SNP MP wants to talk about menstruation

bold of you to assume that I don't have enough anger to go around Whatsnew, or that you are best placed to advise me on where it should be directed.

And, cara, if you check back, my first post on this thread was answering a quote beginning with the question 'how many transmen is this an issue for?'. now (foolishly) I assumed this question had been asked in good faith, and shared my personal experience to show that actually, there are a number of young people identifying as trans for whom it is very much an issue, who are of an age where they do discuss menstruation and puberty, and for whom inclusive language is tremendously helpful. it was not an attempted mic drop. my posts on this have been in good faith. now comes the pile on, interspersed with disingenuous 'oh but who is silencing you'. But I've been here long enough to know what would happen, so shame on me I guess.

not all trans people are middle aged men wanking off in suspenders or trying to get their bollocks waxed ffs

No, but these are the people who your anger should be targeted at. Not women. The men with various paraphilias who have hijacked the trans movement who have nothing in common with your child but are more than happy using teenage girls as collateral damage to push men's sex rights.

And this is what I don't get:

We are told 'TERF is not a slur, what are you getting so uppity about, its just a descriptor and I can call women TERFs if I want to'.

We are told 'Calling women menstruators is not offensive, it's just a descriptor, if you don't want to apply it to yourself then that's fine, but other people can say what they deem appropriate'.

But by God, we refer to adult human with a penis as 'he' or worse 'a man' and we are actually committing the crime of the century, and deserve endless vitriol, some of it violent, thrown our way.

Its all a bit double standards isn't it? Why is it OK to call an adult human female a 'menstruator' when she has made it clear that she finds it offensive, but it's not OK to call an adult human male a 'man' if he doesn't like that?

I've just left the SNP. Can't take this shit any more.

I wonder what Bunbury would say?

no one is saying you have to have menstruator on your passport

I'm not sure why sex is included on my passport. I think it's reasonable to argue that sex is often requested on official documents when it isn't helpful or relevant.

However, the 'F' on my passport certainly doesn't provide any information about my 'essence' or 'sense of self'.

'Menstruators' is not very inclusive of the women who find it really offensive, is it?

enjoy your outrage fest ladies.

I am interested in hearing your response, but if you don't want to reply that is obviously your choice. However, you aren't being silenced.

I'm very sorry if your situation is genuinely difficult but it's not the fault of feminist women.

the biggest parenting conundrum of my fucking life so far, and I cannot so much as mention it on the uk's biggest parenting website that I have been a member of for over a decade.

Who has said that you cannot do this?

sorry, "female deer and female sheep".

is it not being used, not as a descriptor that defines you and your essence and sense of self, but rather as an inclusive term to define a specific group of people within a specific context?

"Woman" doesn't define me or my essence or sense of self. It is an inclusive term that defines humans whose sex is female. Similarly Doe, Ewe. The thing that distinguishes me from a female Deer and a female deer is that I am a human. My sense of self comes from my human brain, not my sex.

No you came onto a thread about politics and thought you could do the mic drop of "this will upset my child" and stop the thread in its tracks. It's a form of emotional blackmail.

I started out sympathetic towards you, but I'm afraid with every post you make, your actual agenda becomes clearer.

@merrymouse, spot on.

yep, it's definitely you being silenced here Cara, not me. enjoy your outrage fest ladies.

of course I must want to snatch medals from female athletes or stick rapists in women's prisons because I support inclusive language.

Nobody thinks you believe this.

We all believe in inclusive language. We just think that the inclusive language should refer to sex, and that nobody needs to be classified according to outdated concepts of acceptable gendered behaviour. There is no need for the word 'woman' to refer to gender at all, but I'd be happy to swap 'female' for woman, if that were acceptable - but it isn't.

'menstruators' is harmful because it obscures the fact that menstruation only affects women. If we break down all the things that affect women into unique phenomena - menstruation, lactation, gestation, menopause - and pretend that they could happen to anyone, we make it impossible to protect women's rights. We enable sexism.

And you're reaching straight for the false analogies, MadameButterface.

If the original literature which JKR referred to had said "women and transmen", I'd have had no problem with it. But I will not be dehumanised by being turned into a "person who menstruates" or a "cervix haver" or a "pregnant person" or a "gestator" or any of the other crap the TRA lobby throws at me.

Because you are being disingenuous in the extreme if you do not see that a substantial section of the extreme trans ideologues are trying to change the language we use to render women invisible. And (as is very telling in Daniel Radcliff's response to JK Rowling) the trans people they particularly want to centre are the ones who started out with (and for the most part retain) penises.

Sorry your child is collateral damage in this clusterfuck, but I didn't start this fight. The fuckwits who put Karen White in a women's prison started it. The fuckwits who let pubescent boys in Connecticut and full-grown 6 foot tall male bodied people compete in women's sports started it. I am merely trying to halt the damage they've done before it becomes irreversible.

This isn't a made up urban myth about Winterval, this is actually happening to women.

Nor will I be silenced by people who want to use appeals to children and to women's socialized kindness to stop women expressing political opinions.

"I am not a menstruator. I am a woman. I find it offensive to be defined by a biological function."

is it not being used, not as a descriptor that defines you and your essence and sense of self, but rather as an inclusive term to define a specific group of people within a specific context? no one is saying you have to have menstruator on your passport or even use it yourself in any context ever, are they? or have I missed that?

ah here we go, the smug fake 'of course I support you and your child' while deliberately using unhelpful and upsetting terminology. this is why I had never posted about this on here before, and never will again. the biggest parenting conundrum of my fucking life so far, and I cannot so much as mention it on the uk's biggest parenting website that I have been a member of for over a decade. well played MN

ah I knew we would end up with the strawman race to the bottom. of course I must want to snatch medals from female athletes or stick rapists in women's prisons because I support inclusive language. using menstruators to describe people who menstruate is neither inaccurate nor is it stopping anyone else from calling themselves anything, or talking about their own biology in any terms they like, just as supporting the use of the blanket term 'partner' in formal parlance does not stop people from calling themselves someone's wife, girlfriend, bidey-in, lover or anything else they fancy. it's a blanket term that aims to be inclusive of various permutations of human. what harm is it doing you? these threads whiff of 'muslims are demanding we say happy winterval soon you won't be allowed to even mention Jesus'