Conciliatory Conversation On gender

[FairAdvocate]

Hello!

In the last few months I have been reflecting on the transgender and feminism debate and I feel I've got a few things to share with you on it from a perspective perhaps you wont maybe often hear.

To preface and explain, I am a transgender woman/female and I'm writing here today not to create any kind of argument or discord but because I am here to say that I think there are things that my side of the floor has gotten wrong.

I want to start from a position of saying that I can understand why some of you feel erased or afraid. I dont say that in a patronising way; I say that from a position of being fully periceved as female in society and I often to feel quite vunerable because of that in certain situations just like I imagine many of you do aswell.

I started down this road from hearing about how a 'A woman is person who says they are a woman'. I must admit I never quite got it. It makes no sense but yet, there are many transgender people and allies who say this like it has any kind of meaning. Just like when they also say that 'woman' is defined by a certain set of catagories etc. Its always bothered me and I didnt know why. For me, the more I have medically tranisitioned to female, the more Ive began to understand the word and defintion of female cannot be just removed from the term woman.

Now, I suspect this is where most of you reading this will be in decent agreement of. However I suspect what I say next will cause more issues. I believe myself to be female not just because of my physical aspect having been changed through medical transition (albeit its not a perfect process) but also because I believe my brain structure to have formed female in the sex differences between male and female likely at birth. There are quite numerous studies that do back this up to an okay but emerging degree and I am also aware that there also a few that dont say that exactly but say my brain formed in a kind of third way. Either way, I think it is clear from these studies that my brain developed differently to that of a male and it has manifested itself so I am quite closely alligned with being female.

To me, I feel like this makes a me kind of intersex person but perhaps in a different kind of way than we usually think of the term intersex. Though, through my medical transition obviously estrogen has, at least for me, solidified my mind to that much more towards female.

With this in mind, I find myself looking at the world as a woman but a woman who came with unique challenges and hurdles that are difficult to explain. For example, often I have been accused of saying its wrong that GRS gives me a vagina and have often been shouted at and saying im just sexualising it. However for me, the vagina isnt and wasnt the main source of my distress. The main source of my distress is that I will never have ovaries and will never have children and be a biological mother. I have never been interested in having a child as a male in anyway.

For me, it reminds me that I am not just a straight forward female and many will not accept me. After some deep reflection I think that I have also accepted that I will have to go through hurdles and I will have to remove my male form in such a succfient manner that I can be accepted by other women in certain areas. With that in mind I have also come to accept that self indentifcation shouldnlt be accepted. That tears at me because I wish I lived in that ideal world. But, as a woman who is only attracted to men, I understand frankly just how dangerous some of them can be. But ive come to the conclusion that if we keep pushing for this we are only making it harder for everyone and it will only lead to further division, more toxicity and we will just tear oursevles apart.

I do look at my rights from five years ago and I look at them now and see how they have reduced from prisons putting people such as as me in mens prisions, to the recent SC ruling, sports associations banning us. I do truly think that most women do and have historically accepted women like me but I also understand that came with agreements and understandings. Understandings which I think have been overstepped in the last ten years.

While I dont and will never accept calling me a man; I can understand why some of you that are reading this may have gotten fed up and stopped caring. I suppose what I am really trying to say is, can we all start again? If I can accept that women (including myself) need protections in some areas and I can accept the need for medicalising, the dropping of self identification, the need for due process in changing your sex legally can you accept that Im not a man? Can you accept that calling me certain things and the misgendering, using terms such as Trans identified Male is actually causing more harm than it is good?

Can we not as women actually just get our heads together and work out a decent solution? I do believe we might remain with some differences. For example I do believe a woman is a person who was born with a female gender identity by which I mean the overall average structure of the brain and therefore mind. And I do understand you will use a defintion to be defined by your anatomy. But I do believe that actually both of these can be true. While I cant be 100 percent true to your defintion I have tried to be because of where my defintion has led me and I understand how difficult that may be for someone who has all the correct anatomy to understand. But I have tried to understand how you feel so I am trying to ask for the same.

