Monday night saw the broadcast of an hour long BBC Four documentary on the extreme feminist group the London Feminist Network.
Being a BBC programme the best method they could come up with to tackle such a topic in a fair, balanced and neutral way was to ask Vanessa Engle to make the programme (and the whole series for that matter). Engle is of course a feminist herself, the Daily Telegraph notes she "was involved in the women’s movement while at Oxford studying languages in the 1980s; she protested outside porn shops, joined the Reclaim the Night march against male violence". These exact same protests are featured in the programme so she's effectively making a programme about herself. Presumably this will be followed by an investigation into the BNP presented by Nick Griffin and an IRA expose by Martin McGuiness? When the BBC cover Men's issues we invariably get exactly the opposite situation, with the like of Women's Aid supporter Fiona Bruce interrogating Father 4 Justice in an an incredibly hostile manner in breach of BBC rules.
Although the programme may have been conceived as 60 minutes of free prime time advertising for the London Feminist network, if you can stomach the misandry, constant pro feminist bias not to mention abysmal songs then you'll actually find it was quite enlightening in places.
The first signs of dissent from the militant feminist dogma in the programme came from a male, one of the girl's fathers. Whilst his wife rambles on, equating child pornography with lads mags and pretty much anything sexual, he's brave enough to put forward the entirely reasonable argument that there's actually nothing wrong with prostitution so long as both parties are happy and consenting to the transaction. Strangely, such an argument seems hugely radical, controversial and out of place at that point of the broadcast due to the extreme anti-male atmosphere of the organisation being discussed. I suppose it's a bit like going to church and pointing out the lack of evidence of the existence of God.
The programme was full of the usual nonsensical feminist cliches, with the group so keen to "end violence against women" and to "take back the night". Some went further, their only concern being the rather narrow subject of "men's violence against women". Given the rates of recorded domestic violence by lesbian females, never mind the countless male domestic violence victims out here, this is clearly not only sexist but extremely stupid too.
It was particularly ironic to feature a feminist group located in London complaining about violence against women as apparently such a huge issue so much more important than any other. If we look at the epidemic of teen violence in the city, there were 27 teens killed in 2008, with just one of those unfortunate people being female - 96.3% of victims were male. The previous year again again saw 27 victims, and there were a slightly more significant three female victims ton his occasion. However one should remember that feminists only count violence against women if it's perpetrated by a man, therefore under LFN logic a third of such victims are to be ignored do the the killers being of the wrong sex.
It's certainly true that our streets are rather dangerous places, but it's women who are the safest out on them, and men need to reclaim them far, far more than any other group. Yet there's further hypocrisy from LFN. Not only do they ignore all the evidence and pretend that it's only women need to reclaim the night, men are even barred from marching . They are neither allowed to reclaim the night from themselves nor are they even welcome in helping to achieve fundamentally flawed and sexist goal of reclaiming it just for women.
The ridiculousness of such a situation was beautifully illustrated in a bizarre discussion of how the LFN members could identify those awful men in order to prevent them from taking part. It was noted that they do indeed allow men who "identify as women", to participate, though only certain men are allowed to benefit from this loophole and the feminists had to use their judgement as to who qualified for such a privilege. The problem of actual women who looked like men also arose (unsurprising given the androgynous appearance of so many of the participants) with "caution" and "sensitivity" urged. In reality there is of course a very simple and elegant solution to all these complicated "problems", that being to simply stop being so incredibly sexist and discriminatory and let make everyone in society welcome instead! Surely you can't get any more sensitive than that?
