Times today: JK Rowling fell foul of transgender thought police

Yet it did mean that their identity documents would expose these people as transgender and put them at risk of discrimination, harassment and abuse.

This bit says it all.

Instead of actually tackling the underlying attitudes that result in discrimination etc against people who don't conform to the stereotypes associated with their sex, authorities have been allowing allowing a small subset of those people to hide by granting them fake documents.

DH seems to think it's bad that the Hungarian authorities are no longer willing to collude in this particular method of ignoring the human suffering that results from the enforcement of sex stereotypes.

I dare say said authorities are still massively fucking up in many other areas, and I don't see any indication that the Hungarians have any sort of proposal for how to overthrow the patriarchy, but I approve of them trying to avoid some of the shit we're seeing here by making it damned clear that one's birth certificate records one's sex at birth.

I think it's a bit disingenuous of DH to make a point of praising English for having separate words for sex and gender where Hungarian doesn't when a lot of the trouble we're seeing over here is precisely because most people - trans or otherwise - don't actually understand gender to be anything beyond a synonym for sex. The authorities sure as hell don't; they've been using "gender" to refer to one's being male or female for ages. Kudos to the Hungarians for making the distinction clear.

Saying that you notice things not working well for you because of the actions of a new group of activists is hardly saying you really don't give a shit about the principles

No, but the fact DH hasn't detransitioned is a clear demonstration that either DH does not in fact give a shit about the principles or DH does not in fact understand the principles.

Best to order the pens now, Tinsel, to allow time for shipping.

the argument is for maintaining something close to the legal status quo in the UK, or at least the possibility of distinguishing sex and gender.

Transactivists, including Dr Hayton, are not seeking to distinguish sex & gender/ gender identity. Considerable efforts have & are being made to prevent such clarification.

If the NASUWT Guidance doesn't matter now, I'm not sure whether to start the calligraphy or not?

From the Spectator article:

"The word 'nem' – meaning sex or gender – was replaced by the unambiguous term, 'születési nem', meaning sex at birth."

"While English speakers may routinely conflate sex and gender, the fact we have two words allows us to give them different meanings... It is rather harder to separate them in Hungarian, where there is no second word but exactly the same biology."

So nem is to gender as születési nem is to sex?
Hungary is now using sex rather than gender on identity documents and clarifying this refers to actual sex.

This seems to be Dr Hayton's main concern presumably he includes himself in this group?

"..transsexuals who have gone through gender reassignment surgery and pass reasonably well as the opposite sex will be forced to carry ID that fails to describe them and exposes them every time they use it. As a small minority they are very vulnerable."

I'm unsure which lesson Dr Hayton is teaching here & who the intended students are. A LO (learning objective) would be most useful.

I would say, Spectator readers are the audience, and the argument is for maintaining something close to the legal status quo in the UK, or at least the possibility of distinguishing sex and gender.

I'm not sure why you'd find that confusing.

Hayton doesn't align himself with transactivists. He alights himself with the women opposing transactivism. In order to separate himself from the activists who he, quite openly, says are ruining things for him.

He's not speaking for women, no. He is speaking to women. And he appears to be leveraging their analysis of the trans ideology and their campaigning for their own rights, as a means to make a distinction between himself and other transactivists.

Hayton isn't required to agree with transactivists about one thing, or all things they say. There is not a list of discrete positions anyone has to agree with to participate in the public discourse. Hayton can say that the transactivist position is wrong, and bad for trans people. That's not somehow disqualified because to some extent it agrees with, or is even borrowed, from other people or groups.

That's how ideas and public discourse work, they aren't owned by people who get to decide who uses them. If that were the case feminists would have to turn in their right to speak right now, because they didn't come up with the terms and fabric of feminists discourse whole hog. No one ever has.

Saying that you notice things not working well for you because of the actions of a new group of activists is hardly saying you really don't give a shit about the principles, it's only your own life you care about. Again, this place would be depopulated if you said, women, if you've noticed transactivists, or MRAs, or Stonewall, making your life more difficult, and that prompted you to take notice, your views are just self serving and don't count, and you should just keep quiet.

