Friend shocks me by suddenly saying he's female. How to handle this?

I've never been involved in any online discourse about this before now. I'm just going on my own memory from the news when I was younger.

My argument is that everyone is safe, but if you posit otherwise , then obviously they are safer in the women's. Because there are no men there.

Predators are going to predate, but it helps if you now the predator who has just come in SHOULD NOT BE THERE so you are allowed to SCREAM, SHOUT, KICK or RUN instead of thinking you cannot say a word because they have a right to be there.

This is whether they appear to look a bit like a woman, or look like a man but could be a woman.

My argument is that everyone is safe, but if you posit otherwise , then obviously they are safer in the women's. Because there are no men there.

Indeed, but I remember my history and it's common sense not to ignore the homophobia and misogyny that some men have, and how that affects their treatment of trans women. It's disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

@LittleMyLabyrinth posted earlier today What rights are you thinking of? I can't think of any that are that specific, but as you say I haven’t given it much thought.

The ignorance around this subject is clear to see. But if she hasn't given it much thought and, in her own words said - idgaf - then it's easy to see how she lacks knowledge and understanding around the subject which many women on these boards have been involved in for years.

It's all very well sitting in a place of privilege knowing that it's not going to be you locked up with a sexual predator.

This was in April this year. A whole year after the Supreme Court judgement.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4glne43101o

My argument is that everyone is safe, but if you posit otherwise , then obviously they are safer in the women's. Because there are no men there.

That comment didn’t appear to be about you.

I agree, in an ideal world it wouldn't be mix & match, but I'm a big believer in practicality. We have to do our very best in the world we are in while we work to improve it, especially since said unisex facilities are not always available yet. Hopefully one day they will be and we can all move on.

By your argument transwomen (aka men) are no safer using women’s toilets so they may as well go in with the other men

But in theory I don't see how mixed sex imprisonment is inherently cruel or unusual punishment.

Really?

Tell that to the women raped (and made pregnant) in prison. Tell that to the women forced to shower with male criminals. Tell that to the incarcerated women who have been victims of MVAWG, whom I believe are in the majority of female prisoners.

I do not think you can be a serious poster.

They aren’t murdered by men at an alarming rate. Maybe read sources other than TRA propaganda.

I mean,

Signage protects nobody.

Well, heck. That's a bit embarrassing for me. I'd always thought signs were automated to rise up, knives bursting from the sides like a Wolverine macuahuitl, always ready to attack on the merest scent of a wrong chromosome.

Oops.

Better get rid of speed limits, warnings about deep quarries, reminders not to cheat in exams, the umbrella roadwork man...

Anyway, this is silly now (the above included - I hate collapsing into sarcasm, and am slightly sorry for it, not least as I recognise you're being polite overall, Little, and this is appreciated, but hope you'll excuse me as 1) I'm running out of ways to get through and 2) I really did want to use the word macuahuitl sometime 😁).

I'm off, wishing you all the best.

It’s far crueler to say to a transwoman that they can be a ‘real’ woman in these circumstances but not in another.

You can use the ladies loos but if you commit a crime you cannot go to a women’s prison.

You can be in the women’s darts team but you cannot be in the women’s football team.

You are welcome in the women’s dorm in a hostel but you cannot be serviced in the women’s DV shelter.

Society cannot treat TW as women in all circumstances so much better to treat them just a the gender non confirming men that they are in reality. They can use services and facilties set up for men if they wish and if they don’t want to they can use unisex facilities or stay at home.

A mix n match approach is a head fuck quite frankly.

The murder rate for transgender people in the UK is extremely low, around one every two or three years. However, the murder rate for women in England and Wales, is around one every three days

Well, quite. Which is why we're arguing for women being defined and accepted in a way that requires no "policing" - the way we'd always been before this.

If you truly believe that our only choice is between 1) the absolute capitulation of all women to opening previously single-sex spaces to males just on their say-so or 2) these extraordinary, hysterical visions of a dystopian hell...

You're arguing either for the silencing of hundreds of thousands of worried females to accommodate a minority of males (1, above) or for the most extraordinary kind of horrors imaginable (2, above).

Frankly, I find this hard to understand. It feels illogical (and far-fetched to say the least!)

So I just go for 3): women fought for and won single-sex spaces, and these have functioned without the slightest issue for over a hundred years; as such, let's show respect for the hundreds of thousands of women who want to retain this precious gain, while building on it - by campaigning to ensure trans people have equivalent accommodations in their turn.

@LittleMyLabyrinth you also said TIF would be in danger in male prisons, but if no one can know anyone’s sex, how would the men know they were TIF were not male?

It will become increasingly obvious to this man that pronouns are being avoided, and if he goes down the familiar path, his gender identity will become more and more important to him. Perhaps the most important thing.

If OP monetises this product, that will involve correspondence and conversations with third parties. Having watched a number of tribunals where the whole point of the legal argument is that their male client is now a woman, and listening to the barristers end up misgendering their own client, I suspect she will be unable to avoid missteps.