decentralization, grassroots democracy, and a united Green Party—which will be especially important in this difficult election year. The political principles that unite us remain far more important than the questions where we clash, significant as those questions might be.”

If you are a member, volunteer, contributor or supporter of the GPUS, you can sign the Dialogue Not Expulsion statement (or sign the statement and also join the caucus) to show your support for allowing dialogue on issues affecting women here.

Green Party National Women’s Caucus Bans Feminists from Discussion first appeared on 4W.
It is republished here with permission.

Thistle, Kerri and Freind at DNC

Push Progressives to Protect Women’s Sex-Based Rights: Sign the Petition

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By Jeanne F. Neath

In February 2020, the Georgia Green Party endorsed the very feminist “Declaration of Women’s Sex-Based Rights.” Immediately, the LGBTQIA+ caucus of the Green Party (Lavender Caucus) called for the expulsion of the Georgia Greens from the Green Party of the United States. A group of Greens are now calling for democratic discussion about the issues involved in this conflict. If you are interested in getting progressives in the Green Party talking about gender critical and radical feminist perspectives, you can sign the petition sponsored by Greens for Dialogue Not Expulsion. You do not need to be a member of the Green Party to sign.

What Did the Georgia Greens Do?

Georgia Green Party logo What is going on between the Georgia Greens and the Lavender Caucus? At their February meeting, the Georgia Greens modified their platform stating that policy makers should find nuanced approaches that can both protect trans-identified individuals and protect the sex-based rights of women. Among other changes, their Human Rights plank now concludes:

“The Georgia Green Party here endorses the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights, as developed and publicized by the Women’s Human Rights Campaign, and encourage our members, our national party, policy makers and the general public to do the same. We will regulate access to gender-affirming therapies to protect Georgia children from medical experimentation, prosecuting ethical violations involved with subjecting children incapable of fully informed consent to such life-changing and irreversible procedures. We will protect women and girls from unfair competition in sports by male bodied athletes. We will protect girls and women in the enjoyment of female-only facilities, programs, or services, particularly in places where women have a need to be in a state of undress, or where their privacy may be compromised or their safety may be at risk from male-pattern violence.”

Lavender Greens Go Over the Edge

Lavender Green Caucus As you might expect, the Lavender Greens were a bit ticked off! On February 28th in an “Open Letter to the National Committee of the Green Party of the United States” this LGBTQIA+ caucus argued that the Declaration on Women’s Sex-Based Rights would “force children to undergo permanent physical changes that exacerbate their dysphoria, inflicting trauma that could last the rest of their lives.” (Note that the “permanent physical changes the Lavender Greens are concerned about are those of going through a natural puberty!) The Lavender Greens go on to say they can’t “stand by while one of our state parties aligns itself with a hate group.” (And now note that the “hate group” they are speaking of is the Women’s Human Rights Campaign.) The Lavender Greens demand that the Georgia Greens:

Rescind its endorsement of the Declaration of Women’s Sex-Based Rights.
Apologize to transgender and gender nonconforming members of the Green Party and commit to “centering trans people who have the relevant experience and are directly affected by gender affirmation policy before issuing a statement.”
Commit to educating themselves and their membership about the necessity of gender affirmation to protect the lives of trans youth and trans adults. Any member of the Green Party of Georgia Coordinating Committee who does not undergo this training must resign.

The Lavender Caucus called on national Green Party to disaccredit and disavow the Georgia Green Party unless that party grovelled as requested and met all three demands.

Georgia Greens: No Way!

Dario Hunter criticizes Georgia Greens A letter on April 7th from the Georgia Greens to Dario Hunter provides a look at the unfolding conflict. Hunter is the delegate of the Lavender Caucus to the Green National Committee. He is also seeking the 2020 Green Party presidential nomination. Although Hunter published a video condemning the Georgia Greens, he still felt he could propose a “reconciliation retreat.” The Georgia Greens found Hunter’s terms unacceptable, replying:

“The private nature of the conversation you have framed, and its stated design to limit participation to a handful of participants seem better designed to browbeat and reeducate the single spokesperson of the Georgia Green Party your proposal invited to this reconciliation retreat; or at best to engage him in an ad hoc group therapy session to assuage the hurt feelings of Lavender Caucus leadership over our refusal to comply with an ideology we understand as destructive to the rights of women and children.”

The Georgia Greens described the hostility directed toward them by the Lavender Caucus, including “incessant namecalling,” sexist slurs, actual threats of violence, and efforts to silence and censor their voices on social media channels of the Green Party. They note that:

“Many folks, including those far beyond Georgia, have noted that the often heated exchanges in party channels on this subject seem to be driven by the hostility of people who demonstrate no familiarity with the document we endorsed, and which they dismiss as hateful, bigoted and transphobic.”

In their letter to Hunter, the Georgia Greens invite discussion of the Declaration of Women’s Sex-Based Rights, and especially a written critique from the Lavender Caucus.

“We welcome an opportunity to participate in dialogue on the issues raised by the Platform amendment which has been the subject of this recent controversy. But we would prefer to do so with people who have actually read the language we have adopted, and the document we have endorsed, not just the hyperbole and derogatory misinformation being spread about it.”

