Telegraph - Women prisoners who call transgender inmates ‘he’ or ‘him’ face extra jail time

It's a massive con.

Indeed it is, Datun.

And conversely a TW following a woman around demanding "am I a woman" to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped.

Not a prison situation, but this immediately brought to my mind the image of I Willoughby in CBB, bellowing in full narc rage mode at the cowed women contestants, “I AM A WOMAN! LET THAT PENETRATE!”.

Bullying - facilitated by big dollops of male entitlement and the fact of living in a society that fundamentally privileges males over females.

This notion that it is the women who are liable to bully by using correct sex pronouns is ridiculous and “problematic”. The women in this scenario are being bullied by the male people. Over and over and over again. Fundamentally.

I will add to that, that in the light of the evidence coming from prison guards, women prisoners and collated by the Keep Prisons Single Sex campaign, I don't have much remaining belief in the idea of a vulnerable TW being subordinated to more powerful women; particularly TW with a history of serious sex offending against women. The power seems very much established on the other side.

There also has to be the issue of yet more power being handed to the male person to control and subordinate female people already harassed and subordinated by their presence. In this situation it is possible to envisage why some women will be angry enough to retaliate.

Agreed, ArtichokeLeaves.

I simply feel that bullying focuses on a noticed thing that really hits home with the target.

It does. And the trans lobby have managed to convince the world that correctly identifying the sex of a male is bullying. It isn't.

(See Helen Joyce's book, Trans and the narcissistic rage of autogynephiles).

No one should be bullied in prison.

Forcing women to adhere to an ideology that requires compelled speech and repeated lies under threat of punishment is bullying.

I don't see why bullying (persistent targeting using whatever upsets or scares the target loads) should have ONE exception written IN.

It already does. The sex of a male in a female prison is relevant 24/7. It's the most relevant thing about them. These women must be forced to pretend they agree with the ideology that makes them subordinate.

Its like they thought of the most likely people dynamic to encourage bullying (incarcerating men with women), added the best case scenario, (make women obey the men or else), wound it up as tight as possible and set it off.

And the real kicker is that if the women don't comply it is because they are the ones with the power!

It's a massive con.

And yes, excellent point about structural oppression.

Thanks! I stole it from Jane Clare Jones - this is one of her bugbears...

She hates bad analogies, and thinking of women as "just" being like any other discriminated-against minority is one of them.

And conversely a TW following a woman around demanding "am I a woman" to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped.

Definitely this ^^

The common factor is the intent to harass and cause distress.

Which is bullying.

Which policies and practice already exist to manage perfectly well.

Pronouns should not be anything special or different in their own right.

(Does the TW get their sentence added to for bullying? Is the equality there? What about sentences extended for sexual assault of women?)

And yes, excellent point about structural oppression.

I think everyone here is bothered by the asymmetry where the police care about "transphobia" but not "misogyny", but I think the majority would rather rectify that by cutting back on application of "hate" than giving "misogyny" the same privileges.

Yes I agree. I don't believe "hate" should solely be based on the perception of the complainant. There should be an objective test.

I’m confused. I thought feminists long supported the concept of crimes being punished harder because of discrimination/hate/or ill will as an aggravating factor?

Did they? I imagine some people calling themselves feminists may have done so, but I don't see how it necessarily arises from feminist principles. (Not really a feminist expert...)

On the whole the push from this sort of thing was initially directed towards race and homophobia, afaik.

"Feminists" aren't speaking with one voice here. Those around here are far more inclined towards classical liberal principles and universal rights, rather than the "identity politics" type. We're generally supportive of "Fair Cop" who are fighting against excessive use of "hate" stuff by police, distorting the legal process. We just want women to be treated fairly as people.

I think everyone here is bothered by the asymmetry where the police care about "transphobia" but not "misogyny", but I think the majority would rather rectify that by cutting back on application of "hate" than giving "misogyny" the same privileges.

(And personally, I think "misogyny" as an analogue to "transphobia" or "homophobia" is a bad fit for women's problems anyway. Women suffer oppression, not just discrimination. Women actually are a resource for men - sex providers and child bearers - not just an "other", and as such suffer systematic oppression in a way other groups like trans/gay do not. Acts against them do not so much arise from "hate" as their biological position w.r.t. males. Attempts to unpick "misogyny" from that and treat it worse than other male-vs-female crime would not really help.)

Our characteristics aren't protected in law. It's not a hate crime to use misogynistic words, in the same way it is to use "transphobic" ones. So feminists haven't "won". Hope that helps.

I’m confused. I thought feminists long supported the concept of crimes being punished harder because of discrimination/hate/or ill will as an aggravating factor? I also thought feminists supported the idea that people shouldn’t be allowed to say certain offensive things to others?

