Passing privilege

I actually had this conversation with DP last night. He asked me to explain radical feminism, so I did, and his response was "So what are men supposed to be? What does feminism want men to do?"

I said, "In answer to the second question, stop killing two women a week in the UK would be a jolly good start. In answer to the first, feminism has nothing at all to say about what men are supposed to be. You'll have to figure that one out yourselves. Good luck starting a new mens movement based on humble self assessment and personal growth. I shall look forward to the results of your extensive labour in a couple of decades. In the meantime, do remember to knock the whole violence towards women thing firmly on the head, eh?"

I've no issue with trans people of either sex being in my changing room, but I just know they probably don't want to be there and many men won't feel the same as me

That's a problem right enough, but it's not our problem. Men and transwomen need to sort this out amongst yourselves, not come barging into sex-segregated spaces needed by women for our safety, privacy, dignity, representation and ability to engage in public life.

Apologies if I've come across a bit bullish, I'm just a direct person. That said, the term 'mansplaining' is to me a very reductive term which I often see used to shut down debate. Any time a man gives an opinion the 'mansplaining' accusation can be thrown and it's tiresome.

I've not said anywhere that I believe I'm right or implied I'm educating you all/explaining how it is. It's a bit like calling an assertive woman 'bossy' IMO - lazy stereotyping.

I've no issue with trans people of either sex being in my changing room, but I just know they probably don't want to be there and many men won't feel the same as me.

The idea is to make a challenge impossible. Walking into a women’s only space is an act of self iding as a woman. So if you approach a man in a women’s restroom to challenge them that would be transphobic by virtue of the implicit self id of yh bring in there in the first place.

Ah Mr Reasonable is back in town. I'll text Lundy and let him know.

I suspect most of us as 'young' people - the 18-24 age group as it's often polled - would have been far 'cooler' about bodily privacy and everything else. Sexism, how ingrained it is and how disadvantaged women are by it is something that doesn't sink into the average woman until after they've passed out of the university environment and often not until they hit the reality of pregnancy, child bearing, child raising, dealing with a work place, rack up their endless experiences of harassment, sexual assault, violent and abusive men via themselves, their friends, their families, their kids' friends -

I think I was probably mid thirties and post my first pregnancy before it really started to occur properly to me. I've heard many women here share the same experience.

So a lot of these 'cool kids' with XX chromosomes currently being polled may very well not hold onto these views into later life, as their experience racks up. And right now, the experience of all women is racking up very fast, very high, on a daily basis, and so is their sharing of information.

As always, I am reminded that I have a solid list of articulate, funny and intelligent MNers that I want to be just like when I grow up

Funny how men feel they are feminist allies and then don't like it when they are roundly told that being an ally doesn't mean marching in and telling us all what we should do. Sit down, shut up and listen - you might learn something.

Jaw continually dropping in this thread. How is it possible that men can be so totally confident in pompously pontificating on things they clearly don't understand? Mansplaining is a really heady drug for these dudes.

Apartheid? Women should accept trans feminine people into their spaces because more women than men are comfortable with feminine presentation? 'I have a right to be here'?

Mate, how do you manage to function with that scant amount of self-awareness?!

There's nothing to stop you posting, Jnr, as long as you observe talk guidelines.

However it perhaps hasn't crossed your entitled mind that Feminism Chat endures a constant trickle of men like you telling us what we're doing wrong. We tend to employ them (and you) to illustrate the points we're making for the huge number of lurkers we know are here. So you become a sort of teaching aid.

If you're OK with that and don't mind being as welcome as a fart in a lift, then fill your boots.

It just keeps coming back to the total lack of awareness so many males seem to have of the physical, real-world actuality of being female, doesn't it?

It's really interesting to see in action the complete lack of understanding of the implications of physical sexual differences that someone like Scott manifests.

Using the analogy of 'black people commit more crime, so....' The problem with this analogy is that it is perfectly possible to imagine a different geohistorical situation that might have led to it being white people who commit more crime. Because one 'race' committing more crime than another is always something that is down to social circumstances. And indeed, in some for example rural communities, it could well actually be the case that whites are committing more crime.

Whereas men in any social environment are always significantly bigger and stronger than women, are always massively more liable to sexually attack women than women are to attack them, and are capable of impregnating women against their will. It doesn't matter what social situation or historical circumstances are involved. Which is why in all civilised societies, the need for separate spaces for women and girls in certain circumstances is recognised.

We're not stopping you posting Scott, we're pointing out that you have muscled into our discussion to tell us how you think we should conduct ourselves with respect to a situation that you don't know very much about.

You have a right to your opinion, but you have given us no reason to respect it.

Scott, I'm glad the penny has finally dropped. I get your concern for early transitioning TS, I share that. The problem is, you can't pick and choose which transpeople you're defending on this issue, because the transactivists have overreached into women's rights and there's no going back if/when self-ID happens. You're standing shoulder-to-shoulder with people like the bandwidth man and the extreme porn advocate Jane Fae. Are you ok with that? What about the Karen Whites who aren't in prison? The Labour women's officer who is telling people to "suck her big lady cock"?

