Help! Where do I start explaining the trans issue to male friend?

I asked him how he would define man and woman and at what point he believes a man turns into a woman. He says he doesn't know.

From one of mine (teenage at the time): 'I don't know! Nobody knows! It's one of those things you can't understand unless you're trans, but just because you don't understand it doesn't make it not true!'

A few years later, he is still nice to his trans friends as he should be and wishes them happiness in their decisions to have drastic surgery, but no longer believes that anyone changes sex. He has experienced the joys of the mixed-sex loos at university and hates them, and he can see why the female students loathe them even more.

I can talk to him without either of us losing our temper. But it took time.

All these foolish people are the same. I lose all respect for people who know they can't answer but double down.

Yes it's quite sobering. I asked him how he would define man and woman and at what point he believes a man turns into a woman. He says he doesn't know. He believes sex and gender are social constructs. We talked about transwomen in womens prison and he apparently consideres the odd raped female inmate acceptable collateral damage for the sake of inclusiveness. And he refuses to debate any further. That man is a biological scientist! I'm honestly stunned.

It's cognitive dissonance. He has come near to questioning elements, and he knows he can't answer certain questions you've asked, but something tells him the whole card house will come down if he concedes and then he'll have to be a transphobe and not woke. Hence no further debate.

He believes sex is a social construct?? And he’s a biological scientist ??? Fucksake

I’m
Sorry you’re down a friend OP but any man who thinks the odd raped female is justifiable collateral isn’t somone you need as a friend

Just getting into those questions in a discussion will begin to lead to everything else. There’s a reason why TRAs etc are so keen not to let anyone define what the word woman means - because as soon as you do all their arguments crumble around them.

Yes! Great post.

I await to meet his new girlfriend.

he does not seem to get the issue with women being forced to give up their space to anyone who demands access.

Like most woke blokes he isn't concerned for women, is he? Ask him what his problem is, why he cant be more inclusive. He doesn't get to demand women do all the work. Thats just privilege speaking, inst it.

Let me guess; male friend who thinks it's nice for women to be kind and inclusive?

What is male friend doing to make male spaces more inclusive of people who have a penis but no GRC?
Does male friend think he should date men who have a penis but identify as female?

As if it's a normal thing to do to ask your friends if they'd have sex with random people.

So you’ve never come across such a thing as a hypothetical question, @TheBlueStocking? You need to read a bit more.

Yes, questioning is often a good place to start. Sometimes people really agree but the language is obscuring that.

Questions about the language. Questions about what we mean by being kind - because being kind IMO is a good thing. But being kind does not mean having no firm boundaries and most people understand that, they don't always think about it clearly though. A good general question is, when we are kind to people or a group in society, how do we decide where we should just let things go, or where we need to keep rules in place? What are some different scenarios where we need to make decisions like that? A simple example might be a drug addict - we should be kind and tr and help drug addicts. But it is clear that some jobs would be unsafe, it is clear that sometimes the behaviour of an addict cannot be tolerated. It's also a question whether we should give addicts drugs or not, it's a big question and people disagree without anyone being wrong.

Get him to start by saying that to make sure you’re not talking at cross purposes, you want to know what he understands by the terms man, woman, male, female, sex, gender, transition, transman, transwoman.

Use questions to make sure that you (ie he!) really understand what he means - when does actual transition happen, what is it, does it happen once in a flash or is it slow and drawn out, what about people like pip/Phillip bunce who are female approx 3 days a week, how does it relate to having a penis or not, how do sex stereotypes tie in, if a girl cuts her hair short/man grow his long does that make them trans (in which case explain Princess Diana et al with short hair/a load of long haired male iron maiden fans), etc.

Also - how come a woman can’t change sex enough to inherit a male title or money or become a priest so are there different types of male but not female?

Also - hypothetically (depending on his current relationship status!) - if he was swiping through on line dating profiles - would he expect to be told ? What level of ‘trans’ ness would be acceptable to him? And so on...

Just getting into those questions in a discussion will begin to lead to everything else. There’s a reason why TRAs etc are so keen not to let anyone define what the word woman means - because as soon as you do all their arguments crumble around them.

Also, ask if Rachel Dolezal is black, she is quite adamant that she is, despite being very very white (under the tan and hair dye). She - I do believe - really really 'feels black'. But is she? No - then how does this differ (at least she makes the effort to look black).

