Feeling really low after being honest

@Minglingpringle

I don’t personally object to trans women calling themselves women, although I wouldn’t allow that to prevent me highlighting that they were a subset in situations where it would be useful to do so.

'Subsets' of people is a really difficult idea fraught with issues but if you want to make that analogy, Transwomen are a 'subset' of men.

Because the only reasons to group with women are based on sexist stereotypes.

It does seem to be the case, though, that, for the people who care most about the subject, the word has acquired an additional patina of meaning - as an indicator of tribal allegiances.

It hasn't acquired an "additional patina of meaning" because most people don't use it or consider its meaning in the first place. For me, it's an imposition on me of your ideology and an attempt to universalise your gender identity based worldview.

Without this belief in gender identity ideology, if a "cis woman" means a woman who isn't trans, a "trans woman" should mean an adult female person who, for whatever reason, identifies as a man.

@Minglingpringle

Ah yes, motivations.

How do you respond to the growing evidence that huge numbers of the young people who want to transition are also young people with autism, depression , eating disorders, confusion and anxiety about their sexuality and other conditions -including the immature brain development of adolescents - which means that their thinking and logic processes are largely fucked up?

Do you think telling these young confused people that taking powerful, life changing, and irreversible chemical treatments, and having radical surgery on healthy body parts is a good way to help them to feel more at ease with themselves ,their sexuality and their post pubertal bodies ?

Or do you think that it might be more helpful to give them the help they need with their autism, eating disorders and depression and help them to overcome the anxiety they feel about themselves, their sexuality, their bodies, and their place in an uncertain world without offering them unhelpful solutions that do not address their primary needs and will, moreover, lead to a lifetime of taking medication with the likelihood of serious consequences like infertility ,heart issues and osteoporosis ?

And talking about motivation, what do you think was (and is) the motivation behind the medical teams at places like the Tavistock, and other clinics, who knew/know about the mental state of their young clients but chose/choose to ignore it, not offer appropriate treatment programmes and , in the case of the Tavistock ,did not think it worthwhile following up on the mental health of their clients to see if the taking of puberty blockers, doses of artificial hormones and encouraging surgery actually sorted out the autism, anxiety, depression and eating disorders their clients presented with?

Fair point, language obviously makes a massive difference.

When I used “cis”, I didn’t use it to suggest that women were a subset of their gender. Another way I might have phrased it might have been “main women”, the trans women being the subset. Perhaps that is not how it is used by those who most commonly use it. However, as I said, I am still working out what I think about all this and I’m not well versed in the lingo. I’m probably not the only one either - it’s a word in general circulation and most people probably haven’t thought about it that deeply.

It does seem to be the case, though, that, for the people who care most about the subject, the word has acquired an additional patina of meaning - as an indicator of tribal allegiances. I have accidentally waded into a group where everyone shares the same view and I have thrown my own, slightly different, views around, rubbing everyone up the wrong way. But it seems the clincher that made everyone decide I was a traitor to women was my use of the word cis.

Just thinking re: my worry re. de-railing… We’ve actually gone neatly full-circle…

That absurd claim made by the trainer that women aren’t at risk in the way the stats show they actually are? Well, it sounds like s/he was ignoring the existence of any stats full-stop, so thank goodness the OP knew they were out there, right? Had the knowledge to refer to them, yes?

Those stats she drew on are the very ones these oh-so-kind-&-harmless linguistic shifts are obscuring & could destroy.

Whether you agree with her view re: single-sex spaces or not, surely she’s entitled to the information necessary to make the judgment she did. Denying it exists is bad enough, but can be countered. But manipulating it at source, as our great & good are now doing…?!?!

Yes. The observation that offenders are pre-disposed to bad behaviour would seem to acknowledge that men do self-identify as female for malicious purposes with sufficient regularity for this to be increasingly recognisable as a pattern in police & media reports for those who read carefully enough. The “wrong language” can obscure or even deny this, limiting public understanding & damaging faith in our institutions & democratic values. The wrong language can be a big, huge!, deal!

For me, it doesn’t seem obvious that this is the case, although I can see that a lot of people on here are convinced that it is.

They don't all have to have malicious intent, for it not to be a good idea to lie about their sex.

If we are to allow trans women to call themselves women (which I don’t mind but obviously everybody else on here does), then it is useful to have a word to differentiate the two.

As they aren't actually women, women and "trans women", if you must. If not there are plenty of ways you can be less gaslighty.

I do think that is a pernicious and concerning area. Offenders are pre-disposed to bad behaviour and I would not be willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. I agree that it is suspicious behaviour in this context.

