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.

YANBU, Cis is a term of insult. It should be deleted.

Read the whole thread and still have no bloody idea WTAF the thread is about.

Please enlighten me!

It's a kind of votes for Women modern day battle. Call us Women!

But if you don't want to identify as having a female gender of course you don't have to! And if you don't, you're not cis. The point is that it's within your power to choose your gender.

And I think that most proponents of the word cis are in favour of not assuming anything about people's gender identity and checking what any give individual's preference is before assigning a pronoun or a term like cis. I'd point out that in most of life we don't receive this courtesy - no one ever asks which pronoun we prefer, they just make a decision about our gender.

The problem here is that you seem to believe the bollocks about there being two genders to go with the two pronouns. The problem a lot of us have is not that anyone is assuming we go by 'she' because we are women, it is that they are trying to cement the idea that going by 'he' or 'she' means anything meaningful at all.

I dare say I have no definable gender identity. I am a woman - can't put a finger on anything that would sway me towards a particular gender. And I refuse to have people assume that means I'm odd. I'm not, especially. I'm just not walking around with the weight of patriarchy and confirmation bias going 'oh, I like choosing new furniture for my flat, that must be because I'm a woman', 'oh, I'm not particularly interested in shoes, that must just be an exception to my otherwise entirely feminine interests, and not evidence that gender identities might be based on utter bullshit at all'.

And so to bed! confused

YANBU. MN seems bent on catering to a minority whilst disenfranchising the majority.

Jello, you and a few thousand other self absorbed people presumably enjoy having the 'power to choose your own gender.'

The vast majority of people don't know and don't care. It's like hearing people go on about auras or something.

I'm a woman, 'woman' doesn't need this ridiculous qualifier. A transwoman is, well,a trans-woman. I might be a black woman or a white woman or a gay woman or a postwoman or an English woman (or a mixture of all those things), or a female doctor or a female astronaut, but I'm not a cis woman, I'm a woman. My iPad doesn't even recognise the word, ffs.

I don't mind being called a cis woman any more than I mind being called a British woman, a Caucasian woman, a 29-year-old woman etc.

I think sometimes referring to women as either cis women or trans women is helpful for context when there is a need to differentiate between the two. I've never seen it used as an insult or a slur.

I think if a poster refers to another sow if poster as a 'cis woman' and that specific poster dislikes the term it should be removed. But the term is not generally offensive and shouldn't be removed when it is used to refer to differentiate between cis/ trans women generally if it is part of the context of the content.

I would say the same should be the case for the word 'trans.' Some trans women may prefer not to be specifically referred to as trans women and may prefer the term women and in that case if somebody referred to such a trans woman as a trans woman the prefix should be removed, but generally the term trans is again useful to differentiate between trans and cis women when that is necessary for context.

Sometimes it is just necessary to differentiate between different groups of women whether that be cis/ trans, pre-menopausal/ post-menopausal, British/ non-British, short/ tall, overweight/ healthy BMI etc. Sometimes these subsets don't matter but sometimes they do and in such cases I think it's fine to specify the specific groups of women being referred to.

You would need to qualify a post menopausal woman as cis?

As far as I can make out, most trans women are born feeling women.

Personally I wasn't born feeling a woman. Human babies are born helpless and need nurturing for many years after birth. It's that nurturing I call into question regarding gender.

I generally don't go around thinking of others as pre menopausal non Britsh women. That's just bizarre.

feeling like a woman.

One of the weird things I have found out from all these trans threads is that some people are really into putting people into either/or categories and then assume everyone else does too.

If she's not short she must be tall! Not true. Most people are neither.

If she's not overweight she must be a healthy weight! Not true obviously.

If she's not British she must be non British. Bit rude really. Can't you specify other ethnicities?

It's all a bit odd.

