What the gender critical movement is trying to achieve

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Brilliantly summed up.

I guess I would add a part that states: There are no male behaviors or female behaviors. Human behavior is on a continuum...

Males and females can have behaviors on every part of that continuum. There is no such thing as being born in the wrong body. If we as a society don't give a specific behavior a gender then maybe gender dysphoria will cease to be an issue.

And really when you think about it, feminists and gender non conforming people have a lot in common and should be natural allies.

And indeed they were back in the days of transexualism.

But unfortunately transsexuelism was hijacked and transgenderism took over. And then lesbianism and homosexuality was hijacked.

And it's all very invested in the myth / social construction of gender and therefore an absolute gift to patriarchal society.

Such a waste. But also utterly inevitable.

I don't think anyone who has been thinking about and analyzing gender for some time is surprised that this is where we have ended up.

Apologies for the mega quoting but am on my phone.

What you say here is so true @Seamsthesame

No-one with a conscience and sense of ethics wants to encourage or god forbid force others to have surgery or take hormones.

And this is where society (yet again) should be listening to feminists. People's bodies are not wrong. It is not the people or their bodies that need fixing. It's the stupid system that tells us that body / sex = gender stereotype. And if you don't fit the stereotype it's not the stereotype which is the problem, it's your body / sex.

But of course we can't have honest and thought provoking conversations about that because if we did the whole system has to be questioned and that opens up a Pandora's box on which all of society is founded and functions.

Which is that male privilege is totally unjustified and indefinsible.

And we've never had much luck with that conversation. So now we are in a big old mess with no obvious way out.

From a medical ethics point of view you can't have a situation when one gender dysphoric individual is 'genuine' and another is not because one has surgery and/or takes hormones and the other doesn't.

What if the gender dysphoric person is a high anesthesic risk, or has a clotting disorder (the genitals are extremely vascular) or has a history of cancer/genes increasing risk of cancer that is hormone dependent? No legislation can be put in place that pressures people into dangerous medical decisions by declaring them as 'not genuine' (obviously ignoring the fact that in all likelihood every transition is medically dangerous to some extent).

Gender dysphoria is a mental health condition and should be managed accordingly, IE, individualised care to make them functioning and comfortable members of society, but without expecting anyone else to play along with their delusions/ be adversely affected by them.

At the highest level, being GC means you want to abolish gender - a world in which no-one assumes any desires, behaviours, skills, abilities, personality traits etc about anyone purely based on their sex.

This does not preclude risk assessment at group level where sex is a risk factor.

I think in a world where we have disentangled female/feminine and male/masculine, everyone would be a lot more free to be themselves.

The idea that your sex has anything innate to do with your personality was wrong to me for many many years before I even thought about trans people. The idea that how you are socialised as a male/female can shape a lot about you is definitely interesting, and I'd like to see how this could change without gender.

Yes, exactly.

For decades before gender identity ideology came along, feminists were pointing out gender oppression and were striving to get misogynists to acknowledge that gender is a social construct and an oppressive tool of the patriarchy. Most people (in my experience, anyway) dismissed this view as extreme and thought we were fanatical feminazis who were reading sexism into everything even when it wasn't there.

And then gender identity ideology saunters in and the men start saying "oh, guess what? We've just made this exciting new discovery that gender is a social construct, but don't worry, here's the solution..." and because it's men saying it this time, everyone listens and suddenly everyone agrees with the men's amazing new idea (which was what feminists were saying all along, but obviously no-one credits feminists as they're just horrible jealous bigots).

In my opinion, it's precisely because no-one listened to feminists about gender oppression in the preceding decades (which was a result of misogyny and, well, gender oppression) that society was so vulnerable to gender identity ideology, as people failed to spot what it really was.

It seems so obvious that the people who couldn't spot the misogyny and gender oppression that was blatantly staring women in the face for centuries before gender identity ideology came along weren't going to suddenly be able to recognise it in this newly repackaged, male-driven vehicle with sequins all over it.

It's the exact same misogyny, and yet again, women's voices are dismissed through that same misogyny.

OK. I hear you on the slip of the keyboard but I still disagree with you. I think because we are coming at this from very different perspectives.

