Disown by mum friends who I have known for 20 years due to my gender critical view.

[rouxelitee]

I am a bit sad today because I have been disowned by my group of friends who are mothers. I have known them since college. All of us have children, mine is a toddler.

One of them is a paediatrician. Let's call her JY. She supports the trans-movement for children. Recently she has shared an article with the whatsapp chat group on sexual and relationship saying that this should be how children are parented. https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/sex-relationships/
I didn't agree with the gender and identity section and I called it out. I said that affirming children in this matter will make things worst. The conversation escalated and she basically cautioned me that this is hate speech and if a doctor have the same view as I do, their license will be taken.

Fast forward to today, my partner and I are have been researching on local schools and their policies on the same matter, preparing ourselves for when our child is of school age. We found out that this school in Leicester has the following policy.

7.3 In accordance with the Equality Act 2010 we will not inform a parent or carer about a student being Trans or gender questioning.
7.4 Confidential information will not be shared with the parents and carers without a student’s permission, unless there are safeguarding reasons for doing so.
_
https://www.newcollege.leicester.sch.uk/force_download.cfm?id=3190

I felt that this is such a massive red flag, that I need to warn all my friends to look into their school policies.

JY then said "Much as I value our friendship, I do not have headspace to engage in these issues. I'll bow out of this group." A few others followed and quit the chat group.

They will possibly not talk to me ever again. I am very sad and I feel very alone in this matter, and that my partner and I and alone in this battle alone trying to protect our child from the state, the school and dangerous ideology.

I guess I just want to not feel like a crazy person shouting on top of my lungs "please look into this, this is bad".

Thanks,
roux

Really: forced to self exclude? I have no idea what that could mean or why it would have anything to do with someone else's gender preference or presentation. How someone else identifies has absolutely no harmful effect on me. Im not even curious about it.

You really can't see why some women would choose to self exclude from spaces where biological men could be regardless of they 'identify'? Really?

Yes I really can’t. I don’t give a fuck who pisses next to me in a public bathroom.

Do you think women who have suffered rape, sexual abuse, trauma at the hands of men, or for religious reasons may want to be in places like changing rooms (where you would expect to be in a state of undress at some point)!and the like which they expect to be just women and not want men there?

Or like me who luckily hasn't experienced such trauma but just doesn't want men in my such spaces because I just don't?

You really can't understand that? Hmmm.

Then you clearly know nothing about the effects of severe trauma. I know several women and girls for whom going to the loo in public spaces is difficult even if they are single-sex. Sharing, or even queuing with men, makes it impossible. What is your response to that? I know 12 women and girls who have been raped, and I don't work in the field. I think you massively underestimate how many women have made horrible experiences and need single-sex spaces for their sense of safety. Why do you prioritise trans people over these highly vulnerable women and girls?

You're so worried about the 0.5% chance that your child might believe they have gender dysphoria and not tell you about how they feel - that you're prepared to move house to find a school that will definitely tell you if your child discloses?

🤦‍♀️

The world has gone mad.

I work in Trauma—I am an LICSW in the US. Lots of people get raped, assaulted, abused, and have trauma. Girls, women, men, boys, and non binary and trans people. They are all human and deserve safe spaces and therapy and consideration. Itvis not healthy or necessary to demonize an entire class of people in order to “protect” women. Your energies and political will would be better spent strengthening protections for all, making the police force take sexual violence seriously, prosecuting and imprisoning sex abusers, getting money for trauma victims, and creating truly safe spaces for everyone such as private/single occupancy toilets or staffed toilets. Lots if things can and should be done to make society more humane, less violent, safer for women, better for trauma and torture victims of whom there are many. This anti trans hysteria is absolutely a distraction from the hard work that needs doing to make all our children safer. Its cheap fake heroism for a tiny subset of bigoted women that does nothing to protect actual victims which, of course, include boys, girls, and non binary and trans children. Everyone needs safety.

It's not anti-trans. It's anti-men, as statistically they commit the majority of the violent and sexual crimes that occur. No one gives a fuck how men identify (trans women are men), as long as they stay out of women's sports and spaces. Why do you think single sex spaces exist in the first place?

That's why you don't get people being against trans men being in spaces. As they are female.
The fact you can't or won't understand this, and you work in Trauma is very concerning.

And all that still doesn't explain why you can't understand why women need single sex spaces away from men.

Ok well IM NOT ANTI MEN. Is that not clear to you? I am certainly anti criminal acts. But I am not anti men, ffs. Your child will go to school with little proto men whether they are trans or not—she will share classrooms with (ugh) boys and have male teachers. You are projecting all this rage on gender non conforming people when your real antipathy is towards the entire male sex—does it not include your dh, df, db? Are you determined to vilify an entire sex because of a few bad actors? This is nearly pathological at this point. No wonder your friends dumped you.

Anti-men in women's SPACE AND SPORTS. Not anti-men PERIOD. Are your comprehension skills really that poor?

I've got plenty of friends. Are you even an adult?

@pikkumyy77

You're wasting your breath trying to persuade the GC's on this board to show any sort of humanity towards or acceptance of transgender women.
They would ideally like to live in a world where this group is legislated out of existence.

Women need single sex spaces. Get over it. Accept it.

@izimbra your comprehensions skills are sitting at the same level, as evidenced by this post and all the others.

Any answer (you've been asked a lot) as to why men should be in women's sports with all the physiological advantages they possess just because they 'feel' like a woman? Should they be in women's prisons and rape crisis shelters?

