To think I have solved the heart of the trans gender identity issue very simply.

[JapaneseTea]

The basic problem with the proposed bill is that it conflates two discrete groups:

People with body dismorphia who want to have surgery and live as the opposite gender.

Men who wish to identify as women but keep their genitalia, and have access as women to women's spaces.

I support fully the first group. I do not support the second group.

How can the needs of the first group be met, without women having to give access to the second group?

Working today so may not reply quickly.

They NEVER answer do they?

They insist this new meaning of old words now exists, that it has evolved, that it's so very real, and so much more meaningful than the old meaning, so much more useful, that anyone who wants can claim the word with its new meaning, and it's so very important that it justifies completely abandoning the category of sex in favour of the superior new definition ...

And you ask them what the new, improved meaning IS

Crickets.

If you identify as a woman, you're a woman. That doesn't water down the definition of a woman or anything. Good god, people.
So what are people identifying with, if woman does not actually mean anything at all?

I identify as a fartblaggit
What is a fartblaggit?
Anyone/anything that identifies as a fartblaggit.
So what is a fartblaggit?
Anyone/anything that identifies as a fartblaggit.

And round and round in circles. See the problem?

Identifying as a woman is not sufficient to make someone a woman. "Woman" is a biological reality, not a social construct.

I guess most people would find it very difficult to explain what is the sense of their 'my own body' (proprioception), you simply feel 'you' and logically assume that your body is yours.
That does not mean that in some neurological conditions people feel that their own body is not 'theirs'.

Proprioception is perception and integration of the location of your body parts relative to other body parts. It allows you to touch your nose with your eyes closed. It's not a sense of your body belonging to you or otherwise.

I can most definitely feel I have breasts and a vagina. And no penis!

If you identify as a woman, you're a woman. That doesn't water down the definition of a woman or anything.

Really? What's the definition then? This would be hilarious if it were not so deadly serious.

I'm prepared to accept that there are people who 'feel like' a woman or a man, and I'm prepared to accept that for some of those people the sex they 'feel like' they are does not match their actual sex. I can also see that if the feeling is strong it would be very distressing.

But that doesn't mean a sex dysphoric man is a woman, or vice versa, any more than some people's very strong feeling that god exists means there is actually a god. We shouldn't be basing laws on these feelings.

That does not mean that in some neurological conditions people feel that their own body is not 'theirs'.

Well, yes. Neurological conditions exist. Transsexualism is likely one of them, if it is not just a case of unhappiness with gender stereotypes. (Hard to differentiate the two.)

But that's all it is. A male who feels like his penis doesn't belong to him is a male with a neurological condition. Not a woman.

A woman who believes her breasts are not part of her is a woman with a neurological condition, not a man.

But that's all it is. A male who feels like his penis doesn't belong to him is a male with a neurological condition. Not a woman.
A woman who believes her breasts are not part of her is a woman with a neurological condition, not a man.

I totally agree, they are not a woman/man. If they transition, they may become a transwoman/transman.

My comment was because people keep saying 'I have no internal sense of being a woman, I am a woman', as if that made this 'sense' not real.

My guess is that if you do not feel/perceive this 'internal sense of X' is because there is no disagreement between what you see/feel and what you are. In the same way that I do not question if my hand is my own hand.

klaphat you are right, sorry. But my understanding is that proprioception is needed for 'body ownership'?

klaphat you are right, sorry. But my understanding is that proprioception is needed for 'body ownership'?

Seems likely, yes, but it's also needed for just about everything you do, so I suspect 'body ownership' would be the least of a person's worries if they had a severe disorder impacting their proprioception throughout their entire body.

