Talking to non GC people

Hence it is sometimes a very good idea to use sex categories if clarity and accuracy is needed.

They are female sports categories because they will also be often divided into sub categories by age and include girls. They don't and should not include male people at all if it is a female category.

I dont think that's true at all. I'm not gender critical. You've misrepresented the argument haven't you? Its about how you classify a woman. Obviously there's a difference in what you would accept regarding someone entering into womens sports. So from their perspective gender critical people have not prevented men from entering womens sports, they've prevented some women from entering womens sports.

"What I am saying is that for me at least, a factual aggregation of problems is far more convincing than individual horror stories in deciding the right position on an issue."

Many threads have both and discuss both. They have the prisoner statistics which is the only statistics that is reliably gathered and reported by sex and shows, as confirmed by professors in criminology and in sociological research, that that specific group of male people does not show they are less likely to commit sexual offences than any other male group of people. And they then will drill down when other posters demand examples of crimes being committed by male people with transgender identities specifically in toilets.

What more can women do than present both macro level discussion and specific discussion when that is demanded as proof of the macro level pattern? And if you have not seen it, would you like us to link up the threads where this happens?

And this is not sarcasm, this is a genuine question.

I dont think that's true at all. I'm not gender critical. You've misrepresented the argument haven't you? Its about how you classify a woman. Obviously there's a difference in what you would accept regarding someone entering into womens sports. So from their perspective gender critical people have not prevented men from entering womens sports, they've prevented some women from entering womens sports.

I think the point about spectrum is that either a space is single sex or it isn't.

I'm perfectly happy for people to argue that the WI should be mixed sex but it seems very regressive to argue that a man who likes making jam and talks on local wildlife should be excluded unless he claims to identify as a woman.

Conversely, as I said before, I don't have as instinctively strong feelings about single sex spaces as many on this board, although I understand the logic and I support women's rights to set boundaries. What does seems mad is to make the argument for single sex spaces and to then argue that I should be wary of this man but not that man.

Being told that one person was assaulted in a specific place and circumstance by a specific type of person will certainly horrify me, but is not the same kind information and can be misused to stoke emotion.

I think these examples are often used to rebut 'this never happens' claims. However, we have another problem in that the police have not been recording data accurately, so sometimes a lack of evidence is an intrinsic part of the problem.

I would also make another point - we shouldn't have to wait for the figures showing that women have been assaulted to take steps to prevent assault. If we agree that this is one of the reasons that we have single sex spaces, why weaken boundaries?

I’m not a trans activist. Never have been. Never been remotely tempted to be. And much closer to being the opposite if I had to choose (I could quite possibly be completely converted with one calm, respectful conversation if anybody bothered). My post was free of sarcasm (and sneer). I stated explicitly that I was muddled, and moving in my views, and included numerous statements of belief that are much more aligned with most people on this thread.

Maybe I lack empathy, but I simply cannot see how one can see that women deserve rights (eg sport) whilst also saying that women don't deserve all rights - the right to privacy in a theatre toilet is not reasonable, nor is the right of an orthodox jewish woman to go to a theatre reasonable (too bad she can't go because there's no single sex toilet for her to use).

"As I said, this has not been the issue I’ve engaged on greatly"

Men can be women, therefore women have no rights separate from men. Men cannot be women and women therefore have rights. Pick a side, you really don't need to spend much time or effort engaging!!!

"on the other side, would be having female only streets after 7pm. or female only hotels"

Surely the starting point is that in 2015 women had rights to single sex spaces in terms of toilets, changing rooms, prisons, rape crisis etc etc. No-one has ever explained why women should have fewer rights (men wanting them does not count), so the starting point is "lets defend women's rights".

The following point, a totally different point which can only follow once basic women's rights are re-affirmed, is "should women have more rights? Would women only streets or women-only hotels give women a genuine benefit, and if so can it be done in a way that does not unreasonably harm men?"

