Talking to non GC people

It seems that someone who takes an absolutist stance would believe women and girls saying that toilets should exclude all male people over the age of about 8 years old is akin to someone saying all male people are rapists. It is actually not even logical when you consider it.

Not all male people are rapists yet we still exclude all male from toilet once they are no longer children needing assistance.

There isn’t a logical conclusion that then leads to the comparison of wanting segregation based on race, religion or sexual orientation or any other illegitimate discrimination.

Perhaps it is an automatic and not carefully considered reaction to what some people think when they think about ‘discrimination’. That anything that discriminates is bad.

But of course, there is legitimate and illegitimate discrimination. Race, religion and sexual orientation discrimination for toilets is inappropriate and has negative impacts on those being discriminated against. Discrimination based on sex category, age and disability is legal and contributes to positive impacts for those in the categories benefitting from the discrimination.

If a major consideration for safeguarding is reliant on the physical power difference between male and female people (as accepted for sport), why is this forgotten or dismissed for toilets? There is a major inconsistency there and I have never seen it explained in any convincing way, why we should ignore it. It always seems that someone dismisses it because it is inconvenient.

The other thing mentioned was about evidence being presented. I actually see this as a type of victim blaming where women are blamed for collecting and presenting evidence. We do it because we have been put in the position of having to justify our need to have safeguarding reinstated in toilets.

Because a group of people removed the safeguarding structure that we once relied on. If we were constantly having to justify our need to keep a group of men out of the toilets, we wouldn’t keep presenting evidence that they still commit sex offences so should be kept out of single sex spaces.

I hope that helps readers gain some clarity why women reject some people dismissing our needs.

This, every time.
We are frequently sneered at for caring about toilets, told it's not important, told that our needs are not important, our spaces are not important.
But suddenly, when a man wants to use them, they are important. To him.

The communal changing room issue yes I see , because people are stripping down naked in front of each other, but toilets, where you always have individual locked cubicles for women, and sink areas or many toilets are communal/non sex specific anyway….it doesn’t feel like a defined right to have a female only space, but rather a right to have a lockable, private cubicle.

I'm guessing you didn't see the video doing the rounds yesterday.

Of a 'trans woman'

In a ladies changing room

Wanking.

This is the crux of it for me too. Either male people can be women, in which case, they must be treated exactly the same as all other women in every aspect; or male people are not women so there is no justication for including them in places where men are not permitted.
It was precisely the binary nature if this that changed me from thinking there could be a compromise to realising there could not.
Because if I don't think a male person is a woman its wrong, patronising and disingenuous to pretend that I do just because I've taken it upon myself to decide I'm OK with it in that context.

Why are women told toilets are not important so that transwomen can use female toilets because this is important to them? Aren't toilets and which one to use important or unimportant for all or for none?

And a lot of us (me!) were "progressive", #bekind, TWAWers too.

Ultimately though, what I think she needs to consider is this. There is no middle ground. Either men can be women or they can't. Either women have language of their own or they don't. Either women have spaces of their own or they don't. Either women matter or they don't.

No-one (I hope) would say to an Orthodox Jewish Brit "obviously you have the right to practice your religion, obviously discrimination is wrong, but come on, we can't have orthodox jewish women working in law or accountancy - that would be silly". Why is "obviously women have a right to single sex sports and rape crisis centres, but budge up for the men when it comes to toilets and Hampstead ponds" any less ridiculous?

I've never seen the toilet issue as being an attempt to suggest all TIM are dangerous or that they are particularly dangerous. Nor have I seen the presenting of evidence of TIM assaulting women or behaving in perverted ways in the toilet as a smear against TIM.
The first is simply an acknowledgement that some men are dangerous to women, and as we don't know which ones, we keep them all out of spaces where we are vulnerable, such as the toilet.
The second is not proactive 'smearing' its responsive provision of facts when it is argued that TIM are not as dangerous as other men so exceptions should be made for them.

