Rules of Misogyny

There’s a much referenced list which circulates in women’s groups: created by Rose, a second-wave feminist known by the internet username ‘TheBewilderness’, it is called the Rules of Misogyny and details all the underhand techniques used to silence, attack or shame women. The rules run as follows:
1. Women are responsible for what men do.
2. Women saying no to men is a hate crime.
3. Women speaking for themselves are exclusionary and selfish.
4. Women’s opinions are violence against men, thus male violence against women is justified.
5. Women and Feminism must be useful to men or they are worthless.
6. Women who go around being female AT men by menstruating and breastfeeding babies deserve punishment.
7. Women should always be grateful to men for everything.
8. Men are whatever men say they are and women are whatever men say they are.
9. Men always know the “real reasons” for everything women do and say.
10. The worst thing about male violence is that it makes men look bad.
11. Whatever women suffer from, it is worse when it happens to men.
12. Women’s ability to recognize male behavior patterns is misandry.
13. Angry women are crazy. Angry men have trouble expressing themselves.
14. Women have all the rights they need: The right to remain silent.
15. Men are the default human. Women are strange subhuman others.
16. Everyone owns and controls women’s bodies except the women themselves.
Those familiar with the list who tuned in to watch the cross-examination of Sandie Peggie, the nurse at the centre of the Fife Tribunal, would have recognised all too many of them. Ms Peggie was suspended by NHS Fife after she expressed discomfort at being required to share the female changing room with a male doctor who goes by the name of Beth Upton. For much of the morning, however, it felt like Ms Peggie was on trial rather than being the complainant. Ms Peggie says she encountered Dr Upton three times in the hospital changing room; on the first two occasions she excused herself from the room when the doctor entered (one time hastily replacing her shirt), but on the third she was experiencing a heavy period and needed privacy. She alleges that Dr Upton began to undress in her presence, at which point, feeling intimidated and uncomfortable, she spoke to him. They were alone, it was midnight on Christmas Eve.
Jane Russell who led the questioning – more accurately, badgering – of Ms Peggie is a woman, but a woman who seems to have graduated from head mean girl to sententious CBeebies presenter by way of the witchfinder charm school. Lawyers, of course, have jobs to do, but that doesn’t mean they don’t sometimes overstep the mark. Ms Peggie, remarkably, stayed calm under pressure as Ms Russell dreamt up ever more convoluted ways to ask the same question in hopes of getting a different answer with, it seems, the ‘rules’ to hand as a guide rather than a deterrent.
First on the charge sheet was the egregious contravention of rules two and four. Ms Peggie had not only said ‘no’ to a man, but she had also voiced the ‘opinion’ – more accurately, the fact – that he was not a woman. If we believe Ms Russell, this appalling ‘offensive’ claim sent the medic into a tail-spin, apparently causing him to dissolve into tears the moment he was in the company of a witness. Ms Peggie’s scientific and medical view that a man is a man was framed as a ‘political or religious’ opinion which she was ‘imposing’ on Dr Beth. Conversely, however, when Dr Upton undressed in the female changing room, he was merely ‘standing there’ and not, in any way, imposing his male body or a wholly unevidenced belief that a metaphysical gendered soul over-rode all the safeguards and privacy arrangements based on sex.
Of course, Ms Peggie also fell foul of Rule 1. As part of a shabby attempt to discredit and smear her, Ms Russell dredged up some off-colour posts which Ms Peggie’s husband had made on his own Facebook page. Ms Russell may be more softly spoken than the late Senator Joseph McCarthy, but her determination to hold Sandie responsible for the views of those in her family circle would have made him very proud. To an extent, this backfired when it was revealed that Ms Peggie’s other half mused about whether a man who dated a transwoman ‘with a d*ck’ was gay – a not unreasonable supposition one might think. It was even more ridiculous to accuse Ms Peggie of homophobia as she pointed out that her own daughter is a lesbian. The uncomfortable idea intruded that Ms Russell was alleging that the working class nurse and her family were bound to be copper-bottom bigots (possibly in contrast to the connected, middle-class male doctor). Worse, Ms Russell’s line of argument, carried to the logical conclusion, would mean that the wife of any man with views ranging from unpleasant to a bit daft, should be ineligible to claim the sanctuary of female-only spaces and, presumably, be fair game for any passing predator. One wonders what other human rights the wives of such men should forfeit.
Dr Upton had made copious notes detailing the minutiae of his interactions with Ms Peggie even before the third interaction in the changing room. It would be fascinating to know if he had recorded every slight or side-eye from all members of the nursing team or if Ms Peggie was singled out for special treatment due to her earlier refusal to undress in front of him. Presumably, this falls under rule 9: he knew the real reason for her reluctance to enter the room was bigotry rather than concerns about privacy. These accounts, which served as the basis for his complaint of bullying, were treated by Ms Russell with the breathless reverence generally reserved for holy writ.
Beth was especially annoyed that Ms Peggie had referred to the case of ‘a prisoner’ which he and Ms Russell took to mean Isla Bryson aka Adam Bryson, the double rapist held for a time in the female estate. Entertainingly, Ms Russell, who had made a great fuss about the possibility that Dr Upton would be ‘dead named’ in proceedings, failed to extend the same courtesy to Graham/Bryson. Following the lead set by Scotland’s former First Minister, Ms Russell repeatedly pointed out that Bryson was a rapist and therefore nothing like the doctor, thus rather missing the point that both were men invading women-only space. Oddly, her insistence on reiterating the nature of Bryson’s offence (to the casual listener, she appeared to use the word ‘rapist’ about a dozen times or more) only served to reinforce the fact that there was at least one incarcerated transwoman in Scotland convicted of this crime. Which makes it all the more bewildering that she appeared to suggest that until and unless a man is convicted of rape, a woman cannot reasonably object to his presence and that a convicted rapist has nothing in common with other members of his sex.
In other installments from Dr Upton’s notes, we learnt that he was ‘empathetic’ and ‘understanding’ of Ms Peggie’s concerns. Not empathetic enough to leave the room when a woman told him she was intimidated, of course. Rather than redounding to his credit, as Ms Russell apparently believed, it merely served to underline that Dr Upton rated his need for validation above the rights and feelings of his colleague even as he acknowledged how reasonable her fears were. Ms Russell, for her part, could not understand why Ms Peggie should feel so strongly: she repeatedly returned to the question of harassment, asking Ms Peggie to confirm that Dr Upton had never touched her or made a sexual remark, as though a simple right to privacy, dignity, and safety were not concerns in law.
On Monday, Ms Peggie had to reveal the abuse she had suffered as a teen at the hands of a GP. On Tuesday, her distress at being placed in an intolerable position with Dr Upton was dismissed as unreasonable. Meanwhile, any suggestion that staff or patients in a hospital might have the right to know or comment on the sex of a doctor was treated as offensive and derogatory. Dr Upton’s upset was dwelt upon long and lovingly. Ms Peggie stood accused of commenting on Beth’s chromosomes and genes – something she denies. As she, rightly, said, she didn’t need to ask what they were. Indeed, even the non medics in the room would take any odds that there was a Y chromosome and an SRY gene present in a man’s makeup. But that’s the thing about the rules of misogyny: even observable science isn’t the be all. Men are what they say they are, even if – especially if – they say they are a woman.