AIBU to ask what you think should happen with Trans men?

[Akiddleydiveytoo]

OK, I know this is an emotive subject that people feel passionately about so I'm prepared to don my hard hat here in anticipation of the backlash I'm likely to receive. I'm genuinely not trying to be goady though - I am genuinely interested in trying to understand people's opinions on this.

Since the Supreme Court ruling last week there has been lots of discussion about trans women and the impact that the ruling has on their rights to access female only spaces. There has been less debate, however, on the impact that this ruling has on trans men. Surely, if it is ruled that trans women are men, then it follows that trans men are women and should, therefore use women's facilities.

Is this really what women want? A post op trans man who had undergone full gender reassignment surgery would, to ask intents and purpose have a male presenting body complete with muscles, body hair and penis. Would women really be comfortable sharing facilities with such a person. Similarly, should a post op trans woman with breasts and a vagina be forced to share facilities with biological men?

I fully understand and support the need for women to have female only safe spaces and disagree wholeheartedly with trans women competing against biological women in sports due to their genetic advantage but I'm not sure the SC ruling of last week is really the 'triumph' that women's rights activists claim it to be as it presents as many questions as it does answers. I also fear that this judgement will result in single sex spaces being lost altogether as service providers, unable (or unwilling) to comply with all of the legalities and complexities involved, just get rid of single sex provisions in favour of unisex/ gender neutral facilities.

As I said, I've seen lots of debate about this over the last week but, for me, I still have a ton of unanswered questions so I was just wondering what others opinions are.

men's rights activism.

I'm so sorry that this happened to you

Thank you.
The trans umbrella covers such a multitude, including what would in the past have been referred to as transvestites (males with a fetish for female clothing)
The individual I referenced wore/wears lingerie, stockings, heels etc as a kink to be frank, but most of the time is male presenting and ultimately is a heterosexual man who is abusive. These males should not be in female spaces no matter what style of clothing they are wearing that day.

@Theresyoursalad Do you know that your original pre edited post can still be viewed, you could report and ask MN to delete your post if you don't want people to be able to see it

I still don't understand why, for some women, the argument is only the likelihood of any woman being raped by a TW.

TW aren't women. That's why they don't belong in women's spaces.

Otherwise, what's the point of having women's spaces in the first place if we still have to also be open to any man who wants to be in there?

It's a shame that some people allowed themselves to ignore the law and take advantage in the first place and that that now puts them in an uncomfortable position. But it's no more uncomfortable a position than it was for the women who knew they shouldn't be there and didnt want them.there in the first place.

I don't support the fact that all the attention on trans women is letting the cis men off the hook.

This is just nonsense though.
It doesn't let anyone off the hook. Why are you so concerned about protecting some men (if not all)? Why is your concern for men and not women?

The crime stats are there. You choosing to ignore them isn't making them go away.

The focus is currently on TW because of the recent clarification. That doesn't mean people have forgotten that men are the problem. That's the whole point of the ruling - recognising that some men pose a risk to women and TW are men.

I mean, it's not rocket science!

There are accessible toilets because disabled people campaigned and fought for them, so that they could actually go to places knowing they would be able to go to the toilet.
They are not extra big cubicles to make it more convenient for parents to go in with their children; parents with children often take ages in there. Some places even provide a toilet that disabled people can access, then decide to put baby change facilities in there. Lots of people who need an accessible toilet aren't able to wait around for ten minutes to use it.
If people want bigger toilet cubicles so they can go in with 2 or 3 kids, maybe they should campaign for them.

Funny about all those men who suddenly realise they are women when they're on trial for rape or other violent crimes ...

I would mucher rather have bearded transmen in my spaces than this bearded "lesbian"

Why is every video I ever see of the most militant, obnoxious, aggressively insistent trans people men dressed as women? It's the men in a dress, donning wigs and whatever adornments that are consistently dogmatic and militant in their insistence that they be treated as women. It's not the trans men. Funny that.

I agree it’s not an ideal location for the baby change. But as you say it is where they are often placed and hundreds of thousands of parents across the country use them because that is how it’s usually set up.

At this current point trans people now need to know also that they can actually go to places knowing they can go to the toilet. Technically is this not a medical condition?

Considering this facility is already available it’s a no brainer and hopefully this judgment will mean that more are required.

I am happy to change my baby where ever and if parents vacate the accessible loos then that frees up a lot of capacity for trans people. Problem solved! All we need to do is move the baby change. More free loos for disabled and trans people. Win win!

My 38yr old stepson is trans. He has a full on beard, slightly thinning hair, bulky arms. If you didn't know, you would never know.
He walks like a man, looks like a man, talks like a man, behaves like a man. He is a man.
I cannot, cannot imagine him having to use the ladies bathroom anywhere. You would never look at him and think that he was born female, so what you said there is nonsense.

