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Original poster

To think that “butch “lesbian identity is being erased.

277 replies

Queenofwands · 23/03/2018 05:00

I was chatting to a taxi driver who said she was a lesbian. As we were talking she said that she was getting pressure from her family to undergo a sex change. She said she was confused because she had previously thought of herself as a tomboy. We talked and it became clear that she felt there was no place for her in society . She looked in her early twenties and to my eyes not even particularly boyish. It made me think has being a gay woman who is not especially girly become conflated with being transgender?

OP posts:
SpringHen · 23/03/2018 11:48

Being female is about gender not sex now.

So if you dont identify with the feminine gender steriotypes youre not a woman. Because that is the new definition of woman.

C8H10N4O2 · 23/03/2018 11:49

In Muslim countries they kill you for being gay, they do force gay men to transition or be killed

In all of them? All the time?

There are incidents of this happening (most reports from Iran that I have seen). THey are also happening in non Islaamic countries. Oh and to gay women as well as men. So why are you focusing on Muslims?

Also I am a lesbian

That's interesting. What is your point?

RatRolyPoly · 23/03/2018 11:53

So if you dont identify with the feminine gender steriotypes youre not a woman. Because that is the new definition of woman.

Springhen I think you need to preface this statement with "Some deranged Twitter loons, the odd il-informed parent and a couple of nut-jobs with an agenda think that..", because otherwise it looks like scaremongering.

orangepie · 23/03/2018 11:55

That's interesting. What is your point?

Because you said I was lesphobic.

Only person with trans regret I have ever met was an ex-muslim who was made to transition because they are gay. They are now living as male again but is in deep depression as they where made go through srs, he knew his options where death or transition at the time.

This stuff doesn't happen in western countries, here no one forces people to transition.

C8H10N4O2 · 23/03/2018 11:59

Because you said I was lesphobic.

Yes I stand by that. You dismissed an entire chunk of working class, lesbian experience as a 'fashion trend'. LRD puts it better than I could.

This stuff doesn't happen in western countries, here no one forces people to transition

If you actually believe this you need to do some serious self education

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:00

Springhen I think you need to preface this statement with "Some deranged Twitter loons, the odd il-informed parent and a couple of nut-jobs with an agenda think that..", because otherwise it looks like scaremongering.

Nope. HR departments have changed their diversity surveys from asking peoples SEX (technically still a protected characteristic, though not for much longer) to "what gender do you identify as" with no option to say you reject gender steriotypes.

School children are being taught about trans issues using resources that say that what makes you a boy or a girl is what you like doing/wearing.

This has gone mainstream already sadly. Not scaremongering as scarmongering is speculating about something which might happen in the future and not telling about things already happening present tense.

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 12:01

Because you said I was lesphobic.

@orangepie

That's getting increasingly common, if you don't fit in with a certain view point, you get called names and have you're experience dismissed.

I don't know what to offer you, I just wanted to acknowledge it happens and let you know I'm sorry that it's happening to you.

Dungeondragon15 · 23/03/2018 12:02

OP may be genuine but the problem is that there are so many antitransgender threads on MN now that it is impossible to read threads like this without suspecting that many people have their own transphobic agenda.

There could be a family out there that are trying to persuade their child that they are transgender but I'm sure that this would be very unusual, in Western cultures and in most others. In DDs experience, it is far easier for parents nowadays to accept their children are gay than transgender which is hardly surprising. The idea that parents everywhere are persuading their "butch" lesbian children to take drugs and undergo surgery to become men sounds like bullshit to me.

ArcheryAnnie · 23/03/2018 12:04

What counts as "butch" has also changed a lot. I see photos on social media of young women (and young women who identify as nonbinary and/or genderfluid) who describe themselves as butch, and who are described by others as butch - and I just don't see it at all. Short hair, tattoos, yes, but also makeup, lipstick, even body language. I am old and none of this would have been counted as butch When I Were A Lad. (Disclaimer: I had a short back and sides when younger but was never actually butch, alas.) Also butch is as much an attitude as a haircut.

I do know one lesbian from my teenage years, many years ago, who transitioned fairly recently, but oddly enough, she (I say she, because I am speaking of the past) wasn't one of the group I would have considered butch at all.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:05

Rat GirlGuides have also redefined girls.
This has already happened. Its not a hypothetical..