I didn’t tell you you were an echo chamber but if you’re telling me an opposing view is considered disrespectful I will begin to think you are.

I'm not, but if you can't see how breezing into a thread where a woman has been attacked for standing up for the rights of vulnerable women, and ignoring the post itself, and calling the fact that other women support her "fascinating", is disrespectful, I can't help you.

Thanks for the response. You’ll be pleased to hear I don’t think it’s the end of the world either, & my concern is less “malicious intent” than implications for women’s rights & safety. In this context, I do actually think the similarly emotive use of “red flag” is actually quite apt, though: to really drill down into the detail, what are your thoughts on the increasing regularity with which male sex offenders are categorised as women or female in the police service, the prison estate & the media, & of the implications of this? I think that, for whatever reason these men are identifying as women, our institutions’ response to this is disguising a fundamental truth about male/female patterns of violence. It’s engineering, if not a new world, then a new reality. Besides the implications for how our society is organised, I worry about the Orwellian precedent this sets: history shows where the mentality of “This group is what those in power say they are, by law & social contract [& contrary to all available evidence]“ can lead….

I was literally asking if they were representative, not telling you they weren’t. This thread came up in the list of trending discussions. That was why it struck me.

I didn’t tell you you were an echo chamber but if you’re telling me an opposing view is considered disrespectful I will begin to think you are.

I don't mind someone using "woman" to mean "person of either sex who...." as long as they can complete that sentence.

If they can't, they are using "woman" as indistinguishable from "man" or "person", and no-one actually knows what each other means.

Did you look at https://terfisaslur.com/ ? Do you actually think I should care about the wants or feelings of the men documented there, threatening to rape and murder women for not going along with their fetish?

You think you are the middle ground, you're not. GC feminism is the middle ground, you're a collaborator in the oppression of women.

I don’t entirely disagree with you. I generally use the word women. Women are a category.

I just used cis in this specific context to differentiate between women and trans women. I don’t think that’s the end of the world. I nearly wrote “biological”
women. I don’t know if that’s the same level of red flag or not.

I don’t personally object to trans women calling themselves women, although I wouldn’t allow that to prevent me highlighting that they were a subset in situations where it would be useful to do so.

If we are to allow trans women to call themselves women (which I don’t mind but obviously everybody else on here does), then it is useful to have a word to differentiate the two.

I would object to them calling themselves women if I thought they were doing it with malicious intent. For me, it doesn’t seem obvious that this is the case, although I can see that a lot of people on here are convinced that it is.

Engaging with emotion, tone & generalities, not arguments & details, is easier - perception of moral high ground, scope for platitudes etc. I think a lot of people do it, from well-meaning but unthinking “be-kinders” to visitors unable to counter the concerns expressed here.

I'll also note that the poster avoided answering any questions about why they hold the belief that a group of males should be considered as female to all intents and purposes.

I don’t know why you perceive it as condescending.

I'm not sure if you could be any more disingenuous.

Just a reminder of what OP said in her training course, that this poster was so "fascinated" by our support for, when she was abused for it:

"Then the subject of safe spaces came up and the presenter (they/them) said well it's actually not a problem at all, there are no statistics which show that sexual offences occur on hospital wards or in domestic abuse shelters and the other women are also really cool with it so it's not a problem at all!
I just said that this wasn't really accurate, we know women don't report sexual assaults or inappropriate behaviour, especially not if they think they're going to be labelled as transphobic, and women are constantly told to put up and shut up, so that labelled with the fear of being labelled a bigot OF COURSE won't mean they answer truthfully."

I don’t know why you perceive it as condescending. But you seem to be telling me that you don’t are about the people on the other side of the debate at all and you would prefer for everybody to stay angry. So I guess it probably is best if I fuck off.

I’ve been cis-sed a fair few times, one way or another. I do find it quite upsetting, because the implications of it, to me, are so very stark.

Im in my 50’s and I can honestly say I’d never seen the word used until I read these boards. And it’s still the only place other than Twitter I’ve ever seen it used.

It’s really not a common word amongst the GBP

I agree.

I am trying to respect everybody.

Your comments on coming into this thread were definitely not respectful. We don't just exist on Mumsnet, you realise, we are out there in the world. OP is a real person. If you think that our views about males in female spaces aren't representative, it's you in the echo chamber, your filter bubble must be very pro trans.

I don’t know if their fear is reasonable or not. But I like to take everyone’s fears seriously.

I’ve already said I don’t think it’s reasonable for them to attack people.

"Cis" is an interesting one. A question that never gets answered: what is one behaviour/trait a woman would have that would meet the criterion of her being "cis" - i.e., what does it look like if a female person has a gender that "aligns with" being female? Is there anything?