to wonder if the world has gone a bit mad!

[guinea36]

I appreciate that this goes over ground that was covered in threads from the last couple of days. Apologies for that. But I really do feel as though I have fallen down some kind of Alice in Wonderland style rabbit hole!

I mentioned this article about Labour MP Caroline Flint to some friends today - saying I thought I was pleased that someone was raising girls' rights in the trans debate following the Top Shop changing room furore.

www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/caroline-flint-girls-rights-must-not-be-forgotten-in-the-trans-debate-a3696461.html

One of my friends responded by saying that there was no dichotomy between girls'/ biological women's rights and trans rights. In her view this is because anyone who identifies as a trans woman is a woman and to suggest otherwise was incorrect and an insult to the trans community.

I responded by saying that while I had no problem with someone who has been formally diagnosed with gender dysphoria and who is in the physical process of transitioning between sexes sharing a swimming pool changing room with me, I might not feel as the same about a man who had simply identified as a woman but had made no physical changes or undergone a formal diagnosis.
I argued that it was my right to feel like this. However I was told by another friend - this time male - that this view was bigoted.
Apparently although I have a right to object to someone who identifies as a woman but who isn't in transition, using a space traditionally reserved for females, I would be wrong to do so.

These are all intelligent people for whom I have a great deal of respect.
I'm unsure how they have come to these views but feel I must have missed some kind of intellectual newsflash down the line as I do not feel the same.

I can't understand why the women particularly - were seemingly unable to consider how that how we vital it is that we hold up any reforms that could impact on our fragile and hard earned rights to intense scrutiny.

I guess I was wondering if someone help me find the words and arguments to allow me disagree with them gracefully and in such a way that limits the chance of me being denounced as a bigot!

Umm, Friend, if you're such a trans ally, why aren't you aware that not all trans women want to be called a women? Because in my friends words (who is a trans woman) 'That would be denying my own history (if I called myself a woman)'.
You appear to have quite a superficial grasp of the issue.

None of my friends get there is a potentially huge issue of woman's rights being lost to Trans rights. They think its terrible bigoted to say anything against the Trans agenda.

FriendNoMore

Are you able to answer the questions I asked you, and support your accusation that the OP has committed a hate crime in her post, or are you unable to do so?

I agree, TheEgregiousPeach - transwomen are not the same as born women and pretending they are the same does a disservice to both.

Op i completely get it and agree with you. (Oh and im 22 so its not an age thing!)

I have no issue with being who you want to be. If thats a different sex than what you were born thats fine by me.

But, i think, there has to be a line and like you say when someone's been formally diagnosed and is about to or is transitioning - i would have absolutely no issue in sharing a changing room. However someone whos just decided they want to be a woman, simply changed their clothes but nothing else, would bother me.

If that makes me bigoted then so be it.

Good God friendnomore you are whats wrong with pc gone mad brigade today. I actually have no words.

Op I totally agree with you.

Muslim, Sikh, Jewish and Romany woman must have single sex toilets. Its bigoted to tell them to stay at home.

In India, single sex toilets are a risk to women
www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/aug/28/toilets-india-health-rural-women-safety

The radically simple way to make female refugees safer from sexual assault: decent bathrooms (single sex)
qz.com/692711/the-radically-simple-way-to-make-female-refugees-safer-from-sexual-assault-decent-bathrooms/

Human Rights Watch say girls in Afghanistan - and Everywhere Else -
Need Toilets
www.hrw.org/news/2017/11/17/girls-afghanistan-and-everywhere-else-need-toilets

"Both need protecting but it's not fair or rational or acceptable to protect one group by appropriating or sabotaging the rights of the other."

So certain religious groups/individuals will be allowed to offer services to heterosexuals only?

Appropriation/sabotage (of whatever term you wish to use) became the norm some time ago.

calling a woman a man

Gosh ive been referred to as man a couple of times now

Hate crime you say...wonder if i can sue?

(Not being serious, I wouldn't sue...i would have them arrested and thrown in prison)

I think transwomen would also be at risk from self-identification.

The people being violent against women and transwomen are men, right? Letting any bloke into women's safe spaces, without any sort of regulation, without any safeguards, without any sort of checks, just means taking away transwomen's safety too. Surely? I don't understand how this hasn't been pointed out (or rather, I do understand, because every time anyone voices even a vaguely dissenting opinion on this they're called a bigot or TERF).

NO ONE will win in this battle.

We should be standing together on this, fighting it together. Self-identification is madness. How long until people self-identify for a day? Or for one shift at work? Imagine in a GP's surgery - "Oh we need a female doctor for a patient this afternoon and all the female doctors are off today. Henry, can you identify as female at 2pm?"

Still, at least it'll get rid of the gender pay gap, eh? Organisations can just claim all the better-paid men identify as women and it'll even itself out.

You are being transphobic and it's a hate crime. People like you are old fogies and thank god the younger generation won't put up it just like with racism and homophobia in the last 20 years.

