M&S changing room policy

nolurkynolighty

I agree. Male violence is the root.

When I first came on the feminism board, there were a lot of threads about male violence.

I found it incredibly informative reading about the way it is framed.

I started to look around me to see how society views it.

And was utterly shocked. Not only the way it is celebrated in films, media, etc. But also the way it is very rarely called male violence just violence.

I experimented with my newspaper.

Over the course of a few weeks, I noted down how many articles were about violence.

On average there were about six or seven a day.

Almost all of them male violence.

But because the word male was never used, it just has this generic feeling that 'people' are violent.

Can you imagine if violent crimes were being committed by people who shared a characteristic, that wasn't their sex?

Headlines like six Sagittarians, this week alone, have violently attacked people.

Another Sagittarian annihilates their family. Sagittarian murdered their wife's lover.

Instead of which, the perception is that it's a Libran this week, a Capricorn next week a Gemini the following week.

Obviously, authorities are aware that violence is very gendered.

But it often comes as something of a shock to the general public to hear that perpetrators of sexually crime are 98% males and violent crime 90% males.

They hadn't realised it was quite that high, if they had ever thought about it at all. Especially other men. Women are far more clued up, because they have to be.

I really wish every time a report was written in the paper, they would hashtag it - #MaleViolence.

Or female violence when it's women. Because I'm fairly confident that it will be overwhelmingly one way.

And a push for public awareness would be incredibly useful in order to address it.

when it is highly likely

Speaking of scientific rigor...nope, sorry, you don't get to just claim that with no evidence. At least not if you expect anyone else to believe it.

Ereshkigal
Yes Debs, that would be exclusive male sex offender prisons. Pretty clear. They didn't "make up their own" data any more than anyone else who does a study does.

But those facilities don't house 100% sex offenders, as Datun pointed out

There is no official information published on the type of offences committed by TIM inmates. However, there are eight male prisons in England and Wales known to house only sex offenders (at least 98% of the population of those prisons)

They hold greater than 98% and no attempt was made to find out what that 2% represents, when it is highly likely the 2% exceptions to the population are the ones the study was trying to identify as trans prisoners are routinely housed in facilities with higher security to their crime level peers and in facilities that protect them from other inmates, you know the sort of facilities found in prisons that routinely house sex offenders. So with such obvious deficiencies in the analysis, the bias of the people performing the research the whole thing is rendered meaningless in terms of scientific rigour.

As for the Swedish study and me quoting the interview, I did also subsequently quote the study which supported the interview statement. But here it is again.

Crime rate
Transsexual individuals were at increased risk of being convicted for any crime or violent crime after sex reassignment (Table 2); this was, however, only significant in the group who underwent sex reassignment before 1989.

I feel like if no woman has ever shared those kinds of experiences with you it's a sign that the women around you don't trust you at all. And probably for good reason.

but the thing is EVERYBODY is vulnerable to male violence. men get killed, gay men get killed, trans identifying males get killed. safe physical spaces for women do not help any of these males and nor can they. they exist because overwhelmingly the perpetrators of violence are male. the actual problem that needs addressing is the problem of violent males, however they may identify. and yet soon the data collected about that problem will be obscured as some male crimes are recorded as being committed by females.

Angry attack kittens good point. I have the opposite problem, not that I mind. Countless women have come to me to disclose, often out of the blue. I’ve windered if I have some kind of Bat Signal. Obviously I expect it when I’m working on SV projects but it’s happened over coffee, in tutorials, in the queue for the loo...

Does anyone remember that horrible book that Katie Roiphe wrote about rape on US college campuses where she concluded that it must not be happening very often because nobody ever came to her and confided in her about being raped?

That's what these women remind me of, Roiphe blithely failing to realize that her complete lack of empathy for other women and obvious contempt for their feelings might have something to do with why none of them felt able to confide in her.

I would like to see an actual argument that backs up the need for self identification and also the assertion that transwomen are women means they are no different to women.

Perhaps Debs has one, if she can tear herself away from the cake.

I’m going to add here that I don’t know but I suspect that most of the noise about the poor law abiding trans people comes from those who haven’t themselves been subjected to the actions of a number of predators, in childhood and adulthood. I have, unfortunately. Like so many others. When will it be our turn to feel safe?

Yes. It's such empathy free virtue signalling bullshit

In leau of that data they went away and made up their own and built a house of cards on a bunch of assumptions on the prison population and types of prisons they are housed in.

Yes Debs, that would be exclusive male sex offender prisons. Pretty clear. They didn't "make up their own" data any more than anyone else who does a study does.

I would like to see an actual argument that backs up the need for self identification and also the assertion that transwomen are women means they are no different to women.

