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See all MNHQ comments on this thread

I am Spartacus

310 replies

disfasia · 21/03/2017 22:15

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.

OP posts:
VestalVirgin · 22/03/2017 09:23

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.

So erasing actual women is just fine, but calling a male a man is rude?

Yeah, right.

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:24

How does using a word that means the human race in its entirety erase women?

BeyondUser24601 · 22/03/2017 09:29
ImsorryTommy · 22/03/2017 09:31

Why would I oppose any plans? I'd like to be involved but whenever I ask what people are actually doing outside of endless MN threads I always get this secret squirrel we can't tell anyone stuff.

How are people going to join a revolution if it's a secret?

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:31
VestalVirgin · 22/03/2017 09:33

How does using a word that means the human race in its entirety erase women?

Are you daft?

"Mankind" does not include women. Unless you accept that "man" means the same as "woman" in which case your accusation of misgendering is void.

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:34

Mankind. Definition.

human beings considered collectively; the human race.
"research for the benefit of all mankind"
synonyms: the human race, man, humanity, human beings, humans, Homo sapiens, humankind, the human species, people, men and women

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:35

The archaic definition, interestingly, is men as opposed to women.

The general definition today, which is not considered archaic, is as I posted above.

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:37

So, when Neil Armstrong said "one giant leap for mankind" he didn't mean all of humanity, he was begun deliberately exclusionary and deliberately didn't include women?

Wow.

numberseven · 22/03/2017 09:41

I see the derailment is in full swing.

alltouchedout · 22/03/2017 09:42
Hmm
BeyondUser24601 · 22/03/2017 09:45

I didn't say any of those things university, but nice derail

All I want is your new definition of man, the one that is not "adult human male"

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:48

But if you say a man can only be defined as to be an adult human male, where does that leave FTM transgender people? That definition excludes those born female who have transitioned.

I think we need new language around this and a clearer separation between sex and gender words. But this will take time and should be carefully considered so as to include everyone of any gender.

ErrolTheDragon · 22/03/2017 09:51

Armstrong used 'mankind' in an era when acceptance of male as the default was normal. Nowadays, chances are he'd use 'humankind'. In many contexts, it's possible to simply say 'person' rather than specifying man or woman. But that doesn't have any bearing on the fact that a person with a penis is a man, and if the context is one in which that is relevant then people shouldn't be censored for saying so.

alizondevice · 22/03/2017 09:51

OP, I support you 100%. MNHQ, please stop silencing and thought-policing actual women. I, too, am Spartacus.

BeyondUser24601 · 22/03/2017 09:53

I'm not saying anything, im asking you what your definition would be. One that I would guess includes ftt people.

PigletWasPoohsFriend · 22/03/2017 09:54

MNHQ, please stop silencing and thought-policing actual women

They aren't silencing or thought policing. They have rules. You break them you will get deleted.

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 09:56

I am no expert. I tend to verge on not using deliberately offensive language

Im up for debating this, but I would propose a definition such as :

a man is an adult human male whose gender identity is that of a male and who should be addressed by male pronouns in language.

A woman is an adult human female whose gender identity is that of a female and who should be addressed by female pronouns in language.

A transwoman is an adult male whose gender identity is that of a female and who should be addressed by female pronouns in language.

A transman is an adult female whose gender identity is that of a male and who should be addressed by male pronouns in language.

But then. Those make me uncomfortable as they are labelling the trans person and they seem exclusionary.

So, maybe drop the trans and have just address the person as they wish to be addressed and use the sex as assigned on their birth certificate. Which means, as it stands, if they have transitioned under GRA they will have a birth certificate in their transitioned sex.

BeyondUser24601 · 22/03/2017 09:58

Okay, then can you define "gender identity"?
I don't think I have one of those.

Ifitquackslikeaduck · 22/03/2017 09:59

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ErrolTheDragon · 22/03/2017 10:00

But if you say a man can only be defined as to be an adult human male, where does that leave FTM transgender people? That definition excludes those born female who have transitioned.

They're transmen, still biologically women.

I think we need new language around this and a clearer separation between sex and gender words. But this will take time and should be carefully considered so as to include everyone of any gender.

A clear delineation between sex and gender words - starting with the words 'sex' and 'gender', the conflation of which is part of the reason for this sorry mess - would be a good idea. 'Masculine' and 'feminine' are (I think) gender rather than sex adjectives. male and female are sex. Man and woman have always been sex, but people are trying to use them for gender now. Words relating to sex can't include everyone of any gender (remembering also that 'gender' unlike sex isn't binary)

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 10:00

But you know what? I don't care. The trans people I know in real life are just my friends. One of my friends Is MTF. She is my friend. Why would I deliberately want to cause her offence by insisting she's a man? She's not. She's a woman.

She comes in to the ladies loos on nights out. She wears jeans and a hoodie to walk the dog and doesn't always wear make up and a skirt.

She's in a relationship with a man who is male and man and there's not fetisih anything going on.

So really, I don't care. Live and let live. Accepting her as she is is taking nothing away from me.

Universitychallenging · 22/03/2017 10:02

Gender identity refers to the social constructs in any given society around gender and commonly also reference sexuality. There are many more genders and sexualities than just the binary sex definition.

ErrolTheDragon · 22/03/2017 10:06

So, maybe drop the trans and have just address the person as they wish to be addressed and use the sex as assigned on their birth certificate. Which means, as it stands, if they have transitioned under GRA they will have a birth certificate in their transitioned sex.

That's pretty much how it was, until 'self-identification'. Which even ahead of the law being changed in this country seems to mean not just that someone can, without any medical transition, demand not merely to be addressed as the opposite sex but also disregard sex segregation.

OnionKnight · 22/03/2017 10:06

You posted a sarcastic comment in regards to a woman who has suffered abuse. That was disgusting. Instead of apologising you kept pushing your point.

No I didn't, and in case you didn't read my posts I explained that I was aiming my comment at the transphobes, not the victims of abuse.

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