I always find it odd here - on the one hand there is some pretty good insight and recognition of the problems of things like purity spirals, check-box activism, controlled thought or speech. But then you get all this vetting of who has the right motives, who it is ok to read, who has stolen what idea from what group, and some pretty steep purity spirals.

Today's article by Dr Hayton, this time published in The Spectator
'Hungary offers a lesson in crying wolf on ‘transphobia’'

(extract)
"While Britain has been embroiled in a heated debate over proposed changes to the Gender Recognition Act, which allows people to change their legal gender on the production of medical reports and a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, in Hungary, Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz government has swept such rights away.

On 19 May, the Hungarian National Assembly voted 133 to 37 to ban transgender people from changing the gender on their identity documents. The word 'nem' – meaning sex or gender – was replaced by the unambiguous term, 'születési nem', meaning sex at birth. Hungary's government's communication office explained that this did not stop people living according to their identities. This might be true. Yet it did mean that their identity documents would expose these people as transgender and put them at risk of discrimination, harassment and abuse.

While English speakers may routinely conflate sex and gender, the fact we have two words allows us to give them different meanings. Sex is biology, while gender is a vaguer term that links to expression or identity. That has allowed English speakers to talk about our gender, while avoiding the harsh realities of biology. Sex is not 'assigned at birth' by something akin to a Hogwarts Sorting Hat. It is observed, often well before birth, and is immutable. Male or female we were created, and male or female we will stay.

It is rather harder to separate them in Hungarian, where there is no second word but exactly the same biology. So Orbán’s government may have a point. But while some campaigners welcome the return to reality, Hungarian transsexuals who have gone through gender reassignment surgery and pass reasonably well as the opposite sex will be forced to carry ID that fails to describe them and exposes them every time they use it. As a small minority they are very vulnerable. " (continues)

But for now an uneasy compromise is maintained in the UK. Under the GRA, transgender people change the sex marker on our birth certificates, but only on production of medical evidence. Meanwhile the marker in British passports can be changed with a letter from their GP. Records held elsewhere – by banks, libraries and the like – can be changed on demand, though it does raise the question why such organisations need to record anyone’s sex in the first place, other than for equal opportunities monitoring.

Unlike the authoritarian politics of Hungary, UK legislatures are largely socially liberal. Social conservatives in our country have no credible equivalent of Orban’s Fidesz party. But social liberals must not be complacent. (continues)

We would be wise as a society to take note of this sooner rather than later. Maybe the Government will be able to oppose the excesses of gender identity ideology, restore confidence and all will be well. But they cannot stand by and do nothing. If social liberals don’t take action, social conservatives will."
www.spectator.co.uk/article/hungary-and-a-lesson-in-crying-wolf-on-transphobia

I'm unsure which lesson Dr Hayton is teaching here & who the intended students are. A LO (learning objective) would be most useful.

If only you were closer and seeing people wasn't potentially lethal! DH knows calligraphy.

I've looked for the thread from before - it will give me thread titles but it won't let me look at the threads for some reason.

But my memory is that Hayton said directly that they no longer had the same view about use of changing rooms etc.

However, I think the purity test issue is at work here in any case. Anyone who wants to can write an article stating their own views, particularly about something that affects them, they aren't required to agree with anyone else about stuff fist.

I've always fancied learning calligraphy.

It's likely going to be a while, maybe we could add War and Peace to the reading list?

What shall we do while we wait?

Still waiting, tinsel.

Has anybody found evidence that Dr Hayton no longer stands by that NASUWT guidance yet?

Thanks for throwing those links in, R0.

Bilek's article, I didn't read it and have a lightbulb moment. I read it and thought "Well thank fuck someone else actually gets this, because I intuitively grasped this when I was still a child and it has been bloody lonely waiting for everyone else to catch on." I'd love to share a pint and a rant with her one day!

I can't remember offhand whether it was on this thread or a different one, but someone was suggesting we should be exploring where fetish comes from and what the biological roots are instead of castigating AGPs.

