How to lose friends and alienate people? Be openly GC

I hadn't mentioned any because I thought it was obvious. But here are a few if you are genuinely saying you are unable to think of any (obviously these are only examples and there are many other instances where society has deemed such segregation to be appropriate).

Anywhere where people are in a state of undress, for example changing rooms, hospital wards.

Anywhere where the physical differences between male and female bodies is important, for example sports.

Anywhere where a totally mixed sex space would put women at risk, for example prisons.

I'm wary of saying everything from that period was a free speech champion time. Guess who were two of the most prominent figures to tell Salman Rushdie to pipe down in the early 90s? None other than Margaret Thatcher and Norman Tebbit.

But, with the fracturing of Western societies via social media, and the dilution of legacy media and journalism changed from seeking the truth to amplifying grievance mongers, TRA can flourish in our atomised society.

Tony Benn, Michael Foot, Dr David Owen, even Bob Crow, would have been as of one with Rosie Duffield.

Beyond the anti Semitism issue, the biggest disappointment Corbyn was to me was his capitulation to TRA and open borders migration policy, and his embarrassment over Ukraine.

I can't think of any genuine socialist from his generation that would be so openly hostile to women. His mentor Tony Benn would have been horrified. Indeed Corbyn would have probably tried to silence him.

Agree, @RealityFan

The “interview “ that Ali G did with Tony Benn c 25 years ago is brilliant: TB was having none of AG’s nonsense and wasn’t scared of being labelled a racist for calling out AG’s deliberate stupidity - unlike everyone else he interviewed.

But clearly what we’re disagreeing about is the definitions of “woman” and “man”, not whether a body which developed down the male pathway in the uterus can ever become how it would have been if it had developed down the female pathway (and obviously in the vast majority of cases this extends to the effects of having gone through a typical male or female puberty).

Beautiful. That's why I come onto MN.

It's the modern day equivalent of talking to a wise old sage (auntie, grandma, older sibling, mum or dad even, etc) who would say just because you feel this or that, doesn't mean the world owes you anything.

I always remember the greats of TV interviewing, Brian Walden, Sir Robin Day, Parky, Jeremy Paxman...they would never have placated interviewees, would have called out this BS for what it is.

We're lacking a whole generation of vocal truth sayers in the media.

@Mrspenguinsschoolforfreaks

Is that a serious question? Are you able to think of an answer yourself?

Can you be more specific about the instances in which you consider men and women are segregated because of the differences between male and female bodies?

I think all of my friends are GC. Even the ones with trans-identifying kids don't buy into trans ideology, although they are supportive of their DCs and try very hard to understand their perspective. We are all in our 50s.

Men and women can’t become each other, just as cats and dogs cant. They are two mutually exclusive categories that have differences that cannot be changed. But it’s not just about that. There is also a linguistic thing going on where genderists try to say that what makes a “man” or “woman” isn’t biology or dna, but feelings or cultural roles or what people see in front of them.

The trouble with that is you’re just destroying meaning. If a named thing can be its opposite or just mean whatever someone wants it to mean, it becomes meaningless. It’s like if I said water can mean oil and vice versa if I say so. Now if I say either of those words you have no idea what I really mean. But they’re still different and those differences still matter functionally - so you just need new words to describe them separately. That will never end no matter how much you try to conflate them because they’re different and we need to know what we’re talking about.

But, there are some categories that can change into each other. I’m not disabled but I could become disabled. A child does change into an adult. Weight can change. And yet we don’t say that it’s ok to put a child on an adult rugby team because of how they “identify” or put boxers in the wrong weight category because they “feel” 3 stone lighter, or let a fully able bodied person compete in a sport category for people with disabilities.

it’s not just about can we change - it’s about what we are. No male is a female. Just as no 12-year-old is 50, even if they were very convincingly made up. And someone doing a great impression of having cerebral palsy doesn’t mean they have it. And the same goes for race - which of course genderists can easily understand even though race is a spectrum. Something being hard to prove, or a deception being effective, doesn’t change reality. We have strict rules about what you can do and where you can go at different ages, and we make a big effort to enforce that, even though it’s often hard to tell visually.

