Anti trans debate

I'll add that the most homophobic 'hate' I have ever experienced has been in the past seven years - not in the 70s and 80s - and it has been directly from the transactivist community.

But very much on the understanding that there are women who care. Because otherwise, they just might have to take notice.

I am gay, I was during the time when I could have lost my job for being gay, no this is not like gay rights. Gay people did not need anything from anyone else but tolerance. They made no demands, they removed no other rights. They did not have a difficulty with caring about anyone or anything but themselves.

I see you're concerned about 'hatefulness' - what would you like to do with all the women excluded from any space to permit male people to have free access of choice to all spaces?

Many of those women do not have a choice. They cannot use mixed sex spaces, many are disabled, have other faiths and cultures, are traumatised, have a whole host of reasons and needs of their own.

What do we do with them? Because obviously, they matter as much as male people do. And their inclusion and not experiencing 'hate' is just as important.

And what are we going to do about women being searched by male police? And the women raped in prisons and on hospital wards? And the women staying in dangerous, life threatening relationships because no refuges are permitted to stay female only for their inclusion? And the women without rape crisis services?

Are these women walking 'hate' for existing or are there some legitimate problems here that an intelligent, basically socially competent and caring person ought to be able to comprehend?

I actually think there’s an unspoken party of the handmaiden manifesto.

They say ‘if it doesn’t affect me, I don’t care’. But what they actually mean is ‘it doesn’t affect me right now, and I very much care about using this to make myself look better in the terms set by patriarchal society’.

It would be better if they didn’t care. Instead they are willing to throw all the other (unpalatable and problematic) women under the gender ideology bus if they think it reflects well on their identity as ‘kind’ and ‘good’.

If you define 'trans rights' as the right to redefine 'women and girls' so that the terms have nothing to do with biological sex but are all about sexist gender stereotypes about femininity and/or assumed comfort with sexist gender roles for women, then it's very difficult not to be against such 'trans rights' as they are directly ladled out from the hard-won rights of female people. And would ultimately make seeing sexism almost impossible, as the statistics on that would not be collected, the words to define the affected group would not exist and so on.

If you define 'trans rights' as the right not to be discriminated against in employment or education and not to be harassed or treated with violence and so on, then nobody here is opposed to those rights.

Because words now seem to mean anything someone wants them to mean, we don't know what we might be debating when someone says 'anti trans'.

I am for women's rights, the old-fashioned type, and currently I see those rights being seen as unnecessary and up for repurposing by the more deserving groups.

What used to be called 'women and girls' are now expected to accept themselves as 'cisgender women and girls', the more privileged sub-group in the new gender identity class of 'women and girls'.

We are not allowed to define ourselves as 'women and girls' simply because we are female people. We are told that we must possess an innermost abstract identity, not based on our sex or on what it is like to live as people of that sex, and any attempt to define that innermost 'gendered soul' in practice turns into sexist stereotypes.

This new approach will cause more and more problems the more it is used. Some minor examples:

I saw an article, some time ago, on how "becoming a parent" causes a fall in employed parents' earnings. But that is incorrect, as it's becoming a mother which causes that fall, on average, not becoming a father (fathers see their earnings rise, on average). When 'inclusive language' turned 'mother' into 'parent', what that article argued stopped being true.

I have also seen numerical errors on sites discussing specific female health conditions and their prevalence, because the information was altered to be more 'inclusive' to those who don't identify as women or girls but who are still female. So something that affects, say, 10% of women, was then turned into a condition affecting 10% of all people. This is just an arithmetic error, but I have seen it repeated three times now.

If we can't define the group something affects properly, then we can't collect and analyse evidence about it properly, either.

Similar problems apply in some criminal statistics where areas of crime which are very male-dominated suddenly appear to experience an increase in female perpetrators, and the reason is not that women are suddenly committing more sex crimes against, say, children, but that more male perpetrators are identifying as women. If collecting statistics on the basis of self-identification becomes more common, any policies based on them are likely to be based on erroneous data.

You should contact Stonewall, because they claim that levels of hate crimes on the basis of sexual orientation are rising. The group most likely to commit hate crimes are male and young btw (you know gen X & gen Z), not middle-aged women.