This is simply the things feminists have long advocated for put into practice. Bullying based on protected characteristics not being tolerated with the test of whether bullying has occurred or not largely being based on the victim’s perception? Surely they didn’t just want their own immutable characteristics protected in law and not everyone else’s? Because equality isn’t equality if doesn’t apply to everyone. Feminists should be pleased about finally getting the policies that they wanted.

This sounded a lot like that storyline to me.

Yes, it did, didn't it?

I think this is where it becomes confusing with transgender surely either we accept that they are male or female depending on circumstances. We can’t keep swapping depending on circumstances.

This. Either they are "women" who must be afforded female pronouns or they aren't.

And conversely a TW following a woman around demanding "am I a woman" to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped.

You do see this sort of attempt to cause confrontation occurring from TW quite often - at least more often than the converse. Unsurprising if they now feel they can get someone in trouble for saying the wrong thing. Male aggression has a new outlet.

Yes, exactly this.

A woman following a TW around shouting sex based pronouns to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped

And conversely a TW following a woman around demanding "am I a woman" to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped.

You do see this sort of attempt to cause confrontation occurring from TW quite often - at least more often than the converse. Unsurprising if they now feel they can get someone in trouble for saying the wrong thing. Male aggression has a new outlet.

Examples that spring to mind are that report of Mridha Wadwha from a partygoer, and a recent Tiktok video of someone having a rant at a drive-through.

A woman following a TW around shouting sex based pronouns to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped.

I will add to that, that in the light of the evidence coming from prison guards, women prisoners and collated by the Keep Prisons Single Sex campaign, I don't have much remaining belief in the idea of a vulnerable TW being subordinated to more powerful women; particularly TW with a history of serious sex offending against women. The power seems very much established on the other side.

There also has to be the issue of yet more power being handed to the male person to control and subordinate female people already harassed and subordinated by their presence. In this situation it is possible to envisage why some women will be angry enough to retaliate.

MN rules for this work fine. I will gladly use a person's name. I will gladly avoid using the sex based pronoun the person has specifically stated they do not want used, where possible and where that person is within a socially reciprocating situation. Basically if they are polite to me I'm happy to be polite in return.

What I won't do is lie and use a pronoun I don't believe in, or avoid being clear about sex based reality if it is necessary for me to do so to protect my boundaries, or those of other women. If those boundaries aren't being trampled it won't be necessary for me to do so.

As mentioned in I think Maya's court case: there are rules and boundaries to manage actual bullying as opposed to other situations, and the danger is the two being merged. A woman following a TW around shouting sex based pronouns to harass and cause distress is bullying and should be stopped. Although I want to know for what other bullying actions are sentences increased; what is this on a par with and are pronouns seen as significantly worse than other forms of bullying. People are sadly going to sometimes be unpleasant.

A woman who fails to always be able to jump her language through someone else's hoops correctly, has autism or other needs, is not bullying. A woman in prison who is being treated in an unpleasant and harassing way by a male person who has a hell of a lot of power over her in this situation may use the only remaining power she has left to name the reality of the situation. That is not bullying.

It's where 'misgendering' is invested with special powers that it goes wrong.

I think the Mean Girls- the Prison Years was Hollyoaks.

Maybe the female prisoners can say "sheeeeee" with an eye-roll and air-quotes or a little fake cough. If questioned the females could say they have a tic, brought on by being triggered into a MH crisis due to the stress of sharing a prison sentence with a penis-haver. You can't give someone a prison sentence for being triggered, can you?

Males are male. Full stop. No two ways about it.

99.999 % of the world including in UK also uses woman/ man to refer to sex. And boy/ girl.

Individuals can decide for themselves how they interact with other individuals. I mean in the end it's trivial.

Losing our words is fundamental. Female is going now as well. That leaves NONE.

note the new definitions only apply in certain circs. Anything to do with female (not male) reproductive system. Women's rights but only in certain countries.

Even the most evangelist new definition people and orgs will merrily use women girls to mean sex on other major topics. Without allowing themselves even a moment to notice their huge glaring total massive fucking hypocrisy. Cowardly bastards every one of them.
Because they know that talking about eg women under Taliban using people with vaginas etc.
Would be condemned rightly as outrageous .

I think this is where it becomes confusing with transgender surely either we accept that they are male or female depending on circumstances. We can’t keep swapping depending on circumstances.

My question to those who have a different view (aside from the PP who agreed to disagree) is-

What do you plan to do about it?

Petition?
Write to MPs?
ministry of justice?
The individual who said this?
Etc etc.

And I've never been told to feck off either! It's not a term I've heard IRL. Surely it is for fuck? And round here fuck off is heard very often so I mean it's no big deal either way!

Gawd.

This is all a very interesting conversation for me anyway!

Talking to. No. It means I don't think it's right to alter the existing bullying policy. No more, no less.