The other thing that pushed me towards the pro-trans inclusive/welcoming stance was the style of GC rhetoric around the toilet issue. The toilet issue is still one I find least convincing and most commonly cited. The communal changing room issue yes I see , because people are stripping down naked in front of each other, but toilets, where you always have individual locked cubicles for women, and sink areas or many toilets are communal/non sex specific anyway….it doesn’t feel like a defined right to have a female only space, but rather a right to have a lockable, private cubicle.

@financialcareerstuff The HSE have told me for Document T single sex toilets within a single sex environment are the only ones that can have door gaps. These make them the healthiest and safest designs.

Ask yourself these questions:

‪Q) is it a good thing we have a programme of rolling out defibrillators across schools, venues and workplaces so that we have a timely and best chance of surviving if we collapse? ‬

‪Q) is it important that the place where you go when you feel ill is safe?‬

‪Q) and in a non-domestic situation that would often be the toilet cubicle?‬

‪Q) so is it important that you would be found as quickly as possible in the toilet cubicle if you collapsed?‬

‪Q) so if toilets were all enclosed in full height ceiling-to-floor rooms that were resistant to the passage of sound, do you agree that could lead to delays finding someone who had collapsed?‬

‪Q) so if we get rid of all the single sex designs that have door gaps to make them inclusive of gender, that would mean everyone was more at risk at their most vulnerable?‬

‪Q) and would those people with invisible disabilities (collapsible conditions such as epilepsy, diabetes, heart conditions, POTS) be as safe in the workplace if only enclosed toilets were available?

‪Q) and would women and children who were led or pushed back into a toilet room be less likely to be rescued in time if there was no knowledge of what was going on in the toilet room?

‪Q) so would single sex toilets that were single sex and had door gaps also be a preventative measure for sexual assaults on women and children?‬

‪I have studied toilet safety for years now and know the healthiest and safest design for the medically vulnerable, women and children. It is the single sex design, which is the one that can have door and partition gaps (typically 10cm-15cm from floor-door and space above the door and partitions). But this design becomes floor-to-ceiling enclosed when both sexes are in the space in front of the toilet door.‬

‪The evidence of deaths and sexual assaults in toilets in this country, shows the design you want is least detrimental to healthy men.

Basically DH's thought process is "He's to be pitied so I will call him her and it doesn't hurt anyone". Whenever I try to discuss this particular theme and why it DOES hurt, he explicitly flees the discussion and sends me back to " My forum " (Aka MN).

And I want to stress that he's not a misogynist. We both work and he does more in the home than I do (although I carry more of the mental load).

What I think you need to consider is that lots of people here that you see as hardline were “middle ground folk” until they were exposed fully to trans rights activists and understood just how misogynistic the movement is.

I find people who dismiss female single sex toilets as not being an issue are perhaps those who have never had to use a female toilet space in a way that falls outside of that supposedly locked cubicle (if the locks indeed do work). In a way, it is a privileged position to dismiss other female people's needs for single sex toilets.

Just because you, general you, have not needed to have even the communal handwashing space in a female single sex toilet free of male people, shouldn't mean that you don't listen to other female people saying that they do.

I also often wonder how people who declare that they fully support traumatised women dismiss the toilet issue when traumatised women have in the past articulated clearly that they don't want to share a space with any male person over the age of a child who needs support. We see this quite often. Of course, it goes hand in hand with my first point too.

However, it does all come down to consent. Just because one woman 'consents', doesn't mean that that consent is transferrable.

Here is that Amy Sousa vid.

https://x.com/KnownHeretic/status/2006208789578391667?s=20

@financialcareerstuff Interesting post. I look forward to reading your equivalent post to trans people telling them how they could and should act more respectfully towards women and girls, how they should modify their language, how they should consider our feelings, requesting that they find solutions to problems and telling them what issues they should or should not be bothered about because you personally are not bothered about those issues. I assume you will be writing one?

