Peak trans in New York

[RickRoll]

New law in New York, peak trans I think....

www.nyc.gov/html/cchr/downloads/pdf/publications/GenderID_InterpretiveGuide_2015.pdf

"It is unlawful to refuse to sell, rent, or lease housing to someone because of their actual or perceived gender, including actual or perceived status as a transgender person. It is unlawful to withhold from any person full and equal enjoyment of housing accommodation because of their gender."

"The NYCHRL requires employers and covered entities to use an individual’s preferred name, pronoun and title (e.g., Ms./Mrs.) regardless of the individual’s sex assigned at birth, anatomy, gender, medical history, appearance, or the sex indicated on the individual’s identification.
Most individuals and many transgender people use female or male pronouns and titles. Some transgender and gender non-conforming people prefer to use pronouns other than he/him/his or she/her/hers, such as they/them/theirs or ze/hir.
Many transgender and gender non-conforming people choose to use a different name than the one they were given at birth.
All people, including employees, tenants, customers, and participants in programs, have the right to use their preferred name regardless of whether they have identification in that name or have obtained a court-ordered name change"

"The NYCHRL requires that individuals be permitted to use single-sex facilities, such as bathrooms or locker rooms, and participate in single-sex programs, consistent with their gender, regardless of their sex assigned at birth, anatomy, medical history, appearance, or the sex indicated on their identification. The law does not require entities to make existing bathrooms all-gender or construct additional restrooms.
Covered entities that have single-occupancy restrooms should make clear that they can be used by people of all genders."

" For example, a women’s shelter may not turn away a woman because she looks too masculine nor may a men’s shelter deny service to a man because he does not look masculine enough."

Other violations
"Barring someone from a program or facility out of concern that a transgender or gender non-conforming person will make others uncomfortable.
" Forcing a transgender or gender non-conforming person to use the single occupancy restroom."

"Covered entities should post a sign in all single-sex facilities
that states, “Under New York City Law, all individuals have the right to use the single sex facility consistent with their gender identity or expression."

"An individual’s assessment of their own safety should be a primary consideration. Covered entities should offer opportunities for people to come to them if they have safety concerns and should establish a corresponding safety plan if needed. For example, if a transgender resident requests assignment to a facility corresponding to their sex assigned at birth instead of a placement corresponding to their gender identity, that request should be honored."

"It is unlawful for an employer to provide health benefit plans that deny or exclude services on the basis of gender. To be non-discriminatory with respect to gender, health benefit plans must cover transgender care, also known as transition-related care or gender-affirming care. "

[VestalVirgin]

An individual’s assessment of their own safety should be a primary consideration.

Unless they are actually female, I suppose, in which case they have to share housing and bathrooms with males in any case, but can choose whether they want to share with masculine males, of feminine-gendered males.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

Essentially if a man, with a penis, wants to access a women's shelter, loo or changing room, they say they are female. Their anatomy, appearance and sex aren't a problem.

I can't see any issue with that at all.

[OneFlewOverTheDodosNest]

Where is the line drawn between "worries about making someone feel uncomfortable" and genuine concerns that it will be traumatic for fellow patients?

[TheCarpenter]

An individual’s assessment of their own safety should be a primary consideration

Unless they are female.

Can we just have toilets, wards, shelters etc labelled for Huge Fucking Terf Bigots and maybe, just maybe, then we will be able to thinking about our own safety before putting every other fuckers 'feelz' first?!

[MrsTerryPratchett]

I'm trying to work out how to make this a man's problem so it gets dealt with. All the places I can think of (posh clubs, golf) where women could muscle in shouting, "we're men" are memberships and you can bet our feelz won't get us into those places. Irritating.

[OneFlewOverTheDodosNest]

There's not really a way to make it a man's problem though, is there MrsTP? Because the equivalent to transwomen demanding access to rape crisis centres and DV shelters with blatantly male anatomy and appearance would be if women decided to demand access to places where men were exceedingly vulnerable and I really can't imagine that happening.

And even if it did, we would not possess the relative body strength and key anatomical appendages that make men such a threat to vulnerable women in these places.

