Gender argument - caught in the middle

Yes!!! I’m off to write this now.

That would be brilliant.

'Here is my article regarding the general numptiness of KM'

'I disagree, you meanie! You're wrong.'

'I'm afraid you'll find that Crochetmonster (2022) disagrees with you.'

'But that's your article!'

'And it's peer reviewed. My cat gave it serious thought and made some excellent points'

I have reached my limit of 'be kind'. Stickers on lampposts saying 'women won't wheesht' were investigated by Kirkcaldy Police as a hate crime. The attached image is a lamppost on the Meadows in Edinburgh. I'm taking a wild guess that the most that will happen is that The City of Edinburgh Council might send someone to scrub it off (largely due to the profanity and the fact there's a School nearby). There will be no investigation into a slur against women (with violent overtones) - totally cool, apparently.

But 'women won't wheesht' is just too horrendous to be bourne.

KM did!

Because Montgomery felt they needed more than a tweet or two to get their points across. I mean, Montgomery was trying to explain their thinking to an academic to be fair. The academic must not have found it very compelling because the academic did not discuss it.

Either way, no tweets that actually provided an answer.

Did KM actually. Cite one of KMs own articles as a gotcha? That’s actually quite sad in a funny kind of way.

I am not one to usually post twitter threads, but you might like this particular one.

I read that last night. Very funny! 🤩

twitter.com/Hungrybeeeater/status/1506086672039034886?s=20&t=X-tFE30I1GpBMFmJ57PgvQ

Dr Rachel Ruysch asks a question that she said would not get answered. And it didn't.

I can name 1000 things shared by most women and no trans women…the notion that something must be shared by all cis women is a STRAW MAN& misunderstands the notion of categories! You name just 1 thing trans women are more likely than other males to have in common with females.

It was quite interesting to watch the twists.

And actually, BC/UCI have not stopped EB from competing, if I understand correctly, but have said that EB cannot compete in the female races this year.

I was just reading in the DM that the female cyclists threatened to boycott the race if EB took part so I wonder if they are just using this as an excuse to kick the can down the road. Good news though if female athletes are threatening boycotts. Might focus the minds of the men running these organisations.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10671179/Trans-cyclist-Emily-Bridges-BARRED-national-championships.html

'it's possible to change sex' and 'sex is immutable'?

Feminists argue the latter - I can't concede it's 'a bit possible' to change sex anymore than I can concede it's 'a bit possible' to teleport.

In terms of the pragmatic ground we can beat out between two inherently exclusive positions, there are compromises like third spaces. Interestingly, I think many transpeople are happy with third spaces, but as we know, the most vociferous voices are often not trans themselves, but 'allies'.

Yes, apparently the female socialisation of being kind and nice seems to have skipped some people who wish to be known as women.

Not sure why I should Be Kind to a side that tells me to suck a ladydick and shut up. Just because I think TWATW and TMATM

I will believe TWAW when someone can give me a definition of woman that would include all women and all transwomen and exclude all men and transmen and does not report to sexist stereotypes. Until the TWATW and TWATM

I’m not sure there’s much of a middle ground really. If you don’t believe that TWAW there’s not much you can do about that really. I believe women should have the right to services/spaces/sports separate from men. This doesn’t feel like an extreme position to me and it’s only really been perceived by others as an extreme position in the last 10 years.

Women express these views in different ways some perhaps more eloquently or “kindly” than others but generally most are coming from a similar position.

Something that the recent Maya Forstater case really highlighted to me was that there is no way that women are able to express this opinion and not be called a terf or a bigot. Maya is very articulate and reasonable and she lost her employment because she doesn’t think that humans can change their sex. The only way she could have been “kinder” is to not say anything about it at all.

So women are probably getting a bit more shouty and assertive because nobody is actually listening. It’s frustrating that the EB situation had to go all the way to 3 days before the race before someone put a stop to it. Think about all the female racers and the stress and frustration they must have been going through. Honestly boggles my mind.

