To be saddened by the transphobia and homophobia on Mumsnet?

[spannablue]

I used to come on here for a good laugh. But now there's just so much casual, vitriolic, uninformed rubbish om here!

Do people really think that trans women are secretly trying it on to take over women's space? Have you not seen what they have to go through (for some, horrific surgery; for others, lashings of abuse; job losses; loss of contact with family; street attacks)? Why would anyone choose that?

Did you know that if your kid comes out as trans, they are around 48% likely to attempt suicide, and around half of them succeed? All the literature/research on this shows that it's transphobia, stigma and bigotry that causes this, rather than some innate pathology. When a trans kid is supported to be who they want to be, those suicidal feelings tend to go away. If you've ever had or known a child with depression, anxiety, or who self harms, you'll know the fear and terror that they might succeed.

We're talking about a tiny minority of people who are trans. But what I'm seeing on Mumsnet amounts to collective bullying.

When did it become ok to be so judgmental? Have you ever actually met a trans person and listened to them with an open mind?

There are people of all kinds on social media - trans, not trans, gay, straight, bi, lollipop ladies, lawyers, teachers, academics and bus drivers. Some talk a load of crap. And others engage in intelligent, informed, openminded debate. Please consider trying out your ideas thoughtfully with these people before perpetuating the sort of hateful kneejerk nonsense which can have terrible consequences.

For the record, I'm an academic researcher in the field of applied sociology. I'm not trans. I'm a lesbian with four kids aged 3 to 25, one of whom is nonbinary.

I think one of the saddest things is that some of the people who scream "transphobia" actually are just reacting to the narrative being challenged, but theyre not actually reading the debate.
If they actually listened to the overriding feminist criticism, its easy to see its merits, even if you dont agree with everything.

Please, just read a bit about the other side before deciding people are phobic or bigoted, because in most cases, that couldnt be further from the truth

I'm fed up of people quoting untrue statistics from fuck knows where.

I'm fed up of people shouting transphobia to the point that it's detrimental to transgender people.

I'm fed up of being told that I'm abusive for not allowing my child to take life long medication that will make them infertile.

I'm fed up of being told that my child will kill themselves because of my decisions.

I'm fed up of all these ever so helpful TRAs and their allies taking away the only thing that was helping my child at all by taking away the mental health status of gender dysphoria.

I'm fed up that I'm on the edge of being thrown out of my house because I now have to pay for private therapy for my child and can barely afford my rent.

I'm fed up of people being so wholeheartedly accepting of this therefore making my child the person used to tick all the 'look how inclusive we are' boxes and pushing my child into situations they don't want to be in.

I'm fed up of people with no fucking clue what it is like to have a child with a severe mental disorder like this screaming transphobia every 2 seconds and therefore making our lives harder.

I'm also fed up with people slagging off the feminists who have helped me navigate a large part of what I'm going through with my child. I have so many private messages with links and support from the people who are called transphobic most often on here and lots of support on the boards too.

Disagreeing with something doesn't mean it's transphobic. I would argue that the people who seem to think they are helping have actually done more damage to us than the few actual transphobic people there are out there.

It isn't the genuine cases i fear but the weirdos who will PRETEND TO identify as women in order to access womens' spaces.
Pro-trans lobbyists using terrorism to get what they want and shutting down debate.
The term Woman/female including those with male genitalia but this not applying in reverse.
How is this difficult for you to understand OP?

Ah but if you put a label on it like transphobic you hope to shut down debate.

It was ever thus. It’s classic bully tactic of a weak argument.

And has often been used to shut up women from the year dot.

Hysterical, menopausal, unbalanced, bra burners, ball crushers blah blah blah.

Anyone who has worked in the field of detection and prosecution of sexual offenders knows that there is core of offenders who are persistent and cunning and will exploit any loophole which permits them to continue offending. If you think self Id won’t be used by those people in that way you are best naive and at worst an extremist who is happy to see woman and children be collateral damage in your warped identity wars.

How is this difficult for you to understand OP?
It's impossible. Because the OP isn't listening.

@ErinCreberz - what is 'hateful' about wanting women and girls to be safe?

Is it 'crap' to think that adolescent girls should not be sharing a Guide tent with an adolescent with a fully functioning penis, without the knowledge or permission of the girls' parents?

Or to think that elite women athletes should not be competing against an athlete who grew up male, so has greater bone density, muscle mass and lung capacity, so can beat them into a cocked hat - but may have transferred into the women's sport because they cannot win against men?

Or to think that the needs of users of a Rape crisis centre or a domestic violence centre matter more than the wants of a male-bodied individual who wants to declare they are female and demand the 'right' to work there?

How about the rights of lesbians to say they don't want to have sex with a person who has a fully functioning penis, without being accused of being TERFs or bad lesbians?

