Not having sex with someone because they don't have the right genitals is transphobic. No prizes for guessing who's claiming this

Progress my arse. So to speak

Oh fuck yes. This gender crap takes us right back to when women’s brains weren’t considered strong enough to vote or do science.

@EmpressLesbianInChair 100%

There's been such a shift recently, my lesbian friends are vilified for not wanting to have sex with trans women.

It used to be me as bisexual who was called "greedy" and other ridiculous belittling things, now it's my gay female friends who are having their sexuality questioned.

All I can attribute that shift to is that I like some dick so I'm slightly more acceptable than lesbians. I mean, Jesus wept what a sad state of affairs.

My mum is almost 70, Irish catholic born and raised. She says "what other people do in the bedroom is no business of mine". Which I absolutely agree with. She doesn't judge other people's sex lives because she doesn't give a shit about them. She does however give a shit about bullying and misogyny.

So an Irish Catholic born in the 50s (and still struggling to equate her entire pretty happy upbringing with systemic abuse of others) is more progressive than a 'woke' movement. Progress my arse. So to speak.

I don't get what falls out of those categories. If trans women are women and I like women, am I not allowed to find any of them unattractive?

I don't think our monitors would have any problem with you finding a woman unattractive...

I know Tyro, we trans widows are used to being publicly defamed by our ex's but accusations of rape just show a level of narcissism that is difficult for even us to comprehend.

Finally got around to checking out the archived link upthread to the "my wife raped me" thing.

I was coerced to have sex for the sake of "the relationship."

I'd just like to take this moment to register my intense fury disapproval at Dworkin being appropriated by the oppressor class in this way.

The fact that your wife has been conditioned to believe that sex is a necessity if she wants to have access to the privileges pair-bonding brings doesn't make her a rapist, FFS.

If anyone needs me I'll be over here having an epic sweary rant.

I like both men and women but not, like, all of them, because that would be weird. Apparently I should though! Just shag anyone who asks, it's the woke way.

If trans women are women and I like women, am I not allowed to find any of them unattractive?

Possibly, or it may just be that you're not allowed to show that you don't find any of them attractive.

You have to pretend every single one is utterly stunning and just your cup of tea.

This may prove problematic if someone you aren't attracted to attempts to initiate a sexual relationship with you. Remember, on no account are you to let them know that you do not fancy them. Be aware that phrases like "I'm not interested," "No, thank you," and "Please don't touch me," may be taken as evidence that you do not fancy them and are thus not permitted.

If the principles are:

Men are men
And women are women
And trans men are men
And trans women are women

Then what does pansexual actually mean? Surely that framework means you can be straight, gay or bisexual.

And within each of those sexualities you obviously when it comes to consensual sex, you can choose who to have sex with (with consent from both parties) and who you don't want to have sex with (totally up to you).

I don't get what falls out of those categories. If trans women are women and I like women, am I not allowed to find any of them unattractive?

I'm bisexual so I fancy women but I don't want to have sex with women who smoke. It's a preference, just like not wanting to have sex with a trans women who has a penis.

All I can boil the argument down to in my head is that basically if you have ever had a dick or still do have a dick, you get the final say.

If "lesbian" means "I dunno, that term just feels right to me, you know?" then that conveys no useful information t all, other than possibly that the speaker is a bit of an arsehole.

Also conveys a lack of access to dictionaries. Time for an update of the Gideon bibles-in-schools thing, I think. Every child to be provided with a free dictionary!

Is there a handy single word for "I've realised I actually have much better things to do with my life than navel-gazing over what sort of people I might be able to have enjoyable and healthy sexual relationships with"? I'm guessing not because this would result in women whose receptiveness to dick is currently an unknown and men we can't be having that..

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master—that’s all.”

I'm pretty sure that's not how sexual-orientation words are supposed to work.

My understanding of how language works is that we use words to communicate with others, and therefore it's helpful if the words have a meaning that's consistent and understood by everyone. So, if lesbian means "female homosexual", then describing someone/yourself as a lesbian conveys useful information.

If "lesbian" means "I dunno, that term just feels right to me, you know?" then that conveys no useful information t all, other than possibly that the speaker is a bit of an arsehole.

Here’s the US version of the Deptford group:

m.youtube.com/watch?v=moWe3rk7LzQ

(Should be discussing economic justice and worker’s rights, instead get distracted by ‘points of personal privilege’ because someone addressed the group as ‘hey guys’ 😬)

Agree. And it comes from a place of privilege to the point of being oblivious to real need of others, or even the capacity of having empathy or care for anyone but themselves.