Finally, thank you for reading my long message. I am very nervous to be leaving it. Please can I ask you from refraining to calling me names and refering to me as a man, this is a request and not a demand. I have very much put myself out there with this and I hope that what is reflected back to me is the same spirit in which I wrote this.

Thank you

P.s I hovered over the 'Post' button for about five minutes before clicking it.

I appreciate that you're trying to reach out and trying to find a middle ground, which I don't want to entirely discount. I also appreciate that you strongly believe you're not a man.
BUT enormous amounts of damage have been done to women collectively and individually by trans activism, and in that context now really isn't the time for conciliation. Now is the time for women to have some space to repair and recover and figure out what needs to be set right without being asked to give another inch. Since the mid 2010s women have been TOLD (not asked) on threat of effectively being cast out of society (or gaoled for "hate crimes") that our needs and feelings and very lives were not just irrelevant, but made us bad people. People's lives (mostly women) have been ruined by this massive overreach by trans activists (mostly men). And so many of us have been walking on eggshells in fear in our social lives, work places and worst, in our own families. Trans activism has been incredibly divisive and destructive for women.
You might not be aware of a lot of what's really happened in countries like the UK because the censorship in media has been SO heavy and strict. Many of your arguments show a lack of awareness of the full situation in context.
Take sport for an example - you've said sport is "complicated". But it REALLY REALLY ISN'T. The US Goverment keeps very detailed annual statistics on childrens sport because of Title IX, and at every age (from 5 years) boys exceed girls in every single sport, except for a very brief blip at age 11 when girls beat boys at swimming and field sports like high jump because at age 11 girls have a big puberty growth spurt just as boys growth slows down pre puberty. By age 14 there is daylight between boys and girls results. 14 year old boys can and regularly do beat adult women's Olympic and World records. Everyone who's ever been involved in sports with both sexes can see this massive difference without being told. It's so painfully clear that someone saying that a transwoman can fairly compete with women is like someone saying gravity isn't real. Like, it's that blindingly obvious. And no the "tiny number" isn't an argument at all. Lance Armstrong was one man taking drugs (which don't give nearly the margin of advantage of male vs female) and he managed to dominate and control a whole sport single handed for decades. ONE transwoman/girl in women's or girl's sport is enough to destroy fair competition.
And that applies to all sports that involve any level of co-ordination, strength or speed, including pool.
Chess should be female only for different reasons - sexism starts young and girls are often excluded from excelling at chess because of social conditioning.
And sport is only one issue of so many.
Now is the time for you to listen and understand, not ask for more from women.

Okay so I dont identify to be a woman. I actually really dislike that term. I find it demeaning to me and who I am. I really dont like when transgender people or allies say this at all. I also dont agree that I dont identify with women. I feel that much of what ive spoken about has tried to do just this.

I do also actually understand exactly how you feel about single sex spaces. For example, if an obvious crossdresser came in then Id feel uncomfortable. Im not without trauma and I understand my ability to physically defend myself isnt great.

I think this is why passing is important and this is why I also made the concilliation on medical transition. I feel that even a transgender woman with testosterone is still problematic because of the sex drive differences between estrogen and testosterone. But however I also think this shouldnlt be taken to extremes. If a transgender woman has made great effort then yes, I fully feel she should be treated with that respect.

Um yeah. It hasnt.
I have read the studies and they are pretty robust to be fair.

Please, please,do not start to use the Holocaust as any kind of evidence to support your claims.
Millions of Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and the mentally ill were enslaved and murdered as they were not part of the Ubermensch.
It is not comparable. In the least.

I just read pages of self absorbed male entitlement here.

I wish you the best but I won’t indulge you. Maybe try Reddit?

Please cite?
We have also 'read the studies'. There is absolutely no convincing evidence that male and female brains are structurally different at birth - they diverge throughout the life course due to the impact of experience (socialisation) and hormones but there is no evidence at all that male people can be born with female brains.

