Their kaupapa is not “inclusive” enough
Another lesbian group kicked out of another Pride:
It’s Pride Month in Wellington and as a part of that Out Wellington Inc. hosts a fair called Out in the Park.
We had our place at the fair confirmed in early February so we’ve been planning on attending for some time. We were excited to go along and show that it’s okay to be a lesbian and proud, but instead we’ve been banned because our kaupapa is not “inclusive” enough.
Kaupapa is Maori for statement of principles. Not inclusive enough how? Let’s see if we can figure it out.
We agree with these core principles laid out by the Women’s Liberation Front:
Maybe that’s it? Maybe “female humans” is considered insufficiently inclusive? But if so…then…then women have to be banned from everything, right? It will be just men and trans women from now on, because only they are inclusive enough?
But maybe it’s not that. Maybe it’s this:
We want an end to all laws and institutions which perpetuate men’s aggression towards and dominance over women.
We encourage non-compliance with sex-role stereotypes. Heteronormativity is built on and maintained through sex-role stereotypes. Nobody should be harassed, threatened or abused for not complying to sex-role stereotypes.
Maybe that’s it? Maybe it’s considered not-inclusive of trans people to encourage non-compliance with sex-role stereotypes? But if so…then…then we can’t encourage non-compliance with sex-role stereotypes any more, which means we can’t have feminism any more.
Or maybe it’s this:
The LRAA is opposed to pornography and the sex industry because it is violence against women and girls. Members of the LRAA do not participate in anyones sexual exploitation.
Not inclusive of pimps and johns? Is that where we are now?
Back to the post:
Festival directors Drew Hadwen and Karen Harris emailed us seemingly out of the blue rescinding our stall and invoice. They said that because they “welcome all people, groups and organisations who want to join with us to celebrate the amazing diversity and creativity in our LGBTIQ+ community” they can not have our lesbian feminist stall or “presence” at Out Wellington Inc. organised events.
Problem. Hadwen and Harris explain that because they welcome all people, groups and organisations therefore they have to banish The Lesbian Rights Alliance Aotearoa. That’s a contradiction, for a start, but it’s also bizarre given the L in LGBTIQ+. The LGBTIQ+ Pride fair welcomes all people, groups and organisations except the L part of LGBTIQ+? Makes.no.sense.
Notes:
Our group was honest and transparent in our application. We applied with our names, as The Lesbian Rights Alliance Aotearoa and said we are “a new and growing lesbian group and we are starting to expand our events and social activities in Wellington.”
Our application was accepted and our attendance at the event was publicly announced on the Out in the Park Facebook page.
Our kaupapa has been publicly available online since 6 June 2018.
The Police, Corrections and Young Nats will all have stalls at the event.
Interesting. The cops are inclusive enough, the department of corrections is inclusive enough, the Young Nats are inclusive enough…
The New Zealand Young Nationals, more commonly called the Young Nats, is the youth wing of the New Zealand National Party, a centre-right political party in New Zealand, and a member of the International Young Democrat Union.
All those inclusive as fuck, but those pesky lesbian feminists…ewwwww no get them out.
So basically inclusive means everyone except women.
It’s probably this:
Plus, of course, wanting to abolish “ gender.” Apparently the proper position is wanting to establish the supremacy of gender while abolishing biological distinctions. But the thing I keep coming back to, mentally, is butch lesbian trans women — gender- nonconforming advocates for retaining gender distinctions. Or not? I don’t know.
But no doubt welcome at Out in the Park.
FFS. Young Nats in, but lesbians out. I suspect their ‘true crime’ is that their resources page includes support info for detransitioning and another in which they document anti-lesbian harassment/shaming by others in the (L?)GBT community. The anger and hatred coming from trans women (and their supporters) that someone doesn’t want to have sex with them is truly astounding and more than a little worrying. The sense of entitlement to women’s bodies, even if they are unwilling partners… uugh.
There is something horrifying about suggesting that someone should be willing to have sex with you no matter what. It’s reminiscent of the incels and the MRAs, the idea that rejection of them is somehow wrong. People choose to have sex or not have sex with people for many reasons, and the fact that someone is not interested in a penis during their sexual encounters is not a sign of bigotry but of preference.
It’s almost like suggesting lesbians have no right to select their own sexual partners. They might even reject you just because they don’t like you, or because they don’t find you sexually interesting. So what? I could theoretically be interested in having sex with someone who isn’t interested in me, and no one would say anything about it, because that’s how the world works.
Iknklast, stop thinking like a reasonable human being will you.
Oh, lesbians don’t have to have sex with people who have penises. They just need to accept being tarred as hateful, bigoted deviants if they don’t.