If a man walked into in a woman's toilet, he could just maintain that in actual fact he's female. How would you know? You think you could tell? Not always.

You haven't understood what I said.

I don't want men in places where I feel vulnerable.

Believing that you are a biological man because you've got some whiskers is nonsense.

I'm slightly stunned that with all this drama over changing spaces and toilets no one seems to have considered that making toilet and changing spaces more private and enclosed and for individual or family use rather than communal would be better for everyone anyway...

You really think no one has considered it and that you’re the first? Really?

Does they? Or being so convincingly male do they use the men’s?

either way it’s not an issue

I’m wondering whether things had gone the other way if all the transmen in women’s prisons (of which there are a significant number) would have been moved to male prisons. In which case they would have been very unsafe.

I wonder if anyone would have cared as they don’t seem to have thought about transmen at all through all of this. Or whether the same rules they wanted for trans women, to be accepted as their chosen gender in all areas of public life, would have suddenly been abandoned.

I suppose I might also be "stunned" about that if I had entered the conversation 8 years late and thought I was the first person to think of it, and also the first person not to think that it goes much further than toilets and changing spaces.

God this is tedious!

So much drama over such basic things. We provide public toilets, jails, and hospital wards that are segregated by sex. If you are a man you use one and a woman the other. Man and woman refer to your sex not your feelings or how you look. The meaning of man, woman and sex has been clarified in the high court so we don’t need to constantly be qualifying what we are trying to convey and can get on with discussion/life.

I agree with the Op some middle ground needs to be made. There’s so much hate on both sides, but the problem isn’t going away. Woman need safe spaces and trans women need safe places but it probably isn’t the same place. But I do think a little compromise and compassion in the world FROM BOTH SIDES would make it less of a problem.

The thing is most of us suggested and argued for 3rd spaces and were called transphobic bigots and worse for even suggesting that they shouldn't be in our spaces. Where do you think the E (exclusionary) in TERF came from.
Transwomen want the validation of being in the women's spaces it's why when swimming created a 3rd category for transpeople lia and his cohort refused to sign up to it. The hate all comes in 1 direction and it's not from women we're just not willing to pandering to an invading force anymore, we want our words and spaces back and now we have the backing of the law we are taking them back and the men don't like it

So much hate on both sides?
Nonsense, all the hate flows one way only and it isn't from women

I didn't 'ignore' anything. I went to watch some TV.

I'm still pondering on the disconnect between trans women in prison having the same pattern of sexual violence as men - which is true - and the fact that the number of sexual assaults committed by anyone in toilets is so low - also true.

Especially given for at least 15 years if not longer, trans women have been using women's toilets. So there's plenty of time for toilets to have revealed themselves as a hotbed of criminal activity. The overall trend for sexual assault has been upward, but the numbers in toilets have remained static. This suggests that the risk to women and girls lies elsewhere.

So I'm not sure anyone has presented the smoking gun statistical evidence of trans women being a risk to women in public toilets, as per my original statement that has upset a few of you. Reports of sexually motivated incidents including assault have increased in unisex changing rooms, but there's no evidence that this is trans women. And this issue is so highly charged that decisions have to be made on the evidence. Women are rightly afraid, and so are trans people, but fear is no basis to make policy.

A massive pressure group has come together to make the world a safer place for women and girls, which is brilliant, but in my opinion - which I am entitled to - they are targeting the wrong audience, and doing so in such an effective way, that no one is talking about cis male violence any more. Trans women make up a tiny percentage of the problem. We've established that their criminal behaviour is aligned with their biology, but they only represent about 0.5% of men.

It's like focusing your efforts on violent men who are colour blind. Also about 0.5% of the male population. Men who have perfect pitch - also about the same. Trans women are not more likely to commit sexual assault than any other man. Men with perfect pitch are not more likely to commit sexual assault than any other men. The identity or ability is separate to their violent inclinations, there's evidence to suggest that sexual assaults in toilets are static and no evidence to support trans women causing problems in changing rooms.

I'm sorry but I'm a facts not feelings person on this, purely because feelings are so high on both sides of the issue. The law is now clear the trans women can be excluded from single sex provision. Not that they should be - they legally can be. I believe they should be excluded from sport, sex-based employment quotas, women's refuges if they choose, women's support groups if they choose, prisons and hospital wards. I don't believe they should be excluded from toilets and changing rooms based on the evidence. I believe we need to find a way to balance everyone's needs. Some of you guys are losing your minds over this - fine. That's your right. But my view isn't extreme.