There could be a family out there that are trying to persuade their child that they are transgender but I'm sure that this would be very unusual I know 3 IRL who have had trans preschoolers....

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:08

So now anyone who feels girly, is a girl, according to Guides who traditionally aimed to take females away from situations where they felt pressure to gender confirm so that they could explore their potential in a non gender steriotype charged environment Sad

Dungeondragon15 · 23/03/2018 12:08

I know 3 IRL who have had trans preschoolers....

That doesn't mean that they intend to persuade their child to have surgery etc to change sex in the future. More likely they are just trying to let their children be who they want to be.

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 12:09

@C8H10N4O2

You seem to be claiming that people, children in particularly are being forced to transition, do you have any evidence of that happening to anyone in the UK?

Not a mistake or someone changing their mind back, but someone actually forced to undergo a gender transition.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:11

More likely they are just trying to let their children be who they want to be.

Then why not "let" them be a boy who likes dresses and a girl who likes short hair? Why tell everyone to re-pronoun them?

TinklyLittleLaugh · 23/03/2018 12:12

Trans preschooler is a ridiculous concept.

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 12:13

@springhen

I know 3 IRL who have had trans preschoolers....

I'm sorry but I'm calling that for the nonsense it is. There are plenty of women here who still have children in nursery and the overwhelming majority won't have encountered a single trans child. That you've managed to dig up three to fit your adgenda, really is stretching credulity beyond breaking point.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:15

See its not coming from the kids when theyre that age.

Boy wants pink dress
Right on parent says "y'know, its cool by me if you wanna be a girl"
Kid thinks "so if I say yeah Im a girl, I get that new thing I want?"
Kid says "yeah Im a girl, can I have the dress now"
Right on parenta go to school and tell teachers to educate their peers that X is a girl coz dresses..

As opposed to
Boy "I like that dress"
Parent "thats fine, boys can like dresses"
Kids runs off and plays in dress, perfectlt happy to be a boy in a dress

orangepie · 23/03/2018 12:16

SpringHen

Most actually do, they are classed gender fluid not trans and can use pronouns like they/zie, they allow their children to express themselves as they see fit day to day. if one day they want wear a dress that's OK the next bob the builder also OK.

TinklyLittleLaugh · 23/03/2018 12:16

Where on earth do you live spring? And how are you defining a trans preschooler, wearing a tutu and having long hair or full on pronoun changing?

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:17

Sure stillscreaming. Doesnt happen. Good arguement there..

Dungeondragon15 · 23/03/2018 12:19

Then why not "let" them be a boy who likes dresses and a girl who likes short hair? Why tell everyone to re-pronoun them?

I don't disagree but I think it is a big stretch to say that if when the child is older they decide they don't want to change gender afterall, that those parents would try to pressurise them to change anyway. I'm sure that the vast majority of parents in the UK would prefer their children to be happy with the gender they were born with.

ArcheryAnnie · 23/03/2018 12:19

There's no such thing as a "trans preschooler".

Unless you think that this absolutely batshit woman - allegedly an expert in her field - is right when describing a toddler unpopping his onesie as a "preverbal indication" telling the world he's really a girl because he prefers dresses.

Batshit.

vimeo.com/185149379

MorningsEleven · 23/03/2018 12:21

There are plenty of women here who still have children in nursery and the overwhelming majority won't have encountered a single trans child. That you've managed to dig up three to fit your adgenda, really is stretching credulity beyond breaking point

I quite agree. Of all the parents of trans kids that I know, none of them wanted this and all have struggled to some extent with grief, fear and prejudice.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 12:21

And how are you defining trans preschooler
Im defining them as children who my children are told to call be a differene name because (long/short hair, trousers/dresses, doesnt/does like xyz)

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 12:24

Right on parent says "y'know, its cool by me if you wanna be a girl"

Right on parents don't think that dress=girl. Right on parents wouldn't say anything of the sort. Socially conservative parents think dress=girl.

If you pitch up at the GPs office saying that your little boy likes to wear dresses, that it makes him happy, the doctor doesn't refer to a gender identity clinic because that's not the criteria for referral. The doctor would ask what you were really there for.

If your child did meet the criteria for a gender identity clinic referral, that child would have a two year wait to be seen, before a robust assessment period,mwithout a team of experts.

School nurses aren't giving out puberty blockers. Ask them.

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