For what it's worth I think women only hotels make a lot of sense. I think they could be popular, and I think they could be provided without destroying men's right to a hotel room. I think women only streets makes a lot of sense too, but it is much harder to imagine it being enacted without unreasonable restrictions on men. [I suspect women might find it easier to imagine that unreasonable restrictions on men via the law is no worse than unreasonable restrictions on women via their self-protection mechanism than I do]

Thank you for your honesty Fallensloppy and that’s an interesting insight….…. you hearing it like that (and seems like you are not alone) indicates why it is so hard to actually discuss. I’m not a trans activist. Never have been. Never been remotely tempted to be. And much closer to being the opposite if I had to choose (I could quite possibly be completely converted with one calm, respectful conversation if anybody bothered). My post was free of sarcasm (and sneer). I stated explicitly that I was muddled, and moving in my views, and included numerous statements of belief that are much more aligned with most people on this thread. Yet I’ve been greeted with quite a few accusations that I think obnoxious things I don’t, been interpreted as sneering, as dictating or deciding other women’s needs don’t matter, a fake feminist etc….. I feel that I’ve been told if I don’t agree with everything, right now, even if I am clear I’m not fixed in my beliefs, then I am to be condemned and my points to be misrepresented and obliterated at speed.

Several of the posts have been very informative and useful - above all on the toilet issue. And one or two were in a similar tone to my post, so I am grateful for those. As I said, this has not been the issue I’ve engaged on greatly. And the difference in safety between semi open cubicles and closed cubicles is something I hadn’t thought about. It does make me think of the safety of spacious disabled facilities, which are closed but aided with an alarm and big enough to have companions in together if desired…. Perhaps we could reclaim and separate out half of the male toilet space (always infuriates me when they have no queue), to create more spacious units like these. anyway, I have no illusions I will solve this, and if I were to try I would first set about informing myself far better than I am now. But I am grateful to those who took the time to share more detailed information (and no I am not unreceptive to hearing about messy femaleness, I am a very messy female myself!)

The accusation of privilege? Quite possibly. We all have it in different ways in whatever dimensions of life we haven’t had to experience, although certainly I have had my days negotiating a pram, shopping and period accidents. But just to be clear, I never denied anybody the right to want, need or campaign for female only toilets. I didn’t even say I don’t support the preference for it myself. I much prefer a female only toilet. I said that in the case of trying to persuade people, the rhetoric that has built around this issue, and the less clear cut aspect to it (that there are many toilet situations when we don’t have these regardless of the trans issue) means it’s not the best to lead with and it’s less clear to me.

And I do disagree that there is not a spectrum (rather than either or) in terms of which spaces must be female only. The further extrapolation of this debate on one side would be to say mixed prisons and rape centres were fine. And on the other side, would be having female only streets after 7pm. or female only hotels. That would be fantastic, and we would make us all far safer and more comfortable - the statistics for it benefiting women’s safety would be monumentally borne out. I could definitely see myself voting for that- I’m really not being sarcastic. We have all made a decision on where the reasonable stopping point is on the spectrum, and at what point we will get passionate enough to campaign…Where segregation is a must and a should be a protected right, versus better when possible. We have already come to different conclusions for different types of venue And different countries of course have come to very different conclusions on this too). The fact that toilets is on a slightly different place in the spectrum for me, for now, than for GC women, does not mean I don’t care about other women’s needs.

A last point to highlight, is I disagree strongly that I am shaming victims by saying that individual horror stories can be scaremongering. I was not saying to not talk about the problems or that any bad experiences we have are shameful. Or even that we can’t share and listen to such stories. What I am saying is that for me at least, a factual aggregation of problems is far more convincing than individual horror stories in deciding the right position on an issue. Individual horror stories have been used since the beginning of time to stoke fear, prejudice or pity, to galvanise crowds to unanalyzed action - often against specific groups. Being told that assaults globally have risen by x% since y change I find Highly informative, as long as rigorously sourced. Being told that one person was assaulted in a specific place and circumstance by a specific type of person will certainly horrify me, but is not the same kind information and can be misused to stoke emotion. And one poster suggested I am saying GC women have done equally horrific things. No, I didn’t say that. I’m not saying GC women have done anything horrific. I said the other side call on equally horrific stories (eg of Individual trans people being beaten up), which you rightly dismiss as not the point. Similarly, I would like to know percentages of people who regret transition, versus say it saved their life…. I don’t find it particularly useful to hear personal stories of either position, as I already know both exist. They are moving on a human level, but they are not the kind of data that helps me decide what my position is.

Hope that makes sense.