@FriendNoMore you do realise trans activism is really, really homophobic, right? And you are OK with supporting homophobia?

Friend

I would like you to please defend your obvious and disgraceful ageism, "Old Fogies" "Your Generation", and on what information you based your assumptions about other MNers ages.

Also please expalin why you clearly think that hostility and prejudice based on someones age (a hate crime in your own words) is ok when "Trans-ism" isnt.

I get confused about how we as a society support genuine trans people, which is what I think the Topshop decision intended to do, but stop the fear that people may claim to be trans to have access to opportunities, or in this case physical space, that they wouldn't otherwise have access to. Then I wonder do people actually do this, ie pretend to be trans, is that line of thinking actually not based on reality (beyond a very tiny minority) and is something that is promoted by people with an anti-trans view? Is the concern justified?

I am also concerned about the impact that a vocal minority of TRAs have on the wider trans community. It's a helpful starting point when thinking about sex segregated areas to consider why we have them? And when that's clear, what are the risks and vulnerabilities of this approach? Who is being protected from whom? How might people try to take advantage of a system in order to gain access to a space which they are otherwise barred from?

FriendnoMore is simply acting up. S/He's probably seven years old, but precocious.

I would like you to please defend your obvious and disgraceful ageism, "Old Fogies" "Your Generation", and on what information you based your assumptions about other MNers ages

Quite. For someone so keen on hostility and prejudice issues, you appear to be guilty of not practicing what you preach.

Oh and "Friend" there are in fact NINE protected characeristics, not just the five that suit your agenda.

I wonder how people decide which trans thread to post on?

It can get confusing when there are so many threads repeating the same points. I get confused which points I've made on which threads.

I read the interview with Caroline Flint and agreed with what she argued. It seems perfectly reasonable to want to stop a man just putting on a dress and then having access to a woman's changing room.

MissionItsPossible That's interesting and concerning about the potential changes to the Gender Recognition Act, for exactly the reasons you outline. Laws need to protect the vulnerable or protect people from being in situations that make them unsafe (eg your women's refuge example), whoever they may be.

Friend I am 27 not an " old Fogey" and I agree with OP

Think you need to calm down a little love

I don't think a man would even have to put on a dress. He could just say he identifies as a woman and that would be that. Challenging him on that would be a hate crime, like our friend Friend says,

You can't object to anything without being called out for it. Not that I object to trans people but I do object to the idea of self identification without any medical back up. It's like I want to be a horse today so I'm going to be a horse (!)
Your friends seem like they are so worried about being politically correct they can't actually think for themselves.
A colleague of mine is 22, psychology grad, she has really interesting views on this regarding attention seeking and our need for labelling, this isn't an age thing.
I do hope there is some uprising about this - not just on Mumsnet!

I think because this is being associated with a long-established marginalised group (transsexuals) - even though trans has morphed into something else entirely - and because it has been associated with civil rights (particularly LGB rights originally), a lot of people just have a knee-jerk reaction on this issue and don't really think it through.

I also think sadly it's because it particularly impinges on women's rights - and, although it is contrary to the interests of both lesbians and gay men, it is also specifically lesbians who are particularly affected. Women tend not to be listened to and taken seriously (dismissed as 'hysterical' women). Women's rights are right down the pecking order (you'll notice they don't even appear on the list of centrally monitored hate crime strands posted in the thread, despite women being harassed, assaulted and murdered because of their sex). Women are also socialised from an early age to put other people's needs above their own.

I used to think like your friends (or rather not really think!). I can't really answer how you get through to someone apart from to identify one thing that they may not be aware of that is just so completely obviously wrong (e.g. the cotton ceiling, male rapists with intact penises in women's prisons, men beating - and even beating up - women in women's sports etc).

Once someone allows themselves to admit that one thing is wrong, they will start to think critically and the whole thing just falls apart.

It is tough but I'm one of many idiots misguided people who has realised what a threat this issue is to women's rights and more and more people are realising this (check out the 5 threads worth of peak trans moments on reddit if you want to reassure yourself that people are seeing sense www.reddit.com/r/GenderCritical/comments/6dl3lm/peak_trans_v_tell_your_story_here/ )

I've read a few of the transgender threads but never commented as I'm still trying to truly understand how I feel about it.
From what I've read about the GRA proposals I don't see how it can help anyone, not natal women, not trans women and certainly not trans men.
As Mission pointed out it would be very easy for a predatory, violent or manipulative person to take advantage of these new proposals and that is damaging for everyone.
Trans women and men deserve to go about their life free from harm but their needs and concerns are different to that of natal men and women, I worry that the pursuit to be seen as 'the same' may actually be more damaging for the larger transgender community.

Perhaps the burden of proof of transgender should be on the individual, not to declare the trans status, but to be able to produce documentation of the steps taken towards trans status. I am uncomfortable with the idea that any bloke can self-identify as transgender and gain access to the ladies changing room.