My teen daughter has burst out crying and gone upstairs because we were discussing Maya Forstater

On the one hand it’s lovely she’s young and been sheltered enough and lives among sheltered enough peers who can take these very privileged views seriously (and they haven’t yet been forced by bitter experience to develop the radar to identify male sexual entitlement in all its forms). On the other hand, we have to recognise that our kids are growing up in a hostile environment towards females that is new to us if we’re old enough to be their mothers.

Yes, misogyny was everywhere way back when when we were girls and still is but when we were that age, it was in different forms. There wasn’t social media, schools, businesses etc all pushing pornified expectations on us from such a young age and ‘calling out’ on social media - a permanent and highly shareable medium- of girls and women who transgress in any way. These are all at the same time normifying this fake-progressive, anti safeguarding, misogynistic and homophobic, gender identity crap. The tears and panic is the cognitive dissonance our kids feel.
We can all have hope that they’re growing up as sensitive thoughtful young people but the sad side of this specific argument is that there is a strong awareness around this issue (rather than around another social group they could spend their energies on supporting) because there is real fear of what could happen personally to our kids, if they are know to dissent.

I also doubt I could have personally put together a very good argument at that age against an informed adult. I just feel very lucky that people I trusted around me weren’t telling me that night was day in quite the same way. I feel lucky I didn’t have the arena for my public witch trial and my little ducking stool at the ready, carried constantly in my own pocket.

Okay, yes, do watch that. Heather's on fire.

There is something about this movement that seems to appeal to young girls.

I was going to post something similar. The vast majority of men won't entertain this bullshit. They may keep quiet at work but they're not afraid of being ostracised by their mates down the pub. I wonder if this is partly because us blokes seem to bond by challenging each other - possibly an evolutionary trait.

This was a question asked of Heather Heying yesterday in the Triggernometry interview - someone (I think male) asking why this stuff seems to appeal more to women, and if there's something evolutionary in it, and is there anything we can do about it?

I forget what her answer was though - I was tuning in and out.

Found it - here's the link. Going to post it before I replay it, so don't know if it's helpful...

K-pop is the absolute worst. Not least because it seems so funky and fun and frothy.

Now, in the days of Eurotrash there was a lot of debate about the way Japanese and Korean culture deals with sex. How these countries never had a repressive Victorian period in their history. It was so long ago that I have no links or references and am not sure I even remember the main thrust, but something along the lines of, they can be very open and honest about what turns them on so they don't need to produce material masquerading as innocent and harmless which is actually.... Erm.... Not.

Therefore, videos of very cute young women dancing in skoolgirl outfits and singing about innocent crushes are very much taken at face value there - just frothy fun because there is less embarrassment about what DOES turn them on....

It does not translate too well here

I dunno, I might have got that all wrong, but if anyone remembers might make a fascinating thread....

K-pop? Pretty girls and boys dancing around and being all cutesy?

There is something about this movement that seems to appeal to young girls. The aggressive protectiveness and strong emotions stirred in them on behalf of gender non conforming boys is bizarre. When the reality is it’s the girls themselves that are the ones actually being harassed and treated badly (see recent ofsted / Everyone’s Invited as evidence). It’s most odd.

I remember when there were debates on gay rights back in the 00s and don't remember anyone screaming "no debate" or "bigot" or "your words are LITERAL VIOLENCE". You don't have to do that when you have confidence in your argument.

It's very frustrating. I'm a teacher and I have to tread carefully about what I say at school.

We had a male student who presented in a very feminine way (I was one of many teachers who assumed he was a girl at first). There was a situation when some younger boys reported him for using the boys' bathroom, assuming he was a girl. Several teachers immediately suggested we talk to him about his gender identity, ask what he would like to be known as etc. I said no way! If he raises any of these issues, then we can address them. But there is no way we can approach a teenage boy and suggest he might like to be known as 'she', just because he's grown his hair, speaks very softly, and hangs around exclusively with girls. It was like people were keen to have the discussion with him. That really worries me.

I was once teaching a lesson about heroes and I deliberately included a picture of JKR on a slide of various women we might look up to (others were Malala, Michelle Obama, Greta Thunberg, Serena Williams etc). I was trying to keep it to women they would all have heard of. I included JKR to see if they would react to the press about her being a transphobe, and sure enough a couple of girls recoiled and said, 'she's not a hero, she's transphobic'. I know they are (were?) both big Harry Potter fans.

I asked them what they meant. They said she'd written terrible transphobic things. I asked them to give me an example. They couldn't. I asked if they'd read her letter. They admitted they hadn't.

We ended up having a discussion about the media and how we need to check our sources, not accept everything at face value etc. I gave them some examples of things JKRhad written in her letter.

No idea if it had any impact but I can't not try!!

