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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Does MN have a problem with trans people? **MNHQ edited title as OP has apologised for 'accusatory' tone**

848 replies

tryandempathise · 27/11/2019 07:54

Seem to be threads constantly on the issue of trans.

Why?

Is it because it conflicts with the idea of sex as a construct?

Is it an age thing?

There must be mums on here with trans kids - do you just stay out of it?

Why the obsession with the idea of being attacked by trans women? Is it not the modern equivalent of homophobic blokes all thinking gay men want to rape them?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
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Gertrudesgarden · 27/11/2019 21:36

However many, it'll never be enough. Not for the blue dolphin tattoo people or the danger haired mermaids who sing to them.

Michelleoftheresistance · 27/11/2019 21:30

And even with the dolphin tattoo nice blokes - it's still a group of men, deciding amongst themselves which of them can commandeer women's spaces. And then shifting around the boundaries.

Any suggestion in there about women being consulted? Because this is the women's space.

You have to have quite weirdly sexist beliefs to feel that women's spaces really belong primarily to men, that it's right they should be controlled and regulated by men for the best interests of men. That it's up to men who can use them, that women shouldn't need a say in this, and that any feelings or even reasons and evidence women have about not wanting those males in their space should be ignored. And that male feelings about really wanting and needing to be with women in women's spaces is crucial and must be listened to, but women's feelings about really not wanting them there and needing to be only with other females is stupid and wrong, and should be ignored.

It shows, as mentioned on another thread today, that even those insisting TWAW don't appear to truly believe in it. Stereotypical sex roles are always followed in how the people involved are viewed and treated, regardless of how they identify. We're supposed to not be able to tell what sex someone is, but suddenly, magically, no one has the faintest trouble knowing when it's a case of deciding who must shut up, get over themselves and obey.

Anyone ever heard this said to a biological male, regardless of how they identify, in the way its so freely said to biological females?

HumberHellraiser · 27/11/2019 21:28

Christ you lot are legends. I’ve been away and now rtft.

Solid gold.

TowelNumber42 · 27/11/2019 21:13

But you have no proof that trans women are as likely to commit violent crime as men.
As others have said, this is not true.

However, even if it were true, how do you prove that a man is a transwoman?

Let's say I did a study showing that men who have a dolphin tattoo on their nose are no danger to women. We thus change the rules to say men with dolphin tattoos on their noses can be placed in women's prisons, go into women's changing rooms, strip search female prisoners, share a room with a woman in a refuge etc.

How long do you think it would be before a huge number of perverts got themselves a dolphin tattoo on their nose?

Now imagine they don't actually have to get a dolphin tattoo on their nose. They can use a temporary tattoo. They can even say they feel like they should have a dolphin tattoo on their nose but haven't made the change yet.

Run the original study again. What would you find now? How many women would have to be hurt by fake-dolphin-nose-tattoo-men before you would rethink the policy? Now the nice original tattoo men are really sad they are excluded again.

What's the acceptable ratio of genuine tattoo men who feel sad vs women physically assaulted by fakers taking advantage. How would you balance it? How many women physically hurt are worth how many men feeling invalidated?

FloralBunting · 27/11/2019 21:00

For the lurkers;

This thread is why the regulars can be a touch suspicious with new wide eyed ingenue posters. The OP and pals have tried reasonably hard to put up an initial front of "But I just don't understand!" and as the thread has gone on, dropped the pretence and just started lobbing nonsense and cries of 'transphobia!' and showed they already have more than a passing familiarity with all the usual TRA/AWA talking points designed to make you capitulate or shut up.

Don't ever feel you have to comply. As you can see, they are shadow boxing. They got nothing, basically, and long experience here has ably shown that they never, ever do.

TowelNumber42 · 27/11/2019 20:43

How does the mannish looking female cousin story result in the conclusion that transwomen should be let into women's changing rooms? Some women were scared because they thought a man was somewhere he shouldn't be. Doesn't this just prove that women are scared of men who want to go into women-only spaces? The shouty women were wrong about the mannish looking cousin being a man, which is both unusual and horrible. Still, the story reinforces that women are really very scared of men coming into single sex spaces. Most of us have been perved at many times before we've even reached adulthood. Of course women are worried about men.

GirlDownUnder · 27/11/2019 20:30

I’m just too sober for this thread Gin

SophoclesTheFox · 27/11/2019 20:10

I’m dying at the cousin story Grin

Did she, aye?

FearOfTheDuck · 27/11/2019 20:06

Eyezwideshut

I've read most of the thread and I have to ask this. Why do you think we have separate spaces for men and women in the first place? Do you think all changing rooms, hospital wards, prisons, etc. should be mixed sex? If not, why not?

I can actually understand the rationale behind thinking all spaces should be mixed-sex, even though I strongly disagree with it, and your strand of argument against treating all men as potential predators seems to be somewhere along those lines. I can't see any logical argument for single-gender spaces, though.

Hexcode16 · 27/11/2019 19:58

Just delurked to say hats off to the women on this thread, you’re doing God’s work! I swear if I rolled my eyes any harder at some of the bullshit I’ve read here, I’d blind myself! Gin

Does MN have a problem with trans people? **MNHQ edited title as OP has apologised for 'accusatory' tone**
Ereshkigal · 27/11/2019 19:53

^Just once, I'd like to see logical, reasonable reasons put forward to this that recognise the needs of women, but explain why - in this ideology- women are subhuman and only trans people's needs and feelings matter.
^^
^But it's always, always, garbled and confused bits of nothing with flat evasion of any real sticky point. Like admitting, up front, women will be excluded from services and provisions. Women will be attacked and harmed at higher rates. Women's lives will be poorer with less dignity, less privacy, much more normalisation of hammering sexual boundaries and refusing homosexuality to them. But that this is acceptable collateral damage compared to the value of the males who will benefit.

