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AIBU?

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Original poster

wedding, hen do, transgender

750 replies

user1488971792 · 21/03/2017 17:11

Hi I'm after some advice.
I am getting married and just organising the hen do. Im in a bit of a predicament. My cousin (who is quite a bit older then me not that thats really relevant i suppose) is transgender- male to female. All the family have been very accepting and we would rather see her happy then living a lie and she is aware this is how we feel. This isn't a new thing and we have known about her becoming transgender for 2-3 years now.
now the difficult part!! Im organising a hen do, nothing wild, just an overnight stay, spa that sort of thing. its obviously all women, but i don't know whether to invite cousin or not. If it had of been a night out it wouldnt be an issue as i would have just invited her. However, we are all staying in a house together with a hot tub, she is in a relationship with a women and hasn't had any surgery so still 'male' physically. There will be young girls there who i know won't feel comfortable with a 'man.' i think it would be different if she had had surgery, i don't know why? if i don't invite her it will be awkward and i know she won't want to go on the stag do which i completely understand. I am yet to mention anything about the issue at all as i genuinely don't know what to do and dont want to hurt feelings etc any advice on how to handle this issue sensitively ?

OP posts:
Bambambini · 22/03/2017 23:26

We gave you access to our toilets snd you went for our changing rooms, rape centres, refugees, prisons, sports. We were kind and cslled you by your preferred pronouns snd pretended we looked on you as one of us. I hate that you have made me take a stand when I didn't want to.

user1487175389 · 23/03/2017 06:56

Why is 'cis' something women now have to call themselves whether they like it or not but 'a transgender' is beyond the pale?

egosumquisum1 · 23/03/2017 08:27

I hate that you have made me take a stand when I didn't want to

Can I presume that by 'you', you mean trans people in general and not 'you' the individual?

Many / some trans people just want to live their lives and have no say or influence in what others say on our behalf.

JigglyTuff · 23/03/2017 10:00

Well, except you could stand up against the vocal transactivists ego. If more transpeople did that, then things might be very different.

egosumquisum1 · 23/03/2017 10:12

Well, except you could stand up against the vocal transactivists ego

I've done that - and got a lot of online abuse for it.

I've also had a lot of online abuse from some vocal feminists as well.

Standing up is hard to do.

Datun · 23/03/2017 10:31

Standing up is hard to do.

Quite.

2014newme · 23/03/2017 10:34

I wouldn't invite them. It's a women's hen night. They aren't a woman even if they want to be.

Bambambini · 23/03/2017 10:46

Not "you" Ego. Gabriella Ludwif, Fallon Fox, Laurel Hubbards,Lauren Jeska, Jillian Bearden and her TW team mates who shout bigot at women who don't think a late transitioning TW should be taking womens places in spory, breaking records and winning events. Those campaigning for violent males to be sent to women's prisons etc. Those taking part in the vilification and abuse of Greer, Jenni Murray, Adiche and anyone (especially women) who state an opinion.

There's just too many to list.

CustardShoes · 23/03/2017 12:07

Which is that some men will attack you or invade you simply because they want to and they can

Indeed.

And we should all have a think about whom that advantages? Who benefits from this generalised caution about men?

Because it's certainly not women.

Beachcomber · 23/03/2017 12:43

Yes exactly. Which is why I brought up my personal experience of sexual assault in the first place.

Women know that male violence, sexualised and otherwise, is a thing.

Apparently not only are we prejudiced because we know this and it makes us treat men with caution but now we are doubly prejudiced because we treat transgender males in female spaces with caution.

Beachcomber · 23/03/2017 12:46

And of course when we don't treat men, transgender or otherwise, with caution and one of them attacks us we were "asking for it".

venusinscorpio · 23/03/2017 12:47

I said it on another thread and I'll say it again. Some people really ought to unpack and think about their internalised misogyny before they sanctimoniously tell other women to get over their feelings and boundaries. Or in the case of the clueless men who pop up to do the same, just their misogyny.

contemporaneouscontemps · 23/03/2017 12:49

I think it must be up to the OP and how she feels about her cousin

No matter whether the OP supports and understands her cousins transition there is the issue of the relationship between them and how that has been influenced by the fact that the OPs cousin has lived as a man for most of their life: you cannot expect the OP to just accept her cousin as a either a de novo woman or somehow always female and forget the details of their past. Would she have considered inviting this cousin to her hen do prior to transition? There are many accounts from siblings, parents and partners who feel there can be an insistence to rewrite history and accept a narrative from the transitioning individual that essentially denies the reality they experienced in relationships while telling them its essential that any questioning of this is prejudiced and unsupportive.