Categories are based on material reality - if they’re not, then how does a make person even think he is or wants to be a “woman”. If sex doesn’t exist or matter, where does he get the idea of “woman” from?

In the interests of disclosure I used to be fully Twaw and that people could be born in the wrong body etc because I’d swallowed the GI narrative. What changed my mind a few years ago was a case in I think Holland where a man wanted to legally change his age to ID as younger and I thought “oh that’s nonsense” - and of course it is - but then logically realised it’s no more nonsensical than someone wanting to identify as a different sex

*using a female name I mean (above)

It is never appropriate to treat a tw as a woman. The only time anyone needs to be “treated as” a man or woman is where sex is important in the equation. Eg medicine, prison, sport, changing rooms. Going along with the fiction of calling a gender non conforming man “she” and using a female pronoun is not treating them as a woman. It’s just maintaining a polite fiction and there are circumstances where it may be appropriate but maybe not

Men are not, nor can they become, any kind of woman or female. Because DNA/biology. So yes, you’re wrong/misguided/captured by ideology.

The real question is when (if ever) and in what circumstances a trans woman should be treated as if they were a woman, where society generally segregates women and men or otherwise treats them differently. And the answer to that depends on the reasons why men and women are segregated / treated differently in each case, and what the impact would be of treating trans women as women in each case.

In the instances where sex segregation occurs because of the difference in male and female bodies, can you think of a single example in which it would be appropriate to place some male people in the female space, but still inappropriate to make those places mixed sex?

For me the question of whether trans women are women (and trans men, men) is an interesting philosophical and linguistic conundrum but mostly a distraction from what actually matters.

The real question is when (if ever) and in what circumstances a trans woman should be treated as if they were a woman, where society generally segregates women and men or otherwise treats them differently. And the answer to that depends on the reasons why men and women are segregated / treated differently in each case, and what the impact would be of treating trans women as women in each case.

In my view this article (jointly authored by Cordelia Fine, who I’m a big fan of) provides a very good assessment of how to approach those questions. https://journalofcontroversialideas.org/article/2/2/211/htm

Saying TWAW isn't an issue you can come to different conclusions on though. It's just a false statement.

OMG yes, Harry absolutely definitely knows he's a man and has never said otherwise, I'd be horrified if he did since I'm a massive fan.
I actually went to London to see the Vogue cover dress in the V&A, totally stunning, but absolutely worn by a man who knows he's a man.

I keep my mouth shut to anyone other than my parents and ILs (who thankfully agree with me). I work in a woke field where I would be unemployable if I made my views public and my employer would likely lose clients. I was encouraged to put myself forward to be the next chair of the women's network but I declined, saying I didn't have time for the extra responsibility but in reality because its for women and TW and I don't want to put myself at risk of being outed as GC. Very dangerous times we live in. I think it will be worse under Labour too.

I went to nursing school in the 70s. So I've been a nurse for a long time. A&P, anatomy and physiology, quite naturally is structured according to male and female. So people trying upend base scientific knowledge should be out of luck. I'm not sure why some medical professionals aren't disputing this forcefully.

Yes, Sam “Aren’t I Interesting” Smith claims to be non-binary @FrancescaContini

I thought he claimed to be NB but I apologise if I have made a mistake. Perhaps I am confusing him with that other bloke of a similar age - Sam Smith?!

(I'm not one of the many people with a crush on him, I leave that to my teenage daughter, but I think he's charming and talented)

@FrancescaContini - Harry Styles is perfectly clear he is a man. A pop star who messes about with expected gendered appearance, just like the 80s. He's not claiming a female identity or any such nonsense.

HS is a healthy approach to wearing feminine clothing while Izzard, in contrast, misogynistically claims appearance is what makes someone a woman.

Does anyone else want to vent about their experiences of navigating (or losing) friendships with GI supporters?

I might have done six or seven or more years ago, but fortunately I've met lots of other better, GC, friends — people who believe in material reality and are critical thinkers. Life isn't the same, but the standard of conversation in the pub or round the dinner table is better. I occasionally bump into people I used to call friends, with their 'be kind' and fence-sitting attitudes, and they strike me as dull and politically unengaged and just rather stupid.

Have you considered that some of us might have considered the issues carefully, read a variety of views, and just come to a different conclusion to you?