To be sick and tired of women's concerns being silenced?

[MerchantofVenice]

Obviously I wouldn't dream of doing a TAAT.

But is anyone else as furious as I am that every time people try to raise legitimate concerns about the legislation about self-identity and transgender people, the whole discussion is shut down?

There's this undertone of 'Oh, you can't say that!!!' when people state scientific facts.

And at the same time, there's this myth that 'MN is one of the only places you can actually discuss the transgender debate openly.' Like fuck it is.

Your average person on the street isn't intimately acquainted with the madness of the debate and will have no qualms about stating facts. You see it on the comments after those nonsense news articles ("Man gives birth"). When you explain the situation to novices (as I did to my husband) they are gobsmacked. They had no idea that it was somehow a hate crime to be literate in biology.

And that's part of the problem; this hushing up colludes with the idea that people are saying something controversial. The debate stays secret and the tide of common sense never comes.

So sick of it.

Some fairly important reasoning, sense and logic left out of your interpretation of a situation where 11 violent sex offending men in one prison all decide they are actually women.

Where does the report say they are violent?

Sex offenders are not violent then? What are they gentle as bunnies?

The act of commiting a sexual offense makes it violent.

Well, Ceto if they are sex offenders, they are violent

Really? Technically a boy who is a day past his 16th birthday who has sex with his girlfriend who is three days younger is a sex offender. Is he violent? And bear in mind that quite often transgender people who have been forced to hide this are so fucked up psychologically that that in itself may lead to sexual offences that do not involve any element of rape or personal assault at all.

Please talk me a sex offence that does not involve violence.

Tell me that should say.

Ceto, there are initial consultations plus the changes to the law were pushed back by Millar. Now is the time to act, raise awareness, write to your mp.

Really? Technically a boy who is a day past his 16th birthday who has sex with his girlfriend who is three days younger is a sex offender.

Taking your senario how many teenage boys are in prison because they had sex with their nearly 16 yo gf?
I would guess none.

How many men are in prison because they commited violent sexual violence against women and are now wanting to change gender?
I bet its much hight than your exame simly because your example does not happen.

So, it doesn't exist and in fact there is no Bill or proposed legislation in place. Isn't it a trifle premature to start spreading panic about it?

I'd say before a law was in place was the ideal time to be raising awareness and debating potential, possibly unintended, consequences.

Rather than wait until it's been passed.

I don't hear anyone spreading panic - that sounds dangerously close to calling me hysterical. You know that's a silencing technique, right?

This is a sistemic problem, not just with MN but society as a whole. A lack of polite respectful political debate. If someone disagrees with you can't just have a tantrum and call them homophobic or racist or whatever. You need to calmly discuss it.

If people know that if they share their views someone will call them names they will just keep quiet and wait until the privacy of the voting booth. Then guess what? Shocking and surprising things happen like Trump and Brexit.

Ceto you seriously think there are 16 year olds incarcerated in HMP LIttlehay for consensual sex with their slightly underage girlfriend? Quite aside from the fact that a 16 year old guilty of a sexual offence serious enough to get him a custodial sentence would be in a young offenders' institution, not an adult prison.

These 11 men mentioned upthread are adults - or they wouldn't be in Littlehay. They've been convicted of sexual offences serious enough to get them prison time rather than a suspended sentence or community service. They really aren't there for being 16 year olds who had consensual sex with a 15 and a half year old.

(I am gobsmacked by the knots people are prepared to tie themselves in to convince themselves that men in prison for sex offences are jolly nice people really and have just been woefully misunderstood. I mean, why, knowing how nigh-on impossible it is to get a rape conviction in this country, would any sane person believe this? Just why?)

Taking your senario how many teenage boys are in prison because they had sex with their nearly 16 yo gf?
I would guess none.

Dear God. The fact that you even have to respond in this fashion tells you everything you need to know.

Me Datun ?

There are an awful lot of posters on this thread who as well as having no regard for women and things that concern many women seem to have no inherent clue about what it is like to actually be a woman.

