AIBU to think that women should be able to request same-sex provision?

[Glinner]

The tweet below is astonishing for two reasons. First of all, as the poster points out, this is the NURSING AND MIDWIFERY COUNCIL saying that one's sex is 'assigned' at birth. They said this out loud! As part of their evidence to the GRA enquiry!

But aside from that nonsense, what stood out for me was the number of nurses, midwives and nursing associates whose 'gender identity' does not match their sex. 4,484! That seems like a high number, does it not? I wonder how many of that number are fully intact males?

You might remember when Clare Dimyon requested a same-sex nurse to attend her during her mammogram, the NHS responded in the most extraordinary way--they took her name off the letter and published it in official literature as an example of a 'bigoted' request.

One thing for which we should be grateful to Eddie Izzard: Now we are under no doubt that in many cases 'trans' means, simply, 'crossdresser'. Are these 'trans' nurses, midwives and nursing assistants crossdressers? Are women within their rights to request that crossdressing men not be present during intimate exams and so on? If a woman makes this request, will she be committing a hate crime?

Here's the Clare Dimyon story

glinner.co.uk/interview-with-clare-dimyon-mbe/

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/patient-branded-transphobic-after-asking-for-female-medic-3jh3snddt

twitter.com/Sexnotgender_/status/1357034763039686662

[quote WouldBeGood]@Kettledodger I think I just wanted to make the point that I don’t think men should be prevented from doing these jobs. I did say there should be a choice.[/quote]

Why should a man have a right to do a job that will cause some of the client base - exclusively women - discomfort? It's not like he can switch to specialising on men. It's totally guaranteed that there will be some women throughout his career who he will make very uncomfortable and they won't be able to say, due to past sexual trauma. This is guaranteed.

So, why does he have a right to enter that profession? Why does his personal interest in a specific part of human biology and function override every woman's right to not be triggered by having a man they don't know touching and seeing their genitals. And quite honestly, why would he even want to when it's put like that? Why is the focus on him and his rights and interested and wants and not on the well-being of all women?

I think it's usually not put like that and these men, if they're the nice ones, don't think about it at the beginning of their careers, but they get it later on and become super gentle and understanding.

There's a sponsored/sticky thread from the MoJ saying that 1 in 8 women are sexually assaulted at some point in their lives. That's an awful lot of women. That basically means on an average single day, every single ob/gyn in the country is seeing a patient who has been sexually assaulted. It's not just one or two women on a Mumsnet thread!

To add: they become gentle and understanding BUT that doesn't mean they're not causing women distress.

Btw it doesn't at all mean all male medics are abusers, not at all. That's again centering them. It's not about them, it's about all women's experiences!

I’ll think on it.

Like many my views are shaped partly by personal experience and I’ve been traumatised by treatment by women both in life and in medical care. But I see the issue and the views of others and will give it proper thought.

I do agree with the right to choose.

I disagree with the view that men’s choices in terms of professions should be limited. But there should be a choice to have an alternative HCP

There are some amazing male obstetricians. I had a high risk pregnancy and was seeing obstetricians in a clinic bi-weekly. I never felt in any way bad when a male obstetrician picked up my file.

Have you heard of professor Nikolaides? His work in fetal medicine is absolutely pioneering (he invented early methods for NT screening, screening for risks of premature birth and how to save the babies in twin-to-twin transfusion). He has a passion to help pregnant women and their children and he is a very kind man.

I think everyone should be allowed to choose their careers, men and women and follow their interests. That is the way we can have amazing, caring professionals.

However, there needs to be a choice for women and men women to be treated by HCPs of the sex they prefer. Some women may want their midwife or obstetrician to be female. Some men may want the person to do a prostrate exam to be male.

I cannot believe that some people are trying to take that choice away. And to accuse people of various things when they try to execute that choice is horrific. Why would you try to close down a discussion about choice with alluding to nasty undercurrents in thinking?

I find this frightening.

Of course it is Leeds which is where the wonderful Managed area of prostitution in Holbeck is unquestioned by the Labour Party...

Ah, Holbeck. The one place in Leeds where they do know what a woman is.

