TERF

Just wanted to say, Mini, your post on Friday was really fabulous. So much stuff to think about in there about what sexuality is... and how false it is that certain sexes / genders have been so deeply culturally associated with aspects of feeling / arousing desire.

Gender is a social construction. Now it appears to have morphed into a medical disorder Yes, this exactly.

I think it's very worrying that at a time when the binary opposition of gender is being deepened and extended, that any failure to limit your behaviour to strictly demarcated gender specific behaviour becomes a medical condition.

But then again, I give you capitalism.Advances will always be made because drugs companies must compete within the market. Its false to say that demand leads to supply, it is that supply leads to demand. We need to be convinced that we require these drugs, shoes, clothes, make-up, surgery etc,... To make this point quite explicitly, do we think it is possible that someone living in a small undiscovered tribe untouched by "civilisation" is likely to be diagnosed, drugged and mutilated in their quest to change their gender? I think it quite unlikely. I am not suggesting that is never the case, but roles and behaviour will likely as not be governed strictly according to sex. Of course gender will be binary. So what is really puzzling is this, as feminism seeks to question gender, capitalism seeks to deepen and entrench it, now we have people questioning their assigned gender. Is it because we dared to ask the question, dared to push the boundaries or is it because every radical demand is eventually subsumed into the totality, not in its original form but as something reconstituted.

So, is it patriarchy that creates the problem of people wanting to transition or the advances, and commoditisation of the human body, atomisation of individuals, the subjection to the ideology of individuality and the objectification of self coupled with the need for expansion into new markets that is driving this?

Psychiatry has always struggled to justify itself as a proper medical science, I am inclined to think that gender dysmorphia, that cannot be scientifically proven to actually exist as a medical condition is much like the myriad conditions that get added and removed from the DSM over time. We are told that the diagnostic criteria change, but whole conditions come into being and vanish.

Really it's one loo in one building. They're about to revamp the whole building so I hope the loos are sorted out properly.

At a festival once, I used the men's loos. They were empty, the queue for the ladies went halfway round the world and back, and when I need a pee, I need a pee.

I came out of the cubicle to a line of men stood at urinals, trying to cross their legs like virgins at an orgy. I cannot, for the life of me understand why they always have the exact same number of male and female loos at events.... it makes it nigh on impossible for women to use the bloody things without invading men's ones and getting soundly told off for it.

Making some of the women's loos into unisex ones is utterly stupid.

Having just reread what Shelia Jeffrey has to say about the child transgendering which is happening in Australia, I am really concerned by it. As a child, I was what was known as a 'tomboy' what she describes as being criteria for candidates for childhood transgendering was what I was/the gender I performed. I wanted to be a boy, but I wanted to be a boy because my mother only liked boys, so, to my child's mind, by being a boy, she would like me. I wouldn't want to be a man now, but if I had been caught up in the 'male mind trapped in a female body' thing, that choice might have been taken away from me.

DH has also watched the 'this is what a male lesbian looks like' video and has almost exploded! He cannot see how anyone who has a penis and a beard and has no intention of getting rid of either can a) classify themselves as a woman, b) classify themselves as a lesbian and c) expect lesbians to want to have anything to do with him sexually. If my DH can get this, and, while he agrees more than he did before he's no radfem, then, why the hell can't other people?

new forces within advanced capitalism has commoditised the female form, privileging female beauty over male, in its quest to create new segmented markets. Now, when most products are sold with sex, and women are increasingly objectifying themselves and other women, it is only a small leap to suggest that this conditions our sexuality. This same process, I believe has given rise to the further entrenchment of gender roles but also to the rise in men seeking to act out their sexual fantasy as "the objectified woman" or to transition. The objectified woman, is the woman who displays her subordinated status by behaving and looking like the "object" in almost comically exaggerated ways, enhanced ,airbrushed, using obviously sexual body language and clothing to enhance her status as sexual object.

Absolutely, Mini. This dynamic is blatantly on display on some of the porny trans blogs, and I've seen many males online, both self-identified cross-dressers and transwomen, talk about this very explicitly - that being seen as a sexualised object excites them.

I believe the legal limit in the UK for children being given puberty blockers is 12 years of age.