Because, it's generally about claiming that transwomen are vulnerable and to have compassion for them.

And if you don't agree, you can suck my dick and die in a fire.

How about gun laws? Should we allow everyone to buy guns over the counter with no licence etc so as not to penalise those who just want to do legal target practice?

I’m going to add here that I don’t know but I suspect that most of the noise about the poor law abiding trans people comes from those who haven’t themselves been subjected to the actions of a number of predators, in childhood and adulthood. I have, unfortunately. Like so many others. When will it be our turn to feel safe?

Interesting. ”law abiding trans people” shouldn’t have to suffer for those who already have access to victims? So safeguarding in schools, which keeps “law abiding parents” at bay because of the minority who also, I imagine, already have access to victims should be shelved? I don’t hear any parents complaining that their freedom is unnecessarily curtailed. Is that because the understand 1. How sex offenders operate. 2. That safety comes first. ?

Debbie6666

In leau of that data they went away and made up their own and built a house of cards on a bunch of assumptions on the prison population and types of prisons they are housed in.

They didn't make up any data. They reported the data that they found in the inspection reports.

Along with information that was not contained in them. They were forensically accurate about what was wasn't available in order to draw a conclusion.

Eg whilst DV is not something to be ignored it is also not something that has any bearing on public safety in public spaces and given the made up data is supposedly showing a concern with the more serious crimes,

The only concern is to be able to effectively dispute the assertion that transwomen, by identifying as female, somehow have female pattern violence.

I'm sure you didn't mean to imply that's a man convicted of domestic violence is somehow both displaying female pattern violence and is not a threat to any other woman because he doesn't know them.

Do you really think people are bothering to spend all this time so they can go ner, ner?

Every few weeks there is another trans-identified male in the paper committing a crime that is wholly outside the normal female criminal pattern. And people, personally, have experienced male pattern aggression, intimidation and threats. It's everywhere online.

But transactivists will still say no, prove it! Which, given the small number of actual trans people, is difficult. The information is not being officially recorded.

Where it is being recorded it backs up exactly what I said.

"A similar observation has been published using official prison data and by interviewing transgender inmates in Californian prisons in the US. From a male prison population of approximately 130,000 men, a total of 298 TIMs were identified. Sixty-eight of these were sex offenders (20.5%). This was higher than the average rate of sex offenders in prison among all male inmates (14.6%). Similarly, the proportion of TIMs in maximum-security prisons (custody level 4) was higher than the average rate for all male prisoners (32.1 vs 22.8%)."

From the Uk:

There is no official information published on the type of offences committed by TIM inmates. However, there are eight male prisons in England and Wales known to house only sex offenders (at least 98% of the population of those prisons). A total of 46 TIMs were identified in these sex-offender prisons (Figure 7, dark blue). This represents almost half of all TIMs currently housed in the male prison estate.*

There is little studying being done about this, but one study that has been completed claims:

"The incidence of transvestism in sexual offenders, however, has been found to be very much higher. In a study of over 500 sex offenders, it was observed that over half exhibited transsexualism and/or cross-dressing as their primary paraphilia."

At the other end of the scale any rational person can see that it would make far more sense for a voyeur to get a job as a janitor than commit perjury with a false statutory declarations and the upheaval and difficulties in their daily life to change their primary identity documentation to the opposite sex to give them very little advantage in practising their voyeurism.

You're kidding, right? A stat dec is based only on what the person says. There is no test for transgenderism. It's not identifiable, nor verifiable by any objective means. It's entirely subjective.

Predators spend literally years grooming their victims. They will go into healthcare, scout leading, the clergy, teaching. All to gain access to their victims.

But yeah, filling out a form would be too difficult and an upheaval.

Debbie6666

We have at least four trans people posting on these boards, who are aghast that transactivism is campaigning for self ID in their name.

No one, other than transactivists are seeing the benefit to it. Because it's so easily exploitable.

Neither do many transpeople agree with the direction the transwomen are women assertion is going. Women's sports, all women shortlist, twits making a point of trying to change fitting room policies, Hampstead heath women's pond, targeting businesses, claiming biology is exclusionary, etc.

We shouldn't have to keep rebutting the claims that men who identify as women are the same as women.

I will post the analysis to the Swedish study, once I have it. But in the meantime, anyone can read the reports about transwomen in prison in the link below.

fairplayforwomen.com/?s=Prisons&submit=Search

(Offers LangCleg napkins)

But Haddock, that never happens! And wouldn't happen, because sensible people would make sure the policies were applied in a sensible way!