The thing is, a fetish is an obsessional sexual interest in an object.

The AGP reduces women - who are people, ffs - to objects. The chief difference between this and your average porn-addled straight bloke is that the latter wants to dominate the object whereas the AGP wants to become the object.

This is really not on a par with eg shagging bicycles.

In any case - most of the posts objecting here seem to be objecting to Hayton speaking for women, but I don't see how that's the conclusion.

Hayton doesn't align himself with transactivists. He alights himself with the women opposing transactivism. In order to separate himself from the activists who he, quite openly, says are ruining things for him.

He's not speaking for women, no. He is speaking to women. And he appears to be leveraging their analysis of the trans ideology and their campaigning for their own rights, as a means to make a distinction between himself and other transactivists.

I'm still on excellent terms with the AGP ex because he actually changed his mind when the underlying misogyny of reducing women to sexual objects to be inhabited was explained to him. That's the bit DH hasn't done.

Uncommon Ground Media
Deconstructing the “Good Transwomen”
May 6, 2020
by Jennifer Bilek

(extract)
"Autogynephilia is a male sexual fetish of precisely desiring to see oneself as a woman. What makes it a fetish, beyond it being aside the realm of “normal” or “average” sexual desire toward another, is its obsessive quality, which Hayton acknowledges, and its focus on objectification. A fetish entails a fixation on a particular object for sexual gratification. Men who develop a fetish of “signaling sex as women” must first objectify women and womanhood. To embody – as a fetish – the opposite sex, one must first dissociate from their own body. This is what sexism does and this is what transgenderism does. It dissociates. It disembodies and objectifies women.

In their interview, Boyce and Hayton discuss the social shame in this particular sexual proclivity and how it contrasts with the LGBT pride marches and events. They both, absentmindedly, conflate transgenderism with same-sex attraction/relations – or at least discuss them as if they were closely related. But same-sex desire/relations are not an obsession, they do not indicate dissociation or encourage it, they are not a fetish and do not inherently objectify anyone. Transgenderism on the other hand, is brilliantly deconstructed at its roots, by Dr. Em, in a recent article, as a social construct whose evolutionary roots are in sexism – objectification. Hayton seems to understand this – or at least he gets close. He says his “identity” as “trans” at this point is a compromise with society. He is not sure how to navigate his desire for objectifying women or “passing” because if he “passes,” even if it makes him feel good, he wonders if he’s lying to society. He is. He also understands, at least now, that transgenderism, is palliative. Speaking with Boyce, he weighs the cost to himself and his family over the course of his life and wonders if it’s worth it.

What Hayton does not consider is the cost to society. These men, “identifying as women,” “passing as women,” surgery or no surgery, with an understanding of their situation or not, are still objectifying women. It is astonishing that they can get so close to grasping it, how destructive it is in society, eloquently describe it to others, and still be unwilling to part with it. They still call themselves “transwomen.” They don’t just like lipstick and skirts. We’re not talking Boy George or Prince here. They want to “signal sex as women signal sex.” They want to hold onto their obsession with this objectification of women no matter the cost to women in the real world, which is precisely how so many men behave." (continues)
uncommongroundmedia.com/deconstructing-the-good-transwomen/

Articles by Dr Em referred to above:

'Sexist History at the Heart of the ‘Science’ on Transsexualism, Part I: Benjamin, Ihlenfeld, Money & Ehrhardt'
uncommongroundmedia.com/sexist-science-transsexualism-part-i-benjamin-ihlenfeld-money-ehrhardt/

'Sexist History at the Heart of the ‘Science’ on Transsexualism, Part II: Robert Stoller, True Trans'
uncommongroundmedia.com/robert-stoller-true-trans/

30 Jan 2020
Benjamin Boyce interview with Dr Hayton referenced:

It's not victimless. And he must know that. Just take a look at the transwidows threads. It's far from victimless.

