Gender Self Identification debate continued

[PoochSmooch]

Continuation of the thread from here

Sensible middle ground - exactly.

When I was at the gym last night we were waiting for our class outside the entrance to the ladies changing rooms. A bearded man walked past and we all looked at each other but no one said anything being too polite. So I did. Being middle aged and not caring any more. I said excuse me that's the ladies. He was very apologetic and had obviously taken a wrong turn.

However if he had whipped about a piece of paper and told me he had every right to be in there then I wouldn't have gone in there with him in there. It's an open changing room with open showers and women walking about naked. I had a think about this last night and I want places where I change and where I wee to be penis free. I just do. So clearly I am wrong and what I would have to do is cancel my gym membership, not use public toilets, try not to get sent to prison. I mean I live with 4 penises in various sizes so I'm not against men at all. I just like my female spaces.

Datun but will women really withdraw/ boycott?

I think it more likely that many women will just accept, put up with it, oh well it just part tof life, explain it away with the internalised misogyny. I'm not sure we have come far enough yet for a majority of women to stand up and do something. Only some 'outspoken troublemakers' and you know how people hate those sorts

What will happen is that women will just stop. Here and there women will just cancel their gym membership, stay at home for drinks, not visit cities. They'll check the policy at work before they accept the job.

Exactly! This is what makes me so angry about this. Why should I, and countless other women, be forced out of places like this to satisfy the wishes of men.

How did you manage to remain naive about these issues when you were younger when your own mother was sexually assaulted?

Was much older when i found these facts out. And was in my 20's when i realised how awful some men's behaviour can be. As a 16 or 19 yr old? I just wanted to be strong, unafraid, equal to the guys, tolerant, progressive, future thinking.

doobree, I think for lots of women it won't even be a choice to withdraw from those spaces, it'll just be what we have to do. I could not use a gym changing room with a man as it'd would likely trigger a serious anxiety attack for me. So my only choice would be to stop using those facilities.

My gym has recently added a sign in the ladies saying 'Boys over 8 years must use the male facility". Maybe 4/5 months ago. presumably there had been complaints. There are a lot of old ladies going to get a hell of a fright when they are preparing for their Pilates class. I think I'm going to start talking about it in the changing room to see what people think

doobree

I agree, people will just go along with it. Shrug their shoulders and accept. And that will lead to curtailment of freedom.

I don't think people will be boycotting gyms as a mark of protest. They will just try to find a more female friendly one, until that one gets taken over.

It's already happening to lesbian spaces.

San Fransisco (or LA, can't remember), used to have a wonderful variety of lesbian spaces.

Now there is only one. All the rest have been taken over by transwomen trying to pick up lesbians.

Michfest. The women only, largely lesbian, festival that has run annually lfor 40 years finally had to shut down because of trans-activists vandalising it and targetting it.

They now have two other women only gatherings that are being kept secret and they have had to employ extensive security. Men are busy online determinedly trying to find out the details so they can shut them down.

This is not going to have a benign effect. It's an attack. And women are not being listened to.

Laws are being changed to accommodate it.

I definitely see it having a devastating effect on women's freedom and future generations.

Because it already is.

Why would any woman use a changing room in which males are allowed?

The whole point of a changing room is privacy. If you don't have that, well, you could just as well change in a(nother) public area.

I don't think we should leave. I think we should organize, and go to gyms in groups of twenty women, and form a circle around the women who are changing at the time. Perhaps not even in the changing rooms but in another communal area, because really, who needs changing rooms if they aren't private?

We should wear skirts and just squat in the streets to shit if there's no women's toilets that afford any more privacy. Pee at street corners. Change pads while obscuring private parts from view with a skirt, then throw the waste on the street.

Just not shower at all if there is no privacy in the showers.

Yes, of course you are right Anon, and I am sorry for your experiences and the effcts on you. I would not go to mixed changing either. I was generalising too much.

I was just thinking of some others I know who would meekly acquiese or 'be the cool girl' stockholm style. And how generally hard it can be to mobilise anyone about important things

VestalVirgin

Well exactly. If privacy is no longer necessary, we can just dispense with it all together.

I was in Texas years ago and my husband came out of the loos looking a bit . Because there was no privacy at all. The urinals were along one wall and the lavatories along the other. Completely open, no cubicles at all.

And an elderly gentleman sitting on there doing a poo, while DH peed in the urinal trying not to listen to this guy grunting and straining whilst wishing DH a good morning and asking him if he was on holiday.

If privacy and comfort aren't necessary, we should just all do everything together at the same time.

But it doesn;t mean we shouldn't try and mobilise and keep the debate open.

Focussing on Primogeniture is the way - make it so that if it we get a change in the law onw way then it must affect Primogeniture too.

I do hope this is just a smokescreen by the Tories to appear more caring but then as others have said, if men lose nothing in this then the Tories could feel they have a win-win on their hands. Gain some progressive kudos without losing any male dominance or change to the status quo. From their point of view, if they think it could work, why wouldn't they try it?

Perhaps not even in the changing rooms but in another communal area, because really, who needs changing rooms if they aren't private?

Changing at the side of the pool, where you are overlooked but arguably safer would get the message across.

illegitimateMortificadospawn

Exactly. It's so illogical and such double standards.

Let all the women change poolside before their aquarobics. Any gentleman who feeling embarrassed can take it to the government.

I was just thinking of some others I know who would meekly acquiese or 'be the cool girl' stockholm style. And how generally hard it can be to mobilise anyone about important things

I wonder about that. Whether they will really be naked in front of males, when this up to then was absolutely taboo, just to be a cool girl?

