Dress Code Discrimination -and LGBT community feeling uncomfortable

Well, yes - that's because that's what many science/tech types wear, regardless of what gender they identify as. I guess there's an element of performing techy, rather than performing masculinity or femininity, but quite a lot of it comes from "can't be arsed" , at least on a conscious level.

All of the trans women I know are geeky science/tech types who wear walking boots or vaguely orthopaedic looking shoes to work, along with most of the rest of their colleagues.

Are they suggesting that lesbian and bisexual women all have short hair, sensible shoes and trousers? And that heterosexual women don't?

That is what it seems to imply.

But why on earth would it make transgenders uncomfortable? I bet that trans"women" are about the only group of person who likes this kind of dresscode, because it enforces femininity.

(Actual women who like to wear heels and skirts will likely be content to be allowed to do it; they have no need to have it enforced on all women in order to look like women, after all.)

"Before you get off the Magic Roundabout could you just help me out with the definition of queer and gender queer?"
I'm afraid I haven't a clue! Back when I was on the gay scene, queer just used to be a reclaimed word for very gay as applied to gay men. Since it now seems to be part of the whole sex, sexualities, gender mish-mash I avoid reading about it given that when I tried reading Judith Butler, it made my brain hurt. Plus why would I go there when I already have a different feminist understanding of gender? I'm of a generation that found LGB almost too much (in terms of not always a lot in common between lesbians and gay men for starters), let alone LGBTQIA+..........

My sensible trans people comment was in reply to others on the thread (going the usual way that any thread with the word trans in it goes), not really so much about the original point, which yes is definitely about possibly-well-meaning but definitely-clueless HR-type people :)

trills - well, yes, that's exactly what I wondered!

I don't think 'sensible trans people' are the relevant group here - the relevant group is your average policy setter at work, who probably has not the tiniest clue what he (probably he) is talking about.

I've just come back from a LGBT event where someone trying to be supportive decided to coin the phrase 'LBGT ... or, er ... alternative sexualities'.

That is the sort of person who you worry about, who might have grasped that dresscodes must be varied for Linda because she's (whisper it) trans, but somehow feels that the ladies on reception are letting the side down a bit with those flat shoes.

Somedyke

Before you get off the Magic Roundabout could you just help me out with the definition of queer and gender queer?

I'm worried if I don't get this all straight soon it will all change anyway.

"Sorry if I was snippy earlier, SomeDyke. I had hideous PMS...." . Yep, we've all been there.

And I unfortunately seem to have painted myself into a corner where the defining characteristic of whatever the bobbins I was talking about seemed to be not being attracted to men (which I of course resent as them shouldering into the definition even when it's not about them...........).

Time for bed said Zebedee (I need a BOING emoticon!).

Sorry if I was snippy earlier, SomeDyke. I had hideous PMS and was probably projecting a bit about the many 'not a real lesbian if you exhibit X stereotypically feminine behaviour' comments that abound.

That's an interesting one LRD. If your personal style is of the "butch dyke" flavour, but you are not actually a lesbian, is that allowable? Is it actually just an alternative style that is "permitted"? Or does one have to be a lesbian?

On the whole "throwing under a bus" issue, no sensible trans person thinks that everyone else is perfectly happy to comply with all the gender stereotypes and expectations. (there are of course idiots in every group of humans you could possibly name)

I believe people when they say that being trans is about more than just wanting (or not wanting) to wear dresses and play with dolls. What that "more" is, I have no experience of, but I believe them that it exists.

"I agree with others who think they put in 'LGBT' as a supposedly 'polite' way to say 'trans'."
I think they were aiming at this, especially since now really, REALLY not wanting to wear clothes stereotypically associated with your own the one you were coercively assigned at birth by nasty medics...... sex is held up as such a strong indicator of how someone is really trans............

Which, of course, just reinforces the notion that which type of clothing matters. And also throws butch dykes under the bus (well, into the uncomfortable shoes pit at least!), saying they are really trans but unable to admit it. Because anything else would be saying that sane, sensible, normal women (as well as butch dykes) could be totally averse to all this femininity nonsense without actually being a man.............

Yes, sorry, wasn't aiming my comment at you in particular, Ovaries.

Oh absolutely almond I was just veering off topic explaining the difference between bi and pan :) we definitely enjoy a "passing privilege" that lesbians don't, particularly if we're in a relationship with/married to a man.

I agree with others who think they put in 'LGBT' as a supposedly 'polite' way to say 'trans'.