The overlap with abuse dynamics/ coercive control patterns is very significant. It is the women & children who are frequently the primary victims to a men's paraphilia so rooted in narcissism.

From Trans Widows' Voices website,

'Philomena's Story: There and Back Again.'
(extract)
"He did not help at all with the kids but he did not interfere with my slightly off-the-beaten path parenting. I took his passive disdain for support and thought it was balance enough. Looking back I was so very lonely and exhausted. I've often longed to retroactively shake some sense into the sad stupor of that young mother.

After my third child, he sank into a deep depression and was in bed for months. He began to dress as a woman almost every evening. Or, I should say, what he considered to be a woman. It was not my idea of womanhood. In fact, his version offended me. It was degrading and violent. He clearly thought being a woman meant wanting to be raped and tortured. I told him wearing strap-ons was very sore on my c-section scar, my "turn" being tied up frightened and hurt me, I expressed my preference for gentle, nurturing sex. He told me complaining was very manipulative and selfish and that I was trying to stifle his womanhood. He said I couldn't handle him being a woman because I was jealous, that it wasn't his fault that he wasn't fat and I was ,that I was barely a woman at all but more like a wizened balloon. I tried to avoid it all after that and focus on the children." (continues)
www.transwidowsvoices.org/post/philomena-s-story-there-and-back-again

In any case - most of the posts objecting here seem to be objecting to Hayton speaking for women, but I don't see how that's the conclusion. Hayton is speaking as Hayton, or maybe as a transwoman. It doesn't make any sense to say, you can't have a male with AGP speak for transwomen's experience or POV.

It shouldn't be much of a surprise in a feminism & women's rights space to find women objecting to men using women's actions to gain a platform for themselves or using women's work for their own benefit.

Thanks, Goosefoot. Would be good to see it.

I wasn't aware of that. Can you link to it?

It was something in a thread about a month ago, maybe two?

I'll have a look, I'm not great as searching this forum though.

Most of the larger problem of AGP for others comes out of this idea that somehow, it is possible to actually become a woman, and that others, including spouses, ought to believe that and live happily with it and that it should have legal force.

Were we not in a weird alternate reality about this, much of the harm would be reduced. I suspect that marriages still would often not survive, but marriage breakdown is often an outcome of significant mental illnesses or problems that necessitate a whole-scale change in living conditions. The bigger harm is in having to say, this is just fine, there is no problem here. And actually I think it harms the patient as well, to be told that they are effecting something real, rather than a coping device with real social consequences for themselves and others.

I'm not generally very convinced about theoretical breakdowns of the origins of fetishes. I think the mechanism for their development is mainly biological or physiological, and I don't think we know much about why one guy sees a rubber wet suit hanging on a line one day and fixates on it, or why the most common fetishes are foot related. I suspect AGP might relate to voyeristic/exhibitionist fetishes, but that's just my own intuition. A radical analysis has to be rooted in the material and there isn't enough information about this for a strong theory.

I agree Blanchard is blinkered about the larger effects of gender transition on women, I suspect it's because his focus is clinical and the patient. I don't think that says anything about his description of dysphoria as arising from AGP rather than the direct exaction of a fetish.

In any case - most of the posts objecting here seem to be objecting to Hayton speaking for women, but I don't see how that's the conclusion. Hayton is speaking as Hayton, or maybe as a transwoman. It doesn't make any sense to say, you can't have a male with AGP speak for transwomen's experience or POV.

Frankly I feel like a victim of Hayton's fetish and I've never even met Hayton IRL.

Also I suspect the thing that DH would like to destigmatise is the label AGP, because the fact we're all aware of it is detrimental to DH's quiet enjoyment of DH's sexually-titillating hobby.

There's a word for what's happening there, but we're apparently not allowed to say it without being deleted. Starts with "g".

Also I suspect the thing that DH would like to destigmatise is the label AGP, because the fact we're all aware of it is detrimental to DH's quiet enjoyment of DH's sexually-titillating hobby.

If we started routinely referring to DH&co as fetishistic crossdressers I fear we'd meet rather a lot of resistance.