Yes, exactly.

ErrolTheDragon · 27/11/2019 19:45

From the stonewall glossary:
^ TRANS
An umbrella term to describe people whose gender is not the same as, or does not sit comfortably with, the sex they were assigned at birth.
Trans people may describe themselves using one or more of a wide variety of terms, including (but not limited to) transgender, transsexual, gender-queer (GQ), gender-fluid, non-binary, gender-variant, crossdresser, genderless, agender, nongender, third gender, bi-gender, trans man, trans woman,trans masculine, trans feminine and neutrois.^

www.stonewall.org.uk/help-advice/glossary-terms#t

Gertrudesgarden · 27/11/2019 19:45

Oops I misspelled Eyez a coupla times.

Oh well....

Gertrudesgarden · 27/11/2019 19:44

Hopefully Eyes is educating Eyez cos Eyes has had Eyez's eyes opened...

BoneAppleTeaa · 27/11/2019 19:43

I read 22 pages and I still don’t know if I’m doing this woman thing right Sad

Lamahaha · 27/11/2019 19:39

BickerinBrattle fantastic post.
I'm in awe of all the wonderfully articulate MNers who have argued brilliantly on this thread and with so much patience against someone who thinks woman is a feel.

Michelleoftheresistance · 27/11/2019 19:38

Just once, I'd like to see logical, reasonable reasons put forward to this that recognise the needs of women, but explain why - in this ideology- women are subhuman and only trans people's needs and feelings matter.

But it's always, always, garbled and confused bits of nothing with flat evasion of any real sticky point. Like admitting, up front, women will be excluded from services and provisions. Women will be attacked and harmed at higher rates. Women's lives will be poorer with less dignity, less privacy, much more normalisation of hammering sexual boundaries and refusing homosexuality to them. But that this is acceptable collateral damage compared to the value of the males who will benefit.

Just own it. Defend it. Explain it. Because all I ever get to hear is batshit.

Gertrudesgarden · 27/11/2019 19:36

LondonKate, you are not alone....I'm terrified for my young lesbian now trans neighbour. By the sound of their voice, they're on hormones already, at 17....

Gertrudesgarden · 27/11/2019 19:34

Bingo!

Gangrenethatmightwork · 27/11/2019 19:28

"My cousin agreed to sign up tomorrow"
But I'm your cousin Hmm

LondonKate · 27/11/2019 19:14

Personally, my main concern is for young lesbians who feel it is so terrible to be female than they feel the need take hormones and have painful, invasive surgeries. I am worried about an environment where it is is so bad to be a teenage female that all that seems like a good idea. As a grown up lesbian I am terribly worried about the teenage lesbians growing up in this environment.

AlunWynsKnee · 27/11/2019 19:12

Indeed Just. On Eyezs source of transgender definitions, Wikipedia, it says "Izzard is transgender".

Justhadathought · 27/11/2019 19:06

Cross dressers arent transgender

They now are.....ask Eddie Izzard.

BickerinBrattle · 27/11/2019 19:05

Oh for FFS.

If transwomen need space away from males, they should do what women did and BUILD THEIR OWN. Stonewall’s drowning in money. Women marched in the streets for female toilets, because in unisex toilets they were assaulted. Women scraped their own pockets to fund DV refuges and rape crisis centres because men saw no need and couldn’t be arsed. Women staffed these with hours of volunteer labour, on top of working at lesser-paid jobs and doing all the care work at home.

Nothing says patriarchy like males now commandeering the fruits of female labour.

Nothing speaks to sheer immaturity like whining and nothing says instability like threatening violence when you don’t get your way, when women say NO.

Nothing says laziness and entitlement like not even imagining the possibility of DOING THE WORK YOURSELF to build your own.

Nothing says “divorced from reality” in not recognizing mammalian sexual dimorphism, including its role in evolutionary process — might as well be a creationist, if you deny that. Or in denying the differing evolutionary tracks that created differing physiology for human males and females, such that almost any man can kill a woman with his bare hands, and almost no woman can do the reverse. The grip strength of a 70-year old man exceeds that of a 20-year old woman.

It all reminds me so much of my asshole BIL who insisted on his right to put his feet up and watch telly all week because “he’d worked all week” — and also my sister should get his dinner — which she did all week in addition to working her own job all week and in addition to taking care of two toddlers.

She finally said no and divorced him. Lucky for her, and unlike GC feminists, she wasn’t routinely threatened with rape, extreme sexual violence, or murder. He didn’t even express his wish that she die in a grease fire.

Justhadathought · 27/11/2019 19:05

From my limited understanding, cross dressing is a sexual fetish and isnt about gender or sex identity so your point is moot, lovie ducks. Really good effort though

Your understanding is indeed limited.

Many heterosexual life-long transvestites are now going 'full-time' as women - and all under the trans umbrella. Men who have been married and had children. And indeed transvestitism is a fetish. This is one of the groups now under the trans umbrella that is becoming more numerous ( along with young lesbians).

Grayson Perry is worth a read on this - although he does not identify as a woman - he has great practical insight into the matter.