Mick Hartley

Why is Extinction Rebellion stepping in to the gender debate? Paul Stott asks the question:

Following the activities of groups trying to ‘save the planet’ is not an easy task these days. Since the summer of 2018, we have been introduced to Extinction Rebellion (XR), Animal Rebellion, Ocean Rebellion, Money Rebellion, Roads Rebellion, Youth Rebellion (there’s a bit of a theme here), Insulate Britain and the newest kid on the block, Just Stop Oil. XR also has a network of local groups. Some of these amount to little more than a Facebook page, but others, particularly those in certain university cities, are much stronger.

Step forward Extinction Rebellion Bristol, which this week found its USP – shutting down meetings of women’s rights activists. Tuesday evening’s Woman’s Place UK event at Bristol University, entitled ‘A woman’s place is with women: feminism, birth and motherhood’, was met by a counter-demonstration of some 50 activists. How did this come about? Earlier that day, XR Bristol’s Facebook page carried a post declaring: ‘Climate justice = trans rights! Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists (TERFs) are not welcome in our city.’ It added: ‘Note that this is not an XR event.’ It had however been posted by the Facebook account of Extinction Rebellion Bristol, on its own Facebook page. In that post, protesters were advised to wear unidentifiable clothing and to cover their names and photographs on their students’ union cards, all in order to avoid ‘doxing’ by the ‘TERFs’…

Why would XR want to step into this minefield? 

One answer might be: because they're fired up with a misplaced revolutionary zeal, so convinced are they of their righteousness. But it's maybe not a smart move…

The group started out with three core demands: to ‘tell the truth’ about what its activists see as a ‘climate emergency’, to ‘act now’ to remedy the situation, and to create citizens’ assemblies to decide how their demands should be implemented. Political movements traditionally find success by appealing to the widest number of people in the broadest manner possible. A generation ago, the anti-Poll Tax campaign flourished precisely because it opposed a tax that was seen as unfair. It tended not to get bogged down in detailed discussions about how to finance local-authority spending. Anti-fascist groups like the Anti-Nazi League in the 1970s or Anti-Fascist Action in the 1980s and 1990s succeeded by physically disrupting the activities of fascist organisations, without necessarily developing a detailed programme to defeat such groups politically….

Popular protest develops momentum when campaigns are supported by people from a range of ideological and political backgrounds, who unite in a way they have not done before around a particular issue. In adopting other unpopular causes, XR is doing the precise opposite.

This week was hardly the end of XR. But it potentially marks the beginning of the end.

Judith Woods in the Telegraph describes how she braved the angry protestors in Bristol:

A young woman with aquamarine hair is striding around with a megaphone leading a call and response, as a policewoman watches from a distance on a Bristol street.

“Trans rights are human rights!”

The motley crowd of students answer as one: “Trans rights are human rights!”

“Protect trans students!” 

“Protect trans students!” they parrot.

Then she gets a little over-aerated: “Terfs can suck my boy d—.” 

Nobody says a word, they just shuffle uncomfortably.

Oh dear. Perhaps not a young woman at all…

Sensing she might be losing her crowd, Aquamarine then reels her angry acolytes back with a more familiar incantation: “Trans women are women!”

A woman in a Harris tweed coat passing by catches my eye, pauses and observes with perfect timing: “But they’re not, are they?”

We grin conspiratorially. She briskly turns right, along with a stream of other women, both young and old, and disappears into a side door of the university.

Welcome to the insane world of identity politics in Britain in 2022, where a police presence is required to monitor protesters shouting at those lawfully attending a public meeting entitled, “A Woman’s Place is With Woman: Feminism, Birth and Motherhood”….

It sounds laughable. But it’s not. It’s intentionally horrible and frightening. And regardless of how you feel about JK Rowling getting cancelled on Twitter for believing men can’t become women, this matters.

Whether or not you care that American stand-up comedian Dave Chappelle was physically attacked on stage this week for making fun of transgender people, it’s impossible not to feel under siege.

And even if you are sceptical of female academics across Britain being silenced for their mainstream view that men can’t have babies, once you actually witness the vitriol from these self-appointed gender guardians, you will be shocked.