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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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AIBU to think that this child should be allowed to compete as a girl? Transgender topic.

999 replies

Cassort · 02/07/2019 00:53

www.bbc.co.uk/news/video_and_audio/headlines/48800075/transgender-skater-fighting-to-compete?ocid=socialflow_facebook&ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbcnews&ns_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR3SHOZZproHs8lkaYi9tz5VcKPnE9xQRt7AR8m8rRPu5lPTJkp1m1808Os

It's an 11 year old (born male) ice skater. There's a little video where to me she looks female.

I daren't put this on the feminism board, but AIBU to think that in 20 years time we will look back in shame at how we have treated transgendered individuals?

I just put myself in those shoes for 5 hours. What on earth would I think? How much hate would I feel? How fucked up/strange/weird would I feel?

I have a very uneasy feeling in my soul about the vociferous opposition to transgenderism on MN currently. It doesn't sit comfortably with me.

I came across this story just now and it's typical of I suppose what the feminist MNers want transgender people to face. I.e. that they can't...

Should she compete as a girl? Or AIBU?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
15
RageAgainstTheVendingMachine · 02/07/2019 20:13

cass
You are entitled to your opinion and believing that you are on the right side of history and you are right that I am not going to run for a bus on any day of the week but you are wrong about this When there are 100 baying wolves, you don't walk in requesting a discussion. You asked AIBU and entered a debate. Noone is baying for anyone's blood, they are simply giving counter arguments you do not accept.
I think there could well be a clusterfuck in twenty years time of children/teens today who regret transitioning early because of the later effect of meds and invasive procedures: I hope that the majority don't go down that route until they are old enough to make informed decisions. Gender bending I have no problem with whatsoever, outdated though that phrase is.
Chucking lesbians under the bus, chucking girls under the bus who have trained hard in their field and chucking biological women under the bus who find penises triggering - just because I'm straight, the least sporty person I know and have no problem with sharing bathrooms/unisex changing rooms-swimming areas-toilets etc does not mean that I don't understand the position of these women. Gender free additions/third spaces would go some way to being a compromise but do not validate identity.
One set of group's rights should not undermine another group's.

HugsAreMyDrugs · 02/07/2019 20:14

I think this thread may have been created to get screenshots.

The OP was very likely goading people into saying something which could be deemed transphobic but when no one took the bait, they have now decided to make transphobic posts themselves to screenshot.

Fibbke · 02/07/2019 20:15

HugsAreMyDrugs yes i thought that

Eaudear · 02/07/2019 20:15

You look at the little girl/boy in that video and she is as effeminate as you could be.

So fucking what?

You're all having hypothetical arguments anyway. Nobody has come on here and said 'my dd is competing against a trans girl' or 'I came 40 in the London marathon, beaten only by 30 trans women'.

Have a Google of Selina Soule. Listen to what she has to say.

Cassort · 02/07/2019 20:15

This will put off more women entering sport as it will make something already tough even harder to compete in that will be awful for our future generations.

It will not. Can you list 10 professionals globally who have said they're dropping out because of trans? 5 even?

OP posts:
Owlchemist · 02/07/2019 20:15

You look at the little girl/boy in that video and she is as effeminate as you could be.

Since when did being feminine/effeminate make you a girl? Does being a masculine girl make you a boy? What the fuck.

Also nice slip with "effeminate" - that's a slit used for feminine males.

Owlchemist · 02/07/2019 20:16

Slit? Slur

HugsAreMyDrugs · 02/07/2019 20:16

Nobody likes 'different'. But 'different' exists. Get over it.

Quite a bold statement from someone who fails to say the biological differences between men and women. Irony overload right there.

Eaudear · 02/07/2019 20:16

I would LIKE to think that in 2019 (not the 1900s), that accommodation could be made for facilitate that anomaly.

Stop calling children who don't conform to bullshit gender stereotypes 'anomalies'. It's so sexist.

DeRigueurMortis · 02/07/2019 20:17

OP - yes it would be that awful if it denigrates Women’s sports as a whole.

I asked the question earlier - why are the feelings of trans athletes more worthy than the physical limitations, training and worth of female athletes?

As for percentages, then think about the massive percentage Male physical bodies have over females in sport.

Lung capacity, femur length, pelvic alignment, ligament strength etc

Then think about the percentages athletes win gold or world records by...tenths and now hundredths of a second.

Your 0.0001% can mean the difference between Olympic gold and last place.

Realistically it means women not getting to compete in the first place at elite events.

BUT BUT BUT (copying your shouting capitals) according to you that's all a pile of shite.....

You've shown your colours. Fine.

I genuinely hope that the women you care for don't fall foul of your ideology.

AyeRobot · 02/07/2019 20:18

When you include males in female spaces, you exclude females.

Oblomov19 · 02/07/2019 20:18

Actually. Forget that. It's good that OP posted in AIBU rather than feminism. This stretches to a larger audience. So normal women can also be educated as to how damaging this all is.

Ascreed · 02/07/2019 20:18

BUT!!! If I did feel somehow 'wrong' as a male, I would LIKE to think that in 2019 (not the 1900s)
I don't find it very progressive to tell children they can change sex and that based on some narrow gender stereotypes of fashion or toys they should try.

fascinated · 02/07/2019 20:19

So do you think they should be allowed to be a “girl” in every other respect? Getting changed, dorms etc? Trouble with all this is, it’s the impregnator class saying it is part of the impregnatee class. That’s a bit problematic. Different in the old days with post-op transsexuals. But nowadays no physical change usually takes place. How do you deal with that? The impregnating aspect and strength advantages only work in one direction. That is why the issues raised by the expansion of trans identifying persons are fundamentally unbalanced.

