DEBATE NOT HATE: WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT GENDER

I agree. But as a compromise, if women's (female) rights, spaces, scholarships etc are safeguarded, I'd be ok with it.

Why should gender identity be a protected characteristic though? It’s entirely subjective and objectively meaningless.

Yes, I'd support that. As long as woman = female.

I have been abused in the street, propositioned and sexually assaulted more since transition. A man held out the possibility of a job I wanted, but he only wanted sex, and would not take no for an answer. I think such experiences would be worse if they started when I was 13. I don't deny any of this. I don't think the answer is to prevent transition, though. Possibly extending Equality Act protected characteristic status to non-binary, while maintaining women's space for women, would improve matters.

It's nice that you are so cavalier with women's boundaries and safety Clare. Some people are walking on eggshells around you here, but you really appear to me as self absorbed as most other transactivists. Appreciate the willingness to dialogue but I don't really think you're making much effort to understand from our perspective.

Ponting or Whitfield is now in segregation. The BBC said there are about eighty trans prisoners. Whitfield had psychological assessment and some treatment, but not genital surgery. I don't know what to do about prisoners. I read of male staff coercing women prisoners into sex. I don't think the possibility of having a trans woman prisoner transferred there is the biggest threat to women in prison or the biggest scandal about women's prisons.

So we're back we started. Transitioning helps alleviate symptoms of gender dysphoria. Everyone understands that.

The consensus is gender dysphoria is exacerbated, if not caused, by strict gender stereotyping. Got it.

Transitioning and claiming you are the opposite sex reinforces gender stereotypes.

Clare I do not agree with your assertion, nor do I share your confidence, that men will not exploit this law. They are doing so already, in droves.

Do you seriously think that every predator, rapist, paedophile in the country wouldn't merely say they are trans? Paedophiles spend literally years on targeting victims. They wouldn't have to do anything. They wouldn't have to dress differently, act differently.

Every time a man commits a crime, he is taking a risk. He is risking arrest, conviction and incarceration. Every single time. These people are not risk averse.

The men who hit Maria at speakers corner looks exactly like young male thugs. Claiming they are women.

Do you really not think these people are salivating at the chance to intimidate women everywhere.

It takes a very specific outlook to not see this from a female point of view. And that outlook is male.

Women get harassed, intimidated, groped all the time. In public, on trains. Women are ejaculated on, for heaven's sake. We get followed by creeps into bathrooms all the time. But at least, at the moment, we can object.

If this goes ahead, it will very swiftly become completely commonplace for men to enter women's spaces. It will just be accepted.

I'm sure you don't want to do any of the things I mentioned. But it's profoundly frustrating when, just because you don't, you think no one else will.

And yes, men are being transferred to women's prisons. Martin Ponting just recently is the latest.

Women's sport will be pointless.

The word woman has no definition. How can women fight for sex protections and rights when the word woman now includes men?

When crimes committed by men are being recorded as being committed by women?

No one fails to understand your reasons for transitioning. Given our gendered society.

But changing the law to eliminate the biological categories of men and women is devastating to women.

Clare I agree with a lot of what you say about gender, I think it is harmful to both sexes and puts people in boxes they do not wish to be in.

You say that you believe a world without gender would be the best situation so that people can present however they wish without discrimination. I agree with this too.

Where I disagree is how to reach that point, I believe that the GRA, rather than freeing people from gender, actually enshrines gender, implying that if you don't fit the man both then you must be a woman and should erase your history and change your paperwork to hide any evidence that you were otherwise. I find this really sinister; this isn't accepting people how they are. I think it is fine to be trans and you shouldn't have to hide this fact away like it's some dirty secret.

I believe people should be free to present how they wish however they were born. I think the best way to do this is to have laws to protect gender non-conforming people in all shapes and forms not by denying people's history's.

I also think we need to have the language to talk about the things that happen to females because they are female - nothing to do with identity. Female infants killed at birth, girls who die in menstruation sheds, who are denied an education, who have their clitoris' cut off, who are forced to give birth, lose jobs because they are pregnant, don't get jobs because they could possibly become pregnant.....
We need to have unambiguous words that describe these people as a class to be able to name the problems. Biology and its effects isn't something females can identify out of in most situations.

Oh and don't forget the prison service flagging up the huge number of applications for transition that hugely disproportionately represent serious sexual offenders.

It may be your genuinely held belief that only men who are trans will want to self ID, but people who work in Rape Crisis and domestic violence know that men will go to extreme lengths to get access.

On Self ID. The consultation has not started.

I heard of a prisoner who claimed to be trans so that his searches had to be conducted by women prison officers, to whom he was offensive. I consider he should be disciplined for that. He was not in a women's prison, though.

Generally I feel that only people who transition will seek a gender recognition certificate. Why would anyone else want one? The claimant would still self-certify: I had to have my GP and my psychiatrist say that I had transitioned, and was likely to remain expressing myself female for the rest of my life, but claimants under streamlined rules would have to assert that themselves. I provided wage slips as proof of having used my female name at work for two years. Society can still be protected from people pretending to be trans without the intrusive and expensive medical certification.

I'm not saying you have any reason, or are malicious at all Clare - just signposting it it general.

Your blogging setup might be that way, but I work with sites that log everything (in fact we use advanced geolocation on some of them - although you're notified of that and would be able to opt out - although then wouldn't be allowed to use the site) and I would know where you were down to your street!

People forget that the internet isn't as anonymous as it might seem.