See this is something I have and where I think most feminists actually part ways with you here. Its specifcally when we hear this:

'Why is the fact that you have a modified your body in such a way that you now feel that you may be threatened in the male single sex facilities, a problem for women to solve?'

because this is really just saying rape and sexual assault on a feminine person, a person percieved to be female is not your problem. This is not the right way for us to go and I really just dont feel this type of exclusion solves any problem for any woman.
And I say this as a Survivor of Male perpetrated sexual assault on me.

You cherry pick the research on “lady brain” because you want to believe it. You think you are a special case, but there have been many, many posts like yours on mumsnet before. Many of us have been here years. We have read the research on brain categorisation, and we have reached a different conclusion to yours: the only female brain is one that resides in a female body. Your body is male. Your brain is male.

Now, I suspect this is where most of you reading this will be in decent agreement of. However I suspect what I say next will cause more issues. I believe myself to be female not just because of my physical aspect having been changed through medical transition (albeit its not a perfect process) but also because I believe my brain structure to have formed female in the sex differences between male and female likely at birth. There are quite numerous studies that do back this up to an okay but emerging degree and I am also aware that there also a few that dont say that exactly but say my brain formed in a kind of third way. Either way, I think it is clear from these studies that my brain developed differently to that of a male and it has manifested itself so I am quite closely alligned with being female.

I find this argument really unconvincing and, frankly, dismissive of women. For a start, I disagree that the science shows anything or the sort. There really isn’t a “female brain”. Even Cohen’s contentious work labeled a minority brain type as “female” because there wasn’t one that even 50% of women shared. And the work looking at transwomen’s brains seems to find they are closer to men’s than to women’s unless they take female hormones.

But also because women’s place in the world and our distinction from men, the grounds of our oppression and the continuing strongest factor in the poorer outcomes we get from society, is so strongly linked to our physiology and the reproductive burden it supports. You do not share it. “Thinking like a woman” even if you do, which I find unlikely, is not and can never be the same as being a woman.

Actually I havent. If you read through my intial message I acknowlegde not only is this still emerging, some studies dont directly say this and they point to a third developed path that actually still isnt male.

You say 'Lady brain' like it isnt a real thing. But sex differences between male and female are real and objectivly exist. Things like Cortical Thickness, Gray Matter, Response to Stimuli, I could go on really but it does get very technical and honestly I must abit I feel abit overwhemled from all the replies.

I am begging you: please channel your intelligence into talking to your fellow trans community.
You understand they are the ones ruining it fir you right? What are you going to do about it?

Male attacks on other males are fundamentally a problem that males are responsible for.

Males are responsible for 98%+ of all sexual assaults and 100% of rapes. Women make up ~90% of the victims IIRC. This is one of the reasons why we need single sex spaces for women.

If we just start letting in any male who feels unsafe in the male spaces then women's spaces lose their ability to safeguard women.

If you want to fight for your own spaces then go ahead. But you must not colonise our spaces. Again, where is the empathy for women?

We never said a feminine person was the same as a female person. What happens to a feminine person is not a feminist issue

Look to be honest, I dont really want to get into a fully technical discussion about studies here. Ive seen quite a few that I have been convinced by if you havent thats fine.

But I do want to reply to this: 'the continuing strongest factor in the poorer outcomes we get from society, is so strongly linked to our physiology and the reproductive burden it supports. You do not share it.'

I do want to highlight here that in most statisics transgender people are usually high percentage victims of crimes like Sexual Assualt. Im also a part of those numbers. Not only do I understand poorer outcomes; I fully share them and I think that by acknowledging that more than one group understands what its like we dont take anything away from anyone. My boyfriend for example reiceves racist abuse all the time. I dont therefore tell him that he will never understand what its like to reiceve poorer outcomes in society. Espesically when racial hate crimes are always so high.