....tumbleweed.....

"Women need single sex spaces. Get over it. Accept it."

That's your personal view.

I'm a female. So is my daughter. So is my sister. We've all been the victim of sexual assault in our lives. None of us want transgender women excluded from female spaces.

So you don't talk for me.

BTW - I'm not going to engage in a conversation with you about issues like sport or female spaces while you refuse to acknowledge the reality of transgender lives and transgender experiences. You're literally incapable of seeing this issue from anyone's point of view except your own. You're absolutely steeped in GC orthodoxy. It's like this issue has become a full time job for you - the hundreds of thousands of words you've typed about this issue, ffs - why not go and do something that materially actually impacts on women's day to day lives?

I am not demonising trans people. In fact, I have little interest in them. I am interested in the lives of women and girls.

Mixed-sex means "everyone", including men. The overwhelming majority of sexual violence is committed by men. It is not being anti-men to say that but a statement of fact. Based on this fact, women and girls are safer in single-sex spaces and that is why we want them. Some women and girls need them in order to be able to fully participate in public life.

Safeguarding is based on assuming the worst of people and then creating rules to try to prevent crimes. That, too, is not being anti-men or anti-whoever, it is just how safeguarding works. If we assumed that nobody would ever do anything wrong, we could could get rid of all protections: safeguarding, the police, the courts. However, statistics tell us that people do commit crimes and that the majority of sexual and violent crimes are committed by men. That is why we need safeguarding. Based on the evidence we have, men should not have access to women's toilets and changing rooms.

I agree that trans people need safe spaces. I disagree that those safe spaces should be women's toilets and changing rooms. Your "solutions" don't work for everyone and are therefore no solutions. You persistently prioritise trans people over other vulnerable groups. I find your views regressive, misogynist, ableist and excluding.

@izimbra
I'm a woman who has experienced sexual assault and you do not speak for me. I'm supposed to have single sex spaces protected in law and people like you are giving that away by bowing to the wishes of men. I would argue you are are the one so indoctrinated and steeped in your ideology that you think the women objecting are the oppressors.

You, your daughter, your sister or your sister's cousin's pal who lives down the road doesn't get to give away that right for all women. If you're fine with that, good for you.

There are plenty of victims of male sexual violence and for religious reasons that don't want to be in spaces with biological men. Why aren't you respecting those? Why are y you campaigning for third spaces? Why aren't you using your time to campaign against male violence towards women, get that 98% stats down and then maybe women wouldn't mind men being in their spaces regardless if they have special feels or not.

For the hundredth time, no one cares where trans men go. Into the women's - fine. They are female. In the men? As they think they are men? Not my problem. So by that it Isn't. A. Trans. Problem.

You can't engage about sport because if you acknowledge you shouldn't due to their advantage, your shitty house of cards falls down.

This is a contentious issue to many and often friendships only survive by agreeing to disagree or just avoiding the topic altogether.

I personally would not have “called out” on WhatsApp a part of the NSPCC keeping children safe booklet shared for everyone to take a look at. Most parents understand that this sort of blanket guidance isn’t meant to apply 100% to every family or child.

In addition, I would not have posted the policy from some random school with some kind of advisory of “watch out for this as it is dangerous ideology”…when you already know that your opinion isn’t shared by the rest of the group.

You need to decide what is more important, friendship or pushing your political views and opinions on others?

Fwiw, I have faced a similar sort of situation and I chose friendship and left all politics of parenting at the door.

"Safeguarding is based on assuming the worst of people and then creating rules to try to prevent crimes. That, too, is not being anti-men or anti-whoever, it is just how safeguarding works"

These are exactly the same arguments the far right is using to justify their arguments for deporting/not offering asylum to people from sub-saharan Africa - because black people are over represented in the crime statistics in the UK.

Quoted the wrong person but no, it’s not exactly the same arguments at all. Please educate yourself about safeguarding before making such an embarrassing statement.

You are statistically very unlikely to be burgled, but everyone still puts in measures to prevent this happening - locking your doors, ring door bells, alarms, despite the odds being tiny.

Same as single sex spaces.

Why do men matter more to you than women?

Honestly it’s like explaining to fucking Sooty.

What exactly are you doing about male violence against women and girls @izimbra

"You can't engage about sport because if you acknowledge you shouldn't due to their advantage, your shitty house of cards falls down."

What advantage?

My daughter is 5 ft 3 and obese. She went to a state school with terrible sports facilities. She's never been any good at sports.

My niece is 5ft 9 inches. She went to a fee paying school and had great sports teaching - she plays competitive netball.

Why are these fundamental genetic and economic inequalities not an issue when it comes to sport, but would be in relation to the very, very tiny number of transgender athletes?

Are you being serious? You must surely be on the wind up with that example? 😂

"doesn't get to give away that right for all women"

You don't get to say what women want or need.

You get to say 'this is what some women say they want or need'.

The whole point is moot anyway - because you and I know that it's simply not possible to police women's toilets to exclude transgender women from these spaces.

So you can talk about it until you're blue in the face (and you will) but the reality is that it's not something that ACTUALLY makes any material difference to our day to day lives and it's fine to gas on about it all day every day, as you do here on mumsnet - but it's a fart in the wind. Legislating on this issue genuinely won't make any fucking material difference to women's lives. Underneath you know this.

Not what the polls say. The majority of women don't want men in their spaces and sports.