Think the way people use the term 'trans widow' is insensitive to actual widows?

[justmaybenot]

The wives of men who have transitioned often use the term 'trans widow' and some of the responses to this letter from an actual widow have expressed some envy for someone whose husband has died rather than transitioned. AIBU to think it's overblown and deeply insensitive to liken the experience of your dh transitioning to the position of someone whose dh has actually died? This is the letter rachelemoss.com/2021/06/24/a-letter-to-trans-widows-from-an-actual-widow/

A husband who transitions is not the husband, not the man his wife married. If she called the husband by his male name, she'd be 'deadnaming' him because that man is dead.

She's a widow but has to suffer the gall of seeing him prancing about being a woman. Probably has to make allowances for /apologies for his new life to ease the suffering of her children. It's not offence to women whose husbands have died to express your complete loss of your husband as widowhood.

@HotChocolateLover

Tough call. Last time I gave my views on this I got called transphobic so I won’t bother but sorry for your loss *@justmaybenot*

I don't think the OP is any kind of widow. Just trying to stir up trouble.

People really don't like women speaking about their truth do they?

@Witchesbelazy

Is this going to be moved the same as when someone who is gender critical posts here about the topic? I hope so

I wonder…

Another one?

The Transwidows twitter account has been the subject of death threats and there is a concerted effort by some groups to destroy, what has been until now, a safe space for transwidows on the FWR page. Some people don't like transwidows talking.

The previous thread (which is still current on the sex and gender debate board) and this one will not be the last....

I tell you who is "insensitive" the people sending us death and rape threats in the last week and trying to shut down our right to associate by mobilising the internet against us.

Jesus

Rachele E Moss has clearly never read a trans widow thread here.

They are a trans rights activist. It appears they have been over here. They just don't care about the predicament of trans widows and don't feel they have a right to complain / find each other for support.

Tinsel and to all the Transwidows.

The intention to shut you down and shut you up is clear. Abusive tactics in plain sight, while playing the victim.

The world can see it.

I think it’s entirely appropriate. It’s not a competition.

@TinselAngel as I said on the other thread,

They cannot silence us all. I am not frightened. I know what is true and what is fact.

I and many thousands (millions) of other women will always have your back.

🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻🌻

@TinselAngel I hope you're holding up ok.

Oh jeez, give it the fuck up OP.

Bloody hell TinselAngel xxx

FFS apparently adult males can identify as girls but women using a well known linguistic shorthand are going too far

Which rule of misogyny is that?
"Men are whatever men say they are and women are whatever men say they are." others probably apply too.

Leave the transwidows alone.

Acceptance without exception
If a man says he's a woman he's a woman
TWAW

funny isn't it that the people demanding these things are trying to deny transwidows those same rights

Tinsel and all the other transwidows

Interesting poll results, don’t you think, OP?

OP? Surely you haven’t plopped and run on a topic so close to your heart?! Not here to discuss?

Never mind, I’m sure all the thwarted prefects will be busily lobbying MNHQ to get this tucked away into the sex and gender section, which works out just great for all the transwidows who go there for support who will then have two threads to read about how their reality doesn’t count lovely stuff, OP, well done you. When it gets moved you won’t have to see it ever again, but you can rest easy that they’re under no illusion about how inappropriate you think they are.

So...

Trans women are women but trans widows are not widows? How does that work then?

Also 'dead naming' has been a huge thing in trans ideology, with the narrative being that the old person is 'dead' and so to utter that name would be 'literal violence'... Or something.

Is that not offensive to people who have actually had someone close to them die?

Or is it just women who must have their language policed in this way?

This again? Pretty sure that the OP on the feminist board got their arse handed to them on this subject.
No, it's not insensitive.
However, insensitive doesnt even begin to cover the lack of empathy needed to police the language of women who have been put through the wringer by the kinds of narcissistic spouses discussed on the ttans widow threads.
I think you'll find, OP, that MNers tend to be fiercely protective and supportive of women trying to escape controlling and coercive relationships. I don't think you're going to get the kind of response you're looking for.

And how come the words 'woman/wife/mother' are fair game to be appropriated but the word 'widow' is not?

It's almost like males can do what the fuck they want and females must always do as they are told....

Nice of the OP to come back

@SilverGlassHare

I’d say it’s a bit fucking rich for TRA handmaidens to object to the appropriation of the word widow when they’re very happy for men to wear womanface and appropriate our safe spaces, our names and our lives.

If you don’t mind golf widow or grass widow and you’re happy to chant TWAW, then you can fuck right off about this.

Couldn't have said it any better myself, excellent post SilverGlassHare.

Support and strength to you TinselAngel and all the other trans widows who are finding themselves in the firing line of yet more abusive and hateful TRAs and their allies, you and your children have gone through more than enough already without having to put up with this latest onslaught. We all know why there is a determination to silence and demonise you, your words and your experiences just don't chime with the most stunning and bravest and most oppressed ever, ever in the whole wide world mantra glibly chanted by the cheering hordes of allies. You can't be allowed to tarnish the picture with the cold, hard and invariably nasty reality of what you and your children have endured.

Strength and honour to all trans widows.

It’s strange and rather fucking annoying that mumsnet have changed the feminist board topics and are being very strict about what you can post and where, but this post can remain in AIBU. They also allowed a trans person to post on the baby name thread as they were looking for a their new name as a man.

In answer to your OP, yes YAB very U. If you refer to trans people by their previous name, they call it dead naming after all.
And if the partner feels like a widow, they are a widow....seems to work elsewhere. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Someone told me on here the other day, in all seriousness, that two intact male people can form a lesbian relationship.

To even speak their name would be dead naming. I wonder if dead people get offended by that term?

Can't speak for the dead, but I find the term very uncomfortable.

I changed my entire name as part of moving forward after a difficult childhood and my first name is more unisex as I like it and it somewhat eases my dysphoria to have a name that doesn't automatically identify my sex - but the name I was raised with is still mine, I don't use it but just like everything it's part of who I am and it's part of how I think of my younger self who I think deserves more respect for what she survived than erasing her name.

More so, I think naming the dead is very important. The idea that something being dead means it shouldn't be mentioned or acknowledged does not sit well with me. I discuss my dead loved ones all the time, by name and the reading out of women who've been killed by men is very powerful and meaningful to many particularly their loved ones left behind.

I just feel uneasy with any cultural concept where death and the dead is made to be something we don't discuss and where choosing a new path in life means we're meant to not discuss the past.

Women are told to 'grieve' marriages and relationships by trained therapists, ffs.

Yup. I've had therapists discuss grieving my mother. My very alive mother, but she wasn't the mother I needed, wanted, or deserved. I had to grieve before I could move forward (something an actual widow discussed once that really resonated with me, moving forward vs moving on) without being weighed down by the expectation that one day that's what I would have. I won't, a loving mother isn't part of my life, and that sucks in multiple ways, but now it doesn't hurt as much because I've mourned, felt the pain of that which takes time, and accepted that though it'll never feel nice, there are better days with things as they are.

Those still in the mourning stage or want to discuss their pain should be linguistically bettered for it, language is often very limited to the complexity of life.