Please help me untangle why gender is such an issue

I recently went on a training course where they promoted genderism, and even had the genderbread person. During the course, the trainer - a transwoman - talked about being ridiculed in public. Receptionists gossiping and giggling, everyone looking, that kind of thing. Then it struck me what's at the heart of this ideology. In trying not to be mocked, TRAs are trying to push their thinking on everyone, so we all state our pronouns and explore our genders and actively fight for the TRA cause (they told us we need to be active allies). They want to be accepted, but it's grown into 'you will think like I think; you will promote that way of thinking until it consumes everything'.

Sarah' s peice is brilliant, this in particular struck me:

"sexism being what it is, the practical consequence of treating transwomen as women is that the male interest is placed first.

The female right to self-organise comes after the male right to be treated as a woman. The female right to critique femininity comes after the male right to claim femininity. The female right to describe your body and what that body means under patriarchy comes after the male right not to be offended by descriptions of female bodies."

I Definitely second that thought, hecates. Her very name seems to need a trigger warning for some people, which I find baffling, because I can’t see that she’s ever been anything but measured and reflective on this topic.

I'd like to add to the chorus of approval. I've learned loads in the short time I've been here.

Thank you xx.

I believe that it's crucial to teach the feminist theory for younger generations and for whoever the feminist theory has passed them by as something irrelevant. Young women now believe they are privileged for not being a transsexual. For that reason, I wrote a book called The Grumpy Guide to Radical Feminism so we can spread the word about the feminist theory and make it mainstream. People are asking for radical solutions on environmental issues, politics, education, but when it comes to women's rights, no radical feminism.

www.amazon.com/dp/B08N6T22KV?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

Thank you for posting that link Hecates.

It was long but Excellent.

(As an aside: every time I think about cancelling my mumsnet account and cutting down on social media in general, I come across a thread like this, full of interesting, well-argued points that give me pause and I realise that I can't possibly cancel! Thank you to everyone taking the time to post and talk and share these resources. Much appreciated).

I've been reminded this evening by a social post of an excellent long read by Sarah Ditum, 'Six years in the gender wars', which touches upon much that's been discussed in this thread and is considered and detailed and well worth a read for anyone interested:

sarahditum.com/2018/09/10/six-years-in-the-gender-wars/

An analogy of why people reject this, in my opinion, is that it is like someone religious telling me that because I do not subscribe to religion, I will therefore be labelled as a member of the A-God religion, which others will define for me. It implicitly demands that others accept your belief system and categorisation, when that is exactly what their beliefs reject. Which is particularly ironic given the emphasis on "self-identification"

Exactly this, Polkadotgiraffe. As I was trying to think of an analogy, I thought of a religion where Vowing is an important thing and people need to be Vowed. I don’t subscribe to that hypothetical religion at all, so I’d really object to being called Unvowed because it’s including me in a religion I don’t believe and is irrelevant to me.

To me, it’s a cunning way to propagate the religion by including everyone in it whether they believe in it or not.

I see ‘Agender’ as just another of those Tumblr labels that some teens love - aromantic, agender, non-binary, etc etc. It’s nothing to do with me and of zero interest or relevance to me. People who are interested can use those labels but they’re meaningless to me and I don’t subscribe to the religion that contains them.

Thanks for sharing Sophocles

Good old Andrea covered this in the dim and distant past

Men have the power of naming, a great and sublime power. This power of naming enables men to define experience, to articulate boundaries and values, to designate to each thing its realm and qualities, to determine what can and cannot be expressed, to control perception itself

If identity is based on the right to self identify then why is it imposed - particularly on women, lesbians and those whose religious identity attaches importance to sex?*

It's almost as if there's an assumption of inferiority 🤔

@RedToothBrush that is so interesting about radicalisation. It's like an extreme form of confirmation bias? I do think to a lesser extent this seems to apply to all of those indoctrinated by religion: even if well educated, conflicting facts are ignored and reasoning abandoned. Very insightful: I shall read your posted thread. Thank you.

Imposing gender labels on people who think the whole thing is a load of crock is offensive.

If identity is based on the right to self identify then why is it imposed - particularly on women, lesbians and those whose religious identity attaches importance to sex?

This "male/ female brain" nonsense particularly riles me because I have Aspergers. Many of the older books/ research on this (now discredited) describe it as having a "male brain". I absolutely do not. I am a woman. This is just biological reality and frankly, fairly irrelevant to who I am (except in terms of the impact it has had on my life except due to societal prejudice, which is why gendered ideas are so harmful). I don't subscribe to any gender stereotypes: my brain is just as female as the rest of me because it is composed out of my cells which contain female DNA in every single one of them.

*@nauticant**
Not everyone has a sense of their gender identity mind - some people are agender

It means this:

Some people don't believe in gender identity. For these people we apply to them the gender identity "agender". Everyone can have whatever gender identity they want but they must accept at least one of them.

@nauticant if you have a gender identity, you don't have the luxury of not believing in gender identity.

"Agender" means lacking a gender identity - if you don't have one, that's the word for not having one.*

@Positrans An analogy of why people reject this, in my opinion, is that it is like someone religious telling me that because I do not subscribe to religion, I will therefore be labelled as a member of the A-God religion, which others will define for me. It implicitly demands that others accept your belief system and categorisation, when that is exactly what their beliefs reject. Which is particularly ironic given the emphasis on "self-identification".

If I do not believe in religion, then my answer to "which religion do you belong to?" is "none".

If I do not believe in gender as anything more than a harmful societal construct that oppresses people, then my answer to "what gender are you?" is "none". It is not "agender", because that would implicitly validate the concept that I reject: that people have a "gender" at all.

My point is that if there any differences between brains due to 'pink or blue brain' or due to political radicalisation and the effect of echo chambers?

If we are seeing the same type of effect in other areas then its hard for the pink blue brain theory of gender identity being innate to stand up to proper scrutiny.

Also if we know that the brain switches off reasoning due to echo chambers and political radicalism and creates 'sacred values' that might lead to people dying for a cause i will pose the following questions:

What if a parent (or any other adult or peer) tells a child over years that they are 'born in the wrong body' or 'aren't a proper girl/boy/man/woman'?

Or

What happens of the trope of if you don't get treatment you will die by suicide is repeated over and over again in gender identity echo chambers - again particularly thinking about children? Why might this be immoral and actively dangerous?

Hmm.

If a child is constantly being told by blue/pink, gender-mad, parents that he or she is "playing with the wrong toys, liking the wrong colours etc...

..Then over a period of time wouldn't it be reasonable to expect that child to come to the conclusion that merely liking stuff is what makes a man a man (or woman) and that if he or she likes the "wrong" stuff, well...

..only one conclusion - born in the wrong body - or whatever daft thing they're calling it this week.

Positrans, how can you really say as a biological male you felt like a girl/female, when 99% of the 51% of the population who are born female dont feel 'female, we only know we are different to boys due to our bodies and the way we are socialised. There is no gendered brain at birth and going forward any differences arise through hormones /socialisation. You may not have felt like the other boys and may be happier being percieved as female, but what you dont have internally is a female body , neither a female mind as it doesnt exist. Funnily enough thats because all have individual minds