MarieIVanArkleStinks · 02/07/2019 20:20

I've flicked through this thread as it's frankly a whole load of repetitive nonsense and 'women's spaces' this and 'erosion of women's right's' that. It's a load of fucking bollocks and you fucking know it.

OK. Why? You make a very strong statement but I'm failing to see any reasonable justification. And in my observation, that's often the case with very strong statements.

Compare these three cases, in relation to the example you've given of women's spaces (lavatory or changing area). Transwoman, at risk of persecution from men. Wants the right to share female-only spaces. Woman, former rape victim, also at risk of persecution from men. Traumatized by her former experiences, she does not want to share these semi-protected female spaces with any be-penised person. Women as a whole, at risk of physical and sexual violence at the hands of men. Just look at the statistics. This threat is present and real.

Whose rights should trump whose here? And why?

IMO there are so many implied issues here that should give rise to serious, reasoned debate as to the way forward. #NoDebate and #NoPlatform are not going to achieve that. Neither are screaming 'bigot' or 'transphobe'.

Major problem 1: if the common risk to both women and transwomen is men, then why is that not the issue being tackled? Why lay it at the door of women?

Major problem 2: the sharing of facilities with transwomen is a long-established process that has been going on since time immemorial (An oft-quoted argument by TRAs). The proposed self-identification law would effectively implement an open-door policy. If we accept, for the sake of argument, that no transwoman could possibly ever be a threat to a woman this still doesn't preclude the opportunists, who can now masquerade freely as women in order to gain unchallenged access to their victims. And I'm afraid the TRAs' argument on that score: 'but that won't happen', just doesn't fly. It will. It already has.

So if the common denominator of risk to both transwomen and women is men, and they've just succeeded in opening up these semi-protected spaces in this way, they've also succeeded in increasing the risk posed by men to both women and transwomen.

Not very smart, to say the least. Who wins here? People with more vulnerable bodies who really need those protected spaces? Or an ideology?

Also, could you please justify how any of the questions raised above amount to 'hatred' of transpeople, rather than a serious question about what happens when the rights of two groups of people conflict?

Oblomov19 · 02/07/2019 20:21

No one, no mother, would wish for their child to be trans.
It's a sad and lonely journey.
Makes me sad, just reading about it.
Wanting to be something that you're not, is hard.

Madmoggie · 02/07/2019 20:22

What a truly unpleasant person the OP is.

colourlessgreenidea · 02/07/2019 20:22

I think this thread may have been created to get screenshots.

The OP was very likely goading people into saying something which could be deemed transphobic but when no one took the bait, they have now decided to make transphobic posts themselves to screenshot.

I completely agree: now that the OP has resorted to wildly ranting fallacies and transphobic comments, MN will take the opportunity to delete the thread and it can be blamed on ‘transphobia’, even though the only hateful shrieking and name-calling is by the OP. Sad

Prawnofthepatriarchy · 02/07/2019 20:22

Cassort, you came across as drunk last night and it's just the same again. You're incoherent and devoid of reason.

As for don't know why you feel so bloody threatened by a few - a handful - of biological anomalies! What on earth do you mean by that? Being transgender has nothing to do with biology. Are you thinking of disorders of sexual development? Because the two things aren't connected, you know.

Livelovebehappy · 02/07/2019 20:24

Don’t you just love how these transgender threads develop? Opening post from OP very rational and inviting friendly debate. Then skip to the last few posts from OP when it is like reading comments from an entirely different poster; lots of bitterness, name calling and inability to see someone else’s POV. Same old, same old. Clearly OP has noticed many posts started on this topic are usually accusatory and goady from the off, so are usually ignored, so is trying a different approach.

slipperywhensparticus · 02/07/2019 20:24

200 years time they will dig up their bones and the bones will still say they are Male because they are

"The child" as you put it can never be truly female and they should never have been told they could be they can be an imitation no more no less
"

feelingverylazytoday · 02/07/2019 20:25

Ooh nice meltdiwn there 😂

Oblomov19 · 02/07/2019 20:25

Sorry. Is OP a man? Identifying as a man? Gay? Trans herself?

I'm confused.

I've tried to find 'her'/ his original posts. But most have been deleted.

Did you come here? For the first time?
To originally, deliberately be goady?

Eaudear · 02/07/2019 20:26

It will not. Can you list 10 professionals globally who have said they're dropping out because of trans? 5 even?

Jen Wagner-Assali
Selina Soule
Tamikka Brents
Feagaiga Stowers

All female athletes who have voices concerns (or their team has publicly) about competing against males in sport.

Plus Martina Navratilova and Sharron Davies, both sportswomen who know perfectly well the sort of advantage a male would have in sport.

JacquesHammer · 02/07/2019 20:28

All for the name of women's sports. I bet 60% of you wouldn't run for a bus, let alone participate or compete in sports

I’ve been playing and coaching rugby for over 20 years.

You want to get twatted across a pitch by a bloke, be my guest.

Not in my fucking team.

We had to self-fund, work harder than any man to get access to equal chance on the rugby pitch. You think it’s ok for men to now enter that space?