To wonder why it's so transphobic here?

[user1490186326]

Really what's the big deal if a transwoman uses the women's toilets or changing rooms - they are women after all!

Can you not possibly imagine how hard it must be to be born into the wrong body? Imagine the pain and distress that must cause?

I have a friend who is a transwoman and she is the kindest most gentle soul you could ever meet so hearing her being referred to as a bloke in a dress or that she has a perverted fetish is just heartbreaking.

Can't we just show a little bit of empathy for these people who have been through so much pain already?

I too am slightly sceptical about the motivation for starting this thread, but since we're all here:

This video show one of the logical conclusions from the belief that transwomen are women (which is what we are now supposed to say, or else we are transphobic).

If transwomen are women, and lesbians are women who have sex with other women, then what Riley says in this useful instructional video in their series on how to do feminism must be true.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=k5GYlZKfBmI

What Riley says is consistent with the statement that transwomen are women. So either Riley is talking sense in this video, or transwomen are not women.

Riley is not talking sense in this video.

OP. ypu are a goady fucker
but worse, you are being a bore

Oh, that's not Riley's best video by a long chalk . I luffs the one where he explains that .

It's not transphobic here. It's women fighting for women's rights in here.

I'm with you OP... the chat about trans people here is so oversexualised. It really does feel like there's an anti-trans mafia who screech "educate yerself", "omg you obviously don't understand the issue"... it's weird, frankly. Seriously concerned about lack of empathy here.

Bitching about a minority group who already have limited rights, on an anonymous board, into an echo chamber, day in day out, is not empowering you or other women or protecting anyone. It's easy to act a troll online and give yourself a high five and really think you've fought for women's rights today. Well you're not speaking for me or anyone I know personally or professionally. You speak here because you know it's against public feeling and you wouldn't do it IRL.

I don't think that if you're born one gender, that's you for life. I don't think anyone who undergoes gender reassignment surgery does it to get one over on other women. I don't think it's a power move, a threat to other women, it's not a perversion, it's nothing more than correcting something they were given at birth over which you had no prior control.

How many of you know transgender people? How many of you are only getting your information from second hand sources? Dare I say it, how many of you are reading sensationalist press? Do you think exceptional news stories are representative of a whole issue?

There is a real fear of the unknown here. Why is this topic so outrageous, so caustic and inflammatory to you?

I think this is a generational thing - these are old school "feminists", like Jenny Murray basically thinking they're not getting enough recognition for their own contributions and that the focus is going on another feminist topic. Guess what... we can fight for women's rights on several fronts.

If there are any transgender women out there reading this... you are as much a woman as I am. You are a valid female. You do not need the recognition of the prejudicial loons here. But there are other women and others generally who support you

Hatred is a cancer and the posters here are obsessing over exceptional news stories to feed the beast that is their own perverted attempt to kick another human down to feel power in their otherwise humdrum lives. Honestly that's how I feel, because you all sound really really weird and sad

"I don't think that if you're born one gender, that's you for life."
Nobody is born one gender. We are born one sex. Gender is imposed upon us after we are born. If gender was not such a straightjacket, more people would be comfortable in their own skins.

Actually the discussions here have empowered many of us toward action. They have enlightened many of us to the encroachment into women's rights. The discussions here have mobilised some of us.

I have linked fellows here from around the world, especially those who are active in women's rights but who have been co-opted to fight for men's encroachment into their hard earned safe spaces.

I am so glad that I found this echo chamber full of bitchiness.

Not my

Do you think Riley is talking sense in their video about genital preferences?

Also, I don't know where you get the idea posters on here are not saying the same things in rl. There are plenty of active threads about writing to MPs etc.

'Weird and sad' at least makes a change from the usual insult of 'hysterical.'

Nobody is born with a gender. It's sets of stereotypes, and hierarchically-organised sets at that. Feminism rejects those stereotypes, which is why calling women 'cis' is so insulting: it implies that we agree and are happy with them.

I don't think that if you're born one gender, that's you for life.

You are born male or female (unless you have an rare intersex condition), gender is a construct of the society we grow up in. If you want to identify as, or have surgery to become as close as possible to society's idea of what the opposite sex is, then you are transgender, and you should be treated with fairness, equality and respect, but you cannot become the opposite sex.

u speak here because you know it's against public feeling and you wouldn't do it IRL I am happy to say the above any where and to anyone.

notmyrealname "An echo chamber" Well, why worry if we are all screeching into the void. Why need to lecture us if our voices don't go any further?