I'd also check out the hope not hate surveys on young people which shows that younger generations are more likely to think that 'feminism has gone to far' - which as a woman should concern you, as well as being more likely to believe conspiracy theories. You maybe shouldn't be quite so complacent

It’s literally nothing like gay & lesbians peoples fight for rights

gay & lesbian people wanted the same rights as everyone

TW ie men want men’s rights AND women’s rights as well & for people to pretend they’re a woman when they’re not

nope

Another post not engaging in good faith. Sighs. I have a young trans relative, I'm not "anti-trans". I'm anti damaging children's health - my young relative is now, a few years post transition, beginning to show that damage. I'm anti homosexual conversion therapy, which is what transition can be. I'm anti misogyny, which you sometimes see in males who claim to be female but want to punch anyone who doesnt 100% support them in the face. I'm anti people like this https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/02/22/commuter-sexually-assaulted-female-toilets-man-who-later-claims/#:~:text=The%20woman%20challenged%20Bullock%20and,that%20he%20identified%20as%20female. - are you?

A lot of healthy gay young people are being persuaded they are trans and damaging their health. If it wasnt so damaging it would be laughable that the activists accuse others of homophobia while promoting homosexual conversion therapy.

Do you know ANY of Gen Alpha? 🤣

As far as I can see they are watching their miserable trans identifying Gen Z siblings and cousins and rejecting gender identity ideology wholesale. Gen Alpha are the Terfy Generation.

You seem very out of date!

Recognising the fact that discrimination against women on the basis of their sex is real, global and systemic isn't fearmongering.

Tis indeed a hot bed and honestly, most of these people have never met a trans person let alone had anything to report to the police about them. It's pure panic, like we had during the debate about gay rights. Even the rhetoric is the same - abusers, pedos etc... It will all be gone in about 10 years because the younger generation are just not as prejudice or frightened, much like my generation and gay rights. I saw so much hate from the generation above me growing up, but now Gen x are the ones in charge, I get zero homophobia and I can even marry my girlfriend if I want.

It's just a waiting game. I tend not to get into any arguments about it because the people I knew back then who were homophobic now don't admit they ever were. Society is on the turn from the younger generation up and society is what changes minds, so best to just let them burn themselves out.

@YireosDodeAver · Today 07:06

No one should be discriminated against if they choose not to follow the sexist stereotypes that are culturally linked to their birth sex

Of course they shouldn't be. That doesn't mean that have to follow the sexist stereotypes culturally linked to the opposite sex. Ignore stereotypes and live as an individual.

I am not anti Trans, but I am strongly anti 'gender'. I believe that many of the people identifying as trans, particularly the very young, are being harmed by the businesses that make money out of pushing 'gender' stereotypes and by convincing the impressionable that they have to conform.

"I've noticed there's such a lot of activism these days for giving women the vote. That's fine in theory, but I'm surprised this topic affects so many women. In my day to day life I never experience any need for this and don't know any women who do. My husband takes care of all that and besides, I'm too busy taking care of the home and looking after the children to care about politics!"

Anyone on the feminist board who doesn't recognise sexism isn't really arguing in good faith, in my opinion.

It's far more likely that lots of women giving explanations of why trans ideology is so dangerous to women, is considered something that needs to be undermined. 🙄

(dangerous to women, but not men, funnily enough).

You fear monger. You tell women, possibly vulnerable ones, that they are on a slow descent into second class citizenship

Why do you think Pregnant the Screwed are called that? Because that’s the point for many women when they realise how the world treats women differently to men. Once you have a baby you go from Potato with her full time graduate job, who manages a team of people and has a range of interesting hobbies, to Mum.
The gender (sex) pay gap is real, women have less in their pensions.
men, however, continue to soar in their career after having children, and no one criticises them at work for being a “working parent” and daring to ask for flexible working <eyeroll>.

Yes, I'm speaking directly to the OP. Of course. This is her thread.

Because she's already noticing the sexism that is starting to arise in her own relationship.

If you don't think sexism and misogyny exists, then great. I suspect you are very very privileged, though. Or possibly male.

And many women start to notice it creeping up when they stop being able to hold an equal status in the family, because there are suddenly children involved.

If you haven't noticed, there is thread, after thread, after thread on this very site started by women who are doing the bulk of the domestic work, and still trying to hold down a job whilst also taking on the mental load of child rearing.

There is also thread after thread of women trying to escape from violent and threatening men. Whereas, we rarely see the converse.

This is the feminist board. It's about women's rights, women's status, and addressing sexism.

