Can you all just lay off trans people

larrygrylls, that is comparable with trans abled people who want a limb amputated which is clearly a mental illness. Transgender identified people reject the idea that they are mentally ill and have had the description of their condition changed to a medical condition. That way they can get the treatment they want instead of the treatment they need.

Either gender identity is one's soul, in which case it is a religious belief and should not be legislated for unless you are arguing for a theocracy.

It's not a theocracy I'm arguing for, it's a tolerant society. One where, even if the majority are totally sure God does not exist, everyone agrees that it's not okay to repeatedly call Catholics deluded as if it's a known fact and it's not okay to refuse to consider their specific needs as Catholics on the grounds that "God does not exist". (FWIW I know this is not a perfect analogy.)

Sex, on the other hand, is a clearly demarcated material reality around which sound laws can be written where necessary.

Laws are indeed written around biological sex, where it is relevant to do. Human rights include the rights to personal and religious expression. These things are also taken into account in law.

Just maybe punishing instead of glorifying male violence might make trans identified males safer in males spaces although there has been no evidence that they are not safe in males spaces. The argument seems to be that they are afraid therefore they are entitled to use the space that suits them.

Pencils,

The reality, though, is that you don't experience having an arm or a leg. It is just 'there'. It is only amputees who have these strong feelings of something missing.

Rat's point is that transgender people might be like amputees; they can feel and miss the bit of them that should be there but is not.

I have no idea whether this is true but the fact that, for most of us, our sexes and genders line up, is not evidence to refute it, any more than those of us with arms can tell amputees that there is no feeling to having an arm.

"What does matter is not which of us is correct. What does matter is that the UK is not a theocracy and we do not legislate for religious belief."

Awesome post Lang.

Totally had it with being told that I have to believe in other people's beliefs and worse, that it will be legislated that they are true.

If you read the religious thread on AIBU you will get many people saying that people are stupid for believing in 'sky fairies'.

However, in all the studies in theology and philosophy since time immemorial, not one has been able to definitively prove OR disprove that God exists. There have been good attempts certainly, but holes can be picked in all of them.

But we are past the stage of calling people heretics and burning them at the stake for non believing. All good

Now we are being told that we have to believe something is true, because it is a feeling in a man's head, when actually there are solid scientific and logical arguments that it is a steaming pile of of horseshit.

You have to base laws aroundpeople's human rights- not to the excision of the human rights of others, of course

You say 'of course' but that is precisely the point. We cannot as a society give TRA's what they are clamouring for without screwing over women.

If you can see a way that everyone can be kept safe and happy, then we badly need to hear it (for me that's a third space for any gender when it comes to things like loos).

Great post Barracker

This seems to me to be the problem; if your sex, your innate gender and the social expectations of you all align you probably wouldn't notice anything at all! If you don't subscribe to gender expectations, you probably notice that, but if your sex and gender align you probably won't have cause to remark upon your innate gender.

Do you experience gender as an internal mental reality, Rat? Can you say how you know you're a woman without reference to socially constructed gender or to your physical body?

It seems like you are extrapolating wildly from a sense a tiny number of people have that their body is 'wrong', and concluding that the rest of us must all therefore have a sense of gender that aligns with our sex. I'm not buying it. I think it's far more likely that gender dysphoria is a type of mental distress characterised by a strong but mistaken belief at odds with material reality. A bit like anorexia or BIID.

you can't force everyone to be religious but you can't ban religion!

What's happening at the moment is exactly like forcing everyone to be religious.

You have to base laws around people's human rights - not to the excision of the human rights of others, of course, but there has to be compromise. You can't just say "transwomen are men, you get nothing".

What human rights don't trans people have? What do you mean by 'compromise'? That usually means give and take on both sides. What's actually happening is one side doing all the taking and the other being expected to suck it up.

Transwomen ARE men and to assert that we are not allowed to say that is an excellent example of the point above. God does not exist. Transwomen are men. Only one of these statements will get me in trouble these days.

Transwomen being men doesn't mean they 'get nothing', they get exactly the same rights as any other men. If this doesn't suit them then they need to come up with solutions that don't shit all over women. I'll support them in that but I'm not doing it for them.

The fundamental right that transgender ideology wants to claim is the right to claim

"I am like THEM".

Where THEY are DENIED the right to prove this claim false.

Gender can only exist if you forcibly impose it on OTHERS and deny them the right to refute it.

This isn't an ideology of self expression.
It's an ideology of labelling and controlling OTHERS.
Women are the others.
Men are doing the labelling.
Against all evidence they are categorising OTHERS in a way that denies reality.

Who is the hardest backlash falling upon?
Women who say they don't have this gender.
Why would we be the prime target? Why target 'terfs' if we are relatively powerless, unrepresentative, not in any way a physical threat?

Because it is our idea that presents the threat. The idea that women don't really have gender, that it isn't real. It is the idea they are scared might spread.

Transgenderism ceases to exist if women are allowed to reject that THEY possess an internal gender type. This isn't about transgender people. They are just the pawns with which a different aim can be achieved. This is about controlling women.

I think it always has been.

This seems to me to be the problem; if your sex, your innate gender and the social expectations of you all align you probably wouldn't notice anything at all!

Is there anyone for whom this is true? I think it is not likely.
Mainly because the social expectations of women are unrealistic and impossible to comply with at all times.

You can't just say "transwomen are men, you get nothing".

No one is saying that.
We are saying make 3 spaces and services but you dont like that solution for some reason.

Don't worry about responding to me, Rat. You can have a religious belief in the soul if you like. I'm not stopping you. You can use that religious belief to convince you that gender identity is real if you like and thus believe that transwomen are women if you like.

