Hampstead Pond - Brave woman speaks

I think @DadJoke might find it helpful if he went back to treating "trans" as a prefix (which was how the TRAs originally treated it - remember that battle cry "It's a PRE-fix you BIGOTS! It's yer actual LATIN!* Have you never heard of TRANSALPINE GAUL? That's why you other lot of people who aren't trans are CIS, because the other way was CISALPINE GAUL etc etc etc")

As a prefix (even though we didn't accept "cis" for ourselves) it modified the word woman. Prefixes are most commonly employed to make words into their opposites eg un + happy = unhappy; im + mature = immature; il + logical = illogical. You get the drift.

Then, almost by osmosis, and in the dead of a dark and foggy night, "trans" began to morph into what at first glance appears to be an adjective - TRAs did this by separating the prefix from the noun. And then they got annoyed when the "transwoman" was used instead of "trans woman" - even though that is what they had always done themselves until that dark and moonless night.

Suddenly "trans" seemed to be an innocent adjective, so a "trans woman" was apparently (in the addled minds of the TRAs) just as much a woman as a tall woman or a thin woman or a blonde woman. (SPOILER ALERT: no way is it an adjective; no way is a transwoman a woman). But it wasn't innocent at all - nor is it an adjective. It is an archaic word, normally used only in science (Oh! The irony!) which has been slipped into everyday language under the guise of "being kind" and trying to legitimise a male fantasy.

This may be how @DadJoke got confused. If he goes back to using "trans" in the correct sense (eg as in Transalpine Gaul - the Gaul on the other side of the Alps) he may find things easier. Transwomen are on the "other side" of woman - ie men.

*Latin is a very scientific language. Also a legal one - 2 stones, 1 bird etc

** Yes - I know I wrote 2 stones, 1 bird. It was intentional.

I will concede that @DadJoke 's definition of the word 'woman' is clear and unambiguous, but worry that it is not at all useful.

It can't be used to interrogate a data set, because it's formed by adding together two classes of humans who have in common nothing that can be measured or studied that is not also shared by all other humans.

And it can't be used in a debate or narrative. I can't think of a single true non-trivial statement that could be made using that meaning, nor have I ever seen DadJoke make such a statement. When he says 'women want to swim with women' he means that transwomen want to swim with actual women - two different meanings in one sentence.

Here are some true statements:

Every person who has given birth is a woman.

The fastest man in the world will always be much faster than the fastest woman in the world.

It is possible to tell whether an ancient skeleton is that of a woman.

Now then DadJoke give us some statements that use your definition. True, grammatically correct and non-trivial. I can't think of any, but I'm sure you can do better.

@negeme 👏👏👏and I can't believe we're wasting our time like this.....

Do you agree or not?

As the late, great, CEM Joad would have said - "It all depends on what you mean by 'agree' ".

He was a great one for defining your terms was Cyril. As a world-renowned philosopher, author and teacher, he was very aware of the importance of knowing what you were talking about, and what your opponents were talking about.

But look. When I say "trans women are men," you know what I mean, don't you? (Otherwise it wouldn't be possible for you to disagree, would it? -And you do disagree. Don't you?)

In order for you to disagree with me - as you do - you have to mean the same thing as I did by the words we use. Otherwise what would you be disagreeing with?

As I said, in order to have a debate, we must agree about what we're talking about - which of course includes what we mean by the words we use.

"Transwomen are not women," I claim, "They're all men," where by "women" I mean women and so on. (By "are" I mean are, etc. Interesting, the disquotation property of intentional terms, hein?) Do you know what I mean? Do you agree or not?

WORTH IT!

😂 @crockofshite

Transwomen by definition, are men.
As a woman, I cannot be a transwoman - ever.

We're talking about a word with a scientific meaning. One which any biologist can tell you is immutable.

But that's what this whole thing relies on, isn't it? 'Sex is a construct' and all that.

No, we’re talking about a belief versus a fact.

You can't "know" men who claim to be women are women. It's a quasi religious belief involving an act of magical thinking. It doesn't stand up to the slightest amount of scrutiny. It is literal nonsense.

if you are going to be pedantic, substitute “think” with “know” in the post above. It doesn’t change a thing. We are talking about how a word is used.

The difference @DadJoke is you think something, whereas we know something. That’s not a limitation - quite the contrary , for knowledge is power.

@negeme I think trans women are women, and won’t refer to them as men. You think trans women are men and won’t refer to them as women. We are unlike to persuade each other differently. Your inability to encompass this difference speaks to your own limitations, not my “mixed-up thinking.”

An alternative is to agree to a common vocabulary, but I can’t see that happening.

"If you want any debate at all on this subject on this forum, then it's best to accept that each group will use different meanings for the same word."

Huh? No. Plumb wrong. If you want to debate, you need to use words to mean (more or less) the same thing. Otherwise you're just shouting in a void: "Blah, mingly, blo!" ... "Ergh hungder grag!"

Try to think about it. This really isn't difficult.

It's fascinating to find someone so mixed up in his thinking, @DadJoke. How on earth do you manage to keep yourself alive?

(I know the answer, of course. In everyday life, you don't behave as though you're really as ignorant and stupid as you pretend to be on MN. You couldn't.)

--And, btw, a transwoman is a man. (Where 'transwoman' means transwoman, 'man' means man, 'btw' means ... But of course you know what I mean, don't you?)

Round of applause

@crockofshite you are so going to get deleted though

Can women use the mens pond? Or only ladie buoys?

Bang on. Human beings cannot change sex. Someone 'legally female' remain what they are and ever will be - male.

A pseudo religion, insisting that we lie about these obvious realities in order to benefit males, needs laughed at, heartily.

A friend and I (for reasons lost in the mists of drink time) quote this to each other frequently, but our version is 'A weasel is weasily recognised, but a stoat is stoatally different.'

Well let's be honest, it's basically 'any male who wants to be called one' and 'the female service humans'. There's a lot of verbal figleafs draped over the nasty bits, but that's what it actually means.

With on going bafflement that apparently some women are not embracing this and going along with it.

Can't think why. 🙄 Nice women service human and are grateful, obvs.

Very droll!

to him, they are obviously not weasily distinguished.
😂

Even though the are stoatally different.

I keep hearing a line from Porgy nad Bess. "A woman is a sometime thing." As in sometime he may tell us.....But to him, they are obviously not weasily distinguished.

I've also got my own trans rabbit analogy.

Ereshkigal · 24/01/2019 21:58

Words mean things.

Cat:

1	Felis Catus
2	"Dogs" which use a flap in the door
3	"Rabbits" which use a litter tray

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/3488731-The-logic-of-non-binary-gender-fluid?reply=84403763&utmmcampaign=reply&utmmedium=share

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3488731-The-logic-of-non-binary-gender-fluid?flipped=1

That's a coincidence that both I and the author of the tweet* used transrabbit examples (I hadn't seen that tweet before).

I only chose "rabbit" as an example because so many of the men involved in this . . . movement . . . are absolute STOATS, and I wanted a contrasting creature (that stoats prey upon).

*and put is much more clearly than I did

Dadjoke has never to my knowledge articulated his definition of woman in any way other than "anyone who wants to be one".