Feminism is what got women the vote, their own bank accounts, their own mortgages, an education, higher education, professional jobs and representation in Parliament.

Plus, the right not to be raped by their own husbands.

A right, incidentally, that was only achieved in 1992.

There will be a significant number of women on this very board who were married before then.

If you think a movement which highlights these things, and offers women support is sickening then perhaps you don't understand it.

The mantra of the handmaiden is, in essence, "If it doesn't affect me, I don't care."

@RoyalCorgi absolutely.

My sister is a handmaiden. Highly educated but completely blind to the erosion of women's rights around the world.

@Beedleneedle - if you are going to characterise feminists being investing in supporting women's rights as "anti-trans", you need to expect some kickback.

Would you go to a group of women discussing reproductive rights and characterise them as "baby killers"? Of course not.

We support women's rights, we campaign for them and contribute to crowdfunders, we debate and discuss. If doing so is "anti-trans" then anything to do with trans rights is "anti-women".

I think if you find yourself asking women why they're concerned about women being raped in prison, assaulted by male police officers with punishment threatened if they dare say that male is a male who is not allowed to search them because male, concerned about all women having accessible services including health care and refuges and public loos, concerned about children being sterilised?

And you frame this as 'anti trans'?

It is probably time you had one hell of a word with yourself. And extended a bit of logic as to what you therefore mean by 'pro trans'.

‘sickening’ is weirdly hyperbolic, mate!

The reality is that most western women are able to convince themselves that feminism has done all it set out to do (and so there is no further need for it) right up until
the point they get pregnant (or fail to get pregnant when wanting to do so or decide emphatically that they will never have a child but find themselves on the ‘mummy track’ at work anyway, because women are expected to want a child at some point).

When you are young, fit, strong and naive (and lucky enough to live in the west) it’s easy to believe that women and men are more or less the same. It becomes increasingly difficult to keep telling yourself that as you age.

For me, having my first child was akin to a bird flying into a patio window, I was totally unaware of the boundaries that still existed until I smacked right into one.

The awful truth is that the only thing that makes women appear to have parity with men is sex equalities legislation. Women and girls in countries without sex equality legislation are fucked, and women in counties where it’s being undermined are likely to be fucked in future.

That doesn’t mean women should roll over and give up, it means we need to keep fighting where sex equality legislation is still-to-be-achieved and stay vigilant where is has.

I love being female, I love my children, I swap the camaraderie that can be part of a sisterhood for anything but I’m pretty sure I’d be less happy about being a woman if I were growing up somewhere where girls still aren’t given equal access to school, for example.

I CBA to check the current figures but women have a tiny fraction of the world’s wealth and own a tiny fraction of the world’s land. Recognising this isn’t sickening, it’s sensible.

Excellent post.

It's the point at which many women find they are on the slow descent into second-class citizenship
See, it's posts like yours that make me take issue with the "GC" stance on here.
You fear monger. You tell women, possibly vulnerable ones, that they are on a slow descent into second class citizenship (which just makes me want to do a big FUCK OFF to that, nobody has said that we're that, you insinuating that we are and putting that in someone as an idea, alienating and "out to get" mentality. As such and an aside but relevant I've only ever heard it said in here men hate us, nowhere else.
It can make people feel that the world is against them, it's exactly what other groups do to radicalise (hate that word, but it describes perfectly) To make you feel alone.
You've tagged her twice in the same post too (to doubly make sure she see you? One surely would do)
It's sickening.

It's more like "fo it to Jane, not me'

It’s like that saying “I didn’t speak up
for….” lists minority group then when they came for It me there was no one to speak up.

The mantra of the handmaiden is, in essence, "If it doesn't affect me, I don't care."

"I don't care about vulnerable women being forced to share prison space with rapists, because I'm never going to go to prison."

"I don't care about male police officers having the right to strip search women, because I'll never be arrested."

"I don't care about sportswomen losing out on scholarships and medals because I'm not a sportswoman."

"I don't care that terrified women in domestic abuse shelters find themselves sharing a bathroom with men, because I've never experienced domestic abuse."

"I don't care if women are disciplined by their employer for having the wrong opinions, because I never have the wrong opinion."

If you're the sort of person who is not inclined to care about other people, then it's very hard to make you care, except out of an appeal to self-interest. So may I remind the OP and others who may be reading of the words of Martin Niemoller:

"Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."