Ive been trying to imagine if one of my male cousins transitioned: would I automatically have the same relationship with them as I do with a female cousin? Probably not - we wouldn't have shared experiences, shared girlhood and past events in the same way and therefore I would not have the same emotional closeness: and I would be very upset if I was asked, in the interests of validation or some idea of arbitrary fairness to pretend an closeness and connection that did not exist, and to assume that all my friends would be willing to do the same. Whatever relationship develops between the cousins following the transition, it cannot be insisted on or forced: as that's not fair on the OP (pushed into the role of emotional caretaker when perhaps she does not feel comfortable with that) or her relative who has transitioned (any acceptance is faked, tokenistic and unwilling)

This has been a hard post to write, attempting to clarify meaning while treading round the myriad pitfalls of potential offence. It would be much easier if the words man/male, woman/female and trans woman/trans man could be used knowing that their meaning was universally accepted and could not somehow be twisted into some narrative of exclusion or offence.

Reality is consensual, we cannot discuss something if we are unable to define it.

Beachcomber · 23/03/2017 13:08

Yes really good point about the rewriting of history and therefore personal lives.

This is something that I think a lot of people who hold a "transwomen are women" position fail to consider.

Where does that leave families? Siblings, parents, children? If one's father decides to transition does that mean one no longer has a father (and according to some trans ideology, never did)??

Sometimes how I feel about transgenderism could basically just be expressed by THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE INVOLVED HERE.

venusinscorpio · 23/03/2017 13:16

Sometimes how I feel about transgenderism could basically just be expressed by THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE INVOLVED HERE.

I think it's frequently characterised by a massive lack of empathy, certainly with the women transwomen claim to be so connected to. Other people's feelings simply don't matter. Only their "identity" and right to be validated in their beliefs by the rest of the world.

VeryBitchyRestingFace · 23/03/2017 16:58

Where does that leave families? Siblings, parents, children? If one's father decides to transition does that mean one no longer has a father (and according to some trans ideology, never did)?

Presumably the father would still he/she was still a father. Just that a father can be female.

But if the transwoman asserts that they are female, have always been female, what does that narrative make their unwitting female partner/wife? A lesbian?

CoteDAzur · 23/03/2017 18:43

"We gave you access to our toilets snd you went for our changing rooms, rape centres, refugees, prisons, sports. We were kind and cslled you by your preferred pronouns snd pretended we looked on you as one of us. I hate that you have made me take a stand when I didn't want to."

^ This.

2014newme · 24/03/2017 10:19

^ this

Bambambini · 25/03/2017 07:56

"Presumably the father would still he/she was still a father. Just that a father can be female."

India Willoughby was described as "a mother of one" in an recent article. I wonder if That was India's words or the writer. Are we going to rewrite history to this extent. I know that passports are reissued as though the person was always their new gender - are birth certificates also changed?

venusinscorpio · 25/03/2017 10:54

I don't think this should have ever been allowed to happen. Too late now though. We were all asleep in 2004!

Italiangreyhound · 25/03/2017 12:33

Yes I think we were asleep.

2004, what happened specifically then? I thought it was a bill that happened in 2010?

venusinscorpio · 25/03/2017 12:40

I think GRC meaning actual legal change of sex was 2004. Just posting on the run but I'm sure they started recording TW criminals as women then.

MrsHathaway · 25/03/2017 13:53

My alumni magazine arrived this week with a good example of respectful but accurate language in the obits... Names changed obviously.

Jane Smith (formerly John Smith)
John was born in Town on Date and educated at School. He came to University in Date, graduating with a special prize in Subject. After post-doctoral work at University, he moved overseas and underwent gender reassignment in 1988. She died in City on Date.

morningrunner · 25/03/2017 13:58

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

VestalVirgin · 25/03/2017 14:07

Am I right in recalling that the main reason for permitting people to change sex legally was marriage?

So they permitted people to change sex legally so they could get married before making homosexual marriage legal?

That's bonkers!
(And also resembles what is happening in Iran. Creepy!)

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