to think Mumsnet should delete posts in which women are called cis

[violetsarentblue]

I (and I imagine quite a lot of women on here) are fed up with being referred to as cis. I find the term deeply insulting.
I'm a woman and prefer to be addressed as a 'woman', not a cis woman.

I noticed MN are quick to delete posts where transgender people are called 'he' instead of 'she', because that group of people find the term insulting and MN don't want to offend.

Generally we delete posts in which people persistently refuse to refer to people by the pronoun (he/she; him/her) by which they’ve asked to be referred, out of respect for that individual’s wishes.

Please - could we have the same depth of consideration for our wishes?

Thank you.

isshoes

Unfortunately the conclusion of "you're a woman if you identify/feel like one" has been these extreme situations which people are asking you about. Here are actual cases which have arisen as a result

• rape crisis centred sued (would have been financially ruined) and called to be closed after they refused a TW as a volunteer. Judge in the case noted that volunteer's primary motive was to reinforce their belief that they were female.
• teen girls swim team forced to squeeze into disabled facilities after a male individual who "identified as a woman" decided they needed to use the showers at the exact time as the teenage girls every week
• women losing places and scholarships to women's colleges and losing sports scholarships to TW
• male individual who identified as a woman given access to 2 women's shelters and sexually assaulted 4 women

Our worst fears have come to pass, and it's because we no longer have a biologically based definition of "male" and "female". The cases above are the reasons why I, and many former trans allies, will no longer participate in this delusion.

The thing is though isshoes is that your position poses problems in real life situations.

So whilst it may work on paper to engage in self-identification of sex/gender as an identity/genderfluidity/sex changes etc as thought experiments one hits all manner of problems when one applies this thinking to real life. (Which to my mind means that the thought experiments don't actually even work on paper.)

Because it is thinking that promotes and protects the right of men to occupy female protected space and space intended to promote equality for girls and women. It promotes the right of men to invade women's space, to define women, to engage in womanface, to reduce women to sexist stereotype, to appropriate female reality, to objectify women, to see femaleness as a thing that can be acquired/worn/bought. Plus we must all pretend that this is a good thing and that the thought experiment is reality and that reality is unreal (in other words we are being gaslighted).

Surely you can see the problems that neoliberal gender thought experiments bring when they are imposed on real life and real people?

(I'm using "space" not only to mean actual places but also jobs, representation, university places, voices, presence etc)

There's a talk here by neuroscientist Daphna Joel, where she discusses brains all being intersex.

At the beginning of the talk she gives a very clear explanation of what sex is:

isshoes - this transwoman sued a rape crisis centre after not being allowed to volunteer.

Thank you for that link Empress.

The mere fact that this was a 12 year legal case just goes to show how complex these matters are. I have never pretended otherwise, and yet have been deluged with questions asking me to provide answers with absolute clarity, and accused of avoiding answering questions when I haven't done so immediately. It's ludicrous.

To turn the tables I would ask whether you believe that a hypothetical transwoman who was born male but had top surgery and hormone treatment from the age of 19, and has lived as a woman for the past twenty years, should:

• be forced to use male changing rooms and toilets
• be placed in male prisons if given a sentence
• be denied access to all services targeted at women
• be referred to as male in all contexts, and despite their wishes or any distress it causes

- be forced to use male changing rooms and toilets

Yes, but there should be a gender neutral alternative.

- be placed in male prisons if given a sentence

Yes, but there should be a gender neutral alternative.

- be denied access to all services targeted at women

I'm not sure what services you mean. In general health services for women concentrate on issues she is unlikely to experience.

- be referred to as male in all contexts, and despite their wishes or any distress it causes

No, as a courtesy and out of good manners she should be able to choose how she is addressed.

First of all I don't agree with cosmetic surgery and I have concerns about the effects of taking hormones. This hypothetical transwomen has a penis and testes and is male so I don't see why it needs to be an issue for them to use male services and be housed in a prison in alignment with their sex in the usual manner.

Notice that I say "needs to be an issue".

We all know that it probably is going to be an issue though. And that is because we know that this person is highly likely to be a target for male violence, threats and abuse.

I don't think that the answer to that however is to pretend that the person is female. Nor is it to oblige women to share sex segregated space with males. The person may find it distressing to be referred to as male but that doesn't make them female - it may reduce their distress to use female pronouns etc but I question the wisdom of that as it seems cruel and dishonest to let the person think you believe in their delusion (particularly as it will make it hard for them to understand when they inevitably hit limitations in people supporting their delusion).

• be forced to use male changing rooms and toilets

Yes, though there should be a unisex facility available.

• be placed in male prisons if given a sentence

Yes, although treated as a vulnerable prisoner.

• be denied access to all services targeted at women

Yes. There should be separate rape centres/refuges etc available for trans folk.

• be referred to as male in all contexts, and despite their wishes or any distress it causes

No. They will always be male, but that doesn't mean people shouldnt be nice and humour them.

In other words I don't think it is up to girls and women to provide solutions to male violence and to accept the erosion of our right to dignity, safety, privacy and collective identity as a result.

isshoes You can hardly complain about being accused of avoiding giving answers when that very complaint is a diversionary tactic to avoid giving answers

What do you think about that case? It was a real event, affecting real people, where both sides have very differing ideal outcomes. How can that be reconciled?