BTW, if the next argument is going to be that those men weren't truly trans - doesn't matter when neither law nor corporate policy makes a distinction between the two, which is exactly what radfems have been saying for years.

it's DARVO time at the cake icing house

Thanks, Kittens, for a messy keyboard! (Just spat my cup of tea all over it.)

I would like to add that really is a complete pain in the arse for women to have to constantly refute, what most people can see with their own eyes

Datun that post was superb. And so is your patient, relentless advocacy for women's safety.

Debbie, do you think the study you refer to might actually reflect a rather different population than the new crop of self-identifying autogynephilic TIMs?

womanmeanssomething.com/1034-2/

A study analysing the impact of gender neutral changing in Target in the US found a tripling of sexual offences against women and children. All committed by men of course.

It’s exactly the same in mixed changing in pools in the UK. I’m not okay with increasing access to creepy perverts and I’m surprised anyone else is either.

Debbie - your quote on male pattern criminality comes from an interview in transadvocate with one of the people who did the original study. Not from the study itself, and the data is not available on the study to prove or disprove her assertion. I've always found it very strange that the data must exist, and the study is available, and yet this note is only made in an interview, and with no supporting evidence.

the interview

the study

People can read both and decide for themselves.

They should also consider the over-representation in the UK prison population of transwomen as sexual offenders, and the fact that the Swedish study was of transexuals, not of self-id transwomen.

It’s due to shops not wanting to pay for a third choice

So I point out that we don't need the Dhejne study because we can see there's a problem just looking at the UK and your response it to try to shift the focus back to the study again? Keep those goalposts dancing!

The expectations that people use the facilities designated for their biological sex and that women and girls have access to facilities where they don't have to get undressed in front of male people are not "sanctions". You can get as dramatic as you like with comments like "house of cards" but it's not going to wash away that underlying issue.

Self-Id is bad for everyone except autogynephiles and chancers and the exemptions in the Equalities act should of course be applied, but as we can see from what happened with the prisoner who the Guardian were stumping to have moved to a women's prison even without an official, legally binding move to self-ID there's already a problem and a rollback is needed. Your perspective may be that the prisoner in question is in a different demographic to your friends and I would most likely agree, but the problem is that right now neither trans activists nor the government/other official bodies/large corporations are making that distinction. If that's where you think the line should lie (people with documented dysphoria in, AGPs out) then go work on that instead of scolding women on mumsnet about how mean they're being, because right now all you're doing is contributing to the resentment that's already building toward trans activism among many women.

AngryAttackKittens

Except we don't know that at all. What we have is a bunch of non scientific and biased people who have tried to move the goal posts to the halfway line by misrepresenting Dhejne and had it pointed out to them where the goal actually was. So in response they have now tried to make a new goal from the UK prison system and been told there is no data. In leau of that data they went away and made up their own and built a house of cards on a bunch of assumptions on the prison population and types of prisons they are housed in.

Even if you accept their house of cards we still have no data on the actual circumstances of the crimes and how it relates to the general trans population and access to public facilities. Eg whilst DV is not something to be ignored it is also not something that has any bearing on public safety in public spaces and given the made up data is supposedly showing a concern with the more serious crimes, Crimes which typically occur between people who are previously known to each other, it further shows that self ID will likely have little effect on the opportunities or occurrences.

As such it is not appropriate to subject the vast majority of law abiding trans people to sanctions due to a minority of questionable characters who already have victims and opportunity. At the other end of the scale any rational person can see that it would make far more sense for a voyeur to get a job as a janitor than commit perjury with a false statutory declarations and the upheaval and difficulties in their daily life to change their primary identity documentation to the opposite sex to give them very little advantage in practising their voyeurism.

If however you want to limit the discussion on the impact of self ID on the prison population then it would seem reasonable to maintain the current approach which makes use of exceptions in the EA and GRA for treating trans prisoner transfers on a case by case basis with or without a GRC and unlike the Worboys parole case where the government is left floundering there is actual law which would allow the secretory of state to step in an revoke a GRC and prevent a transfer.

Likewise it would also seem reasonable to collect crime stats such that trans crime both pre and post medical transition is recorded and taken into account in the overall population crime stats and it would seem more productive to campaign for this than against self ID in its entirety.

But I am sorry my challenge was to the repeated statement that trans women commit crime at the same rate as the male population and the fact is there is no unbiased scientific study that supports the claim as presented.

Indeed i was led to the Swedish study from similar claims Datun makes which were on gendertrender only to find the study not actually supporting those claims in the way they were presented.

Of course none of this is relevant to a trans MAN being denied access to the mens facilities in M&S and again the anti trans movement ignores trans men and turns the debate onto trans women.