Men in women’s groups.

Can I just ask @Anchorage56 did you not understand what I was saying? Are you going to blame that on me being autistic too?

I am open about being a victim of a violent rape and sexual assault.

I thought what I’d written to @Howseitgoin was clear. Can you please tell me what you didn’t understand?

Dresses and skirts make rape easier by virtue of the fact that they can be just lifted up.

What about that don’t you understand? Because to be honest I found your question staggering given that I described my rape in response to a question you aggressively put to me. And told me to - and I quote - get over it.

As I said I'm super feminine & posses personality traits & behaviours more common in women but some of my 'interests' are male coded. On balance my personality is more female associated.

So it's an on balance thing & values dependant in terms of what weight a person places on a trait/s that makes them defining.

"And in that social environment, recognising the reality of sex and the social and physical consequences that it has for women (original female people) in particular and providing sex specific supports to help us mitigate this, and maintaining sex specific language to allow us to express and make sense of our experiennces while also challenging the beliefs that these gendered behaviours (in both sexes) are natural and can never be changed is the only fair thing to do."

But you don't need to challenge the association trans women have with women to achieve this. Acknowledging the association & wanting to mitigate competing rights isn't mutually exclusive. We can (& have) manage sports, gender affirming care & private spaces. The legitimacy of trans women doesn't delegitimise the gender critical cause & yet its deemed necessary to delegitimise them & tacitly support their dehumanisation & demonisation.

Is this descent into irrationality 'manufactured'? In my view its a case of doth protest to much IE there's something underlying the over reaction that's personality driven. The type of person who is more likely to engage in transference under certain environmental stressors perhaps?

"The break for me was realising that these men didn't want "woman's" social conventions to be opened up to men as well, they wanted to keep the old social divisions between women and men and turn these into the actual defintiions of women and men, simulateously baking in the exact sexist stereotypes I had hoped they would be our alies in fighting and destroying the language, history, analysis, laws and spaces women need to make sense of what it is to be female outside those stereotypes and our socialisation."

You could make the same accusation about women who revel in sexist stereotypes. But they are just hapless 'robots' & men 'know what they are doing'? How do you square strong independent career women who hate babies, dominate their husbands but enjoy high heels & makeup? Please.

"I would love to get back to that possibility, but it cannot happen while trans women do not allow female people to exist in our right with our own language, spaces and protections that are separate from and nothing to do with trans women's social "womanhood"."

Unless the biological nature of man/woman changes there's no chance of that.

As I said I'm super feminine & posses personality traits & behaviours more common in women but some of my 'interests' are male coded. On balance my personality is more female associated.

So it's an on balance thing & values dependant in terms of what weight a person places on a trait/s that makes them defining.

The OP is in a Facebook group, not an in person group for starters.

But yes, people do vary, but often share similar characteristics.

We are constantly told that trans women are not threat, like they are the best of humanity - men but with the bad male bits removed, women with all the positive characteristics that suggests, like not committing sex crimes.

And it just isn't true. Trans women still behave like men. The only typically female stuff they do is wearing the clothes and make up and trying to use our services.

They still offend. They can still be violent. They take pics of themselves in bedrooms that resemble hovels - their idea of feminine behaviour doesn't seem to include cleaning up, that's for sure.

Absolutely.

I used to wear dresses, and skirts and elastic waist trousers.

since my rape I don’t.

I thought that was pretty clear in what I said?

I also didn’t used to be gender critical, but since my rape, my need for women’s single sex spaces has increased, and I am now very glad of the clarification of the law by the Supreme Court.

You still haven't explained how someone who has a male body and exhibits stereotypically male behaviour can be a woman.

Yeah well the OP's group beg to differ. Individuals vary, who would’ve thought?

But you don't need to challenge the association trans women have with women to achieve this. Acknowledging the association & wanting to mitigate competing rights isn't mutually exclusive. We can (& have) manage sports, gender affirming care & private spaces. The legitimacy of trans women doesn't delegitimise the gender critical cause & yet its deemed necessary to delegitimise them & tacitly support their dehumanisation & demonisation.

Can you explain what you mean by this in plain English?

I don't care if trans identifying men feel they have an association with women. I don't feel I have any association whatsoever with trans identifying men but their feelings are their own and they are entitled to them.

How do you suggest we manage sports and single sex spaces? How do you actually resolve the conflict between trans identifying men wanting to be in women's spaces and sports, and women not wanting trans identifying men in women's spaces and sports? Because there has to be a winner and a loser. They can't both win.

Lol, varying hugely is irrelevant to on average behaviours.

They aren't uniform. As in some women prefer being stay home mothers, some full time working mothers, some both & some don't care for children. Some women prefer uber feminine presentation, some sporty, some conservative, some androgynous & some butch.

Yes! You are finally seeing it!

All these people have in common is the fact they have female biolog y and deal with the physical and social consequences of that.

We are not socialised exactly the same way, but we all have to deal with finding ourselves within that nexus of the images of womanhood we grow up with, the social pressures we face and the reality of our bodies in that.

So, given that you now admit that there is a huge variety among women to the degree that the only thing women in given society have in common is to be of the female sex in a certain time and place and deal with the social consequences of that, would you like to go back and rethink your statements about "commonalities" between women?

Because you've pretty much undone your own argument now 😂

Irrelevant to the discussion of psychological commonality.

Irrelevant to the discussion of psychological commonality.

All women are biologically female though. That is our sole common denominator.