Where do we actually disagree Clare?

Gender is bad, dysphoria is bad...

... I just don't want any man to gain access to women's spaces without some gatekeeping. (Not to mention sport etc).

The self Id law seems to lead to this.

Surely you can see this could be abused & leaves women with no recourse?

Or are you not supportive of the self Id law? What you've said so far would suggest you manage within current law & that's ok? Or have I misunderstood?

Yes I have a blog! Though it is mainly for trans women, so it would not attract most people here. I have better places to advertise it.

As I understand it, I only get your IP address if you comment on my blog. I have no wish to search you out.

This might be a wild stab in the dark, but do you have a blog you want to advertise?

Snort!

I will also mention that if you follow links to someone's blog, then assuming that like most of us you don't use a VPN, your location via IP Geolocation has now been given to that blog owner - sometimes as accurately as the street depending on what other data they have access to.

I'm not full tin foil hat, but it is an issue to be considered, especially given some TAs have the skills and patience for the long game, and others are definitely violent.

This might be a wild stab in the dark, but do you have a blog you want to advertise?

@Datun

Why bother with surgery? Oh, God...

Because I wanted it, more than anything else in the World. My happiest memory is sitting in the psychiatrist's office when he recommended it. I use my blog to thrash these ideas out in my mind:

Possibly because there was the concept of the real transsexual, in 2003- wanting surgery was part of that. That would be social pressure. Perversely, talking of "autogynephiliac men" may pressure some people into surgery, as proof we are not just perverts.
clareflourish.wordpress.com/2017/07/10/social-pressure-transsexual-transition/

Possibly because symbols matter, and people conflate symbols with reality. The real thing about gender which matters is the human interactions, treating someone with respect or not, but a lot of gender is about the symbols- nail varnish, short hair, whatever- we use to communicate. clareflourish.wordpress.com/2017/09/19/symbols-and-reality/

Possibly even because it is a short cut (oops) for the doctors. We get to the gender clinic knowing what we want, after waiting for years. We are following a path. They don't spend much time on us. clareflourish.wordpress.com/2017/09/22/transgender-medical-care/

"Chest masculinisation surgery" has the great advantage that men will look you in the eyes. It is not a price everyone is willing to pay, but some are.

Datun, I can't speak for clare, but I've just had this question answered by a friend who is a trans man. He says that he has suffered from severe body dysphoria all his life. Since he began socially presenting as masculine, he finds that the dysphoria has eased, and he has achieved something approaching an equilibrium. So for him, the dysphoria is very much about how he is perceived. He says that, if he had a consistent social circle, this might have been enough. However, his work involves lots of travelling within the UK and meeting new people, and despite his best efforts at introducing himself beforehand, he finds he is constantly 'misgendered' - read as female - and this throws his equilibrium off again. So now he wants to use T to enable him to grow facial hair and deepen his voice, to make this less likely to happen. (His body shape means that top surgery isn't necessary, as he also seriously restricts his food intake to keep a flat chest area.)

So in his case it isn't a question of hostile/negative reactions per se, although those things definitely do happen to him. But it's also a question of reactions that aren't deliberately hostile. He experiences the word 'she' as deeply traumatic.

This is exactly the type of person who I worry will be actively harmed by the current transactivist dogma. He is a gentle soul who just wants to live his life. Presentation and perception are all-important to him. I can't imagine him shouting about his 'male cunt'. I can fully understand why, in our gendered society, he suffers from this hideous dysphoria, as part of his wider MH issues. For example, he suffered terrible abuse pre-transition, when he was a masc-presenting lesbian. I wish him all the best in finding peace with himself, but the root of his situation is not that he is really a man who is inappropriately being perceived as a woman. It's the fact that he hates his natural body and wants people to think he has a different type of body, and is terribly distressed when his efforts are not successful.

It also to my mind illustrates the need for trans-specific spaces. If the TAs get their way, and any self-declared woman, regardless of presentation (and presentation is all-important to my friend) can enter spaces that were set aside for biological woman to counteract biology-based oppression - what good will that do him? The fundamental issue is male violence, and he will be no safer from that than ever he was. Nor will any woman, trans or biological, because all spaces will be open to all men.

clare

The other question I have is this. If it's all about gender roles, as you say, and a need to express ourselves without incurring negative reactions from other people, why bother with surgery?

(Just as an aside, this is really showing me how much the waters are muddied in this discussion by deliberately slippery semantics and concepts being twisted by extremists. I appreciate Clare and her willingness to engage.)

And frankly, the debate in Brighton, which I attended, said pretty much everything you have said about gender.

The only other part was where women disagree that you can change sex and that male people should be given female rights and access to women. Is that the bit you find repressive?

There was also a whole section on children. Again, you would have agreed with a lot of it.

I want moderates to cautiously reach out to each other and build trust. Can we reduce fear? Can we lower the temperature?

Great! Good plan. What might that look like? What compromises might be a good starting point to work from? What achievements would you most like to see?

clare

How can we reduce fear and lower the temperature, if you view any debate as repressive?

I understand, totally, that you think violence is wrong.

But you saying that on here isn't going to make the slightest bit of difference.

Transwomen like you really need to stand up and say not in my name.

You need to get behind women for a third space option for people who are trans.

I understand that you disagree with the violence and threats, but unless you support women, you are still part of the problem.

I didn’t mean to shout at you ; )

Oh ffs! My formatting gremlins are having a field day.