MNHQ transphobia guidelines part 2

[QueenStromba]

First thread here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/2120841-MNHQ-are-going-to-decide-what-constitutes-transphobia-on-MN-What-advice-guidelines-would-you-give-them?

Sitestuff thread that was about is here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/site_stuff/2117350-MNHQ-now-email-posters-with-how-to-get-around-the-talk-guidelines?

The thread that was about is here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/2107862-Following-on-from-the-TERF-thread?

OK, fine, sorry, I will leave. I will just add that I do not have a problem with the term 'women' including trassexual people who wish to be considered women, on Mumsnet. If it had ramifications in employment law and who were to be allocated as a spokeswoman for women of the planet, then I would probably reconsider, but it doesn't so I don't.

In reference to my comments of how transsexual people are treated on the boards in terms of comments or questions about sexuality, then I've obviously got the wrong board for that. As someone helpfully pointed out, that is likely covered with MNHQ's discussions with transsexual MNers and so inappropriate here. I'm not the best person to word that either, so it's probably best to ignore that here.

As Hakluyt has just demonstrated.

Well Corey myself and a number of others asked you what you referred to when speaking about intersex people being afforded a 'privilege' and you refused to answer.
I think the only person standing in the way of discussion here, is you.

Fair enough ye but you have to understand that the term 'woman' is not something we all have to agree is up for discussion, there is no reason for it to become ambiguous, if different groups are formulated then they can have their own wording/descriptions but changing the name meaning 'adult human FEMALE' to mean 'anyone who calls themselves a woman' is simply barstadisation. Nothing more.

Also, it is cruel to a person to tell them that they have the ability to 'change sex' and become a different one, nature simply doesn't work like that. I am not sure this new way of describing transsexuals is positive for them or for us.

If it had ramifications in employment law and who were to be allocated as a spokeswoman for women of the planet, then I would probably reconsider, but it doesn't so I don't.

It does actually.

Not as spokeswoman for the planet because it doesn't exist (although it probably should ) but transwomen are most certainly considered women in roles that involve speaking for women or representing women. Transwomen are also considered women for roles such as teaching in women only colleges or holding women only teaching positions such as in Women's Studies departments.

Eh what? On that other thread?! Where did I refuse to answer? I just haven't answered yet! There was no act of refusal. I wrote that post this morning before work. And then, between 9 and 5, as is the case with many people, was AT work. Therefore not on Mumsnet.

In any case, I didn't talk about anyone being afforded privilege, rather that you were privileging biology as a necessary factor of being female. Had I said 'delineating,' this conversation wouldn't be happening!

"If it had ramifications in employment law and who were to be allocated as a spokeswoman for women of the planet, then I would probably reconsider, but it doesn't so I don't."
It does, that is the whole point

I, and a number of others, felt like 'privilege' is very odd terminology to use when describing people born a woman (given the treatment of women) and intersexual people.

Biology is not a privilege it is just nature.

Nowhere did I use privilege as a noun. I suggested that you were privileging/highlighting/emphasising biology, in your argument, as an essential element of being female.

I spent enough years of my adult life in feminist theory/gender studies/semiotics seminars to understand what privilege signifies in the context to which you refer and why it's not the same thing as what I said.

The menopausal argument is totally bogus. It's like saying because humans can hear but some people become deaf as they get older, they are not human.

What do you think is the essential element of being female?

what is, in your eyes, the 'essential element of being female'

Also, while you're at it, what word would you use to describe that section of the population who have vaginas/uteruses/XX chromosomes?

Also, if you would, corey what role do you feel hormones have in the development of the human body? Do you feel that 20/30/40 years of hormones have no affect on the physical and emotional aspects of humans?

Do you believe that boys are socialised differently to girls?

Do you think that babies who are 'privileged' with female genitalia are treated the same as boys?

Y'know, I think I'm going to go down the old Irigaray route and say I don't think there is one. But that's just my view. I know a lot of folk don't rate Irigaray, but she speaks to me.

And Flora, I think 'woman' is a perfectly good word for what you describe. I just don't think that word has to have just one meaning.

You think there is nothing that differentiates women from men? Nothing at all? Not biology (?) or socialisation or hormones or anything at all? We are all just the same.

How do we discuss biological differences between the sexes if we are not allowed to use the definitions prescribed to those biological differences? How would you make a biology lesson 'transfriendly'

I suggested that you were privileging/highlighting/emphasising biology, in your argument, as an essential element of being female.

I totally get how you are using privilege here (as in emphasizing, awarding importance) but if you don't privilege biology, what do you privilege? What is left?

I am really really interested in this and I would love for it to be explored because I don't understand what the other options are. It just doesn't compute in my brain and I am genuinely interested in understanding how it computes in the brains of others if they are good enough to explain it to me. I am curious and fairly open minded I hope.

Well if there is no essential element of being a female, what does "female" mean?

Do you think it is okay to talk about women becoming pregnant, giving birth, women having cervical cancer etc.?

Beachcomber, I genuinely think it's down to how one chooses to identify oneself. It might not be 'true' but then 'truth' vis--vis identity - isn't that the kind of monolithic concept we wanted to, if not get rid of, at least interrogate?

ICan, not knowing much about teaching biology, I don't know how I'd teach a trans-friendly biology lesson. But there is of course physical biology, which is, at the end of the day, what it is - plain for all to see. But then there's subjectivity, which isn't static, IMO.

I don't see that identity plays any part in the oppression of women. In gender studies, it might be an interest examination of the self by privileged people with little experience of actual oppression I am more concerned with oppression on a structural level rather than navel gazing and pondering about the essence of ME That oppression is rooted in biology, women cannot "identify" out of it. There is a truth in the biology of men and women regardless of whether this is a truth vis-a-vis identity (which I don't think there is because I don't believe in identity).