Transmen

Presumably then there will be cases of people who have met a truly passing trans person and only later learned they were trans, much to their surprise. Anyone here ever experienced this?

Quite right, height is literally the only thing that differentiates between men and women. That and high heels. I'm regularly confused when I meet short men. I'm still not sure whether Tom Cruise is male or female.

Which is an argument the point of which is to try and make bloody women shut up and accept that if they are going to have men in their facilities whether or not it entirely fucks up their access, they might as well have men who are dressed as women.

No.

Men do not have to be arses. It's not part of the biology.

And frankly TM tend to be a whole lot more aware and sympathetic to the needs of other females, and a smile and explanation would deal with most women anxious about 'am I in an enclosed space with a biological male, which means I have to leave?' But if you as a female choose to change your appearance to the point it may cause other women distress, concern and exclude them from women's spaces? It's kind of on you to either reassure them or campaign for alternative spaces as you would prefer.

This is about men of all identities coping with the idea that female humans have needs too, and need accessible spaces. And bloody having the decency to stop believing that women's privacy and dignity is something in the gift of men to play with and withhold as they feel like it.

I like the gender neutral loos at the southbank! Even as a woman it makes me more comfortable because of the way I look. It can be pretty confusing though to ever find any loo there

I’ve no objection to them setting up a 3rd space for people who prefer a mixed-sex facility but why would you not then locate that facility in the basement instead of relocating the women’s toilets there? Women who are unable to use stairs are now forced to share facilities with men.

Transition doesn’t change skull size, arm length to height ratio or gait (and gait is the biggest indicator) so no, not really.

Probably won’t stand out enough to be instantly clockable in a big crowd the way a 4’11 transman and 6’7 transwoman do, but on a standing-beside-you-at-the-sink-looking-into-the-same-mirror? Definitely.

My dog can tell a human male from a human female without knowing shit about gendered accoutrements like make up and heels 🤷‍♀️

Isn't that because big tall women who transition and small men who transition pass and you don't realise they are trans.

Of course there has always been a very simple solution to this artificially-created problem, which of course is third spaces. We've been saying that for years.

But it's not the spaces that transwomen want, it's the women in the spaces.

A third spaces has always been a sensible, pragmatic solution but it doesn't achieve the transgender aim of validation. A third space is an oppositional position to the assertion that trans women ARE women (and then, more quietly - trans men ARE men, too, I suppose).

How can we be back to something that never happened?
How is it that for decades men used the Gents and women used the Ladies and the world didn’t stop turning.
Women need the right to be able to challenge males in single sex spaces.

If you're this dim in real life how do you remember to put your shoes on before leaving the house?

No one has or will ever suggest genital inspections for entry into toilets. To pretend that it's even a slim possibility is facetious and deliberately inflammatory.

Who uses which toilet has always been a social contract and norm, decent males have always know that they shouldn't go into women's changing rooms, toilets etc because it makes some women uncomfortable and because it normalises a behaviour that allows the indecent men easy access to victims. If the norm is to question a man in a place where women are vulnerable then that allows for society to safeguard the woman. If the norm is to pretend we don't see the male in a place where women are vulnerable then we are saying it is socially acceptable to ignore safeguarding and pretend it isn't needed.

The fact that so many women and girls are sexually assaulted by males and that convictions are so pitifully low that as a country we have essentially legalised rape tells us that we cannot afford to pretend safeguarding is unnecessary, we cannot pretend that we don't see the man in a womens changing room, we can't for the sake of kindness say that it's ok for our female children to have to share a communal shower in the female swimming changing rooms with a male with a penis because he tells us his name is Sue. We have to be able to question it.

What do you mean BACK to?

Have you been living in a parallel universe where ‘genital inspections’ have been a thing?

🤣🤣🤣

I mean, sounds like we are back to everybody showing their genitals and passport before entering a toilet, which I'm not that keen on myself.

I’m afraid that talk veers into defamation against feminists towards the end - Whittle even predicts a young, angry trans person going on a violent rampage 😬

Buck Angel in the US has been on testosterone for many years and is open about the dearth of knowledge in the healthcare community and how he's had to advocate himself for better understanding. He is also open about the many detrimental effects (e.g. vaginal atrophy) and recognises it will shorten his lifespan, but still believes it was worth it in his case.

EmotionalSupportHyena · Today 02:53
I just wrote a long thing and lost it!

Stephen Whittle (age 67, started testosterone in the late 70s) is probably the UK’s only long-term transitioned FtM in the public eye.

Thank you for that link to Stephen Little speaking. Anyone’s perception of his character is not the subject of this thread, but I thought he was impressive, persuasive and sympathetic.

I would assume he was a male if I saw him in a ladies’ lavatory, and in general find older men and women a bit more difficult to tell apart - their clothes and hair styles making the most difference.

I just wrote a long thing and lost it!

Stephen Whittle (age 67, started testosterone in the late 70s) is probably the UK’s only long-term transitioned FtM in the public eye.

There have been some long-term transitioned MtF people who died fairly recently having made it to their 80s, April Ashley who transitioned in the 1960s and Jan Morris who transitioned in the early 1970s. Not many from that time France as there was no NHS gender service back then and you had to fly to Casablanca for ‘the op’.

All trans people older than about 30 will have transitioned as fully grown adults as paediatric transition via blockers and hormones is only about 20 years old and the first ten years of it were teeny tiny numbers globally.
I think Susie Green’s kid (taken to the US for blockers as they weren’t available here) is now 27-28 ish?
It’ll be a long, long time before the earliest ‘transgender kids’ reach their twilight years.

Transition was much more surgical in the early days with a lot less messing about with hormones/hormone blockers - I have heard stories about the Warhol Factory trans/drag types cadging contraceptive pills from their female friends for DIY transition but obvs in that era, the pill wouldn’t have been particularly easy to access anyway.

Footage from last year of S’Whittle, as an example of female transgender person after 40 plus years of exogenous testosterone (began transition in mid 20s, now aged 67)

I wonder this too. How are all these people going to look at 60/70/80 and how wil their health be after decades of cross sex hormones? The trans women will still get the massive man ears. Their already higher then women risk of stroke or heart attack will be exacerbated by years of Estrogen, plus the cancer risk surely. The trans men will get even smaller and surley they'll suffer massively from osteoporosis and arthritis. It feels like they don't really think these things through.

Are there any trans people in their 70s or 80s yet? It's been happening for awhile right? Would be interesting to see how they fare medically.

Agree!!

@Giveaschitt Yes. It's the old "if two wrongs don't make a right, try three" argument. Men in the men's bogs, women in the women's. However they present and however they pass. We can sort it out if the law is on our side.

Please read back through the thread. It is jam-packed full of posts around the idea that women would find themselves trying to stop transmen from entering our spaces because they "pass" as men so the whole thing can't work. Nah! Not having it.

It's exactly the same argument you see some Americans making for why they shouldn't bring in stricter gun laws. "bad people will still be able to get guns, so what's the point?"

*Arguing that there is no point changing the EA.

I don’t think anyone is arguing that.