Genderism and by consequence transgenderism aren't beliefs in a magical system. The system totally exists - it is the current universal social system that we all live in under which males are privileged and females are subjugated. The system is very real. It is institutionalised, all pervading and we are all socialised by it. Generally this system is referred to as patriarchy. Criticism of this system / gender criticism AKA feminism is not an absence of belief in the system - it is disagreement and resistance to this very real system.

The magical belief is that it is possible to change one's biological sex. Although I don't think that many people (even transgenderists[ really believe that. What they do believe is that male dominated society is entitled to demand that we all pretend to believe that it is possible for men to change their sex. Remember that in male dominated society, men define what women are to that society so it's not entirely surprising that they believe their own hype and now think that because they define what a woman is politically and socially that means that they define what female is biologically. Or at the very least we should all pretend that they do - back to that tedious god complex again.

About policing themselves if the social contract is recognised and respected would have led to next question - how do we expect passing transsexuals police themselves? I would have pointed Buck Angel where the mens' toilet is if I didn't know who Buck Angel is.

But yeah I agree this would have been more negotiatable if not for transactivism overwhelming all the social boundaries and treating toilet as slippery slope "but we have been using your bathroom for decades! Nothing bad happened, ha! Get over it!...So other spaces next!"

Not this time.

Or more simply put;

sexism: males as superior and females as inferior

genderism: males as masculine and females as feminine + masculine as superior and feminine as inferior

Genderism is the marketing and sexism is the product.

Genderism is there to obfuscate and package a clearly outrageous and indefensible socially constructed deeply political and unscientific notion as something normal, natural and inevitable.

Sexism and genderism have been around since forever - trans ideologists / queer theorists / etc didn't invent these concepts. Male supremacist society did.

And feminists didn't start resisting gender when transgenderism took off. We've been resisting it all along (because it is the marketing department of sexism AKA patriarchy[.

It's just more narcissism / lack of critical thinking / lack of self-awareness / navel gazing / dehumanising of girls and women / woeful ignorance of women's history on the part of the transgenderists that they seem to think that being "gender critical" is anything new and that it came about because of transgenderism.

Transgenderism is deeply conservative, deeply patriarchal, deeply sexist and deeply anti-woman; all things that feminists are deeply against no matter who is manifesting them.

And the above are all things that misogynists are totally into. Hence the success of transgenderism. It isn't because lots of people actually believe in it or care about it. It's because it's sexism / genderism on steroids packaged as progressiveness. It allows people to be ulta sexist and ignorant whilst simultaneously virtue signalling about how right-on, progressive, inclusive, enlightened, modern, intelligent and superior they are.

Win win for patriarchy. Lose lose for women. And juggernaut of support and veneer of acceptability for a regressive, sexist, homophobic movement which does terrible things to children, vulnerable people, the gender nonconforming and, of course, women.

Not believing in genderism is probably the default for most of the world.

If only that were true @NotTerfNorCis !!!

Genderism is absolutely the default position all over the world. Genderism is sexism. They are part and parcel of the same thing.

Sexism is the idea that social role and status should be allocated according to one's sex and that that is the natural order of the world.

Genderism is the idea that one's sex naturally dictates one's value and ability at therefore one's social role and status.

Maybe in that respect genderism is comparable to atheism.

Hardly! Genderism AKA sexism is comparable to racism.

I also think we should resist the creeping narrative that ‘gender critical beliefs’ are some new thing - a ‘movement’. The intention is to pretend that gender ideology is the standard and the long-standing societal position. But it absolutely is not.

Yes, the gender critical view that regressive ideas about 'gender' should not govern how people live their lives has been a mainstream view for many years.

Gender ideology with its narrative of ladybrains, stereotypes, and 'feeling like' the opposite sex should have no place in a modern, progressive society.

I agree that the position that people require surgery and medication to be their authentic selves, and that these interventions are a basic right, is just bizarre.

I also think we should resist the creeping narrative that ‘gender critical beliefs’ are some new thing - a ‘movement’. The intention is to pretend that gender ideology is the standard and the long-standing societal position. But it absolutely is not.

The basic idea that biology, and biological difference between the sexes, can matter is the societal default and has been for a very, very long time. ‘Movement’ from that position has been the subject of various forms of activism for a long time.

