Trans-Women are Men!!!!!! Any fule knowe that!
Identity is personal. “Man”, “woman”, “boy”, and “girl” are social roles - that’s gender. Not to be confused with biological sex - male and female. No trans woman claims to be biologically female, and no trans man claims to be biologically male. That’s another right-wing straw man argument.
Trans History is Different to Women's History
The idea that trans women have a “separate history” to cis women echoes the same tactics once used to exclude Black women and disabled women from womanhood.
Tall women, Black women, trans women - these are all adjectives describing different types of women. Every woman’s experience of womanhood is unique. If you exclude trans women from being women, what condition are you using to define womanhood? There isn’t one necessary condition. So trans women cannot be excluded from womanhood on this basis.
OK - so putting aside the incredibly patronising tone that suggests those of us who are gender critical have only come to those views because we've read it in the right wing press and don't have the ability and education to understand the issues for ourselves......
Yes gender and sex are two different things, but it is a complex combination of both of those things that makes a 'woman'. From the day we are born and observed as male or female from our secondary sex characteristics, we are slotted into the boy or girl gender box.
Even if our parents are enlightened and know that it doesn't matter one bit if a boy like to wear dresses and play with dolls or a girl likes to wear boys clothes, play with cars and get muddy, we are still boxed in by wider societies expectations and reactions to that.
For women and girls the formative experiences that come from that - the casual sexism, lack of opportunity, medical ignorance, abuse, religious oppression all have a huge impact - and then comes puberty with the changing body leading to increased leering from boys and men and the scary bleeding which is ridiculously still so taboo (and for women and girls in some countries, deadly)!
Boys and men have their own versions of all of that.
That means no matter how much a female identifies as whatever societies version of 'man' is and no matter how much a man identifies as whatever societies version of a 'woman' is, they can never be those things because they simply do not have the complex experiences that go into creating those identities from birth.
Single sex spaces are important where physical sex is an issue - prisons and sports due to differences in strength and bodies, rape crisis centres because of the trauma elements of being raped by someone who is male bodied and changing rooms and toilets because of the risk to females when so many male bodied people still think it is ok to leer at and assault people who are female bodied.
For people who are born and observed as male or female at birth and who then go through the puberty relating to that observed sex, there should be absolutely no debate whatsoever as to whether they can enter those spaces designed for the opposite sex.
For those with DSD's like Imane Khalif, I think the argument is much more nuanced (and I don't agree with people who call her a man). She was born with female secondary sex characteristics, observed female at birth and brought up female in a muslim country. She would have had all of the same formative experiences as any other girl, with her DSD only being identified at puberty (if at all before she was tested as part of her sporting career).
I do believe that with the DSD being identified, she shouldn't be allowed to compete in women's sports - mostly due to the safety aspect (which is a shame, but no different to someone who has to give up their sport for any other health reason) but as long as she continues to want to identify as a woman, I personally have no issue with that - because having been brought up as a girl, and having those secondary sex characteristics, she will have an innate understanding of what that means, even without female puberty.
Beyond those with DSDs (who have consistently said they do not want to be used a pawn by either side in this debate), the issue with the 'trans' community is that it is too wide an umbrella which has led to a loss of nuance and extreme entrenched positions on both sides.
There are people who are genuinely trans - and by that I mean have body dysmorphia so severe that their doctors think the only way for them to be well is to live as the opposite sex, there should be discussions around how they can access spaces that allow them to feel safe - and before all of this became such an issue, there was quiet acceptance of those people in toilets and changing rooms. They are not women, they know they are not women, but they are just trying their best to live their lives (Debbie Hayton for example - and I have known a couple of people who would fit into this in real life).
When men who wanted to claim to be women for other reasons started to adopt the trans label - that is where the issues started - from the worst case scenarios of men doing it to access sensitive female spaces like prisons or escape more severe punishments (Isla Bryson), to those who simply have a fetish and like to dress in women's clothes and go by traditionally female names but do not have genuine body dysmorphia and do not even attempt to live fully as women (MP Jamie Wallis, Eddie Izzard).
Those people are not women, no matter what clothes they wear or name they go by. Not only did they go through 'boy' childhoods and male puberty, they have spent large portions of their adulthood as men. They do not have either the physical elements nor have they ever experienced the societal and cultural elements of womanhood which is why they shouldn't be accepted as 'women'.
I had a hell of a lot of respect for Eddie Izzard when he was openly a transvestite, before all of the 'girl mode' / 'boy mode' / Suzie nonsense started. I adored the fact that he wore skirts, dresses and makeup, breaking down the gender stereotypes and sticking his finger up to toxic masculinity.
Men like him could be such a force for good in the world, breaking down harmful stereotypes, showing the world that it doesn't matter what you wear or even call yourself, what matters is who you are, but instead they choose to go down the regressive route and embed those harmful stereotypes even further.
More of those men need to take a leaf out the book of the men from Strictly. Nikita Kuzmin and Vito Koppola - both incredibly masculine, straight (or maybe bi), but neither have a problem with wearing 'women's' clothes or dancing intimately with other men. Similarly gay and arguably more effeminate men like Layton Williams and Johanas Radebe look particularly fabulous in 'womens' clothes - but they are all men, don't try to claim to be women and they are bloody fabulous for it!
Wear what you want to wear, use whatever name you want to use, but don't try and claim to be something that you are not and can have absolutely no concept of.
You want to wear dresses and make-up and call yourself Jane, go for it! You want spaces where you can go so that you do not have to use 'mens' toilets or changing rooms, fight for that third space and I'll be right there fighting with you.
You need rape crisis centres but don't want to go to a men's group session - no problem, work to get specialist 1-2-1 or trans group therapy made more widely available.
Want to play sport, but not in the men's category? Again, fight for an 'open' or third category to be set up.
Just respect that until society sorts itself out and stamps out sex based violence and regressive stereotypes and moves away from patriarchy and religious oppression, women will need single sex spaces.
If as much effort had been put into all of the above, instead of trying to break down the hard fought for rights and spaces created for women and girls, society would be a much nicer and fairer place and the toxic, vile, extreme right, would have much less ammunition to use in gaining their power.