Adult daughter dating trans-identified male, struggling to navigate family concerns

OP, I think you should protect your family. This is 100% not worth fighting over, and the worst thing you can do is feed the drama, which to be frank, you are doing.

If it is a silly rebellion then drop the rope, and take the long view. See the partner first and foremost as a person and judge them on their character.

Rebelling and rejecting your parents norms, is developmentally normal. I do think you could examine your need for control over your daughter’s choices generally, and why Disagreeing Agreeably is anathema to you.

I don't understand this. Do you mean people are required to address or refer to bishops in the Lords in a particular way?

You can leave off the disingenuous 'sorry's.
I never suggested that the OP should stand in front of her DD's partner and say, 'Hello, female person,' or, if the DD is talking about her and saying 'he', keep interrupting her and saying, 'You mean she,' which would be antagonistic and disrespectful. But if the OP and her DD are talking and the OP says, 'So how is X? Did she get that job?' or similar, because she didn't stop to think and mentally adjust her words, it would not be fair or proportionate for the DD to take umbrage or see offence.
Discussion over compelling people's speech is not 'crap'. Saying so IS disrespectful.

This is a very good article, thanks.

It struck me yesterday as I was wandering about that, with hindsight, I wish I had tried to get my daughter on her own for a discussion about why she had become so angry with me and whether there was anything I could do, short of changing my entire belief system.

There was quite a long period when she was angry with me. I didn’t question why, because I knew why, but a conversation might have made her think and might have helped us keep communications open, even while we disagreed.

Instead, I ignored her angry outbursts and hoped it would all go away. When it finally fell apart, there was nothing I could have said that would have appeased her and it occurred in the presence of her girlfriend, who I suspect had a hand in driving the changes, even if she was not directly responsible.

I don’t know if that situation chimes at all, but I would suggest trying to have calm conversations with your daughter, explaining why the situation makes you uncomfortable, if at all possible.

I’ve had some discussion with my daughter recently and she finally told me some things she felt I did wrong. I was able to explain why I had reacted as I did, which I suspect has taken some of the power from the person or people who are painting me as an awful person. There’s been no progress since, but I hope it has shifted things a little and opened up her mind to the possibility that things are not as black and white as she thought.

So try not to let it fester and try to keep open communication with your daughter in the absence of the girlfriend, if that’s possible. That would be my advice, if appropriate to your situation. I should have made more effort to do that.

Again the difference here is that the transman is demanding that everyone pretends her choices are great.

It's far more like a situation where the OP's daughter is dating an anorexic and everyone has to pretend that she's a healthy weight and join in with starving her, while they can all see her doing more and more irreversible damage to her body.

But the OP has not said she will ‘misgender’ this person and I am well aware what the judgment said.

What have you made the assumption the OP will directly misgender this female person on? Or do you believe that someone using neutral language is also ‘misgendering’? That only using someone’s demanded personally chosen language is acceptable? Because that demand is not respectful at all.

This. Or if they held other political views that you disagreed with.

If your daughter said "my girlfriend is having a breast reduction" or other surgical procedure that you thought was mutliating, how much discussion would you actually expect to have with them about that? You wouldnt because they're adults and they are making their choices. Talk about the telly or something.

I am gender critical but on a policy level - I don't say anything to trans people themselves. I think separating the policy from the personal is doable. Tbh there is very little expected of you when interacting directly with a trans person, as the English language makes no gender differentiation, unlike say French. And we don't generally say "yes sir" or "yes maam" like they do in the US. Here, it's more when we are referring to someone with someone else eg "what would he/she like". So the OP is being tasked by her daughter with getting it right when talking to her, not to her partner. This is controlling imo and trying to convert her mum.

Misgender not musgender…

Sorry @Helleofabore but it is disrespectful to purposely musgender someone. It’s also of very dubious legality in a work setting too. This from the Sandie Peggie ruling ‘1023 - those with gender-critical beliefs cannot indiscriminately and gratuitously refer to trans persons in terms other than they would wish. Such conduct could, depending on the circumstances, amount to harassment of, or discrimination against, a trans person’.

Kindness and respect only goes one way it seems.

If someone wants to have a respectful (and also kind) interaction with anyone, he or she doesn't intentionally ask you to mis-sex them.

As for intersectional feminism, I recognise the original insight described as "intersectionality" and agree that it has some validity and is a useful tool in understanding oppression and marginalisation, but I think it has been elevated beyond its usefulness. Someone who cannot claim to be at the intersection of more than one marginalised group can be badly oppressed or marginalised, and I see their societal disadvantage ignored by the use of "intersectionality" not as a tool for deeper understanding, but as an excuse to dismiss. And I have seen "my feminism is intersectional" become a way of dismissing anyone else's feminism.

