I do not believe in gender identity.

[SernieBanders]

There are two sexes: male and female. Occasionally, that matters.

There is no such thing as an innate gender identity—no internal essence that makes someone more inclined to wear dresses and sip wine, or football boots and down pints. Those are cultural stereotypes, not proof of some mystical gendered soul.

The idea of gender identity is sexist, misogynistic, and regressive. It reinforces outdated norms instead of challenging them. Women do not need an inner feeling of womanhood to be women. Men do not need a gender identity to be men. Sex is real. Stereotypes are not.

I hope with the flurry of cultural changes, legal challenges, scientific findings and executive orders in the last ~12 months, more people feel able to stand up and be counted, and say - No More.

What sports are women better at - let's discuss those?

You may not care about sports, but millions of women do. Awful 'I'm alright jack' attitude. Why don't these women deserve fair sports?

Maybe they do?

Maybe they actually are that clueless, privileged, self-centred and callous towards other women.

Women like this do exist.

And there we have the usual ignorant answer. The complete falsehood of ‘some’ sports female athletes are better. No, equestrian involves a fine relationship between a well trained horse and the human aspect. No other sport are female athletes better.

But then the dismissal, the ‘I don’t care / don’t like sport / whatever’ anyway.

This is the typical answer for people who argue that people should not be segregated by sex based on their ideological belief. They avoid the answer until they can’t and then this answer follows.

It really is a script and one that relies on not only falsity but the privileged ‘I’m alright Jack’ position.

That's possible. But as we still have men in women's prisons and sports, there are apparently people in positions of power who also hold these views.

Name the other forms of segregation? You keep talking about these other safeguards, please list them or else I think those reading along can understand that you really have got nothing but your repeated declarations that the world should be a better place.

I’ll start. Chaperones as used in medical care and in child safety.

Please talk us through how every prison cell is going to be able to have a chaperone there as protection.

Why do they always have those names? Porn star ones? Nobody is fooled!

40 pages of comments, 86% of people still don't believe in gender ideology, and those who have come to defend it's tenets have only shown how right we are to not believe in this nonsense

We're about to run out of space, but I am very, very glad to have this conversation in front of thousands of people, I hope you will all feel more able to talk about this corrosive nonsense in public, at work and at home. If the vast majority of people agree, you are in good company

It only took one person to say what everyone else was thinking

that the emperor has no clothes on

And the spell was broken!!

Tell your friends. Tell everyone

Usually sports and prisons are the two areas that people who demand the blunt version of equality (instead of equality of opportunity that feminists campaign for) dismiss as unimportant because their theories cannot hold up under those areas.

If you believe in your ideologically based theory that doesn’t reflect reality, you cannot argue your point comfortably around those two areas. So you avoid discussing as much as you can.

Whether it is the blunt version of equality before anything else or the version that is based on male people being able to become female people, which I see as a branch to that grand egalitarian society at all costs theoretical based.

It is why some activist organisations publish communication guidance that warns the people who follow them to avoid those topic of discussions and to deflect away from those discussions.

What I find curious is that government and institutions are still cleaving to ideas that any fool can see are absurd.

Time to grow up and rejoin the adults, now. There are only two sexes and its not possible to change sex.

Men cannot become women, and womens rights are contingent on sex.

Not gender identity.

Gender identity is about as important as astrology to the functioning of society.

elite sport makes a tiny part of my life

And mine, and I'm not planning on ever going to jail ....but I do give a shit about other peoples rights and safety,

being defined by my gender is a much bigger part of my life

I'm curious what on earth that actually means in practice.

Of course there should be nothing to stop anyone from whatever the heck this is (in a similar way to having a life defined by adherence to religious beliefs perhaps) , other than in those few areas where one persons sense of 'gender identity' is in conflict with another persons sex-based needs.

I didn't realise he has died. He,was a seriously violent man who described himself as a woman.

Preach and spread the word

Errol

I think that if the answers keeps following the script, the answer will not be surprising.

True but also more damaging than astrology

@SernieBanders thank you for starting this thread originally. Been really useful to observe not only how many people are woefully lacking in understanding of science, but also how poor reading comprehension skills and understanding of literary devices such as metaphor are. And don’t get me started on critical thinking skills.

At the root of much of this appears to be a chronic erosion in the quality of education in supposedly ‘developed’ nations. I won’t blame social media too much, either, as a decent education, the ability to properly scrutinise sources, to understand the foundation blocks of science and to ‘believe’ established and proven facts is still down to education.

I think we need to start there and get back to basics…

JeannetteBlue
For some sports, women are better.

Could you be very kind and just name three? Not asking for much, I feel.

Some years ago there was an amusing thread where we tried to think up new sports where women might have an advantage ... afaik there weren't many convincing suggestions, except possibly limbo dancing.

Just so. (grin)

The 'women are better at some sports' really is the fall back for those who have no fucking clue. It is like the 'I don't believe in competitive sport anyway, so what does it matter' position.

And the 'are you really saying women are inferior' line of argument.

And the 'children should be all playing sport together because sometimes a girl will beat boys'.

And the 'we should be able to restructure sport to allow male people to compete fairly with female people, just like weight divisions or handicaps on high performers' arguments.

They are made by people who may have read an activist repeat that line and they have been convinced by it. Or they simply wish it was all so with no critical thinking going into the statement and no research at all.

The people who make the statements have not understood the nature of competitive sports, how discrimination works to deter female people from participating, or even the philosophy behind 'fair' competition.

For any person wanting to start to consider the research about sports and why they are segregated by sex, this thread is a good starting point.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5142027-save-female-sports-evidence-thread?page=1

In response to the OP, we can 'believe' in gender identity or not, it doesn't really make much difference. Some people feel very strongly about the stereotypes applied to people of their sex. Some don't. Some hate them, some like them, most of us feel a mixture of things.

'Gender identity' stereotypes mean simply the things that society suggests are appropriate, suitable for your sex - pink for girls, blue for boys. They are arbitrary. Boys who like pink are not girls.

Whether or not we like certain hairstyles, or make up, or certain clothes, or toys, or activities, has very little correlation to our sex.

When we have separate services or spaces for males and females, we have these because of sex, not because of people's feelings about stereotypes.

Women have the right to privacy, dignity, and safety, to fairness in sport, to access to opportunities, to equity.

Women's rights don't apply to 'men who have thoughts and feelings that they think are different to those of other men'. There can be all sorts of men with all sorts of ways of being. But no man can ever be a woman, or become a woman.

I strongly believe no one really believes in gender identity, even the ones who pretend to - their actions show they're very aware of who the men are.

I always end up back at the feeling that if women don't really exist, I can't see why anyone male would be so desperate to become one that they have to pretend to be one. It makes no sense, and seems entirely futile.

Gender is a grammatical term relating to nouns in various languages, as far as I am concerned; I have a feeling Finnish does without it altogether.... Not sure why anyone would be so keen to identify as a noun, but I suppose whatever floats your boat.

It's all about affirming an identity and exerting dominance on others.

Link to part #2:
I do not believe in gender identity - part #2 | Mumsnet