I had a boss say that to me once. Well, actually, what he said is that I kept thinking things should be rational. I did. We were running a scientific enterprise, it seemed little enough to ask. (but it was Oklahoma, so maybe rational means something else there).
Sastra #2
Straight autogynephilic men for establishing the legal and social primacy of “gender identity”.
Well color me shocked!
I thought the whole idea of a lesbian group was exclusionary, ie, it is only for Lesbians.
Men’s Sheds are for men.
Cricket clubs are for people who play or enjoy cricket, not for golfers.
Not everyone gets to sit behind the bigly bootiful desk in The Oval Office.
It is impossible to include everyone in everything. That doesn’t mean denying human rights to everyone, it just means that some people aren’t suited to be members of some groups.
Except men. Men get to decide what groups they want to be in. /sarc
Iknklast @ 7, I’ve been there too. I refuse to give up on the concept of evidence based reasonableness. Call me an idealist, although at this point a tired and jaded one.
Lady Mondegreen @8, Once, in a former life some 3 decades ago, I joked during a discussion amongst friends that I’d make a great lesbian (pause), well I like having sex with women. Laughter from my straight friends and a slightly pained silence from my lesbian friends. God I wish I’d never made that joke now and I’m thankful they saw fit to let it slide and continue the friendship. Although I’m not autogynephilic, the whole comment and attitude I had then just smacks of male entitlement, obliviousness and insensitivity to the needs, desires and experiences of others and the social and political considerations at play. On the bright side, people can change.
I have to say, I find the similarity between the particular breed of trans activist that makes comments of the type documented on the LRAA website and the MRA/INCEL types quite startling. both seem to feel contempt and anger towards women in general and lesbians especially. Both seem to feel a deep entitlement to have sex with any woman they choose, regardless of her wishes. What makes them different?
In fact, it might be fair to say it is impossible to include everyone in anything (except maybe the human race, which they are in by default. Unless they are otters. Or something).
Earthlings is pretty inclusive, but booking space at a venue, and scheduling meetings is really hard. Special diets for luncheon? Please. It doesn’t help that almost all of them are interested in eating any number of fellow members. Seating arrangements can be very tricky.
Mammalia is much more exclusive (and includes otters). Though there are language barriers, they are all tetrapods, so lots of common ground. Or water, for cetaceans and pinnepeds.
I think I noted here once before that I used to think Eddie Izzard’s description of himself as a “male lesbian” was ironically, nonesensically hilarious. Now, not so much.
I don’t know, we have someone in our town who claims to be a Bigfoot linquist, and has deciphered the Bigfoot language (hey, don’t hit me, I’m very embarrassed that my town wants to call itself the Bigfoot capital of the world – thank goodness there is one thing on which our mayor has exhibited some sense). If he can talk to Bigfoot, maybe we can talk to otters…and penguins(who are not included in Mammalia)…and bacteria…if we were only patient enough to listen.
In fact, we might find something on Gwyneth Paltrow’s site that would allow us to talk to any species we wanted…
Too bad there are people who actually believe the nonsense I just spewed.
Why do I have Rex Harrison singing in my head all of a sudden?
f we could talk to the animals, just imagine it
Chatting to a chimp in chimpanzee
Imagine talking to a tiger, chatting to a cheetah
What a neat achievement that would be.
If we could talk to the animals, learn their languages
Maybe take an animal degree.
We’d study elephant and eagle, buffalo and beagle,
Alligator, guinea pig, and flea.
We would converse in polar bear and python,
And we could curse in fluent kangaroo.
If people asked us, can you speak in rhinoceros,
We’d say, “Of courserous, can’t you?”
If we could talk to the animals, learn their languages
Think of all the things we could discuss
If we could walk with the animals, talk with the animals,
Grunt and squeak and squawk with the animals,
And they could squeak and squawk and speak and talk to us.
#0 OB and #2 Sastra, actually I think it is this:
You may have overlooked it because it is at the bottom of the page. You may also have overlooked it due to how true and obvious it is.
I think everything mentioned was sufficient to get them banned by the woke without anything else. Taken together, they probably amount to a double secret probation – excuse me, ban – from the playhouse for ever and ever, or at least as long as they have lesbian cooties (which are the same cooties women have, because they aren’t really lesbian cooties, they are woman cooties).
Re Gwyneth Paltrow’s site and Rex Harrison…
Perhaps Goop would claim their product let you talk with animals, and, in a surprising act of almost honesty, they’d call it Doolittle.
Sackbut, that’s only because ‘Dofuckall’ would be a tad obvious.