Gendercarthyism
Jenny Lindsay knows exactly when her “cancellation” began. It was June 2019 when the poet and performer tweeted her shock at the violent words of a columnist for an arts magazine, who had written: “Take out the Terf trash. Make them afraid. Get in their faces.”
How “extraordinary that such views are given an airing” in any publication, Lindsay wrote, adding “for clarity” that the columnist, a trans woman called Cathy Brennan, was advocating attacks on women, “Terf” being the acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist.
Lindsay’s response seemed reasonable, even understated, given that days later Brennan was under police investigation for lunging at Julie Bindel, the campaigner against violence against women, after an event in Edinburgh.
But the comrades were banding against Lindsay just the same.
Lindsay is the kind of woman Joanna Cherry referred to last week when the MP condemned the “new form of McCarthyism” around gender ideology, which some believe is poisoning the arts and education in Scotland.
In Cherry’s case, her in-conversation event at the Stand Comedy Club was cancelled because staff “expressed their concerns” about her views, which in Cherry’s simple description amount to “biological sex is an immutable fact”. If cancellation could happen to a public figure such as herself, she said, “just think how much more likely it is to happen to women who have less power”.
Imagine having concerns about the statement “biological sex is a fact.” Do they think it’s a fiction? Across the board? There is no biological sex?
Magi Gibson, another poet and performer, describes herself as a lifelong promoter of “dangerous women” who for decades has worked with some of the most marginalised people in society. Now she is tainted with “bigotry” and “transphobia”, and venues have been urged not to book her.
Gibson said: “I was doing an event at the Scottish Poetry Library and they were told my presence made the place ‘unsafe’. I was 67 at the time with severe osteoporosis and a broken spine. How ridiculous is that?”
Yes but women have those hidden powers you know.
As a rejoinder, much the same could be said about the TIRFs, by which acronym I mean the Trans-Inclusive Radical Ferrrrrrrrrkwits.
As a sometime poet it heartens me to see female poets standing up for other women. And one in particular (you know who you are Cathoel). Sadly, her wonderful compassionate piece seems to have been cancelled. The poet herself (like another extraordinary woman we all know) is, I firmly believe, uncancellable.
The title sort of made me think of Jenny McCarthy. I guess that fits – it’s woo all the way down.