I don't understand how the people who are making these absurd decisions can't imagine that, even if all transwomen were completely lovely and safe people (and maybe they are), that nasty sexually deviant men would not take advantage of these laws to get access to further victims. Particularly now we're removing any kind of barrier such as gender reassignment, hormones, ongoing therapy, making an even half decent attempt to pass as a woman.

It makes me mad, and it makes me scared, and god knows what we do about it. Or how many women have to end up dead or raped before anyone significant questions this new dogma.

[kua]

It makes me angry too One flew. I
have dealt with this by talking to other women, enlightening them to what is going on and also being a bit more involved in social media, twitter etc.

We need to have a bigger voice (than the Male), which, while growing stronger is not quite there yet.

Get involved, talk to friends, family.

[FreshwaterSelkie]

I picked out exactly the same sentence when I read it too, isn't it funny that we all homed in on the same part? "An individual’s assessment of their own safety should be a primary consideration"

Weasel words. Not to be applied if it's only silly women who's assessment of their own safety reveals them to be Vile Bigots. Riiiiiight. Got it.

[FreshwaterSelkie]

*whose. Grrr.

I wonder what the "participate in single-sex programs" applies to? Doesn't sound good at any rate.

And this chills my blood: "For example, a women’s shelter may not turn away a woman because she looks too masculine" - it's like a welcome mat for an abusive man, and we're supposed to trust to the finer sensibilities of abusers not to abuse this? They wouldn't even have to do ANYTHING to exploit this now, not take a hormone or change a name or anything, just pop on a skirt, say they're a woman and bob's your (former) uncle (now your aunt), they're in the shelter. And if you were an abuser, whose thing was vulnerable women, why would you NOT do this? It's an open goal.

[OneFlewOverTheDodosNest]

Exactly Selkie - I've read a report on here from people who oversee the British prison population who have stated that an explicit concern for them currently is that dangerous men are "transitioning" because a) they find it sexually gratifying and b) it may give them access to vulnerable women.

I imagine these people have more exposure to violent and deranged men and understand the lengths they will go to to get their kicks, I think it's people like them who we need to get speaking up.

I wonder whether "proper" transwomen see the danger of legislation like this - surely they'd be better protected too by spaces which can't be accessed by men with questionable agendas? Or have the autogynophiles taken over the movement so much now that the early transitioners are being drowned out?

[FreshwaterSelkie]

Dodo, it honestly amazes me when I read documents like this that there isn't even so much as a nod given to weighing up the risks to women. It just vanishes. At it's not even as if it has remained in the realm of a risk, it's a reality - for example Christopher/Jessica Hambrook, who was convicted of sexually assaulting two women while living with them at a women's shelter in Toronto.

But then we get into the "No True Scotsman"isms, which is to say that people like Hambrook aren't "properly" trans anyway (as if that solves the problem, when actually it highlights it, which is there is no way to say from external appearances what is true trans and what isn't, but one may not question that). I'm not saying that there won't be circumstances in which innocent, non-abusive trans women won't need to escape violent relationships, but for that population to have their needs met properly, the trans activist movement really need, as a matter of urgency to set up shelters for those people, because women's shelters are absolutely not fit for purpose for them. But they don't seem to. That's hard to do, and it would underline the fact that trans women and women are not the same, and that's antithetical to the current narrative of trans activism.

[OneFlewOverTheDodosNest]

The Christopher "Jessica" Hambrook case needs to be widely publicised because it highlights two options which have the same outcome.

1. Jessica Hambrook truly was a transwoman who assaulted women because she had access to a woman's shelter therefore transwomen shouldn't be housed with women because some are dangerous.

1. Christopher Hambrook was a sexual deviant who easily posed as a transwoman to gain access to a woman's shelter therefore transwomen shouldn't be housed with women because dangerous men will take advantage of the situation to find further victims.

I'm actually quite convinced by Blanchard's transsexualism typology which differentiates between early transitioning MtF transsexuals who are attracted to men and late transitioning autogynephile transsexuals who tend to be attracted to women or bisexual.

It seems to me that the former group would be equally at risk from deviant men as vulnerable women are, and it is the latter group who both cloud the issue by not passing or not bothering to pass as female AND are likely to be most risk to women / give deviant men a way to pretend to be TS.

