Woman attacked by transactivists at speakers corner - part deux

But, I don't get why I have to change the language used to define me, in order to include you.

I am a woman. A MTT is a transwoman. DH is a man. A FTT is a transman. Transmen were born with the sex, female. If they want to have a baby, none of my business. If they want to call their mammary glands their chest. No problem. But my breasts are breasts and I am not chest feeding. I am breast feeding.

Why do I have to change?

Being inclusive is offensive? Maybe you find pregnant people offensive also, but unfortunately sometimes an inclusive, general term is needed when talking about a general activity for which there is no guarantee that only non-trans females are referring to

It's not being inclusive it is being ridiculous. Only females can breastfeed or be pregnant.

do you understand the concerns about self-ID?

Yes. But the question was what difference this bill makes over the current status quo.

that's just trolling for the sake of it, and being deliberately offensive.

Being inclusive is offensive? Maybe you find pregnant people offensive also, but unfortunately sometimes an inclusive, general term is needed when talking about a general activity for which there is no guarantee that only non-trans females are referring to.

"Chestfeeding"? Seriously, JAPAB, that's just trolling for the sake of it, and being deliberately offensive.

I'm annoyed that my phone has garbled my message!

My post makes no sense! It's meant to be transwomen in every example.

transnem = transwomen, stupid phone sorry!

I think chestfeeding is a specific term for transmen who are BFing, not an attempt to redefine BFing as chestfeeding.

Transmen sometimes have most of their breasts removed, but a but of mammary gland still there.

So they're saying what they do is chestfeeding, not all BFing.

I think ... on slightly shaky ground here!

JAPAB do you understand the concerns about self-ID?

We're not worried about transnem going about their business just trying to get by.

We're worried about opening the flood gates to preditory men, who will us this to get access to female spaces - that will be bad for AFAB women and trans women alike.

If you think predatory men won't do this, you're wrong. PLEASE listen to the lived experince of women who have been on the receiving end of unwanted advances and worse from those kind of men since we hit puberty or - sadly in all to many cases before.

Sometimes I read transmen complaining about how men treat them, that they can't walk down the world without harrassmenet, that they feel constantly at threat of violence just for who they are - and think to myself - don't you get it? This is how (many) men treat women! Welcome to our world.

From the age of 13 (when I grew boobs), men hassled me on the streets pretty much daily. Occasioanlly they tried to drag me into cars, followed me, tried to talk me into having sex for money. Thanfully I wasn't raped by a stranger, but plenty of women who have been.

We know what predatory men are like. If they can self-ID to get access to us - why wouldn't they?

And what's to stop men in prisons with nothing to lose self-IDing to get access to women's prisons? Why should incarcerated women have to be locked up with violent male criminals?

Is the inevitable sexual harrasement and worse of women really worth redifining a law that already expsts on BFing?

And what about women's sports? What's to stop a failed male athlete self-IDing as a woman to get a better shot at a career?

PLEASE can you answer some of these questions or at least acknowledge that it's not unreasomable for women (including transwomen!) to want protection from predatory men? And that self-ID makes us all less protected from them.

Chest feeding

Chest feeding?! Fuck off.

I have ovaries. I have a womb (bit dusty, but still there). I have breasts which produced milk.

When I fed my children, it was with my breasts. I am not changing what I call MY FEMALE BODY PARTS in order to suit a trans agenda.

Please, stop telling us what we have to call you. How we have to treat you. And start listening to what we ARE and who we ARE.

Still Spartacus.

Chest feeding makes me thing of some old trunk in the attic full of old biscuits.

Chest feeding?

Oh honestly JAPAB. You don't think it's coincidence that an older woman got smacked in the face for holding a dissenting view? I was reading Robert Webb's TERFy thread on Twitter. Did anyone threaten to punch him? Tell him to die in a fire? They did not.
The trans woman that allegedly punched Maria posted on the page for the event earlier that day that they wanted to "fuck some TERFs up". They clearly went to the event to start a fight. They clearly hate "TERFs"
Is it coincidental that the term TERF is only applied to women? Is it coincidental that the only criteria for being a TERF is an indication that you don't wholeheartedly believe that trans women are women (i.e. a view most women, indeed most people, hold)? I don't think so.
Whether or not the women are "anti trans" they don't deserve to be punched.

I'm sure JAPAB has well thought out reasons why that was OK too.

Whether or not an action is "OK" or justified is a different matter than what the reasons for it were.

Assertions have been made that the TRAs just hate women. Some of them no doubt do, just as members of any group might (or hate men).

