thank you from a TW

We always have behaved. Behaved well, that is.

We are not the ones who call names.
We are not the ones who make threats.
We are not the ones who yet to stop others talking.

We are not the ones who should be asked or reminded or instructed to keep the discussion respectful.

Behave?

That is a condescending instruction.

To a forum of women.

That very act undermines and parodies womanhood and further drives home harmful stereotypes.

You just have to join in.

It is, isn't it? 😆

crikey, that Shakira gif hadn't loaded when I started writing my post. that's a bit of a tough act to follow

men who start threads rather than just joining in the conversations. It makes me eye roll when Glinner does it too.

'I am not here to join in the conversation, I am here to make sure you talk about the right things (be respectful!)'

high five to the chaps who do manage to just post like a normal person.

Well, it is Friday.

SHAKIRA SHAKIRA

Women need all the allies we can get, and I'd say that trans women who understand the issues are particularly important.

But we women need also to push those potential transwomen allies to see that they themselves also need to understand that there are still issues that they themselves need to be very aware of - not least that the idea of 'passing' is often a forlorn hope and that they themsleves, no matter how well meaning and empathetic, are part of that problem.

My friend, now in his 60s, has had to face this fact. He hates it, hates how age is undoing all the facial feminisation surgery he had, is making him look and feel less 'feminine'. But that is his problem, one he is working on finding his own solution to. And one thing I know his solution will not include is a belief that he has ever actually been undistinguishable from a woman or that he can use female facilities without causing the women also using them a moment of concern or fear.

That's not being nasty, horrible or even prickly. That's simply acknowledging the truth of a thing and finding an accommodation that everyone can live with - even if it is the transwoman who is left feeling less 'whole'. Because it is the transwoman who is asking a favour of women, not the other way round.

It is patently obvious who are genuine trans women and are indistinguishable (clothed at any rate) from women.

No @Atarax no transwoman is undistinguishable. If a transwoman was of petite build, kept perfectly still, didn't move or speak, then maybe. But once in motion. No, never. Most (I'd say all but some quite vehemently deny it) women's senses will spot a transwoman as male as soon as they move.

This isn't new. Ask any physiotherapist, and biomechanist, any physiologist. They will be able to list all the slight differences in body build, gait etc that set even the most 'feminine' of men apart from even the most 'masculine' of women. These are the things our skeletal selves do, both axial and appendicular skeletal bones have their discrete 'tells' - and all humans can see them and know them for what they are. That's how we chose a sexual partner, after all!

I will say it again, the feminist writer Shakira was not wrong - those hips do not lie

Well OP, it's a good thing you know what it's like around here. The pricklier responses to your post won't come as too much of a shock to you. Women need all the allies we can get, and I'd say that trans women who understand the issues are particularly important.

There is no new "big push". Trans women have always used women's spaces. If you weren't aware of that prior to the current moral panic, it just goes to show how little trouble they cause.

Mmm! That's not the whole story though is it?

Many women did notice, and kept quiet because they feared the backlash. It is far, far easier to leave the room, hurry on with your task, not look, not acknowldege, than it is to deal with a man in a sapce that is expected to be single sex and female.

And until relatively recently there weren't many transwomen and those who were around trried quite hard to be asiniffensive as ossible. Nowadays the numbers have risen, what constitutes a transwoman has changed and many choose to make eye contact, be almost combative about their choice to use women's facilities.

That’s great OP!

There is no new "big push". Trans women have always used women's spaces. If you weren't aware of that prior to the current moral panic, it just goes to show how little trouble they cause.

Tiny numbers. And they were noticed. Now it's considerable numbers. Which is a huge problem for women's safety. Clearly you weren't aware of that.

Well done op btw. 👍

Thank you OP. I'm sorry but I'm waiting for the other shoe to fall, but that's on me. I've never been able to take a compliment either!

Any road up, all the best to you.

TinselAngel, I think you're being very patronising.

It is patently obvious who are genuine trans women and are indistinguishable (clothed at any rate) from women. If you are trans and not 1000% certain that no one wld know you were not a woman - be respectful of single sex spaces and don't go there, really not such a big deal to go to the loo in the accessible toilet.

‘Genuine’ transwomen may think that they’re indistinguishable from women. They may even be 1,000% certain of that - 10,000% certain even - but that’s still how they see themselves, not how women see them. It still doesn’t make it acceptable for them to use our spaces.