Or Martina Big who is also very white but says she is black - and was pregnant (must've had the baby by now) with her equally white husband but was adamant that her baby could very well be black. She also made the effort.

Where do I start?How do I explain

Cut to the chase....show images of some men who 'identify as women' these days ( I've started compiling a catalogue of useful images on my computer for such purposes) complete with beards etc......Show some news reports about sexual predators/rapists/ paedophiles who hide behind the 'trans woman label' ( plenty of examples out there)...

And then suggest that for everyone's safety comfort and dignity he should campaign for third spaces and leave women's alone. An obvious solution, and very reasonable too.

Also explain, briefly, it is not just about toilets, but about all spaces, services and sports ( show a few photos of trans women who compete in women's sports) - and mention the issue of trans- children ( puberty blockers) and gender ideology in schools.

DH was very 'doesn't hurt to be nice/psychologically maybe they're women [?]/why are you so obsessed about gay people [???]' until we started seeing transition in quite so many of the teenagers we know, including one in the family.

I got so fed up of the humph-and-retreat and the eyerolling that I said 'You really believe [female family member] has turned into a boy, do you?' and he immediately, reflexively said 'Of course not!'

When it was a boy in daughter's year declaring himself to be a girl, he got it immediately.

Funnily enough, he risk-assesses 'Can I stay over at Ollie's?' [transboy, natal girl] very differently from 'Can I stay over at Ellie's?' [transgirl, natal boy].

As if it's a normal thing to do to ask your friends if they'd have sex with random people.

I’d ask if he would consider a few people as women/potential girlfriends. There’s from trans women who have had surgery and are taking hormones to - well someone who has just said the self ID words ‘I am a woman’.

Where on the scale does he think the transformation occurs? How does it happen? Why does he think this?

And as Janice Turner said in that RedBox podcast yesterday - women campaigning to retain the rights we already have in law are being called a “hate group”.

Blue - Are you still here? Stop forcing your opinions on us! Or at least do it properly with a 1000-slide PowerPoint presentation.

You could try not forcing your opinions on other people.

Such sweet irony!

It takes a while for people to get past the ‘this is so wrong it can’t possibly be true’ point.

I think it takes a while for people who genuinely want a clear view to develop insight.

Perhaps discuss transwomen who know they are male. Debbie Hatton, Fionne Orlander etc - there is no uniform opinion.

Also Morgan’s Oger - a Canadian transwoman actively campaigning to defund rape centres.

You could try not forcing your opinions on other people.

That's hilarious. If the TRAs and their friends stopped forcing their opinions on us we wouldn't be in this situation of having to defend our rights that we already fought for and won before, perhaps you could suggest that to them instead.

"Just got into this with male friend who thinks it's nice to be kind and inclusive."

Tell him it is easy to be kind and inclusive when he has no skin in the game.

If you really want to talk to him (but I wouldn't bother until he starts seeing the issues himself) maybe try a though experiment.

Ask him if he would be happy to be locked in a jail cell with a stronger bigger rapist who attacks men by preference. Then tell him that the rapists feelings matter more than his and he must defer to them in all matters and be kind and inclusive to his needs. Any complaints about the cellmare will mean your friend is a bigot.

Let your friend respond.

Then tell him this actually happened as part of the Danish prison experiment, between 2000 and 2014. For 14 years women were locked up with stronger bigger men, many were rapists.
Resulting in 25% of the women being abused (the numbers were thought to be much higher, it was suggested that many women were to frightened to report their violent cell mates) At this point the Danes separated the sexes in their prisons again.

Once he admits that some men are dangerous and untrustworthy, then the rest is common sense.

If he' interested, I'd maybe say that there are a couple of main areas people are concerned about:

The scientific question which has been really misrepresented, and more immediately, the medical question around kids. If what "trans" is is not understood scientifically it is difficult to know what to do about it.

Legal issues, how do we protect sex based rights without words to define them, and which things are sex based rights and which are not. Relatedly the attempts to shut down debate on these kinds of political questions. This gets into questions around safety in places like prisons or hospitals and also language issues.

Sports

I' probably just say that there were worries about problems in many of these areas and they have in fact come to pass, in large part because discussion of them was deemed transphobic.

But I agree with the others, don't inundate someone, it's too overwhelming.