This seems a lot of words to say I’m going to push my male presence into female spaces even though I know it may cause harm and distress to women, but it’s what I want so suck it up. No man can ever know what it’s like to be a woman, and claiming they do is offensive and demeaning to women.

if men claiming a trans identity did in fact have “female brains”, their empathy for women would prevent them from causing harm and distress to others surely? Women are socially conditioned almost from birth to be kind, budge up,make space. It’s how this misogynistic movement took off. And the tantrums when women say no are epic.

The attempt to appear reasonable whilst mansplaining is something we’ve see many many times.

Give me links to posts you have made in trans spaces calling for greater empathy and a fresh start

Let's just say none of us here needed telling you were male. Your male entitlement shines through everything you write.

Your middle ground- I'm a special case and you must allow me - no you are not special, you are not female, you do not have a female brain because you are not female.

The conditional understanding we tacitly offered has been abused beyond belief. We gave an inch, and look at the miles that have been taken. No. Not again. Take it up with the activists who messed this up for you.

This sums it up. We have spent years fighting for our sex based rights. We’ve lost jobs, lost friends & family members, been physically attacked & arrested. I’ve been surrounded & intimidated and had smoke bombs thrown at groups I was in. Your side used to be very clear on ‘No Debate.’ Our side were told to be kind and shut up. Lesbian groups had to go underground because it was the only way to stay single sex.

Now suddenly we’re expected to be open to debate and start conceding again? If the judgment had gone the other way, would the TRAs ‘be kind’ to us?

You must see that on a practical level there is no way to say ‘Some males can come into our spaces & some can’t.’ There’s no realistic way to monitor or enforce who does or doesn’t qualify. Even if we wanted to.

No it really isn’t complicated, and here is my view. Sometimes in life you cannot have what you want, it’s that simple.

So if you have chosen to present as the opposite gender, you need to accept that part of that decision was self excluding from sports. You do not get to say ‘but I still want to do sports so everyone needs to pretend I’m not what I actually am, tolerate me in their changing rooms, forget about their own privacy/dignity and be willing to lose out on their dreams of winning because I’ve decided that I’m more important.’

I think the real issue with this, as it often is the case, is that even if you dont see me as a woman im still not a man. So relating Sex crimes done by men onto women either makes me a victim myself or not part of it.

I dont understand all this exclusion. Its the one thing I can never understand. I understand the fear to be fair though. I think I have answered the point of 'males entering into the spaces' fairly well initially and its obviously why I made concilliations around certain trans rights targets and why I think they dont understand the sensitvities that sorround womens history and experience enough.

You are a man though. That is biological fact. Adult human male = man.

Is the robust research the one which divided men into trans/not trans, but did not think to divide gay/straight for the analysis? Or one of the ones looking at proportions of grey/white matter which do not, between them, find consistent results? Or one which selects a single trait, and doesn’t look at multiple measurements which would undermine that categorisation? Does it ignore the plasticity of all human brains? We have read them all. I can’t be bothered to read them and criticise them again, and I may be misremembering some, but the bottom line is, we have been there, we have done that, and we do not agree with you on the science.

It is, sadly, very common for people to visit these boards and severely underestimate the collective knowledge of the incredible women here. Our female brains are the brains of lawyers, statisticians, philosophers, geneticists, poets, teachers, doctors and many more. The feminist board of mumsnet is one of the most erudite and impressive internet communities out there.

Links to your posts in the trans community please

Your reply honestly just made me sad. I feel Ive tried to make an effort to start a conversation that was always going to be hard and taxing for me but I wanted to do it because I feel we all have to start talking or we are just going to end up giving ground to the worst kinds of men if we havent already.

Every cell in your body is male. You cannot change sex. Having surgery to try and change your outward appearance is irrelevant.

You are not a woman or female and never can be. I feel sorry that you have presumably been lied to by health care professionals and activists in your community.

Frankly I think you should seek help for your mental health issues from a competent professional who does not believe in gender woo.