TW and IVF

Yes it’s illogical. Unless you can come up with a definition of woman which includes characteristics shared by all women and all TW but which are never all shared with men.

And as we know, despite being asked many, many times, no gender ideologue can do this.

Which is why TWAW is an illogical position.

What makes you a tw?
I identify as one.
Well, that means you are a cisw.
Why?
Because you are female.
No, you misunderstand me. I identify as a tw.
You can't.
Why?

Etc

"It's not an analogy. If TW are actually women, then why should they not attend IVF clinics? Biological women do. So it's the next "logical" step. Men are now "chest feeding" babies. Why can they not become pregnant? If TW are women then..."

But the phrase isn't "trans women are biological women" is it? It's about stretching the definition of "women" to include bio women and trans women. You can find that upsetting or call it progress, but it doesn't mean that TWAW is an illogical statement. "TWABW" would be illogical

If you wanted to use it as a thought experiment, it would be this: John is now a woman. Me and John are trying for a baby, but nothing is happening, John is still not pregnant. The Dr refuses to investigate why John is not getting pregnant, but has offered to investigate me!!! This is blatant transphobic discrimination, isn’t it friend?!

If friend starts to argue about John’s body still being male, you have an ‘in’ to talk about men in women’s sports ( amateur too) as that is based on bodies, women survivors being triggered by male bodies in support groups, the importance of sex and sexed language in health care and communications, including sex Ed and contraception for young people, and so on.

Transactivism seeks to redefine 'women' to only include things that can be bought. Clothes, make-up, breasts, a hole for sex. It seeks to divorce the definition from those things that can't be acquired by men - an xx chromosome body developed around the production of large gametes.

Some people - even some seeming intelligent people - are happy to go along with that because they think someone's internal desire to be something they are not is the most important thing for society to facilitate.

The constituent parts of femaleness are then dealt with in isolation, which is how we get to bleeders, gestational carriers, cervix-havers, uterus-owners.

The better question is to show your mate (and Lettuce’s husband) the pictures on the Anne Coomes thread and ask at which point has the man become a woman.

Then ask why they are no longer a man.

I mean, you still won’t get a proper answer but you’ll get clues in on what someone actually thinks woman means.

You won’t like it though.

The well-versed TRA knows that the next line of the argument is "what about a woman who's had cancer, or a hysterectomy? They can't harvest eggs/carry a baby. Does that mean that you think they are men? Ugh, you're obsessed with genitals, you fetishist."

Don't forget, these are the same people who will insist that you can't possibly know your own chromosomes unless you've been genetically tested. But that also, chromosomes are irrelevant anyway. Except when it suits them. 🐦♟️

I love that.

The argument that's thrown back here is that some women have hysterectomies and they're allowed to call themselves women and therefore men are allowed to call themselves women too if they want to.

I know it's ridiculous. I know it's offensive. But that's the level these people are operating at. Teenage levels of logic.

I ask if Usain Bolt should be allowed to run in the women's 100m if he decides he's female.

Should Wayne Cousens be moved to the female estate if he decides he's female

Etc etc.

Brilliant post @Rightsraptor

Send his a diagram of the male reproductive system, which transwomen have, and tell him to point out where a fetus would gestate for 9 months.

Sorry - that like doesn't work. Try this and scroll back to the right episode: http://paddyspodcast.ie/episodes-3/

He's ok with them being in some kind of segregated area of a women's prison

He might need to listen to season 2 episode 1 to find out more about how that works in practice http://paddyspodcast.ie/episodes-2/ (spoiler - not well).

And who does he think should staff these separate sections - should women prison officers have to perform intimate searches on TW prisoners, restrain them if they become violent, observe them on suicide watch (which involves watching them all the time, including on the toilet)?

That would indeed be a slam dunk if you believe that someone being unable to carry a child to term is definitive proof that they’re not a woman.

But I doubt you think that.

@FatAgainItsLettuceTime - your husband might get there one day! I must say it's very nice of him to be ok with men in a separate section of a women's prison, not something he'll ever have to deal with. Can men not hear themselves when they say things like that?

If these things are edge cases, you could try the 'dog shit Malteser' test, which goes like this:

Someone offers you a Malteser. There are 10 in the dish. Then they tell you 9 are ordinary chocolate-covered Maltesers and the other one is a Malteser too, just dipped in dog shit. Would he eat one? If not, why not? After all, there's a 9 in 10 chance that his Malteser would be fine and delicious, so why bother about the one in ten chance of the nasty one?

@FatAgainItsLettuceTime

Does your husband think that biological women need a word to describe their specific experiences of having been born in a female body and being socialised from birth in a world that sees them as such?

What characteristic does he think all women and characteristic share?

That’s the problem, catandspoon - you can’t use logic here. There is none.

I listen to a podcast about the paranormal featuring a believer and a sceptic and one of the points they make is that if you’re talking to someone with an irrational belief (ghosts in this case TWAW in your case) then the believer will always move to goal posts to justify their belief.
Because if you start from an unrealistic premise you may as well go hog wild to defend it.
If you start from the idea that men can be women in some metaphysical way you can bolt anything - no matter how ridiculous- on from their as you are starting with an unreal concept to begin with.

@CatandSpoon - it's not gaps in your logic, it's that there is no logic in their argument.

A woman is an adult human female. A female is someone whose reproductive system is intended to produce large, immotile gametes. It doesn't matter one jot if the individual concerned doesn't actually do this (she's too young, too old, her system doesn't work as expected) - she still belongs to that reproductive class. The other reproductive class that makes small, motile gametes is male (same rules apply). There are only these two types of reproductive systems in humans and we all belong to one or the other.

And we all know which group John belongs to the moment we see him. It makes no difference if he's wearing a sequined mini skirt and 6" heels. However, some seem to think the mini skirt and heels are what makes a woman. They're wrong.

My DH is part of the TWAW group (yes it's frustrating and leads to some incredibly annoying conversations) what I find incredibly difficult is that he is a really clever man, articulate, generally good common sense but 'kind' to the extent that he will twist logic to avoid the possibility of being hurtful to anyone so he has a real blind spot here.

We have had many conversations where he maintains the TWAW stance as I work through a variety of scenarios, eventually he does come to the conclusion that TWA not W in some scenarios but always then defaults back to 'but that's an edge case, for everyday living TWAW' at which point I start banging my head against the wall (metaphorically).

His turning points which he then dismisses as edge cases are:

• rapists/violent male criminals who are placed in women's prisons in the general population. He's ok with them being in some kind of segregated area of a women's prison
• male presenting TW in rape crisis refuges/therapy groups
• him ever having sex with a TW who retains a penis

Exactly right.

OP, you haven't properly understood their ideology.

Yes, like so many ideologies, it is nonsensical and contradictory and all these things, but it still has these internal structures that make sense to people within the ideology and if you don't understand them you will never win this 'gotcha' moment you seem to be fantasising about.