Thank you for your honesty Fallensloppy and that’s an interesting insight….…. you hearing it like that (and seems like you are not alone) indicates why it is so hard to actually discuss. I’m not a trans activist. Never have been. Never been remotely tempted to be. And much closer to being the opposite if I had to choose (I could quite possibly be completely converted with one calm, respectful conversation if anybody bothered). My post was free of sarcasm (and sneer). I stated explicitly that I was muddled, and moving in my views, and included numerous statements of belief that are much more aligned with most people on this thread. Yet I’ve been greeted with quite a few accusations that I think obnoxious things I don’t, been interpreted as sneering, as dictating or deciding other women’s needs don’t matter, a fake feminist etc….. I feel that I’ve been told if I don’t agree with everything, right now, even if I am clear I’m not fixed in my beliefs, then I am to be condemned and my points to be misrepresented and obliterated at speed.

Several of the posts have been very informative and useful - above all on the toilet issue. And one or two were in a similar tone to my post, so I am grateful for those. As I said, this has not been the issue I’ve engaged on greatly. And the difference in safety between semi open cubicles and closed cubicles is something I hadn’t thought about. It does make me think of the safety of spacious disabled facilities, which are closed but aided with an alarm and big enough to have companions in together if desired…. Perhaps we could reclaim and separate out half of the male toilet space (always infuriates me when they have no queue), to create more spacious units like these. anyway, I have no illusions I will solve this, and if I were to try I would first set about informing myself far better than I am now. But I am grateful to those who took the time to share more detailed information (and no I am not unreceptive to hearing about messy femaleness, I am a very messy female myself!)

The accusation of privilege? Quite possibly. We all have it in different ways in whatever dimensions of life we haven’t had to experience, although certainly I have had my days negotiating a pram, shopping and period accidents. But just to be clear, I never denied anybody the right to want, need or campaign for female only toilets. I didn’t even say I don’t support the preference for it myself. I much prefer a female only toilet. I said that in the case of trying to persuade people, the rhetoric that has built around this issue, and the less clear cut aspect to it (that there are many toilet situations when we don’t have these regardless of the trans issue) means it’s not the best to lead with and it’s less clear to me.

And I do disagree that there is not a spectrum (rather than either or) in terms of which spaces must be female only. The further extrapolation of this debate on one side would be to say mixed prisons and rape centres were fine. And on the other side, would be having female only streets after 7pm. or female only hotels. That would be fantastic, and we would make us all far safer and more comfortable - the statistics for it benefiting women’s safety would be monumentally borne out. I could definitely see myself voting for that- I’m really not being sarcastic. We have all made a decision on where the reasonable stopping point is on the spectrum, and at what point we will get passionate enough to campaign…Where segregation is a must and a should be a protected right, versus better when possible. We have already come to different conclusions for different types of venue And different countries of course have come to very different conclusions on this too). The fact that toilets is on a slightly different place in the spectrum for me, for now, than for GC women, does not mean I don’t care about other women’s needs.

A last point to highlight, is I disagree strongly that I am shaming victims by saying that individual horror stories can be scaremongering. I was not saying to not talk about the problems or that any bad experiences we have are shameful. Or even that we can’t share and listen to such stories. What I am saying is that for me at least, a factual aggregation of problems is far more convincing than individual horror stories in deciding the right position on an issue. Individual horror stories have been used since the beginning of time to stoke fear, prejudice or pity, to galvanise crowds to unanalyzed action - often against specific groups. Being told that assaults globally have risen by x% since y change I find Highly informative, as long as rigorously sourced. Being told that one person was assaulted in a specific place and circumstance by a specific type of person will certainly horrify me, but is not the same kind information and can be misused to stoke emotion. And one poster suggested I am saying GC women have done equally horrific things. No, I didn’t say that. I’m not saying GC women have done anything horrific. I said the other side call on equally horrific stories (eg of Individual trans people being beaten up), which you rightly dismiss as not the point. Similarly, I would like to know percentages of people who regret transition, versus say it saved their life…. I don’t find it particularly useful to hear personal stories of either position, as I already know both exist. They are moving on a human level, but they are not the kind of data that helps me decide what my position is.

Hope that makes sense.