"And in that social environment, recognising the reality of sex and the social and physical consequences that it has for women (original female people) in particular and providing sex specific supports to help us mitigate this, and maintaining sex specific language to allow us to express and make sense of our experiennces while also challenging the beliefs that these gendered behaviours (in both sexes) are natural and can never be changed is the only fair thing to do."

But you don't need to challenge the association trans women have with women to achieve this. Acknowledging the association & wanting to mitigate competing rights isn't mutually exclusive. We can (& have) manage sports, gender affirming care & private spaces. The legitimacy of trans women doesn't delegitimise the gender critical cause & yet its deemed necessary to delegitimise them & tacitly support their dehumanisation & demonisation.

Is this descent into irrationality 'manufactured'? In my view its a case of doth protest to much IE there's something underlying the over reaction that's personality driven. The type of person who is more likely to engage in transference under certain environmental stressors perhaps?

"The break for me was realising that these men didn't want "woman's" social conventions to be opened up to men as well, they wanted to keep the old social divisions between women and men and turn these into the actual defintiions of women and men, simulateously baking in the exact sexist stereotypes I had hoped they would be our alies in fighting and destroying the language, history, analysis, laws and spaces women need to make sense of what it is to be female outside those stereotypes and our socialisation."

You could make the same accusation about women who revel in sexist stereotypes. But they are just hapless 'robots' & men 'know what they are doing'? How do you square strong independent career women who hate babies, dominate their husbands but enjoy high heels & makeup? Please.

"I would love to get back to that possibility, but it cannot happen while trans women do not allow female people to exist in our right with our own language, spaces and protections that are separate from and nothing to do with trans women's social "womanhood"."

Unless the biological nature of man/woman changes there's no chance of that.

That assumes that trans women are all lovely, and they are not. They might even be lovely, but still acting with male entitlement, which they can't help because they were socialised male. All the trans women i have ever encountered are big and take up the space in a way women tend not to. They can't apevthe way we women were socialised to use space in a less dominant way. And for me this is one of the main reasons we need women's groups. Plus this one might be nice, the next one not so. But the precedent has been set.

Of course I understand that. I constantly challenge myself and look at it from different perspectives.

I always come to the conclusion that sex is real and has material consequences for women both physically, and, because of patriacial social structures and norms, socially, financially, emotionally and politically.

And in that social environment, recognising the reality of sex and the social and physical consequences that it has for women (original female people) in particular and providing sex specific supports to help us mitigate this, and maintaining sex specific language to allow us to express and make sense of our experiennces while also challenging the beliefs that these gendered behaviours (in both sexes) are natural and can never be changed is the only fair thing to do.

I used to see trans women as great allies. I thought male people whose existence proved that much of what society says is "female" isn't specific to women at all, but just a convention attached to our sex.

The break for me was realising that these men didn't want "woman's" social conventions to be opened up to men as well, they wanted to keep the old social divisions between women and men and turn these into the actual defintiions of women and men, simulateously baking in the exact sexist stereotypes I had hoped they would be our alies in fighting and destroying the language, history, analysis, laws and spaces women need to make sense of what it is to be female outside those stereotypes and our socialisation.

I would love to get back to that possibility, but it cannot happen while trans women do not allow female people to exist in our right with our own language, spaces and protections that are separate from and nothing to do with trans women's social "womanhood".

Why is it so important to you to destroy this? Why do you hate female people so much that you cannot allow us our own existence in law, society and language?

The post you are replying to was spectacularly insensitive and ignorant. Don't feel that you have to respond to that kind of arseholery. Sending love and hugs.

Resist what and in what way?

Have you read the literature on rape and the shut down response? I fought as hard as I could. I still got raped. And sexually assaulted. I broke one of my fingers trying to get away. I bit him. I searched him. I kicked him. I tried my fucking best to stop him. And because he is a man and bigger and stronger than me it wasn’t enough. And that goes for all men. Any of them would be capable of overpowering me by virtue of their sex.

How victim blaming of you. I don’t know how these sort of posts are allowed to stand.

I feel a genuine serious threat when any man I don’t know is in my company, and very often even in groups with men I know. That will never leave me.

Nowhere is safe for me anymore. Not even my own home. I have cameras. Upgraded locks. A dog in the bed. A spray on the beside table. And it’s not enough.

Who are you to decide if my assessment of threat is “genuine”? Who made you the one to determine that?

Yes but its also true that if people feel a genuine serious threat they would be more likely to resist. Perhaps having met the person they don't.

The old conservative trope of: if they see gays they will become gay? Or ''any behaviour I don't agree with was contagious'

The flaw with your logic is that it is self evident is within society tastes & preferences vary huuuugely'. They aren't uniform. As in some women prefer being stay home mothers, some full time working mothers, some both & some don't care for children. Some women prefer uber feminine presentation, some sporty, some conservative, some androgynous & some butch.

The old conservative trope of: if they see gays they will become gay? Or ''any behaviour I don't agree with was contagious'

The flaw with your logic is that it is self evident is within society tastes & preferences vary huuuugely'. They aren't uniform. As in some women prefer being stay home mothers, some full time working mothers, some both & some don't care for children. Some women prefer uber feminine presentation, some sporty, some conservative, some androgynous & some butch.

The old conservative trope of: if they see gays they will become gay? Or ''any behaviour I don't agree with was contagious'

The flaw with your logic is that it is self evident is within society tastes & preferences vary huuuugely'. They aren't uniform. As in some women prefer being stay home mothers, some full time working mothers, some both & some don't care for children. Some women prefer uber feminine presentation, some sporty, some conservative, some androgynous & some butch.