My own children are small but I do not look forward to the possibility of them becoming too heavily influenced by this sort of thinking as they get older. We'll have to wait and see...

If it makes you feel any better, my sister was totally in thrall to the gender cult a few years back. She’s not a teen but we had a heated argument where she screamed at me that trans people are the most oppressed demographic on earth and that my views were vile. It just took a couple of months and a bit of referring to the brave beautiful Danielle Muscato who was at the time living in a women’s refuge and she peaked. Now she’s GC and takes the piss out of it all. I have another sister who is also GC. It’s a relief that I have people to talk to about this and that my family have not lost all critical thinking skills.

OP as your DD will be studying philosophy, buy them a copy of material girls by Kathleen stock, who is after all a philosophy professor. It provides a clear deconstruction of gender identity theory in a philosophical way.
I also have 2 teen / early 20s DDs. And this is a banned subject. The youngest has admitted she agrees with me, but still doesn't want to talk about it. The oldest will literally do the 'not listing, hand over ears' thing! I actually have some sympathy with them. Expressing GC views in their peer groups would make them social parriahs. Women and students have been harassed and 'investigated' for expressing GC views. It is dangerous. I hope and believe that now that GC views are protected more people will be comfortable discussing them, there will be a ripple effect and the curtain will fall. We'll look back on this as a kind of madness.

My teen daughter thinks I am a transphobe and I know nothing. The intensity of her delusion will wear off eventually. Although I do get tired of her teensplaining feminism to me.

One of the traditional jobs of respected media outlets was to interpret these things for people. And even if they had a particular POV about the topic what made them trusted was a sense that they would attempt to communicate what the research said accurately.

I think a lot of these people have been put in a difficult position because the sources they had some faith in are no longer holding themselves to that kind of standard. But there are still people convinced that the Guardian tries to work that way now.

I got “cancelled” from a social media group I was in for saying that Guardian articles weren’t actually “sources” 😂

This caused huge upset amongst the younger members, because I had suggested that journalistic articles in the media aren’t as good as actual research and data, and that was, apparently, very elitist and privileged of me. 🤣

I genuinely believe the issue here isn't about disagreeing on this particular subject

Its about being too influenced by what some dude on social media says and swallowing what they say to be in with the crowd rather than employing critically thinking and questioning the value of whats being said.

Its this subject this time around. What about the next subject?

Teaching the skills to think critically is much maligned, undervalued and dismissed (the principle is the core of history and media studies).

As you say DRM, you should be able to strengthen your argument when you do this - and the failure to be able to do this is a life lesson.

I think its too easy to go head on at this as a gender critical / trans conflict. Its not. Its much easier to disarm it and neutralise unquestioning repetition of ideology by teaching critical thinking.

Its how you tackle people who end up in cults / get involved with extremism.

Indeed....

A conversation I had with the teens in the DRM household.

I can't emphasise how many times I said "show me the evidence - not social media tweets/videos etc but actual evidence" eg look up how how many TW have been murdered in the U.K. vs Women.

Look up the data on how many TW are in prison and for what offences.

Etc etc

She said people on tiktok say...

There needs to be a conversation about tiktok and examining the motivations and agendas of people.

I've had some testing conversations with my DS and DSD on this but frankly I wouldn't stand for flouncing off in tears.

If they disagree with me fine.

Let's talk.

You don't win any argument with me (or anyone as an adult - or at least anyone worthy of respect) through emotional blackmail and as a parent it's a lesson I was willing to teach.

I must admit she sounds very naive.

"I just want to live in a world where trans people are accepted".

Ok in what sense are they not by her standards and what is she doing about it rather than calling you an old out of touch bugger?

Put the onus back on her to make her case rather than you pleading yours.

That's what worked for me. I stopped trying to change their minds and challenged them to change mine, based on facts and evidence.

Every time I was able to empirically prove they were incorrect they had to do more research to prove me wrong until they actually educated themselves beyond their own echo chamber.

So ageism comments are OK then ????

[quote Subbaxeo]@EmbarrassingAdmissions I simply meant that if a man had surgery and taking long term hormone treatment to have female physical characteristics, then the risk of breast cancer is increased. So they come for screening. Incidentally, all visitors are banned from clinics unless they’re in a caring capacity because of Covid. And male patients coming to symptomatic clinics are in the same waiting room as women. But I’d imagine they are the ones feeling more embarrassed as it’s obviously a primarily female environment.[/quote]
As a man I'd be embarrassed for the hospital that it had failed to provide single sex spaces. I'd feel bad for teh women who thought they had a single sex space. I might be a bit embarrassed to be there where I shouldn't be if the hospital was doing it's job, but it would be barely perecptible because it wasn't my fault.

The problem here is a women's problem - listen to them. The man isn;t the victim in this.