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

[Cassort]

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?

If my hard training female relative/friend is bumped down the roster or has even been denied funding because someone who has been through male puberty has "out performed" her, you can bet your arse it is worth making a noise about it.

Well exactly Daaps. If the occurrence of a transwoman/girl wanting to compete against women is so rare, and the rarity is the issue, so why not? let the men deal with that rarity in their sports. Why all the hoo-ha and name calling of women? Surely it's not worth it?

Still, logic is something which is never applied to these issues.

In Rosa Parkes' day EVERYBODY thought she WBU......

The accurate Rosa Parkes comparison would not be about people of different skin colour deciding to use the same public areas. It would be a white person saying they believe themselves to be a person of colour and should therefore have access to special prizes, support or networks reserved for people of colour. And then claiming people were racist bigots if they disagreed.

...but that black-identifyingperson would still want the white advantages too. No inferior service or products or lunch counters for them!

They'd want to be white when it suited them, and only black if it meant getting something they couldn't as white.

Great! Discussion prevails, thanks mumsnet!

So glad this thread was re-instated. That's important, I believe.

Love all the great comments on this thread.

Women’s and girls sport being defended.

Yes it's heartwarming to read. Should be required reading tbh.

There's not going to be a transgender female in every women's race. On the odd occasion where there is, is it really worth all this hatred?

Our daughters need to know that the adults have got their back and that their sport is important and that it will be protected from male-bodied athletes.

Our daughters need to know that the adults have got their back and that their sport is important and that it will be protected from male-bodied athletes.

All children should also know that it's not possible to change sex, and we need to stop this lie being taught to them in school.

The boy at the centre of this discussion is also a victim. He is a victim of being lied to that wearing a dress makes him a girl, and that he will be able to change his body into a female one. At 11 he's too young to fully understand what this means.

We need to combat the lie that people can change sex. Once that is accepted by everyone (as it was until a few years ago), the idea that males should be allowed to compete in female sporting events will disappear.

As long as there are people pushing the lie that people can change sex, there will be males trying to get into female sports.

Stonewall, GIRES, Gendered Intelligence, Mermaids, No Outsiders all promote the lie that people can change sex (there are other organisations as well that do the same). If any of these are going into your children's schools to 'educate' them about trans issues, your children will be taught that they can change sex. This is what needs to be stopped.

A PP said: Love all the great comments on this thread. Women’s and girls sport being defended

I agree. But at the same time, it fills me with despair, because this site is the only avenue through which I see this happening.

Because people are engaging here with topics that are rendered taboo elsewhere, the people doing the silencing are working hard to discredit it. Mumsnet is notorious as a 'hotbed of transphobia' for daring to ask difficult questions; its reputation is growing for being trans-exclusionary. This is the position being touted - to resounding support - by prominent LGBTQ activists on platforms such as Twitter.

Academia is another sphere where such debates quickly make any challengers end up as persona non-grata (cf. the 'no platforming' stance executed against the likes of Germaine Greer). Only two weeks ago, a petition went out with a request for all academic staff to sign in support of trans-rights - but without any consideration of their potential effects on women and women's spaces. Fellow-academics retweeted it, with the message that they were proud of all colleagues who had signed the online document.

I didn't sign. And it's a stance that makes me really fucking sad. I've always, always been a staunch advocate of LGB rights - and also was about trans-rights until the TRAs took over and started their misogynistic campaign against women; lesbians in particular.

It seems to me that Mumsnet contains some of the few voices of commonsense in a very toxic wilderness which once again is set to trample over the very hard-gained and insubstantial progress women have made toward equality so far. What's worse for me is that if I voiced these views openly in the supposedly liberal environment in which I work, I'd almost certainly lose my job (or lose any credibility I ever had within it, which is tantamount to the same thing).

I find it all thoroughly deflating and dispiriting.

Interesting discussion. I'm in the "Boys/men should not be allowed to compete in girls/women categories". If this boy is allowed to compete in a category for girls it will set a precedence.

