Cis

[Fabulosia]

I’m receiving an unpleasant battering on social media regarding the term “ cis women”. Can anyone point me at resources to help me defend my objection to this terminology?

[Whatsnewpussyhat]

But it’s not likely to go away because it’s useful and has gained general acceptance

It isn't useful and is completely unnecessary.
The 99.9% do not need to define themselves as 'not trans'
It would be like defining ourselves as 'not anorexic'

[Blaueblumen]

It literally only means a person is comfortable and happy in the body they were born into.

What a ridiculous concept

Most people I know don't like something about their bodies ?! That makes us all a non-cises?

[PopGoesTheProsecco]

I really hate this term. Just ‘woman’ thanks - I’m an adult human female. I do not need a prefix.

it really smacks of men redefining women.

[CoozudBoyuPuak]

@Blaueblumen

It literally only means a person is comfortable and happy in the body they were born into.

What a ridiculous concept

Most people I know don't like something about their bodies ?! That makes us all a non-cises?

Gosh. So are all the people born with (and not happy about) missing or malfunctioning body parts also "not cis" or does being not happy with your genitals occupy a special status that isn't available to people who aren't happy with the eyes, heart, legs or arms they are born with?

What about people who are desperately unhappy with the body they were born with but have enough grip on rationality to know that they can't identify out of reality?

[CoozudBoyuPuak]

Sorry that was in response to @DemelzasGreenDress (as quoted by @Blaueblumen ) rather than to @Blaueblumen .

[tellmewhentheLangshiplandscoz]

@Titerama

Whatever 🙄

Be offended at it, by all means. But it’s not likely to go away because it’s useful and has gained general acceptance.

See you've summed this up perfectly.

I'm not saying I'm offended but many are.

I've tried to afk you a genuine question (why can only one group be offended and not the other) and you've demonstrated in such a grown up fashion that women should stop moaning and suck it up.

And by the way the use of the single word "woman" to describe a biological female has been widely accepted and in use for centuries longer than cis.

[JellySaurus]

Accepting 'cis' means accepting that 'woman' can mean something other than adult human female.

[Donotcallmecis]

As per my user name, being called 'Cis' infuriates me!
I'm a woman, an adult human female! No prefix required.

[waterlego]

They always try and claim that us old dinosaurs are getting left behind and everyone in the ‘real world’ is now using this language as a matter of course. Well I first saw ‘cis’ in print probably 5 years ago, and I am yet to hear a single person use it in the real world. I haven’t even heard my teenage children and their friends use it.

[NemoandDoris]

Cis, which means 'on this side' in Latin, implies that I am a women (born and bred) as apposed to trans which means 'on the other side of.'

trans and cis implies there are two types of women which are 'equal in gender' status. For those of us who do not believe trans women are women it is a bit grating.

[KohlaParasaurus]

I'm still only seeing "cis" used in earnest by transactivists. It's doesn't seem to be in routine use even in captured institutions. It isn't intended as a neutral descriptive term, and presenting it as if it were is naive or dishonest. I'm not opposed to evolving language, but this example can get in the bin.

[BenCoopersSupportWren]

I don’t think I’ve felt “happy and comfortable” in my body for more than a handful of days in my life, and I’m not young. I was bullied as a child for a physical attribute. I have a congenital disability which has affected me to a greater or lesser extent since my teens. In addition, as a woman (OG variety) I was socialised to be dissatisfied with my body, my looks, my variance to the standard society / male approval considers to be “beauty”.

I do not have a gender identity. Gender is a man-made construct which varies over time and place and which is used as a tool of oppression, particularly for women and girls.

Nevertheless, I have never had any doubt or uncertainty about the fact I am a woman. I was born female and grew to adulthood. That is literally the only qualifying criteria. And it is a fact. Not a feeling, a wish, a desire, an opinion, a fetish or a form of womb envy.

“Cis” is meaningless, unnecessary and downright fucking offensive to women as a sex class.

[BlackForestCake]

There's never any need to say "cis" when you can say "real".

[Treaclemine]

Actually, there is a usefulness about it. It tells you that the user is not worth listening to.

[MargotBamborough]

@BlackForestCake

There's never any need to say "cis" when you can say "real".

I prefer female women and male women.

Just to highlight how batshit it is.

[JellySaurus]

@waterlego

They always try and claim that us old dinosaurs are getting left behind and everyone in the ‘real world’ is now using this language as a matter of course. Well I first saw ‘cis’ in print probably 5 years ago, and I am yet to hear a single person use it in the real world. I haven’t even heard my teenage children and their friends use it.

In the 'real world', where the majority of people are unaware of this assault upon women's rights, the terms 'transwoman' and 'trans woman' are understood as referring to a woman who thinks she is or wants to be a man - ie a woman who has a trans identity, just as a Christian woman is a woman who has a Christian identity etc.