The women I know who have no problem with being naked in front of male friends were seriously weirded out by a woman who did exactly the same - just that she wasn't a part of the friend group. They weren't able to explain what the problem with her behaviour was, just that it was somehow wrong.

So, I do think once the cool girls are removed from their friendship group who applauds them for being such cool girls, once they have to be naked in front of random male strangers who don't make an effort to make them feel cool ... they might feel weirded out by it. At the very least.

But they won't be able to admit to themselves that their voting away female spaces was wrong, so will silently stay at home.

That's what I think will happen.

It won't stop me using gyms or going anywhere though i havr felt uncomfortable when a male cleaner or plumber is in the women's loos. I think men won't be happy either - I imagine they prefer male changing rioms and loos.

Because there was no privacy at all. The urinals were along one wall and the lavatories along the other. Completely open, no cubicles at all.

I already thought it weird that Americans supported genderism with regard to toilets when I read that American cubicle walls are often see-through.

Would never have been able to even imagine there not being any cubicles at all!

What are those people thinking to vote for such a privacy-lacking loo to be used by both sexes!

I think men won't be happy either - I imagine they prefer male changing rioms and loos.

They won't be happy with unisex, but I think won't mind gender toilets much, until us feminists just blithely walk into their loos.

Transmen usually make a lot of effort to pass, so won't be noticed. They often even voluntarily use the women's loos because they know they might be assaulted in the men's. (The hypocrisy is obvious, is it not?)

Don't think there's many women who strut into the men's loo with their DD breasts unbound and obvious, long hair and dress flowing behind them.

I think at gyms, if they go, women will do what my teenage DD and her friends do in communal changing areas - go and change in the toilet cubicles (presuming they are not see through or non-existent!)

I see your point Vestal but I think many girls/ women do things in social groups? Especially at a young age. Swimming, classes etc. Workplaces too. It is the validation from men that feeds the cool girl syndrome too. And some natural hormones.

It is the young women that are most vulnerable I think rather then people on here who have age and/ or experience to draw on - I worry it could be a bit back to the 60s 70s with all those DJs etc where people just turned a blind eye and women's sexual freedom was a real bonus to some men.

And as Bambini was saying, young women feeling all young and invincible and that things will be different for them.

But I am a bit out of touch with teenagers/ young women so I hope it really will be different :)

For what it's worth, I just wanted to let you know that there is solidarity out there. I'm a fully transitioned trans woman and shared my own concerns about self declaration in the online survey. I have no connection with the trans lobby (they'd tear me apart!) but at least this survey has given me an opportunity to give a different perspective.

I thought it might be helpful for trans allies reading this to know that the trans lobby does not speak for people like me, who just want to quietly integrate into society as far as gender is concerned. I think that the current system works pretty well (apart from clinic waiting times) and that this new proposal is generally a bad idea.

I share the same concerns about self declaration as many on this thread. It clearly creates problems with access to women's refuges, prisons and sports, as well as access to changing rooms for non-transitioning trans people. I'm also worried about children on hormone blockers and can't even imagine how that repulsive idea of the "cotton ceiling" became mainstream. I've clearly stated my objection to the proposals referencing some of these worries.

Incidentally, if there are any other trans readers on the site, I urge you to rise above any hurt you feel from some of the rhetoric and theorising on threads like this and listen to the genuine problems. Fill out the survey and let the Equalities Office know that the activists don't speak for you. For some reason, the voices of trans people are being heard when others aren't. I really hope other trans people can use that to influence this debate for the better.

Maybe this is payback for forcing men to accept women in golf clubs etc for invading their hallowed 'nag-free' spaces.

I know not all men think that way thank goodness, but some do.

Gives nopenotinmyname a massive unmumsnetty hug

nopenotinmyname hug from me too - I think the division between people like you who just want to get on quietly with life and the TRAs has become much more stark for me as a result of these discussions, and I think this is helpful for me to focus on in terms of my discussions with others. I'm wondering what opportunities you have within the trans community to discuss your concerns or whether you are also too scared to speak. I was also thinking that the voices of transmen seem largely to be absent from these discussions. I can imagine people are feeling pulled in all directions.

pooch
I think there are a number of factors at play for why people can be unthinkingly supportive - as indeed I was until I...well, until I wasn't any more!
Socially liberal people pride themselves on being "non-judgemental". What this means is that we like to think we've don't do what has been called "moral disgust". When it comes to, for example, the sexual practices of others, we're at pains to say "hey, no judgement here- you're all adults". Anyone who doesn't hold this viewpoint is felt to have a "phobia" - homophobia, whorephobia, and of course, everyone's favourite "transphobia".
sorry to quote you but you have hit the nail on the head.
Being an 'old gimmer' I find/have found it very difficult to rapidly accept some of the trendy liberal changes so advocated by the SJWs
Too much has changed in too short a time and just when I have come to terms with the new 'normal' and consequently can appear less of a 'bigot' - another 'frankly bonkers' idea like self-declaring gender identity comes along and I am totally floored. It is an attack on women's rights that have been underlined by the progress over the years. I cannot get my head around why any change to the existing law on gender identity is required.

The point Orlantina made up thread about violence against trans people being recorded as either male or female is an interesting one.

How can we define or protect trans rights if people can legally become the opposite sex? It erases trans people and their experiences.

Shouldn't we be working towards a society where it is fine that your birth cert doesn't match how you feel/present? Rather than changing the birth cert.