Gender Self Identification debate continued

[PoochSmooch]

Continuation of the thread from here

fairplayforwomen.com/transgender-violence-never-happens

Read all the cases in this link. Pages and pages of sickening crimes committed by trans women. Skewing the crime statistics no doubt if they are counted as crimes committed by women.

Paris Green is there if you scroll down: Peter Laing / Paris Green

Bane of the Scottish prison service. We don’t know whether his unstoppable “romps” with fellow prisoners were consensual. The majority of women prisoners have been involved with abusive men – it’s probably quite easy for a violent male to intimidate them, which negates consent but is often overlooked by the victims.

I was attacked in a pool changing room when I was 12. Slightly odd situation. My Mum and Dad were at a sort of business lunch at someone's house - someone it was important my dad impress. The guy was very wealthy, foreign with a wife who spoke no English. She took us (4 children) to their indoor pool (UK and unusually large) and pointed to the changing room - there was 1 large one. 2 sisters got changed and I helped the youngest so was last as they all rushed to the pool. I was alone when he came in and pinched my arm tight while pushing his fingers into my knickers and up into me. I was 12. The wife was at the side of the pool watching my sisters while he came in, assaulted me, and left. She knew. My parents did nothing when told (don't want to jeopardise Daddy's job).

So feeling safe and away from men in pool changing rooms matters to me very much indeed. And this was a private house but Loop would like all changing rooms to be like that so that trans women can feel comfortable. What about me feeling comfortable? Don't I count?

Sorry. Will step away. I have not thought about that man for a very long time.

This proposed legal change terrifies me. As someone who's experienced abuse, I often find it hard to feel safe in places or situations that others might not worry about.

I don't even want to think about how much more difficult this law would make this. For instance, it would mean that a male has the right to be in the female changing room at my gym and I would have no right to say this makes me feel unsafe. What am I supposed to do then? Stop going to the gym because I feel unsafe using a changing room with males?

There has got to be some sensible middle ground that allows trans people to be treated fairly, but that doesn't mean that people like me end up terrified to use facilities like changing rooms because we're not allowed to say we feel unsafe sharing these facilities with males.

HamletsSister

I'm sorry this has raked up old memories for you.

Hamlet, I'm so sorry that happened. I feel exactly the same in thinking "don't I count?" because it feels like politicians and most of mainstream feminism think that my wish to feel safe is less valid than the wishes of some trans people.,

Statistically one in five women will have been victims of sexual assault at some point in their life. That's a hell of a lot of women who have the right to feel safe in a changing room.

Male violence against women is epidemic. You still have to go to work, get on the bus, the train, walk on the street. For god sake, is it really too much to ask that you can go to the toilet without it being filled with men?

Why do they want to come in anyway?

If it's because they're frightened of male violence, it's not women's job to budge up and allow male violence straight into their room as a solution.

There isn't a single incident of a transwoman being attacked in a male bathroom in this country. Not one.

If it's for validation, then no. Just no.

So sorry that happened to you hamlet

I can't understand why people want the feelings of a minority to trump the mental and physical safety of half the population, I'm just baffled by it.

Hamlet's, I keep saying this.

,My sister was buggered by a man in a woman's space when we were eight.

But I'm a 'Mad Feminist'

Nah. Fuck that noise.

And all the men around were 'horrified'.

He was never caught, and I will never avenge my sister, and the way she came around the corner from the running track, with her trousers undone and rubbing the tears from her eyes, behind her glasses.

I've never trusted a man since really and I've protected all the women around me for the last 35 years.

I was only seven.

I will never forget what that bastard did to her.

ILikeyourHairyHands

I'd like to think that was rare, but the sexual assault and rape threads on here tell a different story.

I was ok Datun, I was just an observer. And a protector.

It's not rare though, I was raped at the age of 19.

And we're Upper middle class, we're not natural victims.

But we are because we're woman.

So what? There is no reason to assume that transwomen are different from other males in this (or any other) respect

So what? Well there are reasons to assume that transwomen are different to 'men as a group' because by definition, they are different, have had different experiences growing up etc. So there are reasons?

And so what? So what if people REPEATEDLY say something about a group and crime based on a single small survey. Yes. That matters. It would matter whatever the group was.

I have lots of issues about self identification. But at the same time, I have issues about people repeatedly repeating this claim about transwomen and crime.

I said this on another thread a while ago. I was in my private gym a while ago - communal changing - and I was partially undressed and a male voice came over the female cleaner's walkie talkie and I froze and panicked momentarily. This wasn't a conscious thought, "Oh, there's a man, I better worry," it was the bit of my brain that is always scanning the environment for threats reacting instantaneously and putting me into fight or flight mode. A bit like if you see an angry dog coming towards you, you don't just stand there calmly and think, "There's an angry dog, I better do something," you just react. The reason I panicked is because I grew up with a violent father, I've been repeatedly sexually assaulted by an XP, I've been attacked in the street and thrown to the ground and I have been sexually harassed over and over again in a variety of situations - men are dangerous to us.