Another telling exchange came in an interview with a older member of the group, who discussed her reasons for being an activist. She stated that she had been motivated to join the group as a result of the police' repines to a friend of her daughter being "gang raped". Watching the piece, alarm bells immediately start to ring as she stumbles through the facts rather uncertainly, eventually informing us the supposed "victim" actually received a caution for falsely alleging rape (albeit one she managed to later overturn using a lawyer). Obviously I don't know the facts of the case other than what this rather biased party tell us. However, given that the accused actually had video evidence of consent (not to mention the feminist's ramblings about a woman's supposed lack of choices when in such a situation), I'd say it sounds absolutely like a case of regretting sex after the event and thus a clear false rape allegation. The police are incredibly reluctant to charge someone with making a false rape claim and insist on massive amounts of proof in most cases. The main travesty that I can see here is that a mere caution is vastly insufficient punishment for such a serious crime. Those falsely alleging rape should either be let off if there isn't sufficient proof, or tried in a court of law and face a jail sentence where their guilt can be proven. A caution really isn't appropriate under any circumstances, and if the police were "vile" to anyone as she alleges, then it was surely to the victims of the false accusations. Further still, to use what appears to be a false rape case (and one with multiple victims at that) to be your sole reason for being an activist really is quite strange at best and certainly isn't going to make any useful contribution to ones "sanity" as she believes.
Such a lack of concern with the facts isn't unique to the older activists either. A younger feminist called Laurie, one of the "leading lights of the organisation", later discusses the despair she feels when reading items in the news, specifically citing the case of a man who branded his wife with an iron who only received a two month jail sentence for the offence. She then informs us that this could be "a made up story" and "even though she might have made it up it's probably true". Don't get me wrong - I'm sure that in a population of 60 million people such a story would almost certainly occur eventually, just as monkeys randomly hitting typewriter keys may eventually produce passages from Shakespeare. However it's rather bizarre to see someone so committed to such a cause have such a lack of concern for knowledge and the facts to such an extent they are reduced to fabricating imaginary abuses of women in order to make their point. I'm sure myself and other readers here could list at least 20 key MRA related injustices that have been in the news (or not in a few cases) which are important to the MRA movement. There wouldn't be any need for exaggeration let alone total fabrication of stories just because they might have happened somewhere or may well do so in the future. The exchange against shows us the unique culture of LFN, where facts really don't matter in the slightest - you just have to be a believer.
Anger and the hatred of men are recurring themes throughout the broadcast. Men are not only banned from the marches, not to mention the organisation itself, but the group even meets at a women only bar! In fact men were notably absent from vast swathes of the programme. Now I do realise that extreme gender feminist groups tend to feature vastly disproportionate numbers of lesbians compared to the population as a whole, but such a figure can't be more than 50%. Where were the male partners of the heterosexual feminists? It's clear that a display of such hatred and contempt for the opposite sex isn't the best technique to use in the search for a partner (unless perhaps one is seeking a self-loathing man). Presumably most of the woman were therefore single as a result of their activities, perhaps the feminist equivalent of a celibate catholic priest.
It wasn't just men who were invisible during the programme either. Almost all the feminists seem rather privileged, educated, middles class and white. I don't necessarily have any major issue with this usually, but remember we're talking about an organisation who subscribe absolutely to the exact sort of nonsense we hear coming out of the EHRC on a daily basis. Further still, given that London is about the most ethnically diverse city on the planet it seems incredible that not a single ethnic minority was to be seen anywhere in the organisation, particularly given that so many feminists issues have a vastly greater impact on such people (with many absolutely exclusive to immigrant communities). Presumably such ethnic minorities are fully aware of the stupidity and tremendous harm caused by excluding members based on their appearance and inherent characteristics and thus find a group practising such discrimination to be wholly unattractive as a result?
The most intersecting segment of the programme involved a discussion with two rather more level headed young feminists who had attended the LFN conference. They concluded the group wasn't for them as they didn't share the same extreme views on banning pornography and outlawing prostitution. One might of thought that such differences shouldn't really matter so much as they're still feminists, right? Well that's not the case at all - you see, as these two women point out, if you want to join the LFN you have to agree with everything they say hook, line and sinker, it's all or nothing as far as they're concerned. It's not just those horrible men that aren't welcome at LFN, other equally contemptible enemies include actual concepts such as debate, opinion, and dissent.