It's a public forum. I've as much right to be here as you.

No, it's a public forum in which you have the ability to post, but courtesy dictates that you shouldn't.

That statement is pretty revealing. Upon being told in a feminist space that women would prefer you didn't post, your response is to say that you have a right to be here. You're equating 'ability to post' with 'welcome your presence'.

Mostly, they intrude in our conversations - rather like you're doing here, dear

It's a public forum. I've as much right to be here as you.

Midgebabe, I guess I'm probably thinking of what you'd call 'old school transexuals'. I've googled some of the names mentioned one here and they're certainly not what I had in mind! I do feel sorry however for those who genuinely just want to keep their heads down and live 'as women'. They seem a far cry from that dude with a beard that talks about 'widening the bandwidth of what it is to be a woman' etc.

Thank you ResistanceIsNecessary. Well said. There's another FWR thread just started about another fucking idiot dude telling women off. He's even provided a picture.

Sweet jumping Jesus I am so fed up of woke dudebros carefully mansplaining why it's important that women bow down to gender feelz and show understanding and compassion.

If you weren't born, raised and socialised as female then you have NO IDEA what it feels like to be constantly on your guard when you're alone - when outside, when travelling, when on the bus, when walking to the sarnie shop to get your lunch, when sitting in the library...pick a situation. Comments, stares, invasion of space, "accidental" brushes through to cornering and full on groping.

And now, on one of the few places online where women can actually talk about this shit, a man has taken it upon himself to explain that he really doesn't think that it's that big of a deal and that the younger generation are leading the way in showing their understanding.

How many times were you sexually assaulted by the time you were 21? No more. You don't get to tell me that my EXPERIENCE of male violence, entitlement and minimising is invalid.

Go on, fuck off. Just. Fuck. Off.

@ScottCheggJnr in order to see why women feel uncomfortable with sharing single sex spaces with self id trans women you don’t need to imagine that the trans women are black, or that they are alien, you simply need to think of them as what they are, men.

Do you understand why, once aged 8 or over, male children can no longer get changed in the women’s changing rooms? Do you understand why men aren’t currently allowed into ladies loos and changing rooms? Why they aren’t allowed into women’s refuges? Why we might ask that it’s not a man carrying out a smear exam? You must do, because you already seem to understand that trans women won’t want to get changed in the same room as the football team.

So as Stonewall have given us a figure of 500,000 as the likely number of men who would like to self id as women and use our facilities (which based on current population is roughly 1 in 65 men) how unlikely do you actually think it is that we will come face to face ( or face to penis) with a man in a space we expect to be for people without a penis?

Do you understand that if this goes ahead that the only difference to a man in the football team getting changed in the men’s or women’s changing room is just his decision that he wants to?

So why the concern for transwomen having to use men's rooms?

Could it be that this is all really about the need to save men and transwomen from the embarrassment of having to acknowledge a fundamental breakdown in the collective performance of masculinity? Or something?

Male opinions welcome, especially if they are insightful and not racist

What I find curious is the dismissive notion that these things would be unlikely to happen. So why the concern for transwomen having to use men's rooms?

This.

The deliberately obtuse gain what from these threads?

Scott what did you hope to gain from coming here and telling us women that you don't think trans women are men, so shouldn't be in your spaces?
I can't understand why that would be, unless you agree that men as a group are a risk to women? And if men are a risk to women, why should we accept anatomically unaltered men into women's spaces?
I'm guessing you can't even conceive of the awkwardness of sitting in a toilet stall with a visibly Male person in the stall next to you, trying to change your pad/tampon.
Or lying in a hospital bed, with a trans woman next to you, while you try to get to sleep, wondering if they're safe to be unconscious near.
Or going for your smear test, to find the nurse administering it is a trans woman, as they ratchet the speculum open.
FFS.

The onus is on men to alter their behaviour around non-conforming men, not on women to make their spaces unisex.

Well said, Midgebabe. The old-school early transitioning TS who just want a quiet life are being thrown under the bus by the "I'm keeping my ladydick and you can suck it" AGP lobby and their clueless cheerleaders.

And if you sense some negativity on the board, I will admit, I am torn between thinking you are a man trying tonunderstand or you are an MRA waiting to strike. There have been a lot of them, especially at weekends.

Full surgical, transwomen to date have been on the whole respectful and understanding, On the whole I think that most women have no gripe with these people.

TRAs and Mra’s who support self id and no legal sex differentiation couldn’t give two hoots. They will throw transwomen and women under a bus for a bit of fun. I think you are correct, You are a bit naive., or just lucky in your life experiences. If the mud of transphobia for challenging that man in a beard can be made to stick, it is a real set back for women and girls, and I think bad for most men also.

Remember we have people who are women only on some days taking women only prizes, we have people with no intention of living their entire lives as a women, with full male bodies, taking part in women’s sport. We have people telling us that it is transphobic to dicusss periods.

How do you know this? Do you monitor their actions/conversations?

Mostly, they intrude in our conversations - rather like you're doing here, dear - so it's not as though monitoring is required. It's fucking unavoidable.

Exactly! Talluhah