So I went through the thought process of thinking it's okay, it's only a voice, there is no man in here. But by then I'd already felt uncomfortable and panicked in a place I'd come to for leisure and relaxation. More importantly, that reaction is there for a reason, we all have it in relation to a variety of stimuli and we can't stop it from happening in the first place, we can only override it once it's happened. It concerns me that we are telling women and girls to completely ignore the warning signals that keep us safe on the basis that if something happens we can report it. It makes us more vulnerable in every situation if we have to tolerate feeling unsafe in more places.

There isn't a single incident of a transwoman being attacked in a male bathroom in this country. Not one

Do you think that's because transwomen DON'T use male bathrooms?

So that's why they don't get attacked? Because they don't use them.

What do you think would happen if more transwomen used male toilets and changing rooms?

Most transwomen are fully intact in terms of genitalia. Only 20% have genital surgery

More dodgy statistics.

How are you defining transwomen?

Are you using the definition of people who have gone to a GIC?
Who have gone to the doctor?

People who are on the long waiting list?

This debate is full of statistics that are dodgy and people keep repeating them.

Thank you for those links earlier, BetsyM00, I was on my phone and didn't have the references to hand.

It's not always productive to start trading links to papers online, I know. I did smile wryly at illegitimatemortificado pointing out above that small data samples are not a barrier to people finding studies on "brain sex" compelling, if they are so inclined.

However, as I said above, if we're starting to change data collection methods and policy and we don't know the answer to the question "what effect will changing the defining characteristic of "woman" from one based on sex to one based on gender identity have?", then that's simply not good enough.

I think that gender identity is biological/has a biological component - this is an interesting one. I can very well believe that it does. In the sense that there is likely some combination of genes or hormones or other factor that we don't fully understand yet that causes people to develop gender dysphoria. We also need to understand the links/overlap/correlation to autism, quite urgently.

What that doesn't mean is that the dysphoric person becomes the opposite sex. That's magical thinking. And in the end, I believe it's unhelpful, because that person is always going to "fail" - it's irresponsible to encourage people to believe that they can be something they're not. Look at poor Jazz Jennings, for example.

And it also doesn't explain autogynephilia, which does exist and comes under the umbrella of trans these days. I am completely unwilling to make any accommodations at all to allow fetishists to use female spaces for validation. And yes, I have encountered the mythical transwoman in the bathroom making me uncomfortable. This person was 6 foot 4, drunk at 11am, extremely angry and banging on a toilet cubicle door at a terrified woman within. I don't by any means think that this is typical, but please don't tell me it never happens, because it does.

I did smile wryly at illegitimatemortificado pointing out above that small data samples are not a barrier to people finding studies on "brain sex" compelling, if they are so inclined

You can smile wryly. Those studies are small. So are the studies on crime.

People in any debate need to be careful when using statistics to make a point.

What about the other study that betsyM00 linked to, orlantina?

What statistics do you think should be brought to bear here?

So what are we all going to do about it? Has anyone started a campaign yet?

What statistics do you think should be brought to bear here

You mean the one that looked at sex offenders in prison who decided to transition?

I'm not sure if that tells us anything about transwomen in general It does tell a lot about sex offenders in prison who decide to transition and that is an issue.

Part of me thinks they should be given HRT and then surgery to prove they are serious.

I don't understand any trans person who wouldn't want HRT - and I don't think that people should be able to say they are trans without going through the medical process. I can sort of see why people don't want surgery as it's a big deal with complications.

I can understand how people might not want a medical solution, and want to just present in a different way, but I don't think I understand why that's about actually being a woman as opposed to expanding the ability of all of us to express our personalities in whatever way we want free of gender stereotypes.

Gender identity is biological/has a biological component. My children would say "No shit, Sherlock". It is biological because there are but two genders male and female based on birth sex. We can dress it up, use all sorts of terms to pretend this isn't the case, even legislate to ensure that a tiny proportion of people with a very loud lobby win but......there are males and there are females as have been since time began. There suggestion that any other gender exists is purely Emperors New Clothes. How people behave and dress, how they choose to present themselves to the world is just that - a way they choose to present themselves to the world. Short hair, a tie, large muscles and facial hair do not make you a man. Artificial breasts, dresses, high heels, long nails and make up do not make you a woman.
We shouldn't be unfair or unkind to people because of how they choose to present but neither should we be made to feel uncomfortable or to afford them greater rights. There should be absolute restrictions on young children being anything other than children with a birth gender.

orlantina: "Part of me thinks they should be given HRT and then surgery to prove they are serious."

That's what I think too. Easy solution to the problem.

When it comes down to it, this business of allowing people to choose the sex they identify as, without undergoing any other processes, whether legal or medical, simply amounts to the abolition of sex-segregated spaces. If you say, for example, that a boy who identifies as a girl should be allowed to use the girls' changing room for PE, then you might as well say that there is no point in having segregated changing rooms. Ditto segregated wards, prisons, toilets, schools, colleges, etc etc. I wonder how many people would be happy with that complete abolition.