Georgia Greens call for engagement of the entire Green Party on the issues raised by this conflict:

“Georgia Greens feel many in our party might benefit from a Feminism 101 refresher course, a reminder that feminism, as bell hooks taught us, is ‘a movement to end the sexist oppression of women’. We believe it is important to remind ourselves that as feminists, we understand gender as a social construct and a tool for the patriarchal oppression of women; that we see gender not so much as a spectrum but more of a hierarchy which limits the lives of both women and men; that as feminists it is our job to abolish not celebrate gender…”

Greens for Dialogue Not Expulsion

Greens for Dialogue Not Expulsion: Sign Their Petition

A new caucus of the Green Party, Greens for Dialogue Not Expulsion, has formed to support the Georgia Greens and promote democratic discussion on issues such as sex, gender, gender identity and women’s sex-based rights among the Greens and their supporters. The Greens for Dialogue Not Expulsion Caucus has already issued an invitation to Dario Hunter and the Lavender Caucus to discuss these issues through a public forum and a well-moderated online discussion bulletin.

To support and promote these discussions you can sign their petition. You don’t have to be a member of the Green Party to sign. There is also an option to join the Greens for Dialog Not Expulsion caucus if you want to be more involved. Expect to work with a wide variety of people having a wide variety of opinions if you do join the caucus.

Having a large number of signatories on this petition is important to getting the Green Party to take these issues seriously. I see influencing progressives to understand gender critical and radical feminist thought regarding sex, gender, gender identity and women’s sex-based rights as a top priority and this is a chance to impact the conversation taking place in a national and progressive political party.

Trans Ideology: The Newest “Trojan Horse”!

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by Paula Mariedaughter
The Trojan Horse is one of history’s most famous tricks. The Greeks were laying siege to the city of Troy, and the war had dragged on for ten years. The Greeks built a wooden horse, which they left outside the city. The Trojans believed the horse was a peace offering and dragged it inside their city. Later the Greek soldiers, hidden in the horse, killed the guards and opened the city gates to their army. The war was won with this clever trick.

Browsing at my library, I found this book, Misogyny: The New Activism by Gail Ukockis (Oxford University Press 2019). Both curious and wary I brought it home. I was wise to be wary. Much of her anaysis of sexism is quite valuable. But, reader, beware! Read her words and note her strong bias, evident when she willingly refers to gender-critical feminists as TERFS!

“Trans issues were weird to me as a child, and it took me years to develop enough knowledge and sensitivity to become a trans advocate. Hopefully, my story proves that positive change is possible. Gloria Steinem also went through a similar change of heart regarding trans women. In 1977, she had publicly attacked Renee Richards as a ‘frightening instance of what feminism could lead to’ and “living proof that feminism isn’t necessary”. She asked, ‘If the shoe doesn’t fit, must we change the foot?’ She even praised the book Transsexual Empire: The Making of the She-Male in 1983. Today, though she is a strong advocate of trans rights. Some of my readers may be trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFS) who believe that trans women are not “real” women. However, I posit that it is a human rights issue for people to claim their own gender (or nongender) identity.” p.224

This is followed by three pages of glossary of “Terms and Issues” all from the trans-inclusive perspective! We know the trans ideology is ubiquitous! Young lesbians report having been involved in the queer/trans community and have put aside their own doubts and questions in the name of “inclusiveness.” Young lesbians are not encouraged to read earlier feminist writings and to then decide for themselves. (Note: Radical Feminism: A Documentary Reader, edited by Barbara A. Crow, would be a valuable place to start because it is comprised of pivotal documents written by U.S. radical feminists in the 1960s and 1970s.)

This author describes herself as an educator and a social worker. She has taught a course on Women’s Issues for over a decade and authored a textbook, Women’s Issues for a New Generation: A Social Work Perspective. Young people are continually exposed to the misogyny of instructors and texts that pretend that biological females are irrelevant in any definition of woman. She is educating with a strong anti-radical feminist bias! She dares to write a book about misogyny that will please the patriarchial institutions which published it and who will then use it to instruct young people. Let’s remember that her livelihood in academia depends on her endorsement of the trans ideology.

I see the acceptance of the trans ideology as a modern “Trojan horse”! One source explains that a “Trojan horse” is anything that looks innocent but, once accepted, has power to harm or destroy. In a similar vein, the Trojan horse effect is described as any disastrous result of an anticipated gain; or, the masking of a dangerous agent within an innocent garb.

The “innocent garb” here is the pretense of inclusiveness. Women and Lesbians who value women’s spaces and organizations and festivals are denigrated, threatened and dismissed. Our thoughts and feelings are not considered worthy of “inclusion”. Perhaps with enough “knowledge and sensitivity” (as the book author said earlier about her conversion), the woman-hating of the trans ideology will become clear and that awareness will create the next generation of trans critical feminists.

Sign the Open Letter to PantheaCon in Solidarity with Max Dashu

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From Max Dashu:

Join us in signing this statement opposing no-platforming, defamation and intimidation, forged by a council that began meeting after I was banned from the Witches Confluence and PantheaCon conferences last year. These purges were in turn fueled by smears spread after the hounding of old lesbians at the SF Dyke March last June. You can read the whole statement at the link, and I hope you’ll sign and share it, helping form a new consensus that misogynist bullying, sexist insults and character assassination are unacceptable. Here’s the bottom line takeaway:

“It is urgent for us to dialogue with each other in good faith. We cannot afford not to, under the current direness the world is facing—the attacks on human rights, on the Earth, and all living beings. We need a coalition more than ever before. This cannot be accomplished by demonizing, name-calling, or by sowing fear and intimidation. We seek justice for everyone, across all the axes of oppression. To do so, we need to re-learn what the ancients knew: how to hold council on a foundation of mutual respect.”

See the full text and sign the petition.