Being a BBC programme the best method they could come up with to tackle such a topic in a fair, balanced and neutral way was to ask Vanessa Engle to make the programme (and the whole series for that matter). Engle is of course a feminist herself, the Daily Telegraph notes she "was involved in the women’s movement while at Oxford studying languages in the 1980s; she protested outside porn shops, joined the Reclaim the Night march against male violence". These exact same protests are featured in the programme so she's effectively making a programme about herself. Presumably this will be followed by an investigation into the BNP presented by Nick Griffin and an IRA expose by Martin McGuiness? When the BBC cover Men's issues we invariably get exactly the opposite situation, with the like of Women's Aid supporter Fiona Bruce interrogating Father 4 Justice in an an incredibly hostile manner in breach of BBC rules.
Although the programme may have been conceived as 60 minutes of free prime time advertising for the London Feminist network, if you can stomach the misandry, constant pro feminist bias not to mention abysmal songs then you'll actually find it was quite enlightening in places.
The first signs of dissent from the militant feminist dogma in the programme came from a male, one of the girl's fathers. Whilst his wife rambles on, equating child pornography with lads mags and pretty much anything sexual, he's brave enough to put forward the entirely reasonable argument that there's actually nothing wrong with prostitution so long as both parties are happy and consenting to the transaction. Strangely, such an argument seems hugely radical, controversial and out of place at that point of the broadcast due to the extreme anti-male atmosphere of the organisation being discussed. I suppose it's a bit like going to church and pointing out the lack of evidence of the existence of God.
The programme was full of the usual nonsensical feminist cliches, with the group so keen to "end violence against women" and to "take back the night". Some went further, their only concern being the rather narrow subject of "men's violence against women". Given the rates of recorded domestic violence by lesbian females, never mind the countless male domestic violence victims out here, this is clearly not only sexist but extremely stupid too.
It was particularly ironic to feature a feminist group located in London complaining about violence against women as apparently such a huge issue so much more important than any other. If we look at the epidemic of teen violence in the city, there were 27 teens killed in 2008, with just one of those unfortunate people being female - 96.3% of victims were male. The previous year again again saw 27 victims, and there were a slightly more significant three female victims ton his occasion. However one should remember that feminists only count violence against women if it's perpetrated by a man, therefore under LFN logic a third of such victims are to be ignored do the the killers being of the wrong sex.
It's certainly true that our streets are rather dangerous places, but it's women who are the safest out on them, and men need to reclaim them far, far more than any other group. Yet there's further hypocrisy from LFN. Not only do they ignore all the evidence and pretend that it's only women need to reclaim the night, men are even barred from marching . They are neither allowed to reclaim the night from themselves nor are they even welcome in helping to achieve fundamentally flawed and sexist goal of reclaiming it just for women.
The ridiculousness of such a situation was beautifully illustrated in a bizarre discussion of how the LFN members could identify those awful men in order to prevent them from taking part. It was noted that they do indeed allow men who "identify as women", to participate, though only certain men are allowed to benefit from this loophole and the feminists had to use their judgement as to who qualified for such a privilege. The problem of actual women who looked like men also arose (unsurprising given the androgynous appearance of so many of the participants) with "caution" and "sensitivity" urged. In reality there is of course a very simple and elegant solution to all these complicated "problems", that being to simply stop being so incredibly sexist and discriminatory and let make everyone in society welcome instead! Surely you can't get any more sensitive than that?