Forcing language such as 'cis' upon us is not to differentiate between women and transwomen. After all, the trans belief system maintains that there is no difference between them, so why claim the need to differentiate between them? No, the entire purpose of 'cis woman' is to validate the use of 'trans woman' in reference to male people. Transwomen are men, not a subset of women.

[ATerrorofLeftovers]

@waterlego

They always try and claim that us old dinosaurs are getting left behind and everyone in the ‘real world’ is now using this language as a matter of course. Well I first saw ‘cis’ in print probably 5 years ago, and I am yet to hear a single person use it in the real world. I haven’t even heard my teenage children and their friends use it.

I’ve never heard it spoken either. And I work in a fairly woke field, with other lefties like me. In fact I don’t even know if one would pronounce it with a hard or soft ‘c’!

It’s not common parlance at all, regardless of the frantic efforts of activists like the poster upthread.

[ATerrorofLeftovers]

@Treaclemine

Actually, there is a usefulness about it. It tells you that the user is not worth listening to.

Actually, you are right and I stand corrected. If nothing else, it is very useful for this.

[Blaueblumen]

How is it meant to pronounced - Kiss or Siss? Both sound pretty dumb, the first like a kiss 💋 the latter like a Sissy

[ATerrorofLeftovers]

@Blaueblumen

How is it meant to pronounced - Kiss or Siss? Both sound pretty dumb, the first like a kiss 💋 the latter like a Sissy

Yes, both sound silly. I would feel like a fool saying either.

Maybe that’s a bonus, as far as some are concerned?

[AmuseBish]

@AmuseBish

because it’s useful

So which meaning is true? Someone who has a gender identity that matches their sex (if you can let me know which genders match female, that'd also be useful), or someone who is not trans? And does the latter include agender people?

How would I go about finding out if I am cis, trans, or neither? What do you take it to mean if someone is 'cis'?

@Titerama as someone who finds it a useful term, please could you explain the things I don't understand, that I have asked here?

[DemelzasGreenDress]

@Fairislefandango

Just imagine if we applied this to race! A bunch of white people start identifying as Asian, for example. So then everyone who's actually Asian starts being called cis-Asian. Ridiculous and offensive.

It literally only means a person is comfortable and happy in the body they were born into.

No it 'literally' doesn't. That's a woolly, and frankly even more offensive, description of an already offensive concept. Do you think all people who aren't trans are 'comfortable and happy in the body they were born into'? Maybe have a little think about the people for whom that might very much not be true.

I'm a disabled person who cannot mobilise without a wheelchair, whose body was born broken and not working, I'm in pain constantly.

Of course I'm unhappy with that.

And of course you knew exactly what I meant when I made my comment.

Fucksake. This is why there's no talking to you people. There was no aggression, spite, anything of that sort in my comment but you're so willing, several of you, to tear into those of us who are here answering - perhaps people shouldn't start threads like this if they can't handle the metered, calm comments it attracts without grabbing some buns at the ready.

[literalviolence]

@DemelzasGreenDress

I'm a disabled person who cannot mobilise without a wheelchair, whose body was born broken and not working, I'm in pain constantly.

Of course I'm unhappy with that.

And of course you knew exactly what I meant when I made my comment.

Fucksake. This is why there's no talking to you people. There was no aggression, spite, anything of that sort in my comment but you're so willing, several of you, to tear into those of us who are here answering - perhaps people shouldn't start threads like this if they can't handle the metered, calm comments it attracts without grabbing some buns at the ready.

Thing is, people don't know what you mean and your refusal to explain it is part of the problem. It's not self evident. People who don't see the world as you do are not being obstructive or rude or dismissive. But your refusal to discuss and explain your pov is. The no explain, no debate does not help at all. If you have reasoning behind your assertions, tell us it.

[CoozudBoyuPuak]

@DemelzasGreenDress ^metered, calm comments" that are intrinsically sexist and offensive still cause upset even if the person who wrote them was totally calm and unruffled when they wrote them. People have explained many times both on this thread and elsewhere why the term cis is sexist and offensive.

But also the definition you gave is wrong anyway. There's plenty of people within the trans umbrella who are perfectly comfortable with the maleness of their body and have no desire to change it chemically or surgically. Gender dysphoria exists (as a phenomenon where someone realises they don't fit sexist stereotypes and this is pathologised as a problem with their body) but it isn't a requirement for being trans.

[nilsmousehammer]

'Cis' means 'I'm signalling that I'm a good girl who believes in pandering to men's egos above my biological reality and above the needs and interests of women.' Or to some male people as you can easily find on line, it means 'scum'.

If you're into supporting male supremacism, well that's an opinion and you do you. Some women have been successfully sold a word salad scam about it, but that's in fact what it's about.