Really? Technically a boy who is a day past his 16th birthday who has sex with his girlfriend who is three days younger is a sex offender. Is he violent? And bear in mind that quite often transgender people who have been forced to hide this are so fucked up psychologically that that in itself may lead to sexual offences that do not involve any element of rape or personal assault at all

There are no sexual offences that are not violent. Violence means violating another person's boundaries. That can be by striking, pushing etc, but also by unwanted sexual touching, penetration etc. All are violent.

There is no such thing as "sexual offences that do not involve any element of rape or personal assault at all"

Also, 16 year old boys who have sex with their girlfriends do not get put in jail and if they did, it would be a youth offenders institution.

Teenagers do not end up in prison as sex offenders because they have bonked their 15-year-old girlfriend.

Get a fucking grip. And stop being so ridiculous.

It's funny.

If I posted an OP:

"AIBU to think that the men in prison for sex offences are actually pretty likely to be nice people who just came a cropper of a far too stringent legal system"

I'd get rightly slated.

But in the context of a thread about not silencing women? IT'S TOTALLY FINE.

*This is a sistemic problem, not just with MN but society as a whole. A lack of polite respectful political debate. If someone disagrees with you can't just have a tantrum and call them homophobic or racist or whatever. You need to calmly discuss it.

If people know that if they share their views someone will call them names they will just keep quiet and wait until the privacy of the voting booth. Then guess what? Shocking and surprising things happen like Trump and Brexit.*

This - I think it's incredible damaging & fuels fake news, its making society so divisive.

IAmEatingACurry Nobody on here thinks transwomen are a threat.

Maybe not per se. But the moment they start campaigning for trans-rights and equal recognition, they become the seperate species known as trans activists. And there have been those who have expressed sentiments that TAs are a threat in women's spaces.

Transwomen are not women. We're transwomen. Claiming that there is no difference between transwomen and women and wanting to get rid of the 'trans' is the real transphobia here.

Is that an intrinsic part of the concept though? Saying opposite-sex and same-sex marriages are all marriages, or black men and white men are all men, doesn't have any such implications as denying that the black men are black etc.

Papafran
There is no such thing as "sexual offences that do not involve any element of rape or personal assault at all"

Possession of CGI or animated material depicting minors?

Datun Teenagers do not end up in prison as sex offenders because they have bonked their 15-year-old girlfriend.

It would still technically be an offence wouldn't it? Maybe they would decide it is 'not in the public interests' to take the matter further, but still technically a sexual offence and illegal in principle?

Possession of CGI or animated material depicting minors?

As in sexual/porn cartoons?
That is not sexual violence against a human so whats your point?

Just wanted to note that threads about women's rights seem to always become dominated by discussions about transgender and men's rights/experience.

It would still technically be an offence wouldn't it? Maybe they would decide it is 'not in the public interests' to take the matter further, but still technically a sexual offence and illegal in principle?

Makes zero diffence to the point that was being made.
The post was about men serving JAIL TIME for sexual violence wanting to now become women.

Well I suppose after 25 pages of posts you can rest assured that the discussion is alive and well and not shut down on MN.

Nothing to add misses point of thread

They have shut down others thats the reason this thread was started.
To leave 1 up does not mean there is no silencing.

Datun Teenagers do not end up in prison as sex offenders because they have bonked their 15-year-old girlfriend.

It would still technically be an offence wouldn't it? Maybe they would decide it is 'not in the public interests' to take the matter further, but still technically a sexual offence and illegal in principle?

Correct.

And irrelevant to this discussion.

Yeah, it's heartening that this thread is still here... for now

But it is peppered with people who are, essentially, shouting, "Stop being concerned."

That's what's so frustrating- every time we raise these issues, there are posters ready and waiting to bat our concerns away because they personally are not concerned.

It's maddening.

Merchant but it goes much further than that. It's not just "be quiet, women" it's "if you're not quiet, you're a bigot" and in the less moderated areas of the world "if you're not quiet, you'll be threatened in very disturbing ways"

Being silent over this is just not an option for me.