Another telling exchange came in an interview with a older member of the group, who discussed her reasons for being an activist. She stated that she had been motivated to join the group as a result of the police' repines to a friend of her daughter being "gang raped". Watching the piece, alarm bells immediately start to ring as she stumbles through the facts rather uncertainly, eventually informing us the supposed "victim" actually received a caution for falsely alleging rape (albeit one she managed to later overturn using a lawyer). Obviously I don't know the facts of the case other than what this rather biased party tell us. However, given that the accused actually had video evidence of consent (not to mention the feminist's ramblings about a woman's supposed lack of choices when in such a situation), I'd say it sounds absolutely like a case of regretting sex after the event and thus a clear false rape allegation. The police are incredibly reluctant to charge someone with making a false rape claim and insist on massive amounts of proof in most cases. The main travesty that I can see here is that a mere caution is vastly insufficient punishment for such a serious crime. Those falsely alleging rape should either be let off if there isn't sufficient proof, or tried in a court of law and face a jail sentence where their guilt can be proven. A caution really isn't appropriate under any circumstances, and if the police were "vile" to anyone as she alleges, then it was surely to the victims of the false accusations. Further still, to use what appears to be a false rape case (and one with multiple victims at that) to be your sole reason for being an activist really is quite strange at best and certainly isn't going to make any useful contribution to ones "sanity" as she believes.
Such a lack of concern with the facts isn't unique to the older activists either. A younger feminist called Laurie, one of the "leading lights of the organisation", later discusses the despair she feels when reading items in the news, specifically citing the case of a man who branded his wife with an iron who only received a two month jail sentence for the offence. She then informs us that this could be "a made up story" and "even though she might have made it up it's probably true". Don't get me wrong - I'm sure that in a population of 60 million people such a story would almost certainly occur eventually, just as monkeys randomly hitting typewriter keys may eventually produce passages from Shakespeare. However it's rather bizarre to see someone so committed to such a cause have such a lack of concern for knowledge and the facts to such an extent they are reduced to fabricating imaginary abuses of women in order to make their point. I'm sure myself and other readers here could list at least 20 key MRA related injustices that have been in the news (or not in a few cases) which are important to the MRA movement. There wouldn't be any need for exaggeration let alone total fabrication of stories just because they might have happened somewhere or may well do so in the future. The exchange against shows us the unique culture of LFN, where facts really don't matter in the slightest - you just have to be a believer.
Anger and the hatred of men are recurring themes throughout the broadcast. Men are not only banned from the marches, not to mention the organisation itself, but the group even meets at a women only bar! In fact men were notably absent from vast swathes of the programme. Now I do realise that extreme gender feminist groups tend to feature vastly disproportionate numbers of lesbians compared to the population as a whole, but such a figure can't be more than 50%. Where were the male partners of the heterosexual feminists? It's clear that a display of such hatred and contempt for the opposite sex isn't the best technique to use in the search for a partner (unless perhaps one is seeking a self-loathing man). Presumably most of the woman were therefore single as a result of their activities, perhaps the feminist equivalent of a celibate catholic priest.
It wasn't just men who were invisible during the programme either. Almost all the feminists seem rather privileged, educated, middles class and white. I don't necessarily have any major issue with this usually, but remember we're talking about an organisation who subscribe absolutely to the exact sort of nonsense we hear coming out of the EHRC on a daily basis. Further still, given that London is about the most ethnically diverse city on the planet it seems incredible that not a single ethnic minority was to be seen anywhere in the organisation, particularly given that so many feminists issues have a vastly greater impact on such people (with many absolutely exclusive to immigrant communities). Presumably such ethnic minorities are fully aware of the stupidity and tremendous harm caused by excluding members based on their appearance and inherent characteristics and thus find a group practising such discrimination to be wholly unattractive as a result?
The most intersecting segment of the programme involved a discussion with two rather more level headed young feminists who had attended the LFN conference. They concluded the group wasn't for them as they didn't share the same extreme views on banning pornography and outlawing prostitution. One might of thought that such differences shouldn't really matter so much as they're still feminists, right? Well that's not the case at all - you see, as these two women point out, if you want to join the LFN you have to agree with everything they say hook, line and sinker, it's all or nothing as far as they're concerned. It's not just those horrible men that aren't welcome at LFN, other equally contemptible enemies include actual concepts such as debate, opinion, and dissent.