Posted by Jeanne Neath

OMNI Center Claims To Be “Fair”? Apparently Lesbians and Women Don’t Count

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By Jeanne Neath

In 2017 the OMNI Center in Fayetteville Arkansas and the Goddess Festival de-platformed the XX Amazons, Paula, Susan and Jeanne, preventing us from giving our workshop on “The Disappearing L – Lesbians Rise Up”. This was the result of transactivists and their supporters protesting the workshop. (See “The Story of the Goddess Festival” for details of the de-platforming and our resistance.) A few days ago I received the OMNI Center’s weekly newsletter touting itself and its members on their fairness: “You and your neighbors are right here, working our tail ends off to make the world FAIR, FREE and HEALTHY.” OMNI always advertises itself as the “Center for Peace, Justice, and Ecology.”

I find OMNI’s continued absolute favoritism toward the transgender community difficult to stomach on an ordinary day, but this kind of self-congratulatory lie coming from a group that is so unfair and unjust made me angry enough to email the OMNI director and OMNI Board of Directors the following statement.

Jeanne Neath’s Letter to the OMNI director and Board

OMNI is not doing everything it can to make the world “fair, free and healthy” (as you pretend to be at the top of your recent newsletter) when OMNI will not even allow women-only groups to meet at OMNI and you host a so-called Goddess Festival that silences and excludes radical feminist voices. OMNI has taken sides in the conflict between transactivists vs lesbians and all the many women who want and need women only space. This is an incredibly unfair position.

I don’t think the OMNI board has a clue as to what a woman hating and lesbian hating position it has taken (or if they do understand, then I am even more appalled at OMNI’s behavior). I suggest that OMNI educate itself on the harm that transactivists and their supporters are creating or at least stop pretending to “work its tail off” to make the world fair. Women only space is an essential prerequisite for a women’s liberation movement to exist. OMNI is acting to prevent the liberation of women and at the same time pretending to be fair. Pretty appalling!

Lesbians attacked at 2018 San Francisco Dyke March.

For starters, I suggest you inform yourselves about the attacks by transactivists on lesbians at the 2018 San Francisco Dyke March. (See the accompanying image showing what happened to a lesbian’s sign at the SF Dyke March which said “You can’t silence us with violence. Resist Lesbian Erasure.”) I also suggest reading the blogs (including one about the SF Dyke March) and other materials on xxamazons.org, reading relevant materials on feministcurrent.com, and reading the book Female Erasure, edited by Ruth Barrett and now available at the Fayetteville Public Library. There is no excuse for OMNI Board members to be informed only by the transactivist political perspective!

I don’t particularly want to hear back from you about this correspondence until OMNI is prepared to start making things right in its policies and practices toward women. I would appreciate an invitation for women’s groups to once again be able to hold women-only events at OMNI (and women-only means no “transwomen”). I am still waiting for a real apology from OMNI regarding the events around the 2017 Goddess Festival.”

Jeanne Neath, Former OMNI Board Member

OMNI Director Responds

The director of the OMNI Center responded in a semi-private, personal email to me saying only that she was sorry I was badly hurt. This was not an official OMNI response. I have no idea if the OMNI Board of Directors will even read or discuss my communication to them or respond in any way.

However, members of a local group of women who are resisting transactivist domination and fighting for women only space jumped into the fray with their own comments to the OMNI director.

Darlene Clubb writes to the OMNI director

What kind of response is this? This is a dismissal in my opinion. Please do not lay this at Jeanne’s feet like she is some isolated, wounded individual. From where I stand, OMNI has totally been positioning itself in support of the trans view of reality and appears to have dropped all pretense of concern or interest in the issues raised by lifelong lesbians and radical feminists concerning serious violence against women and the destruction of women’s legal standing/rights that the trans ideology poses. Billionaires are funding the trans agenda. Billionaires from corporate, pharmaceutical dynasties are funding think tanks that are designing and coordinating this homophobic and misogynistic social engineering project that is having devastating effects on lesbians and women’s very basic concerns in general (such as the ownership of the legal term “woman”, issues concerning birth and midwifery, menstruation,etc.)

Paula Mariedaughter’s comments to the OMNI director

Your crass dismissal of Jeanne’s concerns is an indication of your own loyalties. The war on women includes the war on women only spaces! Omni is a collaborator in the efforts to silence women and our strong political differences with all of you so ready to redefine woman.

In Female Erasure, edited by Ruth Barrett, she wrote, “Political disagreement is an opportunity for discourse that is part of a free society, and should be encouraged. When any questions or concerns are written off as hate speech, bigotry or ‘transphobia’, discourse cannot take place.” This is the situation here in Fayetteville, Arkansas where your “fair-minded” organization refuses to sponsor any opportunity for discourse that differs from your political decision to support trans activist’s version of reality.

“As part of the conservative backlash, segments of the left have shifted away from political and structural analysis of oppression and injustice, towards an individualistic politics whose primary demand is for the recognition and validation of individual identities. Gender becomes an identity based on an internal set of feelings that must be believed and accepted without question, and that is unrelated to biological sex. They claim that one set of traits is inherently masculine and another set of traits is inherently feminine, and our identity is dependent on how we align with those traits. Gender identity is seen as innate, and being transgender is entirely a matter of self‑identification. They do not see gender in our patriarchal society as a hierarchical construct of a male supremacy.” This is a quote from Pelican Lee written on the XX Amazons website.

We will not be silenced by the exclusions and expulsions and the threats. Women and girls, our children and our grandchildren are depending on us women!