Indeed, feminists have spent a long time arguing that biological differences between the sexes shouldn’t be viewed as mattering as often as they do - such that they manifest in sexist attitudes and outcomes. But, as we’ve come to learn, there most definitely are aspects of life in which the biological reality of sexed bodies does and should matter. These are often the situations in which women find themselves most vulnerable.

Meanwhile, TRAs have simultaneously entrenched really problematic ideas around ‘lady brains’ and are arguing that changing the physical shape of bodies is crucial to the authentic experience of identity. And apparently that’s progressive.

It feels like such a huge financial scam to compel the NHS (or insurers, in the US) to fund this stuff as if it's a medical condition while simultaneously stating that it's definitely not a medical condition and that everyone should be able to decide for themselves whether they are trans and whether they want to receive expensive interventions for free with no questions asked.

Totally agree with you @LonginesPrime

Transgenderist ideology is full of contradictions like this. Which is no doubt the reason for "NoDebate" - because none of it stands up to debate or scrutiny.

I was gender critical long before I had considered where trans people/ ideology might figure in all this, which I think is something that TRAs don’t tend to be able to comprehend.

This.

And the bedrock of patriarchy as natural order is gender. Gender is the socially constructed notion that sex should determine social role and status. This complex, extremist and oppressive notion is simplified, packaged and presented to us "femininity" and "masculinity".

Another age old pillar of patriarchy is that boys and men are human and self-defining and girls and women are not boys and men and are defined by boys and men.

And also this.

Being GC is, for me, part of feminism. Sex is the basis of female oppression. Gender stereotypes are part of that oppression - and therefore to be resisted.

The goal of feminism is for women to be recognised as full humans, with full and equal human rights.

Feminism is not about men (although in a shared society it will have some knock on effects on them). Being gender critical is not about trans people (although in a shared society it will have some knock on effects on them). In both cases, those people incidentally affected are not part of the goal.

Because there are biological differences between men and women, part of ensuring women's fair and equal participation in society involves recognising and accommodating those sex-based differences. Just as ensuring disabled people can be a full and equal part of society involves recognising and accomodating their specific biological needs - but nobody would start a conversation about disabled rights with the fact that some non-disabled people like stairs, or prefer to watch TV without subtitles. It's arse about face.

I completely agree. It's your body so I can't comment on what you do with it if it's legal. Wear what you want, take a different name, all fine. But only a misogynist will expect to be called 'she' when they're a man and I am not an ally for anti-women actions and you're still a man if you were born a man and men get called 'he'.

I will never ever refer to a man as ‘she’, even if that man calls himself Mary and has decided to have his penis amputated.

Its not a movement as such. Its just a name for a viewpoint. I find it useful to say GC but it's a broad church and I think there are different views such as about the extent to which men can be in women's spaces.

I think the world would be a better place without gender. Take away all the tired old social stereotypes & just distinguish by biological sex when that’s necessary.

People who identify as 'transgender' who do not have gender dysphoria can pay for their own body modifications, like anyone else.

Mixedberrygenderfluidmuffin I agree with you whole post, but especially wanted to single out the above as it's an excellent point (and because I hope that the Cass review will address some of the evidence-base concerns over time, at least for minors).

The fact that being transgender has been de-pathologised to such an extent that doctors now allow patients to diagnose themselves and to demand body modification surgery on the NHS is contrary to everything the NHS stands for.

As you say, if there's a genuine medical need for intervention, then there should be a clear evidence-base for this to receive NHS funding. And if, as many gender identity ideologues claim, this is not a medical condition at all, then the NHS shouldn't be funding any of it.

I find it so odd when trans people assert (usually with a loud sigh and an exasperated eye roll) that being trans is not a medical condition but that it only happens to need doctors to be involved because their "gender affirmation" often requires certain steps such as expensive life-long hormone treatments and complex cosmetic surgeries, often requiring copious revisions.

It feels like such a huge financial scam to compel the NHS (or insurers, in the US) to fund this stuff as if it's a medical condition while simultaneously stating that it's definitely not a medical condition and that everyone should be able to decide for themselves whether they are trans and whether they want to receive expensive interventions for free with no questions asked.

Personally, I just want that we stop pretending gender is something that anyone has to care about much less something that should have 'rights'.

Well said @Mixedberrygenderfluidmuffin

100% agree.