To not stop saying that menstruation is a women's issue?

[HermioneWeasley]

Despite the fact that Twitter loons insist that it is triggering for trans women and erasing trans men?

On behalf of the millions and millions of women and girls suffering due to periods, and lack of access to sanpro and toilets (a FAR bigger human rights issue than where people with gender dysphoria pee) , I will keep saying this is a women's issue.

Excuse me while I go off on a ramble, I'm still just trying to fathom it all. It seems to be that for the transactivists and their supporters, it's almost like an article of faith, this idea that a person can have an "innate gender identity" that doesn't "correspond" with their biological sex. And that this innate gender identity is actually the "truth" about that person, they really are a "woman" or a "man" by that definition, regardless of biology, and that to suggest otherwise is to be inherently transphobic.

From that POV I can see why they think we're such monsters for wanting to exclude transwomen from women only spaces, wanting to continue naming the issue of menstruation as a women's issue, etc. This is like a religious belief for them: the people that have swallowed it whole - including so very many young feminists - absolutely believe that we are excluding women from women only spaces because in their eyes their trans friends are women. So we truly are heretics, the devil incarnate.

It's like the Christian belief in transsubstantiation. For them the communion wafer and wine really are the body and blood of Christ, just as for devout trans people and their allies, their male body really is female (or vice versa). It's this element of religious fervour about it that makes it so very hard to argue against. How can you bring reason into a discourse that is so thoroughly founded on unreason?

I don't know at what point this cult-like ideology took over from what I presume was initially a simple wish for transsexual/transgender people to be able to live lives free from bullying, abuse and discrimination; goals that all of us here would support. At what point did the idea that you can truly "be" something you manifestly physically aren't take hold and take over?

The shocking thing though is how far and how quickly this cult-thinking has permeated the corridors of power, and also the collective liberal mind. All disguised as a civil rights movement. Fucking unbelievable. "Male or non male" in the Green Party indeed - and that's a group that seems to be led mostly by middle aged women!

I can half understand younger women being sucked into all this, believing they're at the cutting edge of new thought, that whole student notion of being on the side of progress and challenging outdated norms, being so marvellously radical. (Radical as in new, obviously, not as in feminist!)

But women who have half a century or so of life experience? Women who know what we've had to fight against just to get where we are now (which increasingly seems to me to be not very far at all)? Women who you just think would know better! But it seems they've been brainwashed too.

Actually the only woman I know personally close to my age who's a proper trans-ally is a very intelligent woman in terms of intellect, but in terms of emotional intelligence she's breathtakingly stupid. Her insensitivity around my infertility was so hurtful that I had to cut contact with her for a while, and only resume it after my DS was born, with much caution. So - based on a sample of one - I wonder if there's a similar lack of emotional intelligence among other women who subscribe to the cult.

I think the well-meaning trans allies (as I think plenty of them are misogynistic shit-stirring men) see things in very black and white, good v evil terms. They can't quite get their heads around the idea of a conflict of rights. For them, this is progress and social justice. They can't deal with the possibility of it being complicated, so they'd rather not think about that. They like things simple, something they can share on social media and have people "like". They think of themselves as good people, with varying degrees of smug sanctimoniousness.

Prepare for the last safe space to go.

www.vice.com/en_uk/read/mumsnet-transphobia-north-carolina-bathroom-bill

You are a genius, Keepit.

Talking, I imagine there is often a lack of real empathy or emotional intelligence in many online "social justice" advocates who haven't troubled themselves to look at the issues particularly deeply (this one, and others). I don't want to be so harsh as this includes people I care about, but I have very little patience with slacktivism and thoughtless virtue-signalling on social media. For that reason I only check into Facebook twice a week or so.

There's a thread on the Vice article in FWR.

when you get the minister for equality supporting the trans-line and dismissing women who raise concerns as transphobic.....

Apologies for the confusion. I was not referring to Nicky Morgan. I have no idea what Nicky Morgan's position on trans issues is. I was meaning to refer to Maria Miller, the Chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, also a previous minister for Women and Equalities, and I clearly should have checked the position she holds before posting.

Yes Venus. I live in the US and am pretty liberal and a Democrat. I am the only one of my close friends who hasn't bought the trans stuff hook, line, and sinker. I don't even feel comfortable talking about it because I'll be labeled as a bigot.