Linda Barnes writes to the OMNI director

The fact that we are even having to discuss who is a woman is really unbelievable to me. A man can never be a woman and vice versa. We know that is biologically impossible. The confusion seems to be with the word sex and gender. A person may change their appearance to look like a woman (in some cases) because society says a woman should look and dress a certain way and men should look and dress a certain way, but that is not sex, that is gender straitjacketing. We know from the beginning of time there was a man and a woman because otherwise there would not have been anyone else. So we know there are two sexes, but race has been a social construct, yet when Rachel Dolezal tried to present herself as a black person and was found out to be white, she was removed from her job and highly criticized for trying to cross a racial barrier. And, yes, blacks have been and still are an oppressed race, but women have been oppressed and held back and their long history of matriarchy almost erased from history. The black man got the vote before women did. And yet the left and the many trans sympathizers seem to have no problem with men saying they are women. Yes, let them go into women’s bathrooms and changing areas, even though most of them still have penises. They are now trying to develop uteri to implant into male bodies so they can have children. The midwifery is eliminating mother from their vocabulary and using birthing parent instead. Have you read “Female Erasure”?

The Disappearing L Here is a quote from Jenn Smith, a male to trans person, “It is my contention that young people today are being brainwashed and turned into Orwellian servants of the state for a much larger agenda. It has been suggested by others that the assault on sexual distinctions and on the perception of basic biological reality is part of a game to give absolute power to the state in the interpretation of reality itself. If the state can force people to admit that men are women, they can force them to believe anything. War is peace. Slavery is freedom. Men are women. All of these are equally contradictory.” I truly believe there is much more to this trans movement than we know and it is really scary. Have you questioned how this has come about so fast and tracked down where the money is coming from? Many lesbians and gays feel that the T should be removed from LGBT because they are just out for themselves and care nothing about gays or lesbians, except to try to force lesbians to have sex with the male to trans so they can feel more validated.

I think you and Omni are going to be on the wrong side of history when this mess gets straightened out. When people try to change the very definition of half of the world’s inhabitants then they are trying to distort reality itself. If the trans people had really wanted to be non-controversial they should have called themselves what Ruth Barrett suggested, “gender non-conforming men, a no less sacred expression of humanity.

Jeanne Neath Sends a Second Communication to OMNI

After reflecting on the OMNI director’s condescending response and the obvious ignorance of the OMNI Board about gender critical thought, I decided to send a second communication in an attempt to educate the OMNI leaders about just how deadly the transgender ideology they are supporting is.

Jeanne’s second communication to the OMNI Director and OMNI Board:
Everyone – women, lesbians, “transgender” people, OMNI, you and me – is being seriously harmed by the misunderstandings about sex and gender that transactivists are proclaiming as a truth that no one is allowed to question. OMNI is not doing itself, or anyone else, including “transgender” people, a kindness by unthinkingly subscribing to an inaccurate view of reality AND silencing the women who have legitimate criticisms of the transactivist position on sex and gender. What does it mean for OMNI and you, its director, an organization and woman concerned about justice, about “fairness”, to take sides in a conflict between oppressed groups and act to silence lesbians, radical feminists and me, a former OMNI board member with over forty years of experience as a feminist activist investigating the problem of sex and gender in patriarchal society? Every day you and OMNI continue on this misogynist path you are on and then congratulate yourselves on how “fair” and just you are, you stray further and further from your mission of “justice.”

“Gender,” the sex-typed behaviors and characteristics society trains males and females to perform, is constructed by society. The behaviors considered masculine and feminine change over time within a society. Do you think that girls were showered with pink clothes and toys one or two hundred years ago in this society? Gender is set up differently in different societies around the world too. The transgender movement is built around the notion that people have an innate, biological “gender identity,” but this is impossible because what is masculine and feminine is set up by each society. Do you think that our foremothers living in gathering and hunting societies over the millenia prior to the development of agriculture wore pink? But, more important, do you think OMNI should be silencing women who want to talk about gender and the ways that patriarchal societies use gender to maintain male power over women?

People who identify as “transgender” are being terribly hurt by their own movement and ideology. Feminists have fought for decades to eliminate the constrictions of gender for everyone. Since gender has been created by society, society has the power to do away with gender and free girls and boys, men and women from being forced into harmful sex roles. But, transgender ideology insists that gender (and “gender identity”) is not changeable and that, instead of changing (eliminating) the social institution of gender, the people who are unhappy with the gender prescribed for their biological sex must become transgender. This would not be problematic – many lesbians, for example, identify as butch and act in so-called masculine ways – but the transgender movement advocates changing one’s body to correspond to (socially constructed) gender (as well as confusing sex and gender and appropriating – stealing – the identity of being a woman). Because trans ideology is supported by progressive organizations like OMNI, by powerful national non-profit organizations like the Human Rights Campaign, and by obscenely wealthy individuals, many of whom are tied to the pharmaceutical industry, being transgender has become “cool” and more and more children and young people are identifying as transgender, especially girls and young women. Many of these children and young people are taking hormone blockers and hormones and having irreversible surgeries to remove breasts, testicles and to reshape genitals. Children are being sterilized and given off label drugs with unknown long-term effects. When OMNI supports the transgender movement and silences lesbians, silences radical feminists, silences me, OMNI supports all of these dangerous, often irreversible medical treatments and the sterilization of children, children who probably would outgrow their desire to become “transgender” (a likelihood demonstrated by the scientific evidence).