Thank you for your honesty Fallensloppy and that’s an interesting insight….…. you hearing it like that (and seems like you are not alone) indicates why it is so hard to actually discuss. I’m not a trans activist. Never have been. Never been remotely tempted to be. And much closer to being the opposite if I had to choose (I could quite possibly be completely converted with one calm, respectful conversation if anybody bothered). My post was free of sarcasm (and sneer). I stated explicitly that I was muddled, and moving in my views, and included numerous statements of belief that are much more aligned with most people on this thread. Yet I’ve been greeted with quite a few accusations that I think obnoxious things I don’t, been interpreted as sneering, as dictating or deciding other women’s needs don’t matter, a fake feminist etc….. I feel that I’ve been told if I don’t agree with everything, right now, even if I am clear I’m not fixed in my beliefs, then I am to be condemned and my points to be misrepresented and obliterated at speed.

Several of the posts have been very informative and useful - above all on the toilet issue. And one or two were in a similar tone to my post, so I am grateful for those. As I said, this has not been the issue I’ve engaged on greatly. And the difference in safety between semi open cubicles and closed cubicles is something I hadn’t thought about. It does make me think of the safety of spacious disabled facilities, which are closed but aided with an alarm and big enough to have companions in together if desired…. Perhaps we could reclaim and separate out half of the male toilet space (always infuriates me when they have no queue), to create more spacious units like these. anyway, I have no illusions I will solve this, and if I were to try I would first set about informing myself far better than I am now. But I am grateful to those who took the time to share more detailed information (and no I am not unreceptive to hearing about messy femaleness, I am a very messy female myself!)

The accusation of privilege? Quite possibly. We all have it in different ways in whatever dimensions of life we haven’t had to experience, although certainly I have had my days negotiating a pram, shopping and period accidents. But just to be clear, I never denied anybody the right to want, need or campaign for female only toilets. I didn’t even say I don’t support the preference for it myself. I much prefer a female only toilet. I said that in the case of trying to persuade people, the rhetoric that has built around this issue, and the less clear cut aspect to it (that there are many toilet situations when we don’t have these regardless of the trans issue) means it’s not the best to lead with and it’s less clear to me.

And I do disagree that there is not a spectrum (rather than either or) in terms of which spaces must be female only. The further extrapolation of this debate on one side would be to say mixed prisons and rape centres were fine. And on the other side, would be having female only streets after 7pm. or female only hotels. That would be fantastic, and we would make us all far safer and more comfortable - the statistics for it benefiting women’s safety would be monumentally borne out. I could definitely see myself voting for that- I’m really not being sarcastic. We have all made a decision on where the reasonable stopping point is on the spectrum, and at what point we will get passionate enough to campaign…Where segregation is a must and a should be a protected right, versus better when possible. We have already come to different conclusions for different types of venue And different countries of course have come to very different conclusions on this too). The fact that toilets is on a slightly different place in the spectrum for me, for now, than for GC women, does not mean I don’t care about other women’s needs.

A last point to highlight, is I disagree strongly that I am shaming victims by saying that individual horror stories can be scaremongering. I was not saying to not talk about the problems or that any bad experiences we have are shameful. Or even that we can’t share and listen to such stories. What I am saying is that for me at least, a factual aggregation of problems is far more convincing than individual horror stories in deciding the right position on an issue. Individual horror stories have been used since the beginning of time to stoke fear, prejudice or pity, to galvanise crowds to unanalyzed action - often against specific groups. Being told that assaults globally have risen by x% since y change I find Highly informative, as long as rigorously sourced. Being told that one person was assaulted in a specific place and circumstance by a specific type of person will certainly horrify me, but is not the same kind information and can be misused to stoke emotion. And one poster suggested I am saying GC women have done equally horrific things. No, I didn’t say that. I’m not saying GC women have done anything horrific. I said the other side call on equally horrific stories (eg of Individual trans people being beaten up), which you rightly dismiss as not the point. Similarly, I would like to know percentages of people who regret transition, versus say it saved their life…. I don’t find it particularly useful to hear personal stories of either position, as I already know both exist. They are moving on a human level, but they are not the kind of data that helps me decide what my position is.

Hope that makes sense.

Please give us the National Security one!🙏🕵

@financialcareerstuff I'm going to be absolutely honest here, and you can make of it what you will.

When I read your post what I heard was a transactivist saying 'okay, okay you can keep the sports and rape crisis centres but please, please, pleeeease give us the toilets'.

You have been brilliant at pulling it all together.