The only people I know who don't support it are also homophobic and are upset on religious grounds, and I don't want to lump myself in with them. (I am religious but not like that, and my objections to all this are feminist and scientific in nature.) The only person I have in my circle who even kind of agrees with my is a gay man who says he has fought against gender being a "thing" his whole life. But he feels even less comfortable than I do "coming out" as not being sure about this because so many of the people he associates with are linking the trans cause with their own.

My friends who are very supportive of the trans movement are good people and their support comes from a good place, a place of wanting everyone to be included etc.

But I seem to be the only one being like "wait, hold on a minute now." I feel like the little boy screaming that the emperor is naked!

I tried to talk to someone about this recently and all she would say was "but 40% of them try to kill themselves without support..." I don't know what to say to that. Of course I don't want anyone to feel driven to suicide! However, that is also the language that abusive men use to keep women in relationships with them so I don't know.

Furthermore, in the States you can't (as stated in the menstruation article linked above) get birth control pills without a pap smear. In the article it said that they want the pills available without these "invasive" tests. But pap smears save lives! Transmen can still get cervical cancer. So we're not supposed to save their lives by screening them for cancer but we're supposed to try to save their lives by eroding our own long fought for rights so they don't feel triggered and driven to suicide? I don't understand.

Yes Venus. I live in the US and am pretty liberal and a Democrat. I am the only one of my close friends who hasn't bought the trans stuff hook, line, and sinker. I don't even feel comfortable talking about it because I'll be labeled as a bigot.

The only people I know who don't support it are also homophobic and are upset on religious grounds, and I don't want to lump myself in with them. (I am religious but not like that, and my objections to all this are feminist and scientific in nature.) The only person I have in my circle who even kind of agrees with my is a gay man who says he has fought against gender being a "thing" his whole life. But he feels even less comfortable than I do "coming out" as not being sure about this because so many of the people he associates with are linking the trans cause with their own.

My friends who are very supportive of the trans movement are good people and their support comes from a good place, a place of wanting everyone to be included etc.

But I seem to be the only one being like "wait, hold on a minute now." I feel like the little boy screaming that the emperor is naked!

I tried to talk to someone about this recently and all she would say was "but 40% of them try to kill themselves without support..." I don't know what to say to that. Of course I don't want anyone to feel driven to suicide! However, that is also the language that abusive men use to keep women in relationships with them so I don't know.

Furthermore, in the States you can't (as stated in the menstruation article linked above) get birth control pills without a pap smear. In the article it said that they want the pills available without these "invasive" tests. But pap smears save lives! Transmen can still get cervical cancer. So we're not supposed to save their lives by screening them for cancer but we're supposed to try to save their lives by eroding our own long fought for rights so they don't feel triggered and driven to suicide? I don't understand.

Oops!

It was worth saying twice, Cheerful.

Yes, totally, Cheerfulyank. I have been in a relationship with someone who (among other coercive things) frequently threatened to commit suicide if I did things he didn't like, like talk to other men, even in his presence. I'm afraid I see it unambiguously as boundary-violating manipulative and abusive behaviour, when you try to control other people's behaviour and freedom to act and speak with threats of suicide.

The number of transgender people who attempt suicide does not decrease after transition.

Great post, CheerfulYank.

As time goes in, being a woman is getting worse not better.

It's 2016. Having a period should be seen as normal and talked about.
Not hidden

I can imagine it must be devastating that it doesn't solve all your problems and you still feel that you don't and never will belong in your body and that people still don't accept what you feel is your identity. But I'm not sure what the solution to that is. I don't think there is one.

This is rather topical: www.independent.co.uk/voices/period-pain-is-officially-as-bad-as-a-heart-attack-so-why-have-doctors-ignored-it-the-answer-is-a6883831.html

That site the ridiculous queeriod article is on is bizarre anyway. If you scroll down there are loads of really graphically illustrated articles about periods, which you would think would be considered triggering to any trans men or women reading? I'm sure they're all approved language-correct but still!

Thanks Katie :) Mumsnet is really my only place to discuss any of this without being made to feel bigoted. I think eventually I just won't care, to be honest, but I'm not quite there yet.