But, I have come across people who (oddly, to my way of thinking) do think sexuality is relevant to dress codes. There's a woman who's quite well known in academic circles - her business is coaching people through the CV/application side of academic jobs and she runs a blog on it - who wrote a series of pieces about dressing for success. They were a bit notorious, though some people swear by them. Basically, she peddles the whole 'ladies should wear smart clothes, groomed hair, try to wear heels, blah blah' stuff. But she also did a special 'exception to the rule' post, explicitly for butch dykes (her terms not mine).

This was a few years ago, but I remember reading it and finding it quite strange that she was quite happy to urge women to conform to a certain image, but somehow thought that if you were a certain kind of lesbian, it was important enough for you not to conform.

She's just the example I can immediately think of, but I don't think she is totally alone in that. Odd, IMO.

"Also assuming that butch dyke culture applies to lesbians in general and ignoring the existence of bi and pansexual women."
No I'm not.

You could say that what I'm talking about in general is non-heterosexual women. Okay, so that includes pan and bi and whatever other prefixes you want to stick into the soup. I'm a lesbian, so I had the temerity (shock! horror!) to talk from my own perspective. That isn't 'leaving out' or 'erasing' anyone elses experience.

But on second thoughts, I think that not being attracted to men/boys is definitely the prime thing. Given that we are supposed to be, so being a bit attracted, or being attracted to some but not others isn't quite as heinous as not being attracted at all to any male ever. Okay, so then I guess I'm leaving out asexual women...........

So back to the dykes! That is what I am and that is what I was talking about.

And kind of comes back to what I was thinking about on another thread, Monique Wittigs statement about lesbians not being women............

BD's point is still fair enough. Being a woman who is exclusively attracted to other women is a completely different perspective (and subject to a far greater degree of prejudice and discrimination) than sexual orientations that involve being attracted to men. The pansexual thing is neither here nor there.

The difference between bisexual and pansexual is -

Bisexual is an attraction to men with penises and women with vaginas
Pansexual is an attraction to people, however they identify and whatever their genitalia.

I am bisexual. I would still love and want to marry my husband if he was a woman with a vagina.
I wouldn't be sexually attracted if he called himself/identified as a woman, and then whipped out his penis. I want a sexual partner, not a Kinder Surprise.

Whereas I have a friend who is pansexual, who wouldn't be fazed by that.

The fact that this was framed as a particular issue for LGB T people, and therefore of greater importance than if it was only a problem for women, reminds me of all the attention in the media last year when Brighton College stopped insisting on skirts for girls and trousers for boys. Good for them, but it was all framed as being solely for the purpose of not making trans student uncomfortable, and as being a positive news story for that reason alone. As a the mother of a girl who hates wearing skirts, but who is definitely a girl, it really irritated me that the preferences and comfort of girls is constantly dismissed or disregarded, unless they're "trans," of course, in which case the dress code becomes human rights issue and a matter of life and death.

Except when you haves joint problem and actually do need to support that joint & limit its motion, of course. For limited period of time, after which you will have to work that joint (physio) to recover optimum strength & range of motion.

Shoes that "support the ankle" actually are not good for the ankle. Limiting a joint's range of motion and allowing it to work less than it normally would have (with a boot, cast, whatever) inevitably weakens the muscles supporting that joint.

Is there any evidence that shoes need to support the ankle?

Even my outdoor Karrimor shoes stop below the ankle.

My teen son has never owned any pair of boots, and mostly wears trainers.

Surely most people who wear boots in January (to work or otherwise) are straight women? Because straight women frequently wear just below the knee half inch heel leather boots at this time of year?

"does that mean a pan sexual person will be attracted to both sets of genitalia, however that person presents? So men, women, trans or otherwise? "

In practice, it probably means:

"Very few people of either sex are interested in me because I've managed to seriously mess my body up with hormones and surgical operations, so I'll take whatever I can get"

and/or

"I have to say I'm attracted to everyone with whatever genitals because otherwise I couldn't harass lesbians for not wanting my penis".

""Bisexual" carries with it the implication that everyone fits neatly into one or other of the boxes marked Male and Female. "Pansexual" makes a point of rejecting that implication."

I don't know what "neatly" means in this context, but except where there is a disorder or genital malformation of some sort all humans are clearly either male or female. Humans are a sexually dimorphic species, like most mammal species.

None of this is controversial and really shouldn't be news to anyone who has had secondary school-level biology lessons.

ActuallyThatsSUPREMECommander

Thank you. So does that mean a pan sexual person will be attracted to both sets of genitalia, however that person presents? So men, women, trans or otherwise?

And queer?

This is very helpful by the way.

"Bisexual" carries with it the implication that everyone fits neatly into one or other of the boxes marked Male and Female. "Pansexual" makes a point of rejecting that implication.