I am Spartacus

[disfasia]

I am posting this here since "Am I being unreasonable?" is only a phrase that a female would ask herself. Women are socialised to concede to men, to institutional pressures, and to ask "Am I being unreasonable?" I am posting here because I know I am not. And this is my protest to MNHQ for censoring women's language, for telling us that the only way to refer to a man who lays claim to be a woman is to call him "she", to call him a "woman." But he is not a woman.

In the past ten days, three different transwomen have been sentenced to prison or arrested for rape or murder of women. Just today a rapist of two children was transferred to a female prison. These are men who commit these crimes and the whitewashing of history and the pressuring of women by MNHQ to say "she", deleting comments when we respectfully disagree and point out scientific evidence, as clear in science as the earth's rotation around the sun. And I am sick of it.

I am sick of the harassment of women who say, "No" to male violence. And make no mistake MNHQ, what you are doing to women on this matter is pure unadulterated violence. You worry more about the feelings of males than women who have, statistically speaking, been victimised by male violence.

If you expect women to come to this website and generate movement for you, you need to understand that in a week where Ian Huntley wants to become a woman, where Jessica Winfield (AKA Martin Ponting) another rapist is housed with women, where Texas is facing a lawsuit from three different prisoners who have been subjected to rape at the hands of another trans prisoner, and the recent sentencing of Kayleigh Woods for the murder of Bethany Hill, her really need to understand that women know the difference between a man and a woman. No, we don't need men telling us to address them as a woman. Nor should MNHQ bei so inclined. This is an open-debate and trans "identity" is up for debate because it is a feeling, not a reality. You cannot oblige women to see the world in a delusory way simply because that individual is delusional or confirmed in his "belief."

MN needs to be a space where women are free to interact honestly, where biology is not written off as unimportant. Rape is very much connected to the biology of males. MNHQ needs to allow for women to set their own boundaries in their own language. We should not be coerced or pressured in any way to goose step with delusional ideologies where the body is irrelevant. This is Mumsnet which exists precisely because the body IS relevant.

This is a revolution.

I am Spartacus.

But there is also quite a lot of silly in your post OP.

"Am I being unreasonable?" is only a phrase that a female would ask herself."

"And make no mistake MNHQ, what you are doing to women on this matter is pure unadulterated violence."

Reeeally?

The hyperbole of calling women who refuse to address a man as a woman as "hate speech" is what is at stake here. I would argue that most people have lost hold of their senses. Do people understand the reason why Rachel Dolezal's pronouncement of "blackness" was so offensive to society both because she took on the decorative and performative tropes of blackness (ie. stereotypes) and because she is not actually black? Is it so far fetched that women might have an issue with a man donning a skirt and mascara commanding society to address him as a woman. Women should be very cautious of what those in the trans community are demanding. They can ask, of course. But we all have the right to kindly refuse. Reality is something that we all have a right to--so while Rachel Dolezal might be living her "inner truth" (which maybe she is), this does not bestow to her the powers of policing how we see her. You might argue that it does, but you would have a hard time arguing that individual perception must be manipulated without sounding like a tyrant.

My comments on the hen party thread were perfectly respectful and were deleted because I reminded that person that her cousin is a man, no matter how he perceives himself. It would be like my letting my drunk uncle drive me about town all because, even though stinking drunk, he claims not to be. People's self-perception is often at odds with reality. This is one main reason why we have the fields of psychology and psychoanalysis. And no, this is not a judgment of "now you're saying trans folks are crazy." Not at all. Humans are complex creatures with all sorts of ways of manipulating others, lying to the self, and construing a personal narrative in a manner that departs from reality. And all that on a subjective level is ok. But once we start to indoctrinate pronouns and the calling of males as woman, we have slid far far down the rabbit hole.

How's this for a fit? Why can people not accept that the critique of gender religiosity (let's call this ideology what it is) does not negate our ability to love and respect all human's desires to wear what they wish, to having housing and employment, and all the equal rights of others. Women are not the mirror of transwomen, nor should we be forced into this role. And that is what MNHQ is doing each and every time it removes a thoughtful post wherein we say "he" or "man." Does MNHQ have a similar policy for deleting threads wherein anyone who says Rachel Dolezal is not black or Michael Jackson not white, be deleted?

We need to have a frank discussion of this matter and allow women to name reality. We need to stop calling "transwomen" by the term "transwomwen." This is not meant to be offensive but is the only liberatory act that women have left regarding this subject. We are harassed, employers called, no-platformed, threatened with death and rape (amongst other niceties), and on and on--all for saying that these are men. All for saying that we need to support men's rights to wear lipstick, dresses, etc. Why is our interpretation bigoted but the woman-facing by men not? Why is their "reality" given FAR more weight than ours? Why is biology cherry picked to suit the trans agenda (ie. sex is real for assignment by the male subject, never real when a female points to biology), and negated as bigotry when anyone else points to the non-science behind transgender narratives? Sex cannot be changed. This is a biological fact. Women are oppressed on the basis of our sex that cannot be changed. Males who are effeminate are oppressed because of being gender non-conforming, not because they are female. Is it really so terrible that an emerging lobby of women, more and more men, and ex-trans persons are coming out to say, "Let men be people?" It is important for women to name their reality and this erasure of sex difference, of silencing women to name sex differences, will remove our ability to name our oppression.