Of course, the very term transsexual has now fallen out of favour for the word transgender so I can't imagine we're going to get far with the above thought process...

[VestalVirgin]

I'm trying to work out how to make this a man's problem so it gets dealt with. All the places I can think of (posh clubs, golf) where women could muscle in shouting, "we're men" are memberships and you can bet our feelz won't get us into those places. Irritating.

They can keep you out, but if you change your name, and apply via e-mail, you can create some work for them.

If I lived in the UK, I would seriously consider changing my name to a typically male one, and apply for all sorts of things - send in articles to men's magazines like "Beef" (Don't know if they are in the UK market, it is essentially a cooking magazine for very manly men), send my manuscripts to publishers, apply for leading positions in male dominated businesses, etc.

It is not advisable to do it if you have a good career in front of you, but if your career days lie in the past, then I'd say, go for it. Apply for memberships in all the male-dominated or male only clubs you can afford to be a member in - and some where you can't but know they won't take you anyway.

Throw a huge tantrum when they kick you out.


As for shelters, I suppose we will have to build new ones, for TERFs only. And pay for them ourselves.

I don't think there will TERF-only toilets in public buildings anytime soon.

[OneFlewOverTheDodosNest]

I enjoyed your post VV - though I don't think I'll be doing it just yet. May suggest it to my Grandma as she's an old school feminist and does enjoy making a point.

"As for shelters, I suppose we will have to build new ones, for TERFs only. And pay for them ourselves." I'd wager that a whole lot of shelters are paid for by women already, after all government funding has been slashed and most women's charities are supported by women. Which makes it all the more frustrating to think that something we're personally paying for is throwing women under the bus...

[RickRoll]

" They wouldn't even have to do ANYTHING to exploit this now, not take a hormone or change a name or anything, just pop on a skirt, say they're a woman "

Eh, there's no requirement to even pop on a skirt.

You can be an 18-stone strapping bouncer, wearing weightlifting clothes if you want.

Your gender is whatever you say it is, and there is no requirement to do ANYTHING. No certificate, no counselling, no skirt, nothing.

[VestalVirgin]

I enjoyed your post VV - though I don't think I'll be doing it just yet. May suggest it to my Grandma as she's an old school feminist and does enjoy making a point.

You know what would be awesome? If all elderly ladies did this, and then the medical establishment would wonder why the heck men suddenly live so long.

And the MRAs who whine about men's shorter average lifespan would have to shut up.

[NormaStanleyFletcher]

@ VV

[Socy]

I'm new to discussions of these issues but can't help thinking that dodo is on to something in pointing out that we now talk of being transgender rather than transsexual. Sex and gender are different things. Sex is biological whereas gender is about social norms which are signified through name, clothes etc. Wearing men's clothes doesn't make me a man. Has being a transvestite become synonymous with being transsexual? How would Grayson Perry or Eddie izzard feel about this?

[BertrandRussell]

""I enjoyed your post VV - though I don't think I'll be doing it just yet. May suggest it to my Grandma as she's an old school feminist and does enjoy making a point."

Or "feminist" for short........

[AllTheToastIsGone]

Does anyone know what the policy is of the refuge charity in the UK? Their website just says that no men are allowed in their refuges. I'd like to make a donation to this type of charity as I know their funding has been cut but I want to support one that doesn't support the nonsense in the above article.

[VashtaNerada]

Anyone catch Woman's Hour this week? I thought it very eloquently dealt with the idea of 'peak trans' and why trans issues became more visible in 2015: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06sgxjf

[VashtaNerada]

I think in the UK it's on a case by case basis Toast.

[AllTheToastIsGone]

Thanks Vashta. Hopefully in that case some common sense gets applied.

[EmpressOfTheVulvaCupcakes]

Thinking about this, there are things NYC women can do.

Take toilets. There's nothing to stop a group of women going in the men's now, hogging the cubicles, complaining that the sight of bio-men using the urinals is cissexist and triggering...

I'd be tempted. I really would.

[HermioneWeasley]

It's fucking frightening.