______, you were seriously off-track in your comment about being sorry I am (supposedly) hurting so badly. Stop trying to dismiss my concerns! OMNI took a serious wrong turn when it bowed to pressures by transactivists and their supporters to de-platform Susan, Paula and me at the 2017 Goddess Festival for our workshop on the “Disappearing L – Lesbians Rise Up”. Your attempt to have a “dialogue” group to bring transgender people and gender critical women into discussion was deeply biased from the start when you selected two trans supporters who were completely ignorant of gender critical thought as moderators. I am asking the OMNI director and OMNI board members to educate yourselves about gender critical/radical feminist perspectives and to make reparations to the women and lesbians you have silenced. Making space at OMNI for women to hold publicized women-only events (that exclude “transwomen”) is a necessary part of these reparations. I, personally, would like a real apology from OMNI once your organization has educated itself enough to understand the great harm you have done to women, to lesbians, to the people who identify as transgender, and to everyone else who is being harmed day in and day out by the pressures to conform to “gender” prescriptions

Conclusion

I am proud of all the women in northwest Arkansas and at XX Amazons who are resisting the silencing of women, transgender ideology, and transactivist attacks. We stand together fighting these patriarchal forces attempting to control women.

Domination by Trans Rights Activists at Dyke March in San Fransciso

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By Jeanne Neath

Twelve old lesbians marching in the June 23, 2018 San Francisco Dyke March were verbally harassed and two of them physically assaulted by transgender rights supporters. Instead of supporting the lesbians being harassed, both the Dyke March and the National Center for Lesbian Rights are falsely claiming that the old lesbians were the ones acting in a threatening and violent manner. As I understand it, the dyke marches across the country have been largely taken over by persons who are not lesbians. How has this happened?

Bats carried by transactivist group at marches

Bats carried at marches by the Degenderettes, an international transactivist group active in San Francisco. Local chapters of the Degenderettes are forming.

In her XX Amazons’ blog last week, Paula Mariedaughter described how “Lesbians [are] Not Welcome at a Women’s Center started by Lesbian Feminists.” That unnamed women’s center in Fayetteville, Arkansas is under the spell of lesbian trans supporters who have abandoned lesbian feminist politics in favor of the transgender politics of so-called “inclusion.”

So far, the board of directors there is all female and may be all lesbian. Some board members support women only space, but are unable to allow women only events due to the power of the trans supporting faction (and the fear of attack on the center by transactivists and their liberal, progressive, and “feminist” supporters). It looks to me like the Fayetteville center is in the early stages of losing its female and lesbian identity and sliding into trans domination. If they are successful in becoming increasingly “inclusive” it may just be a matter of time until lesbians who value women only space are purposefully excluded from the board and a male to transgender person is invited to join the board. Read Paula’s blog for more details of the situation there.

I believe this process of liberal lesbian trans supporters gaining increasing sway over a lesbian organization, adopting a policy and politics of “inclusion”, welcoming transgender persons into the organization, and, finally, welcoming male to transgender persons who claim to be lesbians onto the board of directors has become commonplace. Once this process has been completed, what was once a lesbian organization begins to put the interests of transactivists front and center. If the lesbian organization is considered a valuable enough target, powerful forces from outside the organization may become involved, perhaps training transactivists to infiltrate the organization’s board, providing advice on strategy, or supplying funding.** Some are calling this kind of trans takeover a “transjacking”. Whoops, there goes another piece of our once thriving lesbian culture!

Male to transgender persons are not only appropriating our identity as women, but are stealing our organizations.

Male to transgender persons are not only appropriating our identity as women, but are stealing our organizations. Many women and lesbians are doing our best to stop these thefts. Awareness of what is transpiring is a key part of our resistance.

We offer below links to several personal accounts by lesbians of what happened to them at the San Francisco Dyke March, the Women’s Liberation Front’s (WOLF’s) open letter to the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and a link to a Change.org petition from one of the women whose sign was torn up by the trans rights activists at the San Francisco Dyke March (see photo below).

WOLF’s open letter to the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) demands that the organization retract its slanderous and false allegations against the 12 lesbians who were harassed at the 2018 San Francisco Dyke March. In a classic reversal, “demonstrating a stunning degree of anti-lesbian bias”, NCLR falsely claimed that the lesbian marchers had “chanted transphobic slogans and violently harassed and threatened other marchers.”

See Max Dashu’s account of what happened at the San Francisco Dyke March. Max Dashu writes: “All of the old lesbians in our group were quickly surrounded, subjected to chants of “TERFs go home!” and blasted with hatefulness for the entire course of the march. Young queers berated, hounded, and crowded in on us. Most of them refused to speak with us, only glaring, chanting, and screaming.”

In “Young Women Attack Dykes their Grandma’s Age” Lavenderjoan writes: “It was a nightmare scenario. Imagine the Lavender Menace meets Lord of the Flies. Twenty-something participants in the Dyke March swooped down on our small contingent of old lesbians like crazed predators thirsty for blood…”

Here is Sherri Golden’s petition calling for The San Francisco Dyke March, the National Center for Lesbian Rights and the Bay Area Reporter to retract their “defamatory and libelous statements” claiming that the lesbian victims of threatening and violent behaviors by trans rights activists were instead the attackers. See Sherri Golden and what happened to the sign she carried saying “You can’t silence us with violence – Resist lesbian erasure” in the photo below.

Lesbians attacked at 2018 San Francisco Dyke March.

By Jeanne Neath

** Interview with Mary Lou Singleton, Women’s Liberation Radio News Edition 16 transcript

** Sue Donym, Inauthentic Selves: The modern LGBTQ+ Movement Is Run By Philanthropic Astroturf And Based On Junk Science

Response to the Exclusion of Max Dashu from the Modern Witches Confluence

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By Chelsea Byrd

Hello,
Thank you for making the effort to create this amazing event. I understand that you have been unexpectedly caught off guard by the political state currently transpiring in the LGBTQ and feminist communities. I am writing to you as a member of the witch/pagan community, a feminist, and a member of the LGBTQ community. I have been an active participant in each of these communities for about 25 years, since I was 15 years old. I came out as a witch slightly before I came out as bisexual, which was before I came out as a lesbian. I have always thought of myself as a feminist, but what I know, think, and feel about feminism is constantly changing and evolving.