It’s the TRAs who go on about loos, @financialcareerstuff - because some of these trans ID males are unable to think past their own fetish. Definitely don’t go looking for how the talk about our toilets or watch the furore on Twitter yesterday of the large man masturbating in a women’s toilet in the gym.

if they can make a case for “pee next to me”
they can get in everywhere. Women will not have the right privacy because some bloke wants to wank.

fuck that shit

I really don’t want any men, however they present, in spaces where women are vulnerable, which includes toilets.
Men who understand so little about women that they think they are women don’t understand female boundaries and are IMO more likely to be dangerous than other men. So no men in women’s toilets, ever.

All this guff about inclusion is just a smokescreen.

As this thread is a bit focussed on ‘wavering middle-ground public opinion’ it might be useful for me to share some thoughts….. as that’s where I am. I barely ever post on these threads. I think I did once many years ago when I was still very ‘pro-inclusion’. I have read quite a lot since, mostly here. I think I’m pretty representative of a lot of middle ground folk, and have even thought quite a few of the things that are quoted as typical responses that most people on this thread are bored of hearing. So it may be useful to share some reflections on what I have found useful in evolving my view and what has not been useful. I’m not really presenting these arguments for them to be destroyed here…. But to give insight into thinking for someone who might want to persuade someone like me.

I am an active feminist and anti-racist - through volunteering, campaigning, and putting my money where my mouth - so I am Passionate about women’s rights. Just mentioning that to say that indifference is not the challenge.

For me, the trans movement has provided a massive dilemma. In every other instance, I have been a passionate defender of the ‘outlier’ or ‘disadvantaged’ group who experience discrimination. Women, first of all. Racial minorities (or global majority!). Those with disabilities. And LGBQ people. Trans felt like an obvious other group who were different, often suffering as a result of their difference, and deserving of support and not to be stigmatised. I still believe they are. Also, as they basically ‘don’t fit with the mould’ on a lot of the male/female:gender stereotypes I have battled against in life, they felt like natural champions of the same thing. (“No I don’t have to be like THIS, just because that’s what you expect. I can be a new way you might not be comfortable with, but I will define”)… so my initial strong instinct for all these reasons was to be supportive.

The other thing that pushed me towards the pro-trans inclusive/welcoming stance was the style of GC rhetoric around the toilet issue. The toilet issue is still one I find least convincing and most commonly cited. The communal changing room issue yes I see , because people are stripping down naked in front of each other, but toilets, where you always have individual locked cubicles for women, and sink areas or many toilets are communal/non sex specific anyway….it doesn’t feel like a defined right to have a female only space, but rather a right to have a lockable, private cubicle. let’s say it is not what I would lead with, at least in persuading people. A lot of the rhetoric around the toilet issues sounds incredibly similar to right wing battles against inclusion for other disadvantaged groups. I’m not saying they are, but that’s what it triggers in people. For example, painting Black men as a danger to white women, due to racist views of Black men….thus justifying segregation…. And the citing of individual examples of violence as somehow ‘proving’ the threat is real is another thing that generally hasn’t helped convince me- ‘you see this awful thing happened’ or ‘look at this revolting individual…this is the face of the movement’ This feels like scaremongering, and thinking that individuals represent entire groups…. Feels stigmatising, and intellectually dishonest (because the other ‘side’ can equally cite awful things, etc to try to demonstrate their point so it basically gets us nowhere). The argument that being trans is an illness also unfortunately mirrors very closely the arguments of the past of being gay as being an illness that you could be reeducated out of…. So while I understand the philosophical argument, it doesn’t help for me. It turns me off. Another thing that doesn’t help is all the labels or acronyms. I understand if you are living and breathing this stuff they are useful, but it’s hard to get into the narrative if you are not, and you can’t remember what a terf is. It also encourages boxed up, encamped thinking, which doesn’t open people to shift their position.

So as a “muddled middler” who DOES care about women… what helped open me and move towards the view of most people on this thread?