I just question whether it is just a coincidence that generally speaking the people who get the vitriol happen to be "anti-trans" (or so it is perceived). No, they were just attacked for being women by people who hate women.

Also, what "rights" would self-identification give genuinely trans people that they currently can't get through following the current GRA procedures? I'm genuinely puzzled by this.

Maybe it is a bit like chest-feeding in public places. The law made it clear that this has to be allowed whereas previously there was nothing to formally say that you had to allow it in your restaurant (etc). The bill probably makes it easier to gain recognition, and may formally clarify what has or has not to be allowed, whereas previously it might have been ambiguous or nothing to formally say that trans men had to be recognised in this context, trans women as women in that context?

Thanks

A thread has been started about it Cocker.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3047546-Daily-Mail-article-on-intolerance-mentions-speakers-corner-incident

I've a feeling Daily Mail readers might object, having finally been told what this law means.

Sorry, can't do links, but there is an essay online by AN Wilson, The New Dark Age of Intolerance, which talks about inter alia the incident at Speakers' Corner. (It is in the Daily Mail).

I don't believe "trans women ARE women" btw. I believe they are trans women and should be afforded legal protections and the right not to be discriminated against, harassed or bullied

Well yes beyond. That's why we all need to believe "trans women ARE women". If you believe that (or say you do) then logically it would be unfair to treat them differently.
If you say you don't believe that you are a TERF and on the wrong side of history.

Also, what "rights" would self-identification give genuinely trans people that they currently can't get through following the current GRA procedures

I'm beginning to think that there is really only one thing that TRAs actually want, and that is to be a woman, not a transwoman, but an actual woman whenever they feel like it.

A GRC sets them apart from women.
Biology sets them apart from women.
Gender neutral facilities set them apart from women.

This is why they don't want any of these things.

And I can only assume they want this because they believe they are better women than women are, after all we don't consistently perform femininity for example. And they resent the fact that sometimes women exclude men, have things men don't, do things men don't do.

Also, what "rights" would self-identification give genuinely trans people that they currently can't get through following the current GRA procedures? I'm genuinely puzzled by this.

You're not the only one tbh. I don't get it either.

I have seen people, both here and elsewhere, say that this will be an amazing step forward for trans rights but I still haven't got a clue how. I have asked (and seen other people asking) how it will be a step forward and what rights it will bring us that we currently don't have but always fail to get an answer.

One of my main concerns is that if it does go ahead then all mental health support for people struggling with gender dysphoria will be taken away completely. I'm imagining a vulnerable young teenager who is clearly struggling being told to just start IDing as the opposite sex and that will magically make it all better when it is really not that simple.

JAPAB as always you are arguing against a position no-one holds.

Pretty much everyone on this thread has said repeatedly, here and on other threads, that we have no problem with people who are genuinely trans. We just want some means, in law, of distinguishing them from the sexual fetishists and violent men lying about being trans to gain access to women's space.

So, knowing that there are sexual fetishists and men who will lie out there, what would be your solution, JAPAB? How do you suggest we stop a repeat of the likes of Martin Ponting aka Jessica Winfield being placed in a women's prison? How do we prevent transwomen like Laurel Hubbard taking away places in national teams from female athletes? Or perhaps you're perfectly happy with them.

And were some of them filming people who did not want to be filmed perhaps?

I don't think anyone can reasonably expect not to be filmed while standing in a group, chanting loudly and waving plackards at the person with the camera - at Speakers Corner - just about the most public place in the country!

The guy who made a grab for the camera didn't want to be filmed though, obviously he wouldn't want his face to be recorded during an attempted mugging.

Some people pick their battles.

Yes, this man picked two battles that day, one with Maria and one with another woman, also much smaller than him, who was on his own side. I'm sure JAPAB has well thought out reasons why that was OK too.

JAPAB

I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Men hit women using a variety of different justifications?

So we need to focus on those justifications?

Actually, yes they probably would have found some other pretext for attacking women.

Some of them might have done. And in the here and now they are secretly glad that there is this opposition and that the majority of it comes from non-trans women, so they get to exercise their true heart's desire without having to admit that this is their real motive.

Anything is certainly possible. In the normal scheme of things though, making such assumptions and imputing such motives to a whole group, or a majority of it, would be called prejudice.

I see JAPAB has joined the long queue of men eager to find reasons why punching Maria was perfectly reasonable. No surprise there.

I didn't say it was perfectly reasonable. I just think in order for it to be "telling" why some people act one way in one situation but not another, you need the circumstances to be a close as possible and not leave out any factors that may have something to do with the difference.