Please consider that you have jumped to conclusions by blackballing Max Dashu. The argument against feminists is not as clear-cut as it may seem when you are only listening to one sensationalistic side of the story.

There are actually a lot of reasons why various people consider themselves to be radical feminists, or allies. And there is solid reasoning why this feels threatening to some trans activists. The primary issue of safety in this community is that the law requires a black and white categorization of the definition of male and female. Currently, at a legal level, sex has been completely conflated and replaced with gender. This is a win for trans activists who want trans women to get to go to women’s prisons, and play women sports, etc. However, the other side of the story is that this means that there are no longer any external indicators of who or what a woman is.

Currently, legally, anyone is a woman who says that they are. The result of this is that males are competing in women’s sports against females, and male rapists and murderers are occupying female prisons. From the standpoint of feminism this is a threat to women’s rights and safety. It is true that radical feminists want males to be excluded from women’s sports and women’s prisons. This is a complicated topic that still has years worth of work in progress needed.

XX Amazons’ Who Is a Woman Brochure is available for download.

The perspective of feminists is that it is unsafe for men to be the ones who say what a woman is. Currently, legally, if a man gets convicted of a crime and doesn’t want to go to men’s prison, he can just say that he is a woman and he will get to go to women’s prison. There are documented examples of men being kind of bad at sports, not having the skills to compete at a men’s level, so joining women’s teams, claiming to be trans women. There are many documented cases of males in women’s prisons, and trans women committing acts of violence against women.

In an attempt to keep trans women safe, the term TERF has been codified, in order to target and attack any woman perceived as a threat to the legal replacement of the category “sex” (male/female) with the category “gender” (self-identified man/woman.) The results of this have been real world physical violence, where lesbians and feminists have been punched, pushed down, and beaten up. Lesbians and feminists have also been fired from their jobs, not for doing anything wrong, but for having the opinion that sex is still a category of oppression in America. And lesbians and feminists have been denied venues for performances and academic presentations.

The most common exclusionary act that supposed terfs commit is being lesbian. Lesbianism is considered an exclusionary sexuality. It is frequently said that having a sexual preference is thinly veiled transphobia, and sexual preferences actually do not exist.

When you removed Max from your conference, you cited that you had not done your research or realized that she is a “terf”. TERF is an acronym for “trans exclusionary radical feminist.” The most common exclusionary act that supposed terfs commit is being lesbian. Lesbianism is considered an exclusionary sexuality. It is frequently said that having a sexual preference is thinly veiled transphobia, and sexual preferences actually do not exist.

lesbian symbol

It is unfounded slander to consider somebody to be violent or hateful without any evidence to support that allegation. Lesbians and radical feminists are not performing acts of violence against trans women. Max has never done anything to harm or exclude any trans person from anything. Trans activists are commonly saying that it is the equivalent of actual violence to have the “exclusionary” sexual preference of lesbianism, or to hold the political ideology of radical feminism. Without intending to or realizing it, you have upheld this targeted attack against lesbian radical feminists. This is not ok. You’re being used as a tool to yield darkness and damage, against an extremely marginalized, extremely small community.

In very short order people are going to realize that terf is a misogynistic slur, it is the equivalent of the new McCarthyism.

I understand that you run an incredible risk if you choose to stand on Max’s side, because there are more and louder trans activists speaking up at this point in history. However, in very short order people are going to realize that terf is a misogynistic slur, it is the equivalent of the new McCarthyism. Any woman can be called a terf at any time for any reason, and if a woman is outed as a radical feminist she can lose her job, housing, and live with constant threats of actual physical violence.

Please do your research, and tread carefully as you move forward. I know you are a small organization, but please do not set the precedent of harming women by denying them a livelihood for being feminist lesbians. Please take this opportunity to support women’s basic human rights, rather than pandering to bullies who are threatening, committing, ignoring, denying, and excusing violence against women.

Thank you very much for your time,
Chelsea

By Chelsea Byrd

Lesbians Not Welcome at a Women’s Center started by Lesbian Feminists!

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by Paula Mariedaughter
Lesbians Not Welcome at a Women’s Center started by Lesbian Feminists! How could this be? This local women’s center in Fayetteville, AR began three decades ago. It was funded, in part by a lesbian organization, the Lesbian Natural Resources.

Here is an excerpt from the Fayetteville public radio program describing the organization in an interview on June 3, 2015. The “intentional retirement village for elder lesbians and women in rural Madison County, conceptualized thirty years ago, is finally being established–but as a senior women’s community center in Fayetteville.”

Two years later, The Gayly newspaper on October 1, 2017 in an interview with the manager of that community center declared that the organization “has come to be an inclusive retreat for people of varying genders/orientations”.

However, lesbians and feminists who wish to have women only meetings or events are rejected based on our desire to experience women only groups. For over a year, many of us have tried to work with the board of directors. We are denied meeting space because we do not wish to include male to trans persons as women. We are considered noninclusive and our position is considered unacceptable. Therefore the board of directors continues to deny us women only meetings. The lesbians and women who support the claims of men to be women refuse to see our stance as a legitimate political disagreement.

In Female Erasure, edited by Ruth Barrett, she wrote, “Political disagreement is an opportunity for discourse that is part of a free society, and should be encouraged. When any questions or concerns are written off as hate speech, bigotry or ‘transphobia’, discourse cannot take place.” This is the situation we are facing as members of that un-named organization here in Fayetteville, Arkansas!