"You are as much a woman as I am"
But what are you going to do about those pesky chromosomes? Are they transphobic too?
Never ceases to amaze me quite how gullible some people can be

I still don't understand the brain issue.
Say you have a female brain )and are a man) - how would you get this when your chromosomes and biology all are all male? As I said the body and brain are not seperate and independent of each other.
Could you also define what a female brain is exactly?

How many of you know transgender people?

I have met many transgendered people over the years.

In fact I am trans myself, so um, nice to 'meet' you I guess

I'm curious about this hatred and transphobia that's apparently all over the place here though. Could you direct me to it? I have never seen any transphobia on here but it's possible I've missed it

In my experience if someone is being transphobic then it is often out of ignorance or not understanding something rather than outright maliciousness. So I prefer to address it if I see it. Unfortunately nobody has ever directed me to any of this transphobia on here so I have been unable to address any of it

I don't think that if you're born one gender, that's you for life.

That sentence doesn't make any sense.

Nobody is born a gender. People are born either male or female.

Even if you're using gender to mean sex that still doesn't make sense. Nobody can change sex. Sure you can have the surgery but you'll still either have XX or XY chromosomes and that can't be changed.

If there are any transgender women out there reading this... you are as much a woman as I am.

Am I? Can I not just be a transwoman?

You are a valid female.

In the nicest possible way, may I suggest you can a dictionary and look up the words "male" and "female"? Once you've done that could you please come back and explain what makes myself and other transwomen female? That would be much appreciated.

You do not need the recognition of the prejudicial loons here

Those "prejudicial loons" you talk about are the same people who have supported me, helped me and welcomed me here.

Sorry if I sound a bit snappy here but it's a bit hypocritical for someone to have a go at others for being supposedly transphobic whilst at the same time insisting that trans women are women. Surely someone must see the irony there.

get a dictionary.

I don't think that if you're born one gender, that's you for life.

I really do wish people would stop using the word gender when they mean sex.

"I really do wish people would stop using the word gender when they mean sex."
It's everywhere. I was filling in an online form today, and was asked for my gender, male or female. I think this is the root of a lot of confusion. In so many places they are too prudish/prissy/Victorian to use the word 'sex' in case someone giggles or blushes . So we shouldn't be surprised that in may people's minds, the terms are confused. I have to do it myself, sit there and think 'female, that's sex, feminine, no that's gender ...' etc. Gah!

I really do wish people would stop using the word gender when they mean sex.

The statement betrays a horrible lack of biology knowledge (namely, ignorance of the fact that humans do not change sex. Some fish species do, humans do not) if sex is meant, and is completly nonsensical if gender is meant.

People are not born with gender. Except if their parents are to extremist genderists that they forced gender on the unborn babe immediately after learning its sex, that is.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZE-JoOQ9s7c

For anyone whose brain has turned to mush after listening to Riley explaining why chromosomes aren't important because we can't see them, here's Magdalen Burns.

Tinfoilhattie

I do though worry for my daughter - it's really unfair that she'll have to complete for STEM projects

Is it? She should be handed them, regardless of her ability, because she was born a woman. I hope your daughter doesn't have this attitude.

I think it's really impressive that you all support a male rapist being sent to a woman's prison. You are more tolerant and forgiving than me. You can worry about the rapists need to be seen as a woman and i'll worry about the women locked up with them. I also worry about crime stats from rapists, child abusers and murderers being recorded as female crime stats and the criminals reported as women - but i can be a bit touchy.

TumbleTrans
I wish we didn't need male trans identifying allies to point out that we are not transphobic and actually have valid points but we do. So thanks for being one of them.

On the STEM thing - there are lots of projects and organisations with the aim of encouraging more girls/women to take science and technology at school and then explore careers in something what has traditionally been a very male dominated industry.

www.wisecampaign.org.uk/ fro example.

Or www.accenture.com/gb-en/event-girls-stem

It's unfair that changes to the perception of sex means that boys/men who have declared that they are a girl/woman can then be included in this sort of program, designed just for girls, therefore depriving someone else of her place.

Transpeople - no issue at all and they should have all the support they need. Its a long process and there is some hatred out there.

Transactivism- massive problem because rather than promoting solutions to the problem of transphobia they insist on trampling on womens rights by making ridiculous complaints e.g. a FtM transperson isnt a pregant woman, theyre a pregnant man. E.g. being biologically male but identifying female should mean male students can compete in the womens sports category.

What interests me is that lots of the trans activist "we want to take all your womens spaces" are male to female transwomen. You dont tend to read about female to male transmen demanding rights to male spaces. This makes me feel like trabsactivism is less about supporting transpeople than it is biological men wanting all the perks of male privilege at the expense of women... again.