Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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:
TerfsUp · 23/03/2018 14:17

People are not "assigned" a sex / gender at birth. Sex is determined at time of conception. Sex is noted when the baby is delivered.

Gender is a social construct.

No matter how many times this is repeated, the terminally hard-of-thinking fail to grasp the distinction.

TerfsUp · 23/03/2018 14:18

Also - look for the word "assigned" on your birth certificate. It won't be there, either.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:21

Its not a fuckinh sorting hat system "hmm girly.....boyish....this one is girly.......oooo another girly girl....oh, yes, this ones a macho fellow for sure..."

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:23

@springhen

I think you are spectacularly missing the point.

I think that if you're going to pretend that there are enough people for whom sex and gender don't match, that they would have an impact on data collection, you're missing the point.

Even with Stonewall's great big umbrella term, that could include an awful lot of people, it doesn't include a lot of people because only a tiny minority of people call themselves trans.

Most of the time, when the doctor looks at a baby's genitals, she is going to be able to determine gender, although she can only see sex. These terms are so interchangeable because sex and gender matches up for vast majority of us. No one is trying to or can take that away.

To pretend that this tiny group of people are going to close the pay gap or have an impact on the fact that there are more board members of large companies called 'John' than there are women, is false.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:24

Gender ID would be fine if it didnt replace and erase sex.

If it was an extra thing you can opt into if youre so inclined.

Not something we all have to personally prescribe to and identify with

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:27

To pretend that this tiny group of people are going to close the pay gap or have an impact on the fact that there are more board members of large companies called 'John' than there are women, is false.

sex stats need to be collected.
They are not being collected if sex is replaced with gender.

Pay gaps between the sexes CANNOT be audited if sex stats are not collected.

orangepie · 23/03/2018 14:27

You all realise that sex and gender where not understood the same back then just like homosexuality. Thankfully there is plans already to update the birth certs to change the word sex to gender with our more reasoned understanding of gender now.

DullAndOld · 23/03/2018 14:29

orangepie, sex is sex...
'Thankfully there is plans already to update the birth certs'
oh please, do pipe down, what utter nonsense.

PerfectlyDone · 23/03/2018 14:29

orangepie, I am actually speechless.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:30

it doesn't include a lot of people because only a tiny minority of people call themselves trans.

But if they ask about GENDER and not sex, then all of us who dont believe in gender are forced to tick "other" or "non conforming" and so what? We're just not counted at all as part of our sex?

orangepie · 23/03/2018 14:30

SpringHen

It's the "Gender Pay Gap" not the "sex pay gap"

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap

No one ever complained about the sex pay gap, it is and has always been the gender pay gap. They are collecting Gender info because that is what is important.

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:30

Gender is a social construct.

What the hard of thinking don't get is that there is a difference between something being 'false' and being a social construct. Language is a social construct, it's still very real and very precise.

Female babies are born, we don't call them women because being a woman is a process of maturity and experience.

A gender stereotype is naming the thing that we see most often, i.e. Not all girls have long hair, you don't need long hair to be a girl, most girls have long hair. Some boys have long hair. All of these statements are facts but the gender stereotype is that girls have long hair.

DullAndOld · 23/03/2018 14:31

sorry I am not normally a grammar pedant but when someone semi literate is telling me some crap, I will mention it...

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:32

But if they ask about GENDER and not sex, then all of us who dont believe in gender are forced to tick "other" or "non conforming" and so what? We're just not counted at all as part of our sex?

What do you mean by 'not believing in gender'?

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:34

Thankfully there is plans already to update the birth certs to change the word sex to gender with our more reasoned understanding of gender now.

So erasing biological sex?
How can we protect people from sex discrimination if sex is erased?
(Big spoiler: erasing the word wont erase the discrimination, just the protections)

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:35

What do you mean by 'not believing in gender'?

Gender = steriotypes. Im against it. Dont identify with it.

orangepie · 23/03/2018 14:36

By protecting against what it's called gender discrimination and fighting the gender pay gap.

You cannot just change gender pay gap to sex pay gap, we feminists have been fighting the gender pay gap for decades

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:38

You cannot fight it if you cant call it what it is.

PerfectlyDone · 23/03/2018 14:38

How can you believe or not 'believe' in gender? It is not a religion.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:40

How can you believe or not 'believe' in gender? It is not a religion.

Its as much a social construct as religion.

A person can say "I dont believe in religion"
So why cant a person not subscribe to gender?

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:41

How can we protect people from sex discrimination if sex is erased?

We have had a legal process, by which a small number of people change from one gender to the other for the last 14 years. During all of that time we've managed to keep sex discriminations laws, for the little protection they offer us.

You ticking a box that says 'woman' rather than one that says 'female' hasn't erased any of your protections or rights or any aspect of your identity.

Having a boxes that say 'female' or 'woman' have no appreciable impact on your life, in anyway, whatsoever. No one has erased your sex.

PerfectlyDone · 23/03/2018 14:43

Yes, gender is a social construct, one that is quite obviously evident, but does not require faith in a higher being.

SpringHen · 23/03/2018 14:44

During all of that time we've managed to keep sex discriminations laws, for the little protection they offer us.

These changes and redefinitions are mostly recent.

Applying for a job 10yrs ago you most likely got asked your sex not gender on the equality questionaire.

So really what you say holds no water. Youre basically agreeing with me in that when we previously asked for sex not gender we were able to applt the law..

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:44

Gender = steriotypes. Im against it. Dont identify with it.

You've misunderstood what gender means. It's 'the state of being a man or a women typically used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones.'

I suppose that you can identify as what you like but you can't change the meaning of words and then get miffed when others don't go along with you.

Stillscreaming · 23/03/2018 14:45

These changes and redefinitions are mostly recent.

What recent legal changes are you talking about?