In conclusion, the programme shows exactly how not to conduct oneself as an activist. It revealed feminism at it's very worst, not as a movement concerned with equality, humanity or compassion, but instead showed us feminism the religion. The London Feminist Network were just as angry, bigoted, emotional, devoid of logic and reason as almost any religious institution or cult. We had women as the chosen ones, with men and sex as the devil. Unbelievers we not welcome whatsoever, with debate limited to how best to exclude men. Just as with so many religions they were keen to interfere with and control the lives of women happily going about their lives, whether it be fashion models happily raking in a fortunes for magazine shoots, or the many women happily reliving gullible men of handfuls of money at strip clubs. Fortunately the only real difference here compared to other religions was the size of the congregation, which I'm pleased to say was tiny in this case. Lets just hope it stays that way for many more years to come for the sake of both men and women and society as a whole.
By John Kimble
Just adding a more up to date iPlayer link for when the other one expires:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00rm4j3/Women_Activists/
Posted by: John Kimble | Friday, 26 March 2010 at 01:09
According to their website...
"We currently have more than 1000 members."
Population of London - 7,556,900
Why is the Beeb even bothering with women who are this unrepresentative of the whole? There are probably more than 1000 MRAs in London, will they get the same treatment? Doubt it.
Posted by: Porky Domesticus | Friday, 26 March 2010 at 02:32
Don't be too hard on the BBC. They have conceived this as free advertising for LFN but it backfired and was a useful programme in some ways.
Posted by: John Kimble | Friday, 26 March 2010 at 03:28
Hi John
Good write-up
I watched the programme last night and hadn't realised the programme had been made by someone with close ties to the group.
My actual impression was that the beeb had done an excellent job of exposing the student politic angry teen irrationality of the organisation.
By simply letting them talk, it became quite clear that members were mostly driven by a sense of irrational fear and mild mental health problems.
It is not surprising that as a result they group together with like-minded individuals at the exclusion of others. Most of them, young and old, will grow out of it in a few years, and more will come along to take their place.
The BNP and other separatist organisations often display the same sort of behaviours. In fact it is often claimed that these sort of organisations thrive on feeding the fear to increase anger and membership
Posted by: John Smith | Friday, 26 March 2010 at 12:00
Hello from Ukraine !
This the VERY interesting topic !
Now, as for me, the Ukrainian woman, I say you that I am unclear exactly as to a feminists mind and motive.
For the woman that seeks the equal wages, the equal behaviour towards her, the absence of sexual gesture such as rear slap etc, this the normal struggle all women should strive for I believe.
But, I have friends who have left Ukraine and live with their men, 1 in USA, 1 in Uk, also 1 in Poland and 1 in Austria. These girls have said me much about what occurs in these nations, including about feminist movements, and, it seems to us that such movements do not seek to further equality for women but, to bash the man, denounce him as a lesser being. To chastise his every compliment towards woman, to force him into a submissive role in this life. This is not for me, nor my girls, we are Ukrainian women, with the traditional view of relations between man and woman, proud to be, we enjoy wear the female clothing, we like when man looks, compliments, admires from distance and, when we choose, admires close up. We simply wish not to be handled when against our will, and earn the equal wages when engaging in employment of equal tasks.
So, now I wait the attack from these women from their computers, they surely would not try enter Ukraine to denounce me, their overt feminism would betray them at our border, and our guards would say them “GET OUT” :-)
Sincerely,
Marina.
Rivne – Ukraine.
Posted by: Marina Demchuck | Saturday, 27 March 2010 at 15:37
"not to mention the feminist's ramblings about a woman's supposed lack of choices when in such a situation" ... do you not think it at all possible/likely that someone's freedom of choice might be affected by the balance of power in a situation like that? Whether it's a man and three stronger men, or a woman and three stronger women, or any combination of genders, surely you can see that the potential for intimidation is certainly there?