I don’t think the issue is with men choosing a career as a MW. The issue imo is much deeper.
I think most people, men or women, believe that being professional is what matters and the sex of the HCP doesn’t matter. Of course, being professional is essential. But I suspect there has been very few studies looking at the effect of the sex of the HCP on the care WOMEN receive. I also suspect that even when there is an obvious issue (eg @Dinosauratemydaffodils), the answer is never ‘this happens because the HCP was a male’. These types of occurence are classified under ‘previous MH issues’.
The fact that some trauma has been reactivated by the presence of a male HCP is ignored. Because well.... women’s feeling are often discounted as not important (or nit as important as...).. I really think that, in dinosaur case, said HCP reacted that way. He has done everything right, was kind, professional etc... so how could he be the reason for all her struggles?

Link to that is the fact that acknowledging that also means acknowledging the fact that sex matters. In that we are in a society where one sex is living under the regular fear if the other. Of course, on a day to bay basis, it doesn’t show. But I d8nt think many people, men or women, actually know what are the stats of the REAL level of rape and sexual assaults and general body harm sustain by women. Because they don’t report it. (Or maybe can’t report it... see how the system is set up). Nor are the studies showing how men would readily rape a woman if they know they wouldn’t get caught (or actually have no idea that what they did is was rape).
We go back to minimising ‘women over react/cry for wolf/are too emotional etc...’

I read recently about a lady whose disabled child was in a special school. She was very upset because the school has introduced a policy of allowing staff to self declare their ‘gender’ which would be recorded instead of their sex.

This meant that the parent could no longer specify a same sex carer to perform any intimate care for the child.

So a severely disabled, non verbal child who can’t advocate for themselves at all has their safeguarding and dignity entirely disregarded because the school has decided to ignore the law that is designed to support that child’s need for same sex care.

We know that sexual assaults on vulnerable children happen. We know that predatory males will put in a lot of effort to access victims - why try and make it easier?

Here's a male midwife who thinks women's distress at not being able to object when uncomfortable is funny, and that he is the victim of "sexism" by women who didn't want him to treat them:

I’m 50 now and have encountered a certain amount of sexism in my career. I’ve had 118 people – mostly women – refuse to be cared for by me. I have had other patients who were shocked to see a man; there was one who didn’t say anything, but the look of total shock on her face was very funny. Most people assume I’m a doctor when they see me. I have to be very aware of that. My gender is technically irrelevant, but there are underlying perceptions and unconscious attitudes.

https://amp.theguardian.com/society/2019/may/09/tutor-not-job-man-roofer-male-midwife-nhs

Because they are women now, didn’t you know?
So they can’t possibly sexually assault at or rape a child because only MEN rape....

Actually, I think we also need to say loud and clear that if there is such a thing as a female penis then there is also such a thing as female rape. And that female rape is just as bad and unacceptable as male rape.

One of the comments on the Guardian article I just posted:

It's also disappointing that some women chose not to be cared for by you. It's a side of sexism that we rarely hear about - surely in this day and age we should accept that anyone can do any job regardless of their gender. Clearly some people will be bashful about exposing their genitals to a man, but to anyone with medical training the genitals are just another functional aspect of the body like any other, and there is no need for the taboo.

So a severely disabled, non verbal child who can’t advocate for themselves at all has their safeguarding and dignity entirely disregarded because the school has decided to ignore the law that is designed to support that child’s need for same sex care

And this has happened to someone I know. A woman found out her severely intellectually impaired teenage daughter was having her nappies changed by a male, despite being told the gender of the person was “female”. No one respected the girl’s right or her mother’s right in this instance.

That's awful.

In a bid to make our society equal, we’ve made a lot of things gender neutral.
So everyone can be whatever they want or have whatever job they want for example. We all have the same rights (and should also have the same responsibilities).

The problem is that
1- by making everyone equal, we actually expect everyone to act like men. Being a man being the default position. And everything is ‘making things complicated’. In some ways, it’s a left over from attitudes we see in science for example (women are too complicated with their hormones. Men physiology is the ‘norm’). Also comes from the fact women have been finding hard to prove they are ‘as good as men’ and ‘the same’ (as just as able than)

2- we are deliberately ignoring the fact that actually men and women are different. They are raised differently, they have different experiences in life and therefore are NOT the same. It’s staring in our faces all day long but it’s also a good way then beat women with a stick by saying ‘we are the same therefore if you are uncomfortable/don’t progress at work/feel threaten, this is all YOUR fault as a person.’ Nothing to do with being a woman.
Obviously also applies to all the gyne stuff we’ve been talking about in this thread.

PP quoting this 'comment' from the Guardian.

Clearly some people will be bashful about exposing their genitals to a man, but to anyone with medical training the genitals are just another functional aspect of the body like any other, and there is no need for the taboo.

Fucking hell, I've just seen red mist. And that never happens to me.