I can not believe if I like and I do like. I do not believe.

Neither of us can prove it because dualism is the religious belief or atheist disbelief in the human soul.

What does matter is not which of us is correct. What does matter is that the UK is not a theocracy and we do not legislate for religious belief.

Gotta make tea Lang, will be back

Whilst I could (and happily would!) debate your earlier points all day I will skip straight to the following so as to avoid confusing the matter...

You could have saved a lot of time by simply saying 'I believe in gender as an internal mental reality' and not trying to bounce off this article at all.

Undoubtedly this article is not the best place to start, but it's the place i started to realise the difference between the majority position on these boards and my own. Hence my using it; it's certainly past any usefulness now though, I agree.

Personally I don't believe in gender in that sense. I don't experience it myself and have never heard a convincing description that didn't rely on gender stereotypes or reference the physical sexed body. I'm happy to accept that other people might experience an internal sense of gender in some indescribable way, just as some people have a deep sense that god exists.

This seems to me to be the problem; if your sex, your innate gender and the social expectations of you all align you probably wouldn't notice anything at all! If you don't subscribe to gender expectations, you probably notice that, but if your sex and gender align you probably won't have cause to remark upon your innate gender.

But as with all of these things I'm not prepared to write-off the hundreds of thousands of people who are saying it is real. I believe that, if nothing else, it is real for them and whilst they should not impose their reality on me I should not impose my reality on them. It's a question of tolerance; much like you say about religion. You have to allow people as best you can to live in such a way as reflects their reality; you can't force everyone to be religious but you can't ban religion!

It's not reasonable though to insist that everybody else believes in it too, or to base laws around something so subjective.

You have to base laws around people's human rights - not to the excision of the human rights of others, of course, but there has to be compromise. You can't just say "transwomen are men, you get nothing".

FWIW I don't think the GRA strikes the right balance, although I'm not saying I know what "the right balance" is.

What an absolutely brilliant thread! It has a bit of everything: comedy, pathos, philosophy, drama... Top marks everyone!

As you were

RatRolyPoly

It really is that simple.

Either gender identity is one's soul, in which case it is a religious belief and should not be legislated for unless you are arguing for a theocracy.

Or it is one's personality, in which case the UK has 65 million of them which cannot be realistically legislated for.

That's all dualism is/isn't.

Sex, on the other hand, is a clearly demarcated material reality around which sound laws can be written where necessary.

Italiangreyhound - Does that agree with your statements? Yes

RatRolyPoly if you want to argue for gender as something within the mind, separate from socially constructed gender, this article is probably not the best place to start.

I don't think that's right; social constructs are recognisable phenoma, they do not "exist within minds" in any sense other than that we know about them! Social constructs are external phenomena.

They are invented by minds (many minds, collectively) and if you remove people (minds) from the situation, social constructs cease to function. As the author says, Another way to test if something is a social construct is to remove people from the picture entirely and see if it retains its functionality. Without people to give a dollar meaning it simply becomes paper.

The word "money" refers to both the physical object AND the social construct.
The word gender refers to both the social construct AND the state within the mind.

This is muddled. As I said, if you want to argue for gender being a state of mind, this article and the examples it uses are not the best place to start. I would maybe say:

The word "money" refers to both the physical object AND the social construct.
(yet taken out of a context where it is legal tender, the dollar bill is no longer money but simply a piece of paper)

The word gender refers to both the physical trappings AND the social construct.
(yet taken out of a context where a giant lip plate signifies femininity, it becomes simply a giant lip plate)

The internal sense of one's gender gets it's reality from simply being real and present as an experience within the mind. As is the case with ALL things within the mind.

You could have saved a lot of time by simply saying 'I believe in gender as an internal mental reality' and not trying to bounce off this article at all.

Personally I don't believe in gender in that sense. I don't experience it myself and have never heard a convincing description that didn't rely on gender stereotypes or reference the physical sexed body. I'm happy to accept that other people might experience an internal sense of gender in some indescribable way, just as some people have a deep sense that god exists.

It's not reasonable though to insist that everybody else believes in it too, or to base laws around something so subjective.

Not RTFT did OP never post again?

"drops mic

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

That's the bestestestestest (and another est) bit of undeserved self-congratulation I've ever seen.

Thanks, OP, you've right cheered me up."

Written by Lily Madigan perhaps?

think and feel like a woman.

What does this mean? Genuinely asking. I am a woman, therefore surely however I think and feel is a way that a woman can think and feel. Is there a more woman-ish way to be thinking and feeling? And if there is, why is my woman brain not doing it automatically?

I wrote the above as my reply to OP, I now quickly skimmed the thread. A single OP and not returning once in 13 pages so far, but over 300 replies. Kudos OP.

"I read about a woman who had poly cystic ovaries and had a luxurious, thick beard and moustache as a result."

You have just compared trans women to a woman with a medical abnormality, implying trans women also suffer from medical abnormalities. I dare you to suggest that to trans activists and see what happens. Good luck to you if you do.

I am all woman though, much more than woman than every single feminist that I have met

This means: i perform femininity better than every single feminist I have ever met.

Pp, you are talking about gender, not sex. Feminists are less likely to be interested in performing stereotyped gender roles (which of course you can do more or less well) and more likely to think of a woman as someone who is female, full stop.

Lol Beyond

The difference would of course come if that tree were a conscious being and TOLD you it was a woman

Ugh, it's so unhelpful that we only have our existing lexicon to discuss this. We need two different words for gender and other gender-related terms. Oh well, the reality always comes before the words, I'm sure things will catch up.