ThatStewie do you have a link for that? I've heard that and I've said that to people before (that the rates of suicide do not decrease ) but I wasn't believed and didn't have the exact data to back it up.

venus I think it's true people can't see what's going on when there's a conflict of rights, this isn't the only area where it's evident (and it nearly always seems to be women's/girls' rights that get pushed to the bottom of the pile when there is a conflict). I suppose I can see that they just don't want to look beneath the surface - "equality good, what's the problem?" kind of mentality.

But I suspect there's more to it than that too somehow. Someone like Maria Miller, when she was in post, you would have expected to have an in depth understanding of the situation, especially as the post is "Minister for women and equalities" and yet she refused to engage at all. Nicky Morgan who now has that role (although quite how she's supposed to have any time for that when she's also SoS for Education, I'm not sure!) doesn't seem much more clued in.

And the people I've spoken to personally about it, who are pro the Trans cause, have all expressed such intense anger about it when confronted with an alternative viewpoint - people I've never seen get this angry about anything else, but there's this utter outrage on behalf of their trans friends. Outrage they seem to be totally incapable of feeling on behalf of themselves or other women and girls. There must be some kind of projection going on or something! I do suspect that internalised misogyny has a lot to do with it.

And it's interesting the thing about the suicide threats and EA men. I think that's very true - you see it often enough on the Relationships board on here, women trying to get away from an abusive partner, and out come the suicide threats.

Men who cheat have a "script", men who abuse their partners have a "script", parents who abused their children have a "script" when confronted about their actions.

There seems to be a script operating here too - among trans-allies, I'm realising that the responses other people on here are saying they get from people in RL are the same as the responses I've had when talking to people.

The suicide rate argument is a huge one. (I literally don't know where to start with that one, there are so many flaws in that "argument"!) This sense that trans people are such special snowflakes their hurt feelings matter more than anyone else's, ever, that no one suffers like them. The stuff about "there are seven sexes, you know" or "historically in many cultures there's been a third sex". And "people used to think this way about gay rights too".

And of course if you say anything about women's and girls' safety, you get the "what, you think they're going to RAPE you??!!" line trotted out, as if worrying about your sexual safety is such a pathetic thing to do, or "why does everyone assume all trans people are sexual predators?" - even though that's not what you said, not at all. In fact, they usually don't bother listening to what you actually are saying as they're too busy shouting.

There is so much denial going on around this. It really is a form of emotional abuse and gaslighting, and so many women have been co-opted in to fight against their own interests, much like women in any kind of abusive relationship. Fucking awful. Just glad when I hear about women on MN who were staunch trans-allies but reached peak trans and got out of there.

I agree, talking. With respect to Maria Miller though, I already think she's an idiot, having experience of her through one of her other political roles on a different subject (that's all I will say!) So I am not massively surprised that she doesn't get it. I just don't think they have considered the issue all that deeply.

This is all IMHO:

Re the female trans allies who get angry with other women yet have no capacity for empathy with them, most of them are very young, with little life experience of things which biologically affect women like pregnancy, childbirth etc. They're fairly naturally rebelling against previous generations and see themselves as more enlightened. This is a nice transgressive bandwagon for them to jump on. I think they've been somewhat conditioned to believe certain things are always pro-women which are not. "Choice feminism". Any challenge to this means cognitive dissonance for them, so they get angry about it as it threatens everything they believe in. It's easier to write you off as a bigot.

The left wing liberal men who are strongly pro trans are frequently also guilty of not really thinking about or grasping the issues. And quite often, relishing the opportunity to abuse women on the internet while still getting to feel smug and righteous, and validated on social media.

I totally agree it is abusive, boundary violating, gas lighting behaviour. I think a significant proportion of these transactivists are malignant narcissists. They have no empathy with women and girls, it's all about them. The whole "cis" thing is so arrogant. So they want to decide what the world believes a woman is and if you don't play along it's literally killing trans people but we're not allowed to reject a loaded label that seeks to put us in the position of the oppressor class with trans people being more oppressed than anyone else could possibly imagine? Bull. Shit.

My DD falls - or fell - into that category. She has several trans friends at various stages of transitioning. When the toilets issue came up and we discussed it, initially she called me a terf and convinced herself I didn't understand how oppressed trans people were because I'm an old school feminist.

Recently when we've talked about it, she has realised more what is going on and that some extreme transaction activists are fucking everything up for trans people who just want to be accepted, and not be oppressed or discriminated against. She finds it really upsetting that her trans friends are going to be tarred with the same brush and may even suffer more because of the backlash.

• trans activists