...to be literally speechless after reading this?

[CSLewis]

https://apple.news/AxiPl_cmVRTeudBZ6Kc4mRg

DD said a big part of the reasoning that was left out of the article was that to be legally recognised under the gender recognition act you have to be 18 years old. Hence a 17 year old trans girl would be unable to apply to Murray Edwards, as huge majority of students are 17 at the start of the application process.

I wonder how many transgirls would actually apply? Would it actually be good for someone with dysphoria to be in an overwhelmingly single sex environment?

I have the utmost sympathy for anyone who feels trapped in their skin, born the wrong sex. I cannot even begin to imagine how difficult and upsetting that must be. But the fact is, you cannot just declare yourself female when your biology states otherwise. You're not female. You're male. Feeling or identifying as female does not make you biologically female. I don't mean to diminish anybody's feelings at all, but where does it end?

I'm very live and let live. Be whatever or whoever you want. If you want to be Susan instead of Steven, knock yourself out. I'll do my best to keep up - I promise! But if Susan was born with a penis, and still has a penis, I think it's fucking disgraceful that Susan should be allowed to march HIS penis into any female only spaces. It is fundamentally wrong to force any woman to accept that.

If you want your college to be open and inclusive to all - open and include everyone. If you want your college to be female only and advertise it as such, then no dicks past the gates if you please!

I'm with you, OP. I am utterly speechless.

Men aren't banned from the college, male friends, boyfriends and relatives spend time in the college and stay overnight all of the time. It isn't a female only space in the literal sense.

I can't see any reason for women-only colleges, to be honest.

"The character of female colleges, like all female workplaces, clubs etc is very different from mixed ones." Sadly, that is what will be lost.

ssd men are the main perpetrators of violence, it is a male problem, men should be sorting it out. Not forcing there way into female only colleges.

TabbyMumz Do you not see the difference between all colleges everywhere in the country being male only and women having no options to higher education or any chance to make a mark in public life (or the right to vote, or to their own children) as was the case many years ago... to having a small number of women only collages and most colleges being co-educational?

differenteverytime your post at '21:58:36' is so right. "The women would all be gone." So true such a kick in the teeth for women.

AmaraSas This rule means any male who wants to identify as a woman can do so and go to a woman only college. Don't you think there might be some men out there wanting to take advantage of this? Now the only requirement is to identify, as what? If not biology what is a woman, could you define it for us?

DistanceCall "I can't see any reason for women-only colleges, to be honest."

Sadly, we do still need female only spaces. You may not personally need them, but why should any of us want to stand in the way of other women being able to access them?

www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/02/when-i-was-raped-it-was-female-only-spaces-helped-me-recover

PS I went to a co-ed school and co-ed college. No desire at all to go to a female-only one. But I can still see the reason why some other women may wish to go to one.

distancecall in 2011 the male to female ratio of accepted students at Cambridge Uni was (m) 54% (f)46%. So including 3 exclusively female only colleges males students still outnumber female students.

It could be argued that female only colleges are still required to address the gender bias.

Honest question here...are there any men's only Colleges / universities?

You do realise that until the late nineteenth century all colleges at Cambridge were male? Because women were not allowed to study there at all until Girton was founded in 1869? And that they weren't awarded BA status until 1921? And that apart from the three women's only colleges, women were not admitted to any other colleges until 1972? This in a university which has been educating men since 1209.

But yes, what about the poor oppressed men who are so disadvantaged by the existence of - up until now - two female colleges in a university which has 31 colleges?

FFS

When will people begin to understand that equality and equity are not the same thing?

Thank God Theonlyliving.

Was starting to feel like I had wandered into the Spinal Tap dressing room. ' What's wrong with being sexy' etc.

As a woman who attended a Cambridge college converting to mixed status, men's colleges did not convert 'to welcome all', they converted to improve their academic results.

And yes 'Germaine' is rIght.

I am struggling with the college webpages on my mobile to get the date but I do know that murray edwards is shortly to become co-ed either this intake or next

So this story does appear to be deliberately provocative as men not just trans women will shortly be able to attend the college

Oh is that right I love? Interesting.

If I'm going to be pedantic you're not literally speechless.

strawberrisc - if I'm going to be pedantic, according to the Oxford Dictionary definition of "literally", the OP's thread title is absolutely correct. I presume she is using it, after all, in the context of "informal - used for emphasis while not being literally true".

I can't believe you literally Googled it! I'm crying - half with laughter as it's so ridiculous that you have taken a little jibe so literally and the other half with dismay at the ongoing bastardisation of the English language.

It will probably give you thrills that I gave 110% to this comment.

I didn't have to Google it because - you know - it's general knowledge that the definition has changed. Or it is for some people.

I don't give a fuck what percentage you gave to any comment, btw.

Oh apologies! I didn't realis you had the exact quotation memorised. I feel quite humbled by your memory recall.

Guess you missed the point of my percentage comment.

Hollow laugh at this
www.murrayedwards.cam.ac.uk/about/Collaborating-with-Men

All so supportive of women and then, bam, forget all academic rigour and throw them all under the bus by deciding that there's a new subset. Do they think that women can identify out of the problems that they discovered in their research?

Ok, so women trapped in mens bodies because of some appalling genetic catastrophe

AmaraSas this isn't a real thing.

The day that women are allowed to self identity as men to bypass the antiquated primageniture inheritance laws I will see this as way more equal. Right now it is a shower of shite, especially as that is pretty much the only exclusion...I would guess because it would negatively impact men.

ssd men are the main perpetrators of violence, it is a male problem, men should be sorting it out. Not forcing there way into female only colleges.

it's not a male problem, it's a problem for everyone.

these men have wives, daughters, mums.

To clarify, I object to the conflation of biological sex and socially constructed gender (though if Cambridge is doing it - that powerhouse of independent intellectual critical thought - it seems that fight is long lost). They're not the same thing. Murray Edwards is (was) a single-SEX college. Within that single-sex group, I'm sure there is a plurality of gender-expression amongst its constituents; however, they are still ALL FEMALE.

I also object to the whole concept of "self-identification" because it's complete BS; "feeling" like a 65-year-old Chinese man doesn't actually make me into one, and certainly my 'feelings' (no matter how sincerely held) should not legally oblige the whole world to collude with a personal fantasy. If men want to dress up as women, in private or public, they have the freedom to do so. I do not agree that that freedom should include the keys to spaces/organisations that are female-sex-specific.

If it's reasonable for an all-female Oxford college to admit biological males on the basis that, AT ONE MOMENT, they self-identified as female, then it must also be reasonable for biological males to have access to all-female hospital wards, prisons, dressing-rooms, sporting competitions, schools, etc etc etc.

...and I was actually, literally speechless! So I typed instead

I attended a single sex college in the 80s (by accident rather than design but I really liked it). The fact that male colleges chose to admit women, does not mean that female only colleges should be forced to do so too.

Female only colleges do have a different atmosphere and I think that as long as those running them think they are viable academically then they should be allowed to be retained.

I do think that Murray-Edwards is shooting itself in the foot, as some students specifically will be looking for a female sex only college (and possibly in some cases may not be 'allowed' to apply elsewhere by family/religion). It seems unnecessary given the plethora of mixed colleges that a trans person could apply to with no issues.

Victoria Smith has an excellent article about it here:

www.feministcurrent.com/2017/10/03/single-sex-colleges-admission-based-self-identity/

It includes the shocking reminder that women weren't admitted to full degrees in Cambridge until 1948.