Blog post about a non-trans man in women's toilets

[ageingrunner]

This blog post really spells out the problem with self-identity and the fact that some men WILL take advantage

www.thegetrealmom.com/blog/womensrestroom

[ageingrunner]

www.thegetrealmom.com/blog/womensrestroom

[Bundesliga]

Wow. Just wow.

[MercyMyJewels]

Yep. Will be happening. I bet if challenged he would say that he was a woman. Like Danielle Muscato

But no, clearly we and the blogger are hateful bigots

[MercyMyJewels]

Waiting for Iris to turn up and call me out

[ageingrunner]

Wow as in 'yes I see what the problem is and there is definitely a massive loophole that will allow perv men to take advantage' or wow as in 'die in a fire terf' ?

[ageingrunner]

Sorry that was to Bundeslinga

[Datun]

The thing is, he could easily be transgender.

It's not just about non-transpeople taking advantage. It's about transpeople also taking advantage.

[ageingrunner]

Yy there's just no way of telling a "genuine" trans person from a "fake" trans person at all, no matter what they're wearing. It's such a massive category now and there's no obligation to dress in or act in a certain way, or to have to take hormones or to have any surgery at all. The only way I suppose would be to ask, and risk being called a bigot or perhaps being physically attacked.

[Bundesliga]

ageingrunner wow in that the encroachment onto women's rights and the silencing of otherwise vocal women is shocking frightening - it's happened. Women were silent. They were intimidated and silenced. By stealth rather than declaration really. So much fight to get to the safety of having a voice, so any women fought so hard, it's just so painful to read of the silencing. The confused silencing.

I'm not scared, I'm not easily intimidated but in that situation I probably would have kept silent as I'd have felt afraid.

To watch the erosion of what has been so hard won is just overwhelming

[Bundesliga]

The regression. That's what overwhelms me, the social and civil regression.

[ageingrunner]

Bundesliga I know, it's terrifying. I think I'd take the risk of being accused of bigotry, but I'd be less likely to take the risk of being punched in the face. This is the logical end-point of self identity isn't it? Women silenced and unable to protest about a pervert in our toilets. No decent man would advocate for this to be the case.

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

No decent man would advocate for this to be the case

But who blames us for rape? Tells us we asked for it? Tells us that we incited our domestic abuse?

Where and who are the decent men and why haven't more been sticking up for women even before this?

[MackerelOfFact]

But surely there has never been anything stopping a man going into a women's toilet. The blogger says that ten years ago, he would have been told to leave. I don't agree. I think the reaction would have been the same; the women would have felt uneasy yet unable to confront him.

Outside of MN/online communities, in the real world, I think very few people are very aware of transgender 'issues', let alone conscious of them in any kind of politically-correct way. I can guarantee that if my mum or aunt were in that toilet, the man 'identifying as a woman' wouldn't have crossed their minds at all. They would have stayed quiet for their own protection in case he was somehow unstable.

That's kind of why I can't get worked up about the whole toilets or changing rooms debate. There has never actually been anything physically stopping people going into spaces reserved for the opposite sex anyway. Of course, another user might ask them to leave, but if you require a safe space then you probably don't want to be policing that safe space yourself, as that makes it inherently less safe.

[WobblyLegs5]

The toilets issue came about after Obama made it law for any school child to use whatever bathroom they identified with (& I don't mean they identified as a toilet, I'm just really fucking tired)

He brought it into law. If he wanted the rights of transgender student's protected & prioritised there would have been lots of ways to do that. But now it's all about toilets.

And as anyone can use any toilet it will (has) extended to changing rooms, pysch wards, refuges, shelters, prisions. Where females are v v vulberable

[CoteDAzur]

"The blogger says that ten years ago, he would have been told to leave. I don't agree. I think the reaction would have been the same; the women would have felt uneasy yet unable to confront him."

How can you possibly think such a thing?

I have seen the occasional man who wandered into the female restroom immediately challenged & asked to go into the gents' over there >>

[Bundesliga]

MackerelOfFact I would disagree- do you live in the USA?
10 years ago at Disney you bet to fuck that a man strolling the women's toilets would have been questioned. You bet to fuck he would have.

And yes, Americans do know about the "bathroom thing"

[MackerelOfFact]

I have seen the occasional man who wandered into the female restroom immediately challenged & asked to go into the gents' over there >>

It totally depends who is in the toilet though doesn't it? How many people are in there, whether they're the assertive type or not?

[CharlieSierra]

I think you are wrong Mackerel. Before this was a 'thing' most women wouldn't have had a problem calling him out, asking what he was doing in there, and he would have expected to be called out.

[ItShouldHaveBeenJingleJess]

Could someone explain some of the abbreviations used, like cis and terf? I'm trying to educate myself on the subject but I don't know what they mean. Was reading a trans thread just now but it's getting pulled.

[ChocChocPorridge]

I agree Cote - asked to leave, maybe, maybe not, but 'oh! This is the ladies' with an expectant look - absolutely, that man would then look around, apologise, and leave with a red face - just as I have done the couple of times I've ended up in the mens by accident.

Do all these people really not remember school? Do they not remember that there were always one or two boys in a year who absolutely would have found this an awesome thing to do, one or two in the school who would have had the arrogance to take it all the way, just for fun - because even now, 25 years later I can name the boys who would have done it.

[CoteDAzur]

"he would have expected to be called out."

Yes, and that was stopping pervy men from entering women's toilets & changing rooms.

[MackerelOfFact]

I think you are wrong Mackerel. Before this was a 'thing' most women wouldn't have had a problem calling him out, asking what he was doing in there, and he would have expected to be called out.

Fair enough. There's probably a US cultural element I've overlooked too, being from the UK.

[CoteDAzur]

"Could someone explain some of the abbreviations used, like cis and terf?"

Cis: Supposedly, someone whose "gender identity" (whether they think they are a man or a woman) is the same as their sex (male or female).

TERF: Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist, used to describe anyone with a functioning pair of eyes, a brain, and a dictionary who looks at an adult human male and says "That's a man, not a woman".

[SpringyFlowery]

I'm from a northern WC background and would expect my granny to have said something and her quieter friends would have tutted disapprovingly at the least and gone and complained.

[ItShouldHaveBeenJingleJess]

Thank you cote. I guess I'm both! And a tad insulted that I am derised for being a woman with both a vag and eyes!