I don't at all agree with the 'women-only' policies of any of the feminist groups depicted, or the 'all or nothing' approach of the LFN's attitude towards membership; as a feminist myself I've had trouble finding associations or groups to align myself with because of policies like that. I'm glad you recognise in your article that these attitudes aren't common to all feminists or feminisms. The transphobia of the group was also disappointing: for a group that claims to be against rigid gender roles, to reject as participants people who it could be argued are physically acting out that very philosophy by embodying the flexibility of gender and sexual identities is simply bizarre. They seem to have a rigid agenda of biological essentialism!
Posted by: Claire | Sunday, 28 March 2010 at 21:42
There's all sorts of situations where men or women might feel or be manipulated - it's a common occurrence in many relationships. unfortunately.
At the end of the day she can still quite easily say no and in many ways she's got the most power as she's been able to allege rape here. The only reasons three men aren't in prison right now is because they videod the encounter.
Whatever you views on the situation there's no doubt it is a hugely ambiguous case at best, and to use it as your sole purpose for activism is ridiculous. It's all too easy to let friendships and loyalties cloud one's judgement so perhaps it's a useful lesson.
TBH I didn't see that much evidence of transphobia from the group in the programme, though I'm very much aware that it almost inevitably goes hand in hand with those holding the same viewpoints.
Anyway thanks for posting - we don't get many feminists posting comments here and it's nice to see we're starting to reach a wider audience.
Posted by: John Kimble | Monday, 29 March 2010 at 17:23
I remember some controversy when the LFN organised Reclaim the Night. Didn't their stewards have some women removed by the police because they belonged to feminist groups with the wrong ideology?
There seems to be a bit of conflict between middle class (e.g. the LFN) and (more inclusive from what I've seen) working class feminist groups. I drifted off during this documentary, but I don't think there was a mention of that.
As for their transphobia, the LFN did support Julie Bindel for the Stonewall Journalist of the Year award. I'm pretty sure they even organised a 'Julie Bindel Fanclub' counter-demonstration when transexuals protested against her.
For those of you lucky enough not to encounter any of Bindel's bile, she's responsible for transphobic and misandrist Guardian articles like 'Gender Benders Beware' and 'Why I Hate Men'.
Posted by: Kendall | Tuesday, 30 March 2010 at 21:43
I watched the documentary with a wry smile; these women seemed to search for news stories that only reinforced their own entrenched beliefs. I had exactly the same thought about "reclaim the night" surely young men between 18 and 25 as a demographic are more likely to suffer violence on the streets than any other??? However, your article fails in the same way that Laurie failed: "I could have made it up, but it probably happened." You say you saw no ethnic minorities; though she didn't speak, I noticed a Muslim woman prominent in several scenes and there were clearly working class women at the organisation for "reclaim the night". Plus your vague criticism of the rape allegation that you preface by saying you don't know the full story is the exact flipside to the vague argument the woman in the program was making. If you were being satirical at this point, kudos, if not, it's just poor essay writing and plays into the hands of mysandrists like those portrayed in the documentary. Also, there's at least one typo in the essay, do you write for the Guardian by any chance?
Posted by: L | Tuesday, 30 March 2010 at 23:02
Hi L.
Having one Muslim woman doesn't really reflect the communities of London as a whole so my article and logic is not at all similar to Laurie's. Also the article is about LFN, not Reclaim the Night. These two groups are not the same thing - LFN is merely one of many organsiaitons participating in Reclaim the Night. This is the whole point - reclaim the night is diverse (though not in terms on gender), whereas LFN is not.
I wasn't being satirical in discussing the false rape case - the point is that if everything was so ambiguous then it really shouldn't be one's sole purpose for becoming an activist. I don't know the full details, but even the biased source noted that all the evidence showed it to be a false allegation.
I don't happen to write for the Guardian, but I've actually discovered an article on their website on the issue. They make the middle class issue the main basis for the entire piece so I'm afraid you're very much in a minority there. Here's the article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/mar/24/middle-class-feminism-politics
(And yes my typing isn't too great right now so you're correct on that one as well as your views on violence against young men).
Posted by: John Kimble | Wednesday, 31 March 2010 at 18:55
it a Godless organisation .
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