But happily more and more women are starting to say “no” and sometimes this will be perceived by some as being unkind but it is really just women reasserting our boundaries. It is necessary and long overdue.

In regards to women's sport it is actually very interesting to watch a webinar with Mianne Biggar who was responsible for changing the golf championship rules in the 00s. They now look at what they were responsible for and understand that it was wrong. But at the time, there was no direct studies that could be used so it was all about the feelings of these athletes.

There was an Australian based rugby player (Caroline Flack I think) who played state championship rugby without telling their coach or team mates. They eventually told the coach but I don't think they told their team mates. That player won a state award meant for females. This was again in the 00s. So, even worse. Think of the negative sexist discrimination that the females had faced to get there vs that player's opportunities throughout life.

That is not even including the number of women that faced increased health risks because of this person's inclusion. And still Australian Rugby has made no clear steps to follow the World Rugby guidelines, unless they have since I last checked.

I understand what you mean about wanting to be kind to individual transman and transwoman. I'd be on the side of anyone who needs kindness / support in upholding their normal human rights ...but cannot #bekind if it means pretending that it is possible for anyone to actually change sex.

TWATW and TMATM - I'm fine with that and can accept the desired change of pronouns/names - even (or perhaps especially) when (as so far has always been the case) there is no chance of the individual 'passing' for the opposite sex.

(Any clothing/make-up/hairstyling/colour choice is fine - regardless of whether trans or not. Why wouldn't it be? I've never thought that any particular clothing or style should be exclusively for one sex. )

I think that 1 side is bullying individuals (with serious threats and name-calling and attempting to get them sacked) for questioning the new dogma. It is making being kind much harder. It is entrenching the two sides.

The other side is sometimes said to be bullying when they state their views about groups (transwomen or transmen). Questioning or debate is referred to as assault. This is not reasonable and is not bullying.

Some individual trans people are being singled out in ways that could be called bullying. Lisa Thomas is being picked out and I think this is very tough on her. However, she is taking a woman's place and this is not right - even if it is allowed at present. It is difficult to accept the unfairness she is party to, and not point it out. Leaving her unquestioned is treating her competitors (those who have trained long and hard) very badly. (Would this be as wrong as bullying?)

As you say - sports organisations are at fault. Why are they not acting to uphold fair competiton? It seems that they are afraid of the TRAs and the power they hold at the moment. (They are not afraid of women - GC or not.)

ribbony feartie. Love it!

His blatant women hatred - not so much

Safeguarding is about envisaging the worst case scenario and doing what you can to avoid it.
Given that the worst case scenario is happening with alarming regularity when men are allowed to self-ID as women AND anyone raising the alarm is called a bigot, do you think people should stop raising the alarm.

WIth regards to the TW in women's sports, it might have been Maxine Blythe, or maybe the rugby player (whose name escapes me) who basically said they knew it was unfair / morally cheating but what could they do? They just wanted to pee play sport as their authentic selves.

It certainly is a conundrum, but sometimes in life we have to make decisions that aren't all round wonderful for us. If playing competitive sport is more important than being your authentic self, delay your transition. If the transition is more important, accept that you are not eligible to play on the opposite sex team. Sexed bodies play sports, gender identities do not.

The ribbony feartie is currently talking about discrimination on Twitter and in particular the single sex exemptions in the Equality Act 2010. Apparently 'discrimination is fine in certain circumstances' (such as blue badge holders) but in relation to any single sex exemptions (which include rape crisis centres and prisons) is totally unacceptable. Discrimination is bad. Apart from when it's not.

So exemptions are fine for all the other protected characteristics but not for women.

But it's not targeted...at all. No. (Look a squirrel!)

EB could still race in the correct class for his sex and if he did I might even make the trip to Derby to go and support a true trailblazer.

I’ve also said I don’t think trans women in womens sport should be allowed but the onus should be on the pro bodies to change the rules not the players

Are you denying that trans people can have the agency or morals not to compete unfairly against women.

Sounds a bit transphobic to me.
Good thing this is Mumsnet and not Twitter eh?