1. Sports issue - as cited, is persuasive. Because the danger (ie of a woman being beaten up in boxing by someone with a huge muscular advantage), is categorically based in biology, not fear or discrimination. The weakness about the sport issue is that sport doesn’t feel super important, and everybody involved is kind of choosing to be. So doesn’t fully cut it for me as a human rights issue I’d go to bat for. And there are many sports (eg swimming) when there is no physical risk. Trans being allowed to compete in these sports without rankings would be pretty acceptable to me here, certainly not a hill for me to personally die on.
2. Rape centers far more persuasive than toilets. Women by definition are coming for sanctuary and treatment at these places and are highly vulnerable to triggers. Prisons also, because by definition people in prison tend to be criminals, and therefore not to be trusted by default, meaning someone with physical strength advantages and possibly a penis should not be in an environment that is already endemic with abuse, power play, violence etc.
3. the most powerful for me is highlighting that some trans activists are trying to take away my right to call myself a woman or talk about women’s issues in my way. The first thing that really caught me in this realm and I still think is one of the most persuasive is the idea of doctors surgeries sending out smear test adverts not using the word ‘woman’. I felt for non native speakers or those with less education ‘people with cervix’ would genuinely damage the uptake of needed healthcare for thousands of women, for the sensitivities of a tiny minority. The idea that my field of expression and focus around women’s rights- especially in developing countries, would be curtailed was infuriating. We MUST have the ability to name ourselves and talk about our real problems in the world. I feel very relaxed about what others might want to say about themselves, but when that extends to bossing me around about what I can say or do or how I define myself or sex-based issues on behalf of women and girls, I draw the line.
4. Pointing out that trans men (ie women raised and born) are not the ones extending into that realm of dictating, but it is largely trans women (ie men who have grown up with the entitlement of believing they get to dictate things), helped me reframe these highly activist trans women from disempowered minority I should support to the male hegemony I’ve resisted all my life. while I believe many trans people feel a much deeper, intangible sense of being in the wrong body than simply ‘oh I like knitting so much be a girl’, and we should not trivialise the former as the latter- the ideology that gender matters over sex, feels like it sticks ME in a box I don’t want.
5. the high prevalence of people with autism and others with challenges among those who seek to transition. And the lack of help and knowledge to support children. I feel this is used too often to try to say ‘you see being trans isn’t real’, whereas ‘people with other challenges can be misdiagnosed resulting in great suffering for them’ helps redefine who the ‘disadvantaged group’ is we should be fighting for, and how to protect them.
6. Acknowledge the genuine pain and confusion of growing up in this world trans and/or struggling with societies’ horrible and deeply confusing legacies of sex and gender. the ‘mocking the intellectual idiocy’ stuff feels very distancing for those who are, or who know trans people, who truly fundamentally and deeply struggle with how to exist in the world, in a way that can drive them to suicide or the most radical interventions imaginable.
7. With this in mind, acknowledging that the large majority of trans people just want to live their lives free of discrimination and you want that for them too. I think GC could do more to distinguish between extremists and normal people whose identity has been co-opted in many ways. And that extremists are actually damaging normal trans’ people’s cause. There is a huge dissonance in most people’s minds between the trans people they have actually met and the ‘activist/extremist’ campaigners that GC are often talking about when they are fighting their fight for women. If GC people don’t draw that distinction themselves, then they can sound prejudiced/demonizing/stigmatizing or mocking of very pleasant, struggling people in the lives of the people they are talking to. Similarly, I think better distinction needs to be drawn between trans and cross dressing. When GC people talk about a man ‘sticking a dress on’ not making him a woman, it erases the difference and trivialises a very deeply held feeling of gender disphoria, as something entirely different. Another distinction I think needs to be drawn more often is the difference between acceptance (which we hopefully all support) and co-opting (which is a big problem)Z I think GC people could make more time to legitimize the existence and concerns of ‘mainstream’ folk who identify as trans and even suggesting solutions for these people, rather than just saying ‘tough luck’. These distinctions would help make it clearer who and what you are fighting and who/what you aren’t.
8. And then the most universal principle of persuasion, which is easily said but hard to do when so passionate- don’t despise your interlocutor. Acknowledge and celebrate the shared ground or shared humanity/concern that motivates people. This makes it far easier to hear and open reflection and move ones position. Eg…. Acknowledge That the extremity of online activist chatter on both sides can be an echo Chamber that pushes extremism, and it is possible to be an intelligent person who cares about the world and about women, who has not made this their central issue. Ie: If we have doubts about where we stand on this issue, it really doesn’t mean we are idiots or we don’t care about women.