Revolution does not occur by pretending that oppressive structures do not exist or by making out that men can become women and voila oppression-be-gone! There is a lot of ground between trans persons and women in terms of gender non-conformity, but their lot should not be to take any and all women down who recognise that sex is real and that emulating gender normativity is dangerous to all. Nobody I have met in my entire life is gender conforming aside from drag queens for a night and trans people for their lives. I find this assumption that everyone else is just owning "their" gender risible on so many levels as women still struggle to have parity in the house with male partners, at work with salaries of male co-workers, and representative visibility in all realms of public life.

Women need to say "no." It is every human's right and we need to start exercising this "muscle" now.

My comments on the hen party thread were perfectly respectful

In your opinion.

MNHQ disagreed. Their site their rules. Many people get deleted for many things I have been deleted for things where I have thought I was 'perfectly respectful'.

TabascoToastie

I see a lot of common ground WRT to concern about toxic masculinity, sex role stereotyping etc.

The bottom line is that most of us wholeheartedly support trans people living their lives however they see fit. Trans people should not be discriminated against or belittled. If they need medical treatment they should receive it. I would happily pay more tax to fund it.

But transwomen's issues are different to women's issues IMO and sometimes they conflict. I don't believe that rights for transwomen should be allowed to (perhaps unintentionally) diminish the fragile rights and long-fought-for protections of biologically female people. I think that lawmakers are overlooking the rights of women and girls. I want men to budge up and welcome transwomen into their own spaces before we are asked to do so.

For somebody who believes that biological sex is unchangeable and that gender is a social construct, intersex IS irrelevant to the trans discussion. Our sex (M, F, any of the intersex sexes) is determined before we are born and can never be changed. Our sexed bodies just are as they are. All human bodies. All equally worthy of protection and dignity. How have we reached a point where it is considered bigoted to say this?

You suggest that we go out and meet actual trans people face to face. Most of us already know trans people and are somewhat familiar with the challenges they face (to the extent that anyone can be familiar with someone else's challenges). I will stand alongside transwomen wherever I can. But not at the expense of my own legal protections and those of my daughters.

I agree OP.

If TRA can call misgendering 'literal violence' then we are perfectly at liberty to call being forced to state something we know to be untrue violence.

My comments on the hen party thread were perfectly respectful

If they were, they wouldn't have been deleted.

Those who insist on bringing intersex into an argument where they don't want to be, a third space would be ideal for them. There are many intersex people who "identify" as precisely that - they do not wish to be classed as male or female as it erases them.

Third (unisex) space doesn't suit the TRAs though...

I read the "literal violence" comment as a parody of the frequent "literal violence" that feminists dole out to TRAs (i.e., words on a screen)

"Our sex (M, F, any of the intersex sexes)"

There is no such thing as "intersex sexes".

Humans are a sexually dimorphic species - i.e. we have only two sexes: Male and Female.

"Intersex" is a disorder, not a normal variation of sex.

See Disorders of Sex Development on MedScape and again Disorders of Sex Development on NHS website.

"I will stand alongside transwomen wherever I can. But not at the expense of my own legal protections and those of my daughters"

^ This.

I will stand by transwomen for their safety, employment rights etc just like with anyone else but will not pretend they are female and so can be in female safe spaces like prisons, shelters, rape crisis centres. I will not accept them in female sports because they are male (i.e. "Of the sex that can make sperm").

What are posters doing to bring about the 'revolution' in real life?

Well, if you insist on calling a person with a penis a man on here when they have asked to be called by a female pronoun then you're going to get deleted because MNHQ have said that deliberate misgendering will be deleted.

I'm not a pronoun purist - I don't mind calling some transwomen 'she', and would avoid using 'he' in many cases (though not for rapists, they've forfeited the right to politeness).

But the definition of 'man': 'adult human male'. definition of a penis: 'the male genital organ'. A person with a penis is a man.

No. They are male. They are not necessarily a man.

And anyway, this is a TAAT.

A man is an adult human male.
Do you have an alternate definition that you'd like to share?

The root of the word man shows that originally it could signify a person of unspecified gender according to Wikipedia.

Interesting.

Calling a person with a penis a man is not hate speech it is a fact.

I believe people should be free to present themselves however they wish but I will never agree that a person with a penis is anything other than a man.

I am Spartacus.

Which goes to show that language evolves and meanings change and that is what is now happening wrt gender language.

I am still Spartacus.

I don't agree with the popular slippage of the term 'violence' to cover things other than physical violence. If you use it in the way transactivists and social justice warriors use it I can see how you would argue that MNHQ's censorship of certain things is violent - makes at least as much sense as misgendering as violence - but I think the distinction is too important to lose and I would rather resist the new usage rather than try to throw it back.

I didn't see the thread yesterday so can't comment on specifics but on the whole MNHQ are allowing a wider discussion than most other sites, for the moment, though not quite consistently, and I am grateful for their attempts to keep it going.
We do feel perilously close to not being able to talk about biological reality on here and that will be the moment Mumsnet dies for me.

Transwomen are biologically male, and autogynephilia exists.

Okay, so what is the new evolved definition of man?

me too, i support anyone's right to do what they need to make themselves happy, but not when it adversely affects other people. There is no female brain.

Nb, if man can historically mean both sexes (which it obv can, hence "mankind"), then how is it misgendering to call anyone a man?

What are posters doing to bring about the 'revolution' in real life?

Do you want to join, or do you want to know our plans so you can oppose them?

Hmmm ... you know what, don't answer, I think I guessed.

The root of the word man shows that originally it could signify a person of unspecified
because 'man' is the default sex. The same doesn't apply to 'woman'. I don't mind calling transwomen (other than rapists) transwomen rather than men, but they're not women.

There is a difference between a generic group of "mankind" and calling a specific person a man when they identify as a woman. One is the human race in its entirety. The other is rude and deliberate misgendering.