Early last February, several member women who want space for women only events spoke about our strong desire to use this facility to meet with like-minded women. We attended the organization’s annual meeting, but we entered a hostile environment that night.

Proud to be women identified and women centered!

This is my statement to the board and the members at the annual meeting:

Discrimination as Boundaries
I am a lesbian. I came out in 1973. Choosing to be with women is the best decision I have ever made. Being a lesbian means I discriminate against men every day of my life. I do not wish my life to be dominated by the needs and desires of men.

For forty-five years I’ve lived as a dyke. I am a gender non-conforming woman! I am proud to call myself a Radical Lesbian Feminist. At times, I have been considered too “femme” by some of my dyke friends. At the same time, I have been considered too “butch” by the straight world. My desire is to live as my authentic self. I want this for everyone. Socially enforced “femininity” and “masculinity” are straight-jackets meant to restrict all of us.

I cannot accept the view that there are people born in the wrong body. The biological fact of being born female or being born male is based in physical reality. Discomfort with the roles assigned to each sex is a healthy rebellion to sex role stereotypes, otherwise known as “gender.” The world view of people pushing transgendering as a solution to the oppression of sex roles is a dangerous concept — especially for young people.

I understand that others have embraced another world view. I do not condemn those people. I am an advocate for peaceful coexistence. Women like me, who want to meet in women only space, must be respected. We will resist every effort to allow men to claim womanhood for themselves. Male domination is central to patriarchy. Men claiming to be women is stealing our birthright.

I want women like me to have equal access to the use of the space since we are members. I want young women to experience the reality of women supporting each other in women-only space. I welcome male allies to all open events. We all need for this women’s center to thrive as a unique community resource.

I have a right to set my boundaries. Yes, I am willing to discriminate against men. As I said earlier, I do not wish my life to be dominated by the needs and desires of men, especially the men who call themselves women.

I left that meeting depressed and numb. I walked alone, in the dark, to find our car parked a block away. I could not tolerate another moment in that threatening space.

In trying to comprehend how exactly this disregard of women’s and lesbians’ strong desire to meet together has become illegitimate, I found understanding in these words from Pelican Lee: “In response to the conservative backlash, segments of the left [including women, my addition] have shifted away from political and structural analysis of oppression and injustice, towards an individualistic politics whose primary demand is for recognition and validation of individual identities.” Full article: https://xxamazons.org/emperors-clothes-radical-feminist-view-gender-transgender/

Women and girls are victimized daily by men and by the male dominated institutions of patriarchy. By refusing to acknowledge this reality, many on the left and many liberal lesbians deny the oppression of women and name women and lesbians as oppressors when we refuse to accept the notion that men can be women if they so choose.

In reading and thinking and feeling about all these events and my own experiences, I’ve often encountered a disdain or dismissal of those of us who have lived as lesbians for decades and powered the lesbian feminist rebellion of the 1960s, 70s ad 80s. How did this happen?

Jocelyn Macdonald helped me see into today’s queer culture in her article, “Today’s Shameless Lesbians Won’t Be Queered”. Macdonald provided me with vital information about myself as one of those lesbians who will not even consider being “queered”!

She explained in that Feminist Current article that, “In queer circles, ‘lesbian’ is synonymous with second wave feminism. In a way, this is right on, as it was during the second wave that women fearlessly occupied what it meant to be woman-loving and many of radical feminism’s fiercest sisters are members of the “lavender menace.’ Queer women owe their rights to the radical resistance and separatism of their lesbian foremothers, but are embarrassed by lesbian culture and history.” Read the full article on Feminist Current here: https://www.feministcurrent.com/2017/01/13/todays-shameless-lesbians-wont-queered/

I’m going to close with a favorite photo sure to embarrass those young and middle-aged queer women who have turned their backs on lesbians like me who choose women, not men, as the center of our lives. To be embarrassed by us and to dismiss our radical feminist analysis of the oppression of women is directly related to their attitudes of ageism, misogyny, lesbian-hating and especially to their worship of pop culture! We are led to believe that, as old dykes with our unfashionable dress and generally uncool image, our determined loyalty to women and girls is outmoded. However, we are the dykes who can boldly testify to the rich connections we have built with other women in our woman-loving lives. Queer women have no idea what they are missing. Come join us! We need all the lesbian energy we can get!

Paula (on left) and Martha carrying our Lesbians Unite sign at the Anita Bryant protest in downtown Kansas City MO, 1977.

Attempt to Shut Down Feminist Current

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By Meghan Murphy

Hey everyone. A few weeks ago, I received the following email from the company that facilitates the ads featured on Feminist Current, SheKnowsMedia:

“Dear Ms. Murphy:

After careful review, pursuant to the SheKnows Publishing Network Agreement, attached for your reference, we are terminating your account effective immediately due to Feminist Current’s failure to comply with the Agreement’s quality guidelines regarding content that attacks a group on the basis of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity. Specifically, this articles https://www.feministcurrent.com/…/must-trans-activists-sme…/ and https://www.feministcurrent.com/…/trans-activism-become-ce…/ as well as others of similar tone are in violation.

Please remove all ad code from your site as soon as possible…

CHRISTY ROSENSTEEL
GENERAL COUNSEL
SheKnows Media”

We chose to have ads hosted by SheKnowsMedia (previously BlogHer) because these companies claim to aim to support and empower women AND because I was able to limit ad categories that showed up on Feminist Current, meaning that I was able to exclude ads for things like dieting, makeup, the oil industry, the meat industry, religious ads, “dating” ads, and a myriad of other categories of ads I didn’t want showing up on a feminist site. This, of course, limited the income we were able to access via ad revenue, but still allowed us a base revenue that could ensure we were guaranteed a certain level of sustainability, from month to month. We have had ads hosted on the site via BlogHer/SheKnows since 2012.