Mynewbear, I know you have said sometimes but I don't know if I would agree that it's particularly useful to use labels for subsets in general. I understand that within the trans community there may be a need during debate to label but if generalised it is understandable that this could lead to offence

I'm as lost as lostcat2. It just seems like a very silly label to apply to non-lgbt people. I don't particularly find it insulting, it is too pointless to be insulting and something I've never come across before. Is this just something on threads where it is relevant to the discussion? Because otherwise, surely there would be no need for it.

No. I'm saying sometimes it might be necessary to refer to women as either pre- or post-menopausal, perhaps in a thread about medical symptoms for example. Sometimes it might be necessary to stipulate additional information about a woman or group of women than can be gathered by the term 'woman' or to make a thread less confusing.

In most contexts it doesn't matter whether a woman is pre or post menopausal. It doesn't matter if she is black/ white, single/ married, gay/ straight or whatever. Occasionally it does matter for context and in such cases it makes sense to stipulate.

In real life it often doesn't matter whether a woman is cis or trans - it doesn't need to be stipulated. Sometimes though it is relevant especially when the needs or viewpoints of different groups may be very different. And in those cases it can be useful to use the prefixes cis and trans to differentiate between the different groups you might be referring to. I think sometimes it just makes the conversation less confusing when there are prefixes to make it very clear exactly who is being referred to or encapsulated in the term used.

I agree.

This is seven pages long and MN have not commented. They have commented on other threads and also in MN Stuff about their policy on transgender.

It seems to be that if individual women object to being called cis then they will probably delete.

I don't think that is good enough as they seem to automatically delete if a MTT is 'misgendered' whether they object or someone objects on their behalf.

But individuals who are misgendered 'cis' appear to be on their own.

I am not cis. It is a highly offensive term.

But most women are neither cis nor trans.

And many women are neither post or pre menopausal.

Many women are neither married nor single.

Many women are neither straight nor gay.

Many women are neither white nor black.

Can I respectfully suggest, if you don't give a shiny shit, could't care less, are sick of the subject...etc then you needn't comment? No one is forcing you to comment, no one is forcing you to click on a thread with the word 'trans' or 'cis' or Caitlyn Jenner or whatever. I mean, come on. The clue is in the title.

This is an important subject for many people, and I'm sorry to tell you, it's going to be discussed more and more on MN, I feel. So either get used to it, and comment. Or ignore.

I don't care about cats, school hair policies, the BNP, getting babies to sleep or BFPs. So I don't click on the thread.

It just seems like a very silly label to apply to non-lgbt people.

Certainly, because it doesn't mean that at all.

Sorry X-posted.

I think my first post was misunderstood, or maybe I wasn't clear. Maybe I used bad examples (and I know they were black-and-white and not at all extensive), sorry.

Of course I don't go around categorising women in that way day-to-day. Generally women are just that, women, and any other characteristics unimportant.

But sometimes other characteristics become relevant to a specific discussion. Sometimes it makes a topic clearer if you differentiate between the people you're talking about.

I think this is often the case when transgender orientated discussions come up. In such cases I think it's fine to group women as either cis or trans.

Obviously in my everyday language I'm not going to refer to women as cis if it's not relevant - I think it would confuse matters if I refer to the 'cis-woman at my NCT group' or 'cis-checkout-woman' when whether she is cis or trans is irrelevant but in a topic centring around, for example, where transgender rights fit into women's rights, the prefix may add context to my discussion.

What about using trans women, and women?

Mynewbear,

most women are not cis or trans.

If you mean some women are trans and some are not trans, why don't you just say that to avoid confusion?

Of course I don't go around categorising women in that way day-to-day. Generally women are just that, women, and any other characteristics unimportant.

But sometimes other characteristics become relevant to a specific discussion. Sometimes it makes a topic clearer if you differentiate between the people you're talking about.

Can you define cis and explain how it is a meaningful (and non-problematic) label in that case? It doesn't sound like you're understanding the problem behind the simple solution you seem to be seeing the use of cis as.