Indeed, transfolk should be campaigning for their own facilities, they have different needs to born women.

They shouldn't be campaigning for women to give up their space.

All of the transactivists I am aware of are male - is there a reason for this? I suppose there are more MTT than FTT, butn still you never here of transmen campaigning to join the US Rangers for example.

I agree with ItsAllGoingToBeFine Transpeople need to fight for their own space and their own discourse, rather than appropriate another group's.

be forced to use male changing rooms and toilets
In the absence of a neutral/communal alternative, yes.

be placed in male prisons if given a sentence
In the absence of neutral/communal alternative, yes.

be denied access to all services targeted at women
It would be service dependent but as a general principle, maybe not. Whqat services are you thinking of?
Should they be able to access rape crisis centres? Of course. Should they be able to access women-only rape crisis centres? No. Is it plausible that some rape crisis centres might be able to deal with individual cases on an individual basis? Possibly.

be referred to as male in all contexts, and despite their wishes or any distress it causes
No. I support the right for anyone to identify however they wish, and I will acknowledge that so far as it doesn't trample on anyone else's rights.

- be forced to use male changing rooms and toilets

Not my problem to solve but not in the women's facilities

- be placed in male prisons if given a sentence

Not my problem to solve but not in the women's facilities

- be denied access to all services targeted at women

In general, yes.

- be referred to as male in all contexts, and despite their wishes or any distress it causes

Up to the individuals involved.

Women are socialised to be nice, to solve men's problems and to put men first. You are furthering that socialization. It's not up to women to solve these problems.

I think a distinction should be made here about matters relating to complex ethical decision making and matters of fact.

A lot of the points you have been asked to clarify, Ishoos, are not about ethics but about biological categories.

Categories of biological sex are neither complex nor contested within Biology as a discipline. If we wanted to discuss every aspect of intersex conditions and development of reproductive systems, that might be time consuming but it is not particularly difficult or hard to understand.

I very much dislike the way that talking about female bodies has been painted by genderists as being a topic so difficult and contested that it is beyond the comprehension of women to understand. It is another barrier to women going into STEM that we are not even allowed to use basic scientific terminiology to describe our own bodies without being called transphobes. As if science itself is only an appropriate endeavour for us if we discuss areas of Science totally divorced from our own physical experiences.

Haven't RTFT but I absolutely agree with the premise. I might also add that I don't fundamentally believe that transwomen are actually women but that would probably get my post deleted.

Flora - your 'not my problem to solve' answer essentially means 'I don't know'. Which further suggests that you appreciate the complexities in these scenarios, so your insistence on my providing clarification on each and every point is unfair.

Almond - I disagree. These are not biological questions. Biology is science is fact. There are nuances around what people actually mean when they use particular terminology, and that is subjective. I provided examples earlier of cases whereby gender reassignment has been referred to as sex change. Including by the NHS. These are questions of semantics or ethics, not science.

I agree with other posters - I can understand why isshoes has asked the questions, but they stem from fear of male violence - exactly the same male violence women fear from letting men into their previously sex segregated spaces. Male violence is not women's problem to solve.

If trans people want to campaign for their segregated spaces I will support that. But I'm not prepared to just roll over and give up women's (though thr Tara Hudson debacle shows we've essentially already lost if someone who makes their living from their "7 inch surprise" can be "living as a woman")

isshoes it means it's not my problem. They can either be in men's facilities or a third alternative. It's not complex that they should not be in women's facilities, that is very straightforward because they are not women. It is clear and black and white.

That won't satisfy MTTs as it does not give them the validation of using women's facilities. That's not my problem.

It doesn't always work financially or in terms of adequate space for a third facility. That is also not my problem.

There are problems with male violence in men's facilities. That is my problem because it will be dangerous for women if men are in their facilities. How this affects vulnerable men in male facilities is not my problem.

Some of the problems do stem from male violence but others from issues of isolation. I find it really difficult to get my head around the idea that a trans woman should be denied access to, say, a female bathroom (with cubicles) because she was male at birth. How can a transwoman ever expect to be accepted as a woman if she is repeatedly forced to use male facilities? It essentially negates the benefit of gender reassignment treatment if it is never going to mean acceptance as a woman. Mind you, some of you obviously consider that that would a good thing, because after all it is just a 'delusion'.

This whole "trans woman complete acceptance as woman" thing is also beneficial to authorities, directors, law makers who can conveniently make women shove up rather than have to specify the provision of a third alternative for trans people.

Again Flora your insistence on referring to transwomen as men is goady and offensive. It's also boring and tedious now.

this is the problem of neutral toilets, some men WILL abuse them, even having to wear a dress will not stop some men.
As we are being told not all transsexuals are trying to avoid being homosexual, i know the number of men that will grab a peek WHENEVER they get an accidental chance. In fact an accidental peek so far outweighs porn.

www.lifesitenews.com/news/u-of-t-college-forced-to-cut-gender-neutral-bathrooms-after-peeping-inciden

The issue is that males in general are a danger to females in general. Some places.are.segregated by sex to protect women from male violence. This should not be undermined.

How can a transwoman ever expect to be accepted as a woman if she is repeatedly forced to use male facilities?

She will never really be a woman, no matter which facilities she uses. And she will never be accepted as a woman by most women - she just isn't one. She's a transwoman.

Being a woman is a lot more than just feeling like you are one.