In 20 years time there will be no female athletes. Simply because if men are allowed to compete against them, because they self ID as a woman, there will be little point in girls/women training to be top of their game. They won't win. Sad.... 😢

Girls should be able to compete against other girls without interference, and downright cheating, from boys. Girls against girls and boys against boys makes it an even playing field. Anything else is nonsensical and blatant cheating.

If this boy wants to wear a sparkly dress and perform a skating routine at competition level, there is nothing stopping him performing it - in the boys category.

"If 0this boy wants to wear a sparkly dress and perform a skating routine at competition level, there is nothing stopping him performing it - in the boys category."

This.

I think a lot of people are confusing 'sex' and 'gender'. The two terms are not interchangeable.

In sports one should surely compete against others of the same biological sex.

The WHO has the best definitions I've found:
Sex: the biological and physiological characteristics that define men and women
Gender: the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women.

I don't see how it would ever be appropriate or fair for sports competitions to be based on gender.

The ultimate answer to this problem is that society needs to adjust its beliefs about what is "appropriate" for males and females. Then there will be no need for any sort of trans categorizations of people.

There's not going to be a transgender female in every women's race.

One of the problems is that there's no definition of what having a female gender identity actually means. It can genuinely apply to anyone wanting to enter a race against women.

@HopelessLayout is right - I have long thought that the transgender movement is mired in toxically narrow stereotypes of male and female - even more so than the rest of society, in my opinion.

If we had a society where children could choose their toys, clothes, favourite colours, hobbies, sports and activities without their choices being used to label them, and if adults could make their choices (job, hobby, sexual preferences, clothing, colours etc, etc), similarly unlabelled, then I suspect that a lot more children and adults would feel comfortable in their own skin, and in their own choices.

Exactly SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius

What the trans ideology promotes is that there is a certain way to be either male or female and woe betide you if you don't conform. Acting like the opposite sex, means you are the opposite sex, because only the opposite sex is allowed to act like that.

The Mermaids gender spectrum, which is being taught in schools, suggests children can either stay in their hopelessly limited boxes, or say they're the opposite sex in order to escape.

I've always, always been a staunch advocate of LGB rights - and also was about trans-rights until the TRAs took over and started their misogynistic campaign against women; lesbians in particular.

I was an instinctive ally of trans rights until men turned up in women’s sports and women were supposed to accept that the obvious advantageous effects of testosterone were “unproven” and women should just “try harder”.

The anger that this has engendered in me has unfortunately made me sceptical about the TRA’s agendas in general.

I am not an athlete but I do admire women who are and I enjoy watching women’s sport. One of my daughters has some sporting talent. I want to watch women at the peak of their athletic prowess, not mediocre men winning women’s prizes.

There's not going to be a transgender female in every women's race.

Another cry of 'it will never happen' that has already happened; the Rio Olympics, 2016, Womens 800m. The first 3 medalists were all trans women.

I have only read the first 2 pages and I am horrified by most comments. For what it's worth OP, I don't think that YABU.

This is an 11 year old child and as such the physical difference between the genders is little. I think denying her to compete with other girls is going to be better for her mental well-being than it will harm anyone potentially totally losing to her in a competition (if not winning will affect another child badly then I think we're talking about other issues).

The first 3 medalists were all trans women.

Technically they all had intersex conditions.

I've read more now and I feel like crying.

People assume that it is such an advantage to be a girl although born as a boy that all female athletes will disappear. 🤦‍♀️ That all the abuse and struggles would be worth it.

It is the same as when pro-lifers talk about someone making a choice to have an abortion as being an easy decision like having a cup of coffee.

I'm stunned and very saddened to read this thread.

This is an 11 year old child and as such the physical difference between the genders is little. I think denying her to compete with other girls is going to be better for her mental well-being than it will harm anyone potentially totally losing to her in a competition (if not winning will affect another child badly then I think we're talking about other issues)

It isn’t a mixed competition. The competition is split.

Do you understand what precedent is?

People assume that it is such an advantage to be a girl although born as a boy that all female athletes will disappear. 🤦‍♀️ That all the abuse and struggles would be worth it.

Look at the videos of the girls who have lost out to boys pretending to be girls. Do you think that is acceptable?