Hope this is of some use.

I wonder what trouble this colleague made and who was affected by it? Ask him!

I wonder if he makes a special effort to be kind to female women he thinks are unattractive, or whether it's just the male ones.

I’ve heard lots of men say that a TiM “made the effort” - being fiuckable is their measure of womanhood.

I agree. What a bizarre thought process. He looks like an "ugly" woman so I'll call him 'her' as a consolation prize.

And ‘she’ makes trouble if you don’t comply, don’t forget.

What a fascinating insight into male thinking. 'She's' kind enough to be a woman, but not as aesthetically pleasing as you'd expect from a woman, which is a shame.

As an analogy, I was talking to a (now former) work colleague in Eastern Europe about this type of thing and he shared an utterly heartbreaking story about the experience of a friend of his. The friend was a doctor and had to respect the wishes of his patient's parents (the patient was a young child) who were orthodox Christian and had chosen to refuse his medical treatment on religious grounds. The doctor had to listen to his patient saying he didn't want to die 😓 The child died not long after 😓

As an aside this would not happen in the UK. Children are not the property of parents to do with as they will. In the UK if a parent refuses to give consent this can be overruled by the courts if treatment is thought to be in the best interests of the child. In an emergency doctors are legally permitted to make their own decision that treatment is necessary & overrule parents.

DH about his trans colleague, this very minute (I asked him) "Of course I don't really think she's a woman, but she likes being called her, no big deal. Plus she's a bit odd and really ugly already, so I don't want to be mean. And she's made trouble once. But she's kind."

🙄

This is where a fundamental difference in belief comes into play. To someone who believes in gender identity, this is plausible. To someone who doesn't (like me), there will always be an underlying explanation for this kind of distress.... and it will always be possible for it to be addressed in a different way from transition. However, it's never that simple really because belief is incredibly powerful.

Thing is, I'm pretty sure there is an underlying explanation! I'm thinking either neurological anomaly or unconscious trauma response, but it could be something else still. Problem is: nobody is trained to figure it out. There's - literally - nobody I can turn to to investigate those avenues. So I just went with what's offered, even if it's only treating the symptoms and not the cause.

Personally, I would rather no medical options were available at any age. However, that's going back to my own (lack of) belief standards, so my reluctant minimum would be 25. I would only accept this if the person had received truly neutral support to unpick why they felt the way they did about themselves. To be truly neutral this would have to be without any active affirmation of any kind (e.g. complete pronoun avoidance, so that the person feels neither upset at sex-based pronouns nor "colluded with" via preferred pronouns) and would be about exploring the physical dysphoria and whether it may have a trauma, sensory or other origin.

I actually completely agree with all of that, including the 25 year minimum. I have no doubt that there would be very few of us remaining if this happened. And hopefully, there would be no young detransitioners anymore. The very fact that they exist breaks my heart; they should have been protected!

I didn't go through a gender clinic per se, but the surgeon who operated on me does primarily cancer-related mastectomies, so he would have known about such post-surgery needs and never mentioned any for me, or for another transman who I know personally and who also got his surgery from him. And we indeed didn't develop any difficulties anywhere. I suspect your friend possibly had a more invasive procedure than I did? Maybe she had some muscle tissue removed or something?