What is it with these intrusive arseholes who think they have the right to decide other people's personal boundaries and bodily autonomy for them? Just who are these fuckers? And what do they stand to gain from it?

Like so many women on this site I too am a victim of sexual assault, sexually aggressive behaviour and rape (gang rape). Yes, my Ob Gyn was a truly wonderful bloke, and given he was also my infertility consultant I'll be indebted to him for the rest of my life. But I WILL decide that boundary. No one else. In many other circumstances I don't want some male I don't know or trust implicitly poking around in my nether regions. And I'm within my full rights to reject that.

They can get to fuck with these suggestions that women of a similar mind are guilty of 'sexism'. And I want to know: why the persistent pressure on women (and it is only women) to ignore their boundaries and not to listen to their own gut instincts? Why are some people relentlessly pushing at those boundaries and prodding at women? And what do they stand to gain from it? (I'm including some other women in this too BTW). Women are not bothering men: we are not constantly running about pushing and prodding at their boundaries and making perpetual demands on them. Why can't they just leave us alone?

Grr, even the word 'bashful' gets my bloody up. The Grauniad and its equally ignorant readers can fuck the fuck off with that noise.

a male who identified as a woman came into the psychiatric ward where I was a patient... She was placed on the woman's wing but with a support worker permanently sat outside her door. It did make many of us feel a bit uncomfortable. The worst thing was after being on leave 'she' came back for a discharge meeting and was now identifying as a man.

I just wanted to highlight this important post from UndertheCedartree. Women in a psychiatric ward had their choice taken away from them, because the choice of a male was prioritised. And I say male, as they had decided to be one again, once not in a psychiatric ward. How is it ok for women in such a vulnerable position to be overridden in this way?

Actually, I think we also need to say loud and clear that if there is such a thing as a female penis then there is also such a thing as female rape. And that female rape is just as bad and unacceptable as male rape.

But - as I'm sure is the point you're making - there is no such thing as a 'female penis' so the question is moot. In following your reasoning it's pretty much impossible to arrive at any other logical conclusion, but logic and even plain old reality are elusive in this debate. And unfortunately the emperors new clothes are still remaining stubbornly 'visible', and freedom isn't the freedom to say that 2+2=4.

It's like transubstantiation. You can point at something and declare to the hilt that it isn't really what it appears to be but something else. But it ain't corpus Christi. It's still a boring old wafer.

There are now apparently “female” rapists I believe as crimes are reported on gender identity rather than sex.

The last thing we need in my opinion. Please let us hold on the objective fact and biological reality in law as in medicine.

@DaisiesandButtercups astonishing interview here with Kate Coleman on this subject.

I don't think it's outrageous to be questioning why men are allowed to be midwives. They're not allowed to be NHS mammographers.

Breast screening involves having an X-ray (mammogram) at a special clinic or mobile breast screening unit. This is done by a female health practitioner called a mammographer.

www.nhs.uk/conditions/breast-cancer-screening/what-happens/

I suppose we have to rely on them interpreting the female properly.

Check with Stonewalls first?

Word female obvs - very busy

So what happens if they bring in a post op transsexual who is biologically male with XY chromosomes yet looks like a woman and lives as a woman, and does not have a penis? Would that be ok? Even though she’s actually of the male sex?

For example it’s not the actually the chromosomes and biological sex that is the issue, it’s whether the person has a penis or not?

Or what if they were to send in a pre-op transexual who although still had female XX chromosomes he looked like a man and lived like a man (but without a penis), he had a deep voice and facial hair due to hormones etc, but because he had the female XX chromosomes he was assigned to you because technically he’s of the female sex which you asked for?

I’m just curious to where the line is drawn?

This isn’t meant to be goady, I’m genuinely curious - Is it the chromosomes that matter or whether they have a penis or not?

I’m 50 now and have encountered a certain amount of sexism in my career. I’ve had 118 people – mostly women – refuse to be cared for by me. I have had other patients who were shocked to see a man; there was one who didn’t say anything, but the look of total shock on her face was very funny. Most people assume I’m a doctor when they see me. I have to be very aware of that. My gender is technically irrelevant, but there are underlying perceptions and unconscious attitudes
I’m sorry but that statement is exactly what women experience in professions every day. Mechanics, plumbers, electricians.... the list for women meeting this reaction is far longer. And a female plumber isn’t wanting to check your pipes

No just the fact that they are male.

He acknowledges that people think he's a doctor (perceived as higher status) without calling out the sexism back the other way.