As it happens, I don't claim to be a feminist, though I have a lot of sympathy for some of the causes in feminism.

And what punishment is there for not using the title of such people?

What other groups? There are bishops in the Lords for one.

Have you thought about how disrespectful your own opinion is to others in that you are here seeking to shame others for having a different opinion to you?

I’m sorry @ConstanzeMozart, like the majority of intersectional feminists I don’t think it’s meaningful, just disrespectful & pedantic. And as long as we as feminists let ourselves get bogged down in this kind of crap, nothing moves forward. More unites us than divides us and we need more discourse and to stop hiving ourselves off into two camps. There are clearly much bigger issues.

Demanding that a person acts as if they believe someone else’s subjective reality is material reality when it is not material reality is a significant issue though. What other group of people have the right to do this in the UK at the moment?

Not only that, but why is this demand treated as being respectful?

And yes, if other people didn’t try to enforce their personal language choices that change the established conventions for the English language as the standard that others have to use, many other important things would get the attention needed.

I feel for you OP. If your daughter stays with this woman then she will likely be stuck in the role of carer for someone with poor physical and mental health.

Women's bodies simply aren't built to cope with huge levels of testosterone and there's a good chance that it will lead to incontinence and possibly double incontinence.

This will affect this woman's ability play sport, go on holiday, have sex - all the fun things that you would want your daughter to enjoy with her partner.

This is from a Telegraph article:

"Around 87 per cent of the participants had urinary symptoms such as incontinence, frequent toilet visits and bed-wetting, while 74 per cent had bowel issues including constipation or being unable to hold stools or wind in. Some 53 per cent suffered from sexual dysfunction.
...
Other trans men suffered from frequent urinating including during the night, burning sensations, hesitancy, urgency and difficulty in going, while others had issues defecating.
Almost half had an “orgasm disorder”, while a quarter suffered from pain during sexual intercourse.
...
Elaine Miller, a pelvic health physiotherapist and member of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy, said...she had worked with around 20 detransitioners who sought help for pelvic floor issues - and many more from around the world had been in touch - but that there was a “stigma” around incontinence and that people were “embarrassed” and minimised the issue.
“Wetting yourself is something that just is not socially acceptable, and it stops people from exercising, it stops them from having intimate relationships, it stops them from travelling, it has work impacts,” she said.
“The impact a bit of leaking has on these young people’s lives is huge. It really needs to be properly discussed within gender clinics because I would expect that almost 100 per cent of female people that take cross-sex hormones will end up with these problems,” she added, noting that the study was “robust” and probably underplayed the issue.
“It’s really sad when we hear people say, ‘nobody ever told me this’, and they should have been informed of the risks in gender clinics.”

The authors of the study, led by Lyvia Maria Bezerra da Silva at the Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil, said the findings “showed a high frequency of at least one of the pelvic floor dysfunction symptoms” and that more research into the impact of testosterone was needed because the “long-term effects are still unknown”.
The research was published in the International Urogynecology Journal."

https://archive.ph/2bdC3

women, not women’s! Need more caffeine & have to start work.

But it is meaningful to allow people to use the language they want when it is correct and doesn't use any words recognised as offensive. It is meaningful not to make people go through the extra mental work (yes, even if 'only' for a few milliseconds) that is required to look at someone who's obviously one sex and refer to them as the other.

@RapidOnsetGenderCritic if you want to have a respectful (and also,kind) interaction with anyone, you don’t intentionally misgender them. But this is where we will differ as GC & Intersectional feminists. And what a waste of flipping energy that could be used to the purpose of something actually meaningful to the lot of women’s

Whose pronouns? The pronouns someone uses about you are your pronouns, are they? Or are they their pronouns, their language, which they can use to communicate their choice of meaning?

How would I feel? Well not happy about it obviously but I’m not convinced by a well written ‘whataboutery’ piece that essentially says two very different things are one and the same when clearly they aren’t. That’s my opinion which I’m entitled to OP as you are yours. Again, if it’s a hill you want to die on, it’s entirely up to you! You’ve clearly come on here as it’s a GC forum expecting consensus and affirmation - I’m sorry but I do think this will go only one way for you if you refuse to use your daughter’s partners pronouns. My nephew who uses ‘they/them’ hasn’t spoken to my sister for five years now after a ‘well, it’s all b*llocks really isn’t it? comment. But this isn’t my call or anyone else’s call to make and this is entirely up to you!

There are a wide range of mental health problems of varying degree and for many people, their decision to have unnecessary cosmetic surgery is very much rooted in a mental health issue.