I wonder though if those 'middle ground' readers are interested.

Anyone posting about 'Human Rights', probably means Article 8. However, when discussing human rights, it should be made clear that there are restrictions to that right as well.

It is very often ignored.

https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/human-rights/human-rights-act/article-8-respect-your-private-and-family-life

Article 8 protects your right to respect for your private and family life.

The EHRC link covers what this means. Including these restrictions:

Restrictions to the right to respect for your private and family life
There are situations when public authorities can interfere with your right to respect for private and family life, home and correspondence. This is only allowed where the authority can show that its action is lawful, necessary and proportionate in order to:
protect national security
protect public safety
protect the economy
protect health or morals
prevent disorder or crime, or
protect the rights and freedoms of other people.
Action is ‘proportionate’ when it is appropriate and no more than necessary to address the problem concerned.

These restrictions keep getting missed out.

And in the ECHR documentation

https://www.echr.coe.int/documents/d/echr/conventionENG_

page 11

Article 8 – Right to respect for private and family life

1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

The concept of privacy is also often posited as a blunt human right where others are said to have no right to know the sex of someone. Whereas, there is a proviso to that where it is possible that this right will be dependent on issues relating to safety of others.

The human rights argument also doesn’t work because in the provision of public spaces by organisations, for instance such as changing rooms, as there is no human right that states that someone has the right to privacy from a person of the same sex under those conditions.

Meaning in the provision of publicly accessible single sex spaces, perople can be excluded based on sex category from that the space if they are not the sex category the space is designated as being accessible for. If a male person rejects the male single sex space provided by an organisation, they can ask for an alternative. The organisation doesn’t have to provide that alternative space though. That could be considered an unreasonable request.

A male person rejecting a provided single sex provision does not get to access the opposite sex single sex space just because that person has a belief that they are not a male person when they materially are.

When the term human rights is introduced, it is all too often misused. It is used falsely as an appeal to authority.

Last week I was in a toilet where a young Muslim girl was helping her friend remove her hijab, which had become uncomfortable. She brushed her hair and put it back on.
The walls had several posters with the Ask for Angela information.
There was a poster from a women's DVA service with a QS code to scan.
One visit. Three excellent reasons why women's toilets are more than just a place to pee.

Even you, Helle, are falling into the TRA trap here though.

There are two separate questions.

1. Is a single sex space/resource (in this case, toilet facilities) justifiable?

1. If not, what is the rationale for the inclusion of trans women but no other men?

The two get conflated all the time but they are totally unrelated.

The first does centre the question of women's needs and whether or not they are justified. I think it is always a reasonable question to ask because we should be able to justify the accomodations we ask for. And god knows the evidence is there - I think the more it gets laid out in black and white why these provisions exist and are needed the better.

The second is based on the presuppositon that trans women are meaningfully, materially more "woman" than other men are. That it is a reasonable question to ask how far these a-bit-womanny men get to be treated as women instead of men. That's a totally different proposition that is based entirely on men's needs and self image but gets slipped in unchallenged under the "I don't care who pees next to me" argument.

You are quite right 5128gap.

In the past, I have had some ‘wavering middle-ground public opinion’ posters tell me I have fetishised toilets, I am 'skeevy', I am icky and that other women most certainly don't want me using the toilet in this way either. Also that I must hang out in public toilets a LOT to even have to do these things. And on and on and on. From posters who had previously posted how supportive they are of women and what great feminists they were.

And when pressed, they admit that they drive many places and don't have to walk or take public transport meaning that a lot of those issues disappear. Or they have lots of support at home and don't have to take their children or their disabled mother out with them. Or they never go anywhere that they don't have access to family toilets or reliable accessible toilets (in that the accessible toilets are never out of order).

I looked at a thread from 2018 last week and there were lots of woman posting about having to deal with the issues that I have mentioned. Since then though, it seems like there is this magic era where women don't have to deal with it.... It is a strange inconsistency that I noted.

Maybe my question should be:

With those needs above, how do I articulate those needs so that those female people who dismiss them as unimportant actually consider them as important enough to accept for keeping single sex toilets exclusively for female people?

I can evidence why we should have single sex toilets with door gaps for all of those exceptions even National Security!

I can evidence why we should have single sex toilets with door gaps for all of those exceptions even National Security!