How about the rights of vulnerable women in prisons not to have male-bodied individuals (maybe even ones with convictions for actual rape of women) housed alongside them because they have self-identified as women??

How about the rights of women to have a civilised debate about this issue without threats of violence, and actual violence being used against them, to prevent them meeting and discussing this, or even discussing it online? Are rape threats or doxxing of women OK in your book - because that is happening to women who want to discuss this issue - or is it crap to object to such tactics too?

How about being concerned about children being given puberty blockers, with no thought for the long term effects - such as undeveloped genitalia? Is it hysteria to worry about the physical and mental effects on these children? If they decide to detransition, they may never be able to develop adult genitalia and function sexually as adults. If they do decide to go down the surgical route, and transition fully, boys who have taken puberty blockers may not have a penis big enough to be hollowed out and inverted to form a simalcrum of the vagina, so may end up having to have one fashioned out of skin from their thighs or even a section of bowel - is it OK to be worried about that or is that just hysteria too?

YANBU OP

Getting hysterical about being called cis-gendered who the hell cares?

The people who are being called cis when they don't want to be I imagine

Though i think our definition of hysteria is probably very different

This reminds me of the immigration debate being crushed for years with the cry of 'racism' if anyone so much as questioned policies etc surtounding this issue. Well that has ended well hasn't it?

Fuck hysteria. I’m angry. I thought I lived in a free society where I was permitted to not believe in religion, gender and other made up bullshit. I don’t take kindly to being told I have to subscribe to idiotic belief systems.
If you can read hysteria in to that you need to take your fucking beer goggles off.

Is OP a goady plopper?

YADBU. And you're no academic either. Produce evidence or your points are just wild assertions. Your suicide claims are fake. They've been discredited. But by making them you are going against the guidance given by The Samaritans, which is grossly irresponsible.

Fighting for the rights of women and girls is not transphobic. The reverse is true: that the demands of transactivist men who identify as women and demand more rights than the rest of us are pure misogyny

As for homophobia, on the Feminism Chat board we all too frequently hear from posters who think men can be women and that men can therefore be lesbians, which strikes me as pretty much the definition of homophobia.

Child medical transition is a source of much concern. It's a slow motion car crash in which children and young adults are being given off label drugs with very nasty side effects in a process that will lead to lifelong medical dependence and sterilisation. No wonder posters on a site called Mumsnet are outraged.

The people telling the kids they are in the wrong body are the problem.
If we abandoned gender stereotypes and let people have their own personality there'd be no such thing as gender dysphoria.

Kids would still go struggle with their own feelings and changes, but this is a problem created by society.

buzz

There is transphobia and homophobia and sexism and agism etc on the site...obviously!! But sometimes you just can't figure out why someone is 'yelling' those terms and poster A doesnt explain, just keeps 'yelling' at poster B

I forgot to say that YABU and you've missed the whole point of what is going on and are just repeating the party line.

I can read the same kind of thing under Youtube Flat Earth videos. People parroting rubbish they read under other videos with no evidence or understanding of the facts.

I have never seen any transphobia or homophobia on here. A desire to protect female only spaces is not transphobia.

SDT

Yes yes yes 100%.

I think what sometimes gets lost in translation here is that most people (me included) have zero problem with anyone, trans, cis, gay, straight...each to their own and I do genuinely believe they will get the rights they are so very entitled to.

It just isn't going to be the exact same rights as biological women and that's ok too, nobody is trying to make life harder for people going through what must be a very difficult time in their life (I dread to think what it must be like to be born in the wrong body - everyday problems are enough for me!) but we need to make sure we all work to safeguard girls and women and give trans folk rights that protect them too.

I get how it comes across as transphobic and I can only speak for myself but I think some of it is more misunderstanding than anything.

Starlive

Nope no such thing as cis. Won’t have it and won’t be called it thanks.

No one gets to erode who I am. I am a woman. Not cis anything just a woman.

It’s hateful to try and erase the core identity of what it means to be a woman. Very hateful and bullying

The hate for trans people is ridiculous too. Getting hysterical about being called cis-gendered who the hell cares?

I care. I don't have a gender identity. Gender is a social construct that harms women. I don't have a gender. I have a sex and a personality.

Telling a bunch of women they're hysterical? That's misogyny 101, PitterPatter. Because surely women couldn't possibly have any legitimate concerns about a movement that seeks to eradicate our rights and sex based protections, could they?

@Seasawride sorry if I offended you...I'm sure you can see that wasn't my intention. My point was that people are too quick to jump on one thing and not read/disregard the rest...ironically!

The hysteria and hate seems to me to be not coming from women but from a small group of very stupid and nasty mysogynistic men seeking to undermine and destroy women’s rights,safety and identity for their own agenda.

If that makes women angry and willing to fight back so be it. Women have had to do that since the year dot. Nothing new.

Starlive

I totally understand that.