As shown by the Dartford group who were struggling so much with the facilities for their homeless, severely struggling, working class service users being taken over by affluent highly educated white English students wanting to lecture their service users on how they were actually more oppressed and in need than people living rough/ victims of sexual assault/ extreme end survival need, and instruct those people on identity politics and complex directed language.

The service users did not care. The students were oblivious to their own crassness.

This is why identity politics is so bloody antithetical to any traditionally progressive/leftist positions. If you understand class politics, you can see right through this boggling need to to 'identify' as something for any other reason than you are actually part of that designated group. Because if all you have done is appropriate a label, with no consideration of the issues that face the group which you have claimed entry to, then you actively undermine any and all measures taken to alleviate the bad things that group faces (so, white people identifying as 'black' and taking funding set aside for BAME things etc.)

Of course, a lot of this is young people desperately trying to find their tribe, which is what the young do. But we used to acknowledge that as youthful navel gazing, not profound enlightenment.

I have a lesbian friend who is very out and proud about her sexuality; and who knows exactly what sex body she likes. But who at the same time believes twaw (And seems to have agp men as friends in her local gay bar along with the female lesbians)

I just can't understand it. She would cut me off dead as a bigoted transphobe if I said anything to her so I don't.

Since I've been apparently lesbianing wrong (albeit happily and functionally) and definitely womaning wrong I'm probably not qualified to advise....

I'm starting to think on RM's guidance that if you're enjoying it, you're probably morally in the wrong. Kind of a la Mr Murdstone and the whole middle ages.

It's all so confusing, Michelle! I thought I only had to choose from four options (this one, that one, both, or neither). Is it actually a free text box? Is there a character limit, or can I submit a twenty thousand word essay?

I hear you Tyro , I've been lesbianing wrong for some decades now and no one ever leafleted me or contacted me to let me know it wasn't about being attracted exclusively to other women at all! Doh.

And such a boring restriction on my authentic self, when I was limited only to actual facts. Sheesh. I am now of course a pansexual superhero.

Michelle so being a lesbian is nothing to do with physical sexual behaviour or internal sexual desire, and everything to do with which word-label you happen to like the sound of?

I'm pretty sure that's not how sexual-orientation words are supposed to work. Presumably I missed a woke memo. No wonder I've been struggling with my own sexuality for years - there was me thinking it was about what flavour sexed bodies one's partial to shagging!

Does anyone know where they keep the master list of shiny new genderal orientations? Because I need to add "omnidirectional lysistrata" to it.

Boils down to anyone can call themselves anything they like, redefining things to suit them, but they need to accept that if they go around for example declaiming that they're a type of vegan who eats meat and animal produce, many people are going to think they're a bit weird.

And if they go around then trying to forcibly re brand veganism as eating meat and animal produce and harassing and shaming those who don't because their version of veganism is obviously better and more inclusive and Other Reasons Too, then they are likely to get told to fuck off.

Because shrieking 'don't try to control me!' at people while demanding that they submit to being controlled by you is not normal, healthy behaviour.

ON YOUR KNEES, CIS SCUM!

Some vaginas are outies, that’s all.

I feel like when people first started using that term it meant "doesn't have any real interest in sex, libido pretty much zero" and now like most things words mean whatever anyone feels like at the time.

Oooh oooh I remember this one! It got explained to me when I tried pointing out that biological females seeking out sex with biological males weren't lesbians, but bisexual or hetero, depending on if sex with other biological females was involved.

The answers I got were something like: if someone likes and chooses the name and identity of lesbian (presumably because of how it feels to them to present that identity to others since it obviously isn't a factual description) then they are lesbian. No, it doesn't hurt lesbians when their definition is forcibly reoriented for them, and isn't disrespectful or appropriative at all. (A lot of shut up, shut up, la la la la, you're wrong and those people don't matter anyway kind of posts at this point). And then I got called homophobic for trying to insist that homosexuality involved, you know, actual homosexuality.

So there you go, you're educated! Be a vegan who eats steak, be an asexual who likes it five times a night, enjoy your cosplay And bugger the people left damaged in your wake of course, because they're just wet blankets.

Well I tried to explain. It’s not easy with a concept along the lines of ‘bla bla bla burrrrrrrp’

I explained the ‘Cyclist conundrum’ to a gay colleague. He wasn’t impressed...

I feel like when people first started using that term it meant "doesn't have any real interest in sex, libido pretty much zero" and now like most things words mean whatever anyone feels like at the time.

Yes, totally.