For those who do not feel their body is 'right', I suspect the comparison with anorexia nervosa that is sometimes made is probably fairly accurate. Both seem to be influenced in their manifestation by societal pressures to conform to certain images/roles, whether this was a cause or just a way for the problem to find an outlet. I don't see any reason to suspect gender dysphoria or body dysmorphia are any more neurological than anorexia nervosa. Why not describe it as a psychiatric problem? My mother uses the word neurological when she means psychiatric because of the stigma attached to psychiatric disorders and because she doesn't understand the nervous system enough to grasp why the word neurological exists in addition to psychiatric.

klaphat as a recovered anorexic I do not find the comparison accurate, but anyway, here is an interesting article re. anorexia from a neurological POV.
sci-hub.cc/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2014.07.003

Whole thing makes me weary. Men want to be women so biological women are told to accept and deal with it. Even if some of us have worries about this encroaching on our rights and female spaces, there seems to be a "put up and shut up" aspect. It comes down to male privilege and entitlement, and a default button to take more notice of dick. Women transitioning to men -even if they were more vocal their voices wouldn't really be heard, so to speak. As a biological woman I don't even have equal rights in this world so whilst I don't want transwomen to be discriminated against, I've got other issues to think about and I don't want biological women to be lost in the mists...

Are we "allowed" to say biological women now? Saw a very heated debate on a forum somewhere, saying this is discriminatory.. I can't keep up with it all

The relationship of the self to one's body is not an easy one. You don't have to spend long on MN to read about the feelings of posters towards obesity or female orgasm and to understand that posters aren't all living consciously and harmoniously in their own human skin.

Every trans journey is different. Some people do not feel the need to have the surgery to feel like they are the right gender and some do. I am in the LGBTQ community and know people of both groups. What harm are they going to do in 'women's spaces' anyway?

helle if you RTFT you will see what people's concerns are.

My comment was because people keep saying 'I have no internal sense of being a woman, I am a woman', as if that made this 'sense' not real.

It is rather the notion that "gender identity" is something everyone has that people oppose to.

Especially the notion that a male who is perfectly happy to keep his penis (i.e. does not at all feel there is something wrong with his body can have a "female" gender identity.

Healthy people feel at home in their bodies and perceive all the parts as belonging to them - even though many woman are deeply unhappy with the way we are treated in patriarchy because of our female sexed bodies, and the way those bodies get in the way of us living our lives with periods and all.

That is not because we have female gender identities or some such nonsense, it is because we do not have neurological disorders.

Healthy people say they would feel equally at home in a body of the other sex, had they been born in one - and while that cannot be proven, it is likely true. A healthy brain has an accurate map of the body it lives in, whatever that body looks like.

jellyfrizz And what would being a man mean for you then if it is not to do with body dysphoria or sex role stereotypes?

Allowing body dysphoria as something distinct from gender stereotypes would therefore mean agreeing that to be trans or support trans is not ipso facto the supporting of those stereotypes, as the situation is often portrayed.

To answer your question it means to me things like finding it normal and rigght to have a penis but not a vagina, considering other men to be 'my group' and feeling slightly "othered" from women. Maybe other things I could not articulate in words. You do not have to agree that this is what it means but nothing here involves reinforcing those infamous gender stereotypes.

BBCNewsRave I'm another who doesn't have this internal sense. But, let's go with it, and say for a lot of people it is a thing, this internal sense of male/female.

It is a completely different thing to the objective biological sex of our bodies. It must be, if someone with a male body can "feel" female inside.

Yes it is different, and for what it's worth I would reserve male and female for the biology and use men and women for the gender identity. But of course it is not up to individuals. These things will go where they go.

PencilsInSpace
We shouldn't be basing laws on these feelings.

Depends on the law surely? Maybe not for things where there is a valid safety or other reason to base a law on physicality, but you can have a legitemate need for protections against harassment or hate crimes perhaps.

To answer your question it means to me things like finding it normal and rigght to have a penis but not a vagina, considering other men to be 'my group' and feeling slightly "othered" from women. Maybe other things I could not articulate in words. You do not have to agree that this is what it means but nothing here involves reinforcing those infamous gender stereotypes.

I don't know, lumping all men as 'your group' is pretty much stereotyping them as being the same in some way other than their biology. Otherwise you would just treat people as individuals and connect with them or not depending on their personality.

JAPAB for what it's worth I would reserve male and female for the biology and use men and women for the gender identity.

Did you actually read my comment? Or partake in reality at any stage? "Men" and "women" are words already in use for biological males and females! If people want to make up some new words for this mysterious inner feeling they are free to. And they need to stop assuming we all have it.