Feminist Current is Canada’s leading feminist website.
They provide a unique perspective on male violence against women, pop culture, politics, current events, sexuality, gender, and many other issues that are often underrepresented or misrepresented by mainstream, progressive, and feminist media sources.

Recently, I have had several issues with the ads popping up on Feminist Current, some of which were unsuitable (anti-ageing ads and makeup ads, for example), others which were outright racist and sexist. When I contacted SheKnows about this, which I did numerous times, the problem was not addressed and the company claimed not to be able to do anything about these ads, despite the fact they were showing up via *their* ad network. As a result, I had been planning to get rid of ads on the site entirely, but needed to make sure we were able to sustain ourselves after that loss, so had tried to do some fundraising over the past month, in order to make up for the loss. (Thank you to everyone who donated!)

Before I was able to do this, I received the above email, which referenced two posts, one of which challenges violent, misogynist threats against women and lesbians, the other that challenges the unethical and dishonest tactics trans activists use to shut down critical questions about the transitioning of children and around transgender ideology that reinforces sexist ideas about males and females more broadly.

Neither post “attacks a group on the basis of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity.” Rather, one post directly opposes attacks and violent threats against a group of people based on sex and sexual orientation (women and lesbians), and the other defends journalism/journalistic ethics and good faith debate, and opposes censorship and attacks against journalism that challenges popular discourse and the status quo. Both posts, of course, support a feminist analysis that says gender is not innate, neither men nor women are stereotypes, and that women are oppressed under patriarchy on account of being born female, not on account of their feelings, clothing, or behaviour.

It is incredibly important, particularly now, that journalists are able to report on issues and trends independently and with integrity, no matter how it may upset certain groups. It is also incredibly important that women be allowed to defend their sex-based rights without being beat up, smeared, and threatened. These are fundamental ideas that *should* be supported by those who support democracy and human rights, as well as by those who oppose hate speech and fascism.

I responded to Christy Rosensteel at SheKnows Media, saying I was confused by her email, as the two posts in reference did not attack any group of people, and asked if she could please specify which aspects of the posts constituted an attack on “a group on the basis of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity.” I told her that our mandate at Feminist Current is to advocate the liberation of women from patriarchy and male violence, and that I felt both posts fit this aim. I added:

“I find your claim to be quite a serious accusation, especially considering Feminist Current’s longstanding and dedicated work to opposing male violence against women and supporting the global feminist movement. If SheKnows is opposed to feminist analysis, that would be good to know, as I’d assumed your organization did not support male violence against women or sexism, in general.”

I received no response.

The good news is, we will no longer have to deal with a company that allows sexist, racist ads to pop up on the site, which I have no control over, and who refuses to be accountable for said ads, and will no longer be beholden to anti-feminist companies who revoke revenue because we publish articles opposing misogyny, male violence against women, and the shutting down of feminist debate/discourse. The bad news is that, more and more frequently, women who speak out against gender identity ideology, ask questions about the short and long term effects of transitioning children, and try to host discussions and debates about the impacts of gender identity legislation on women and girls are being systemically persecuted, slandered, silenced, threatened, fired, and rendered unemployable.

It is unacceptable to try to shut down feminist media, simply because feminist ideas offend the sensibilities of some. And this is exactly what has happened. It is clear that someone who opposes the work we do at Feminist Current, who has connections or power at SheKnows, complained, and demanded they cut ties with the site. Our content has not changed substantially in the past few weeks. We have been opposing violence against women and asking critical questions about transgender ideology for years now. We are under constant attack, as a result. This was a direct attack against us by one individual who wished to attempt to shut down the site, by rendering us unable to pay our bills and support ourselves.

Luckily, we have an enormously supportive readership around the world, are independent, and are part of a powerful, global women’s liberation movement that has more integrity and courage in its pinky finger than these self-interested, cowardly, dishonest, greedy, misogynist neoliberals.

Fuck SheKnowsMedia. Fuck these capitalist pigs, who care more about their income than their integrity. Fuck this disgusting cooptation of feminism that bends over for men while throwing women under the bus. If they think this bullying will shut down Feminist Current and the hundreds of thousands of people who support our work and contribute to the site, they underestimate the power, courage, and steadfastness of women.

Lesbians attacked at 2018 San Francisco Dyke March.

In the past year we have seen attacks on our sisters amped up, as warrior women like Max Dashu, Nina Paley, Thistle Pettersen, Kajsa Ekis Ekman, Yuly Chan, and countless more are being smeared and no-platformed because they dare stand in solidarity with women. Women are being beaten up in the streets because they wish to *speak* about gender identity legislation and an ideology that says there is no such thing as a woman or a female body. Women are being threatened at the Dyke March and at Pride because they stand up for lesbians. Women are receiving death threats for supporting women-only spaces.

These women are not wealthy, they are not powerful, they are not “privileged.” They are regular women and lesbians fighting to survive and to have a voice and to protect our and YOUR hard-fought-for rights.

We stand in solidarity with women and in defense of free speech and democracy. We oppose the misogynist, capitalist bullying that dictates the editorial content of the vast majority of publications in North America, including those publications that claim to be “feminist.” At Feminist Current, we have always been accountable only to the feminist movement, and that will never change, no matter how many try to shut us down. Solidarity with our sisters in the struggle. Until we win.

By Meghan Murphy

Republished with permission from Meghan Murphy. See her original post. Visit her Facebook page. Don’t miss Feminist Current!