Yes, absolutely it's happening in the UK, even though we don't know what the long-term effects of puberty blockers will be. I have no idea where medical ethics has got to in this area. There's likely to be a massive backlash in a few years but right now the only people expressing any concern seem to be radfems who get called bigoted and transphobic when they mention it - the proper liberal position appears to be unquestioning support even though it is basically experimenting on kids.

Non gender conforming children being diagnosed as trans =
That's scary, like something from the 1950's.
Is this happening in the UK?

I totally agree with you WhentheRed.

Girls and women need sex segregated spaces for our human dignity, bodily integrity and to prevent men being able to abuse us with sexualized and other violence including voyeurism and flashing.

It is not our fault that men as a class predate on girls and women. And it is not our fault if men as a class are abusive and violent towards men who break patriarchal gender rules.

I abhor the notion that removing sex segregated safe spaces for females is somehow progressive and modern and an obvious and just solution to a problem that men are responsible for. I would campaign very hard against a school my daughters had to go to or any other space that tried to take away female right to privacy and safety. And if anybody called me transphobic for it they can frankly fuck off.

I'm old enough to remember when transgenderism was called transsexualism before queer theorists, post modernists and misogynists got their hands on it. At that time, feminists had a lot more sympathy for transsexuals than many of us do now, that is when they came under our radar at all. But with the escalation of transactivism and the eroding of women's rights and hijacking and colonization of our sex, our view has changed. Calling us transphobic because we defend women who are universally oppressed and victims of male violence is one of the most misogynistic things I have ever encountered.

Goldsmiths.

Which university?

One would have thought so Red.

Excellent points, Red, and beach as always. I've noticed that 'prudery' is thrown at women a lot, as a way of sidelining or minimising women's issues.

I didn't know that those 2 girls in India were looking for a toilet. That is so heartbreaking.

I'm at uni and one of the toilets was converted to unisex, so it can be used by anyone.

Anybody want to hazard a guess which toilets were opened up to everyone?

Thank you so much for that, Beach.

You're welcome. You can download beauty and misogyny as a pdf

www.google.co.uk/search?q=beauty+and+misogyny+pdf&btnG=Search

Yes Sheila Jeffreys new book has been published. You could always request that your library orders it?

That's brilliant, thanks Beach, I'll look out for them. I'll have a read if beauty and misogyny first though, as you suggest. I think I know what the difference is for me, but food for thought is always good. Really appreciate it

CaptChaos I don't know if it is out yet but Sheila Jeffrey's new book Gender Hurts: A Feminist Analysis of the Politics of Transgenderism is going to be a major work on the subject.

This chapter by her from another book will give you an idea of her position. Transgender Activism: A Lesbian Perspective

A couple of quotes from Jeffreys on the subject;

in order to support transgenderism , gender has to be supported. So the subordination of women has to be supported in order for transgenderism to be supported.

I don’t have a gender. I’ve no intention of having a gender. I don’t do masculinity which is the behavior of male dominance, and I don’t do femininity which is the behavior of female subordination, women’s subordination. I hope to engage in human behavior and I hope at some point in the future everybody will be able to do that too, but gender I definitely do not have. I am a conscientious objector to gender as I would be indeed to being drafted into the military

It depends what you are looking for. Jeffreys will give you the radical feminist analysis. If you are looking for writing from transgender people there are plenty of blogs.

When entering transgender politics you need to have it clear in your head what 'sex' and 'gender' mean to you. These two words are often used synonymously when in feminist analysis they mean completely different things. You also have to break away from the gender essentialist and deeply conservative idea that one's sex role equates to one's existence and or identity. This is hard to do because we are conditioned not to do that.

I don't know if you have read Jeffrey's book "Beauty and Misogyny" but it has some very good analysis of gender in it.

"There are a lot of gay people and lesbians in particular who want the T off the LGBT acronym"

That is interesting.

My ignorance about this subject seems to be bottomless, which is awful of me, given that one of the people I manage is FtoM trans*, so I should educate myself.

Are there any resources for me to read? and yes, I know, I'm being lazy in not looking for myself, but if someone could help?

It all seems so counter intuitive, but I know that intuition is just socialisation internalised, so...