Is Mumsnet HQ evil or not very bright.

[TiggyD]

As some of you may already know you're allowed to call transgendered women "men in dresses" and refer to them as "he" and "him.

"So some men dressing as women..." as one posted said in relation to trans women got the reply from RebeccaMN:

We agree that this post is in poor taste but we don't tend to delete on those grounds because it would be really hard to know where to draw the line.
The truth is, we don't think we should be the arbiters of what people should find offensive and what they shouldn't. In these instances, it's very rare that a tasteless comment is left unchallenged, and we would highly recommend that you put forward your point of view on the thread.

Well firstly I think Mumsnet should draw the line at discrimination of a protected minority group.

Secondly, if MN don't think they should be the arbiters of what people should find offensive, maybe they should ask a representative from a human rights or anti discrimination group? Misgendering is always wrong.

Thirdly, is it rare an tasteless comment is unchallenged? Now the trans people on Mumsnet refuse to post on trans related threads who the hell is going to challenge them?

Fourthly, that post was unchallenged. Have a look at the thread.

Fifthly, "tasteless"? "TASTELESS"?! WTF? Tofu is tasteless. Would MNHQ describe calling people spastics or coons or faggots as tasteless? Misgendering is a put-down towards an entire minority. Dismissed as tasteless.

A quick look at a quote about the 2010 equality act:
"harassment - unwanted behaviour linked to a protected characteristic that violates someone’s dignity or creates an offensive environment for them".

Is there harassment in trans related threads on here? Is the dignity of all transwomen violated by referring to them all as men in dresses? Bleedingly obviously yes. Does it create an offensive environment for them? How the hell could it not? Does Mumsnet do anything to stop it? No.

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It all makes me wonder if the people of MNHQ are deliberately letting all this unkindness and discrimination and harassment go on because they evil, or because they don't know any better.
I think I have it. I reckon it's like the Ricky Gervais thing where he started doing "Mong" faces. All kinds of people told him it was offensive and an unkind name for people with Downs Syndrome but he refused to accept it. I think he thought that as he believed himself to be a good person, and he used the word mong, that mong had to be an acceptable word because he was good. I think it must be like that in MNHQ. They believe themselves to be good people and when they allow people to call transwomen men on thier site it's fine because their belief in themselves being good trumps all the views of the victims.

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One question for MNHQ that I alluded to earlier. Have you ever asked any kind of trans, human rights, or anti-discrimination group about how to treat trans people?

Have you?

Ever?

Ego has a tendency to not answer questions but demand answers sophie.

I think three things:

In the medical world, if there is any doubt over a baby's sex, the decision is made based on function: if there is sufficient penile function to enable the child to stand against a wall and urinate, they are designated male. If not, they are designated female. That is regardless of karyotype (XX vs XY). Regardless of presence or absence of a uterus/ovaries.

Secondly, there are lots of people who do or say things I don't agree with. It isn't obligatory to make my feelings on those matters clear. DD1 has SN and her driver has transitioned. Despite taking many years to crack pronouns, she has managed to cope with calling her driver 'she', despite occasionally slipping up. She also clearly notices that her driver is not a 'ciswoman' but has worked out that it isn't something she should ask/talk about. If she can manage it, I think grown adults without SN can manage it.

However if she was to ask about it, I would tell her very simply that some men don't feel like men on the inside so choose to look and dress like women as much as they can. Because that is the truth.

Thirdly, I am a woman and I'm not 'cis' anything.

I would love to know if we have a word for human with a vagina. Do you think we need a word to define these people? DO you think they suffer discrimination based on their biology (having a vagina) or do you think they suffer discrimination due to their 'gender'?

Well its quite intrusive of me to ask these questions. I just don't know where else to ask them.

I hate being in an argument when I don't know the facts. Especially when it might involve offending people.

I just kind of want to understand. I mean for my part I kind of think of myself as both genders, I suppose, or neither - sometimes I see myself as a man, sometimes as a woman I think but it is fluid and never clear.

It's a mixture of all the things I was ever told I was, family members I was told I reminded my mother of, things I did as a child. I identify through these brief moments and conversations and comments.

I don't think I could ever pin it down to 'man' or 'woman'.

So how does someone decide that they are a woman? What is it based on?

So how does someone decide that they are a woman? What is it based on?

Every account by a transwoman has led me to believe the answer is 'not a man'. IF they don't feel like man they must be a woman.

I don't like stereotypically male things, but I do like dresses and bras, so I must be a girl.

I don't like the idea that a woman is 'not a man'. If you are not a man, you are a trans man. But you are still a biological male.

you say you were born male and have a penis? Then, in my opinion (which I believe you asked to receive, in your post) yes you are a man. You will never be a woman even if you do have the full surgery, you will be a transwoman

I'd love to answer your questions but I don't want it to become about me.

Bollocks.

And you never answer those questions. And you certainly have not answered any of mine. But you keep asking us the same questions and we keep answering you.

lougle - is that really still true of medical definitions? It seems unlikely nowadays - if you have an amnio and want to know the sex of your baby they'll tell you 'girl' based purely on XX.

Thanks Ego, I can understand that. I will search you

PM if you like though I certainly won't expect one, it must be really annoying having the same questions asked over and over.

Sorry. You're not on here for a web chat.

I'd love for these threads to move on. And I understand the view that people aren't listening. However, on all these countless threads, there's nothing given by the transpolitics non critical types to work with. It's just accusations of bigotry and expectation of acceptance of a situation that is damaging to women.

I am not a non-man. That you want to be such, Ego, is tremendously sad. It's shit that society is such that you feel that there is only one solution, and that it is such a difficult one.

That said, I applaud MNHQs stance on trans threads. It would be hugely disappointing for a female dominated website to disallow discussion of a topic that affects all women. The debates that are happening are those that should have taken place in the early 2000s. I'm still at a loss to understand why they didn't.

Do you realise how much you are damaging your own cause by claiming that you are here to educate people about your side of things while not actually answering genuine questions that are posed to you? I've never seen you answer any question like that - you always just say that you've answered them before. You're a pretty prolific poster so I think people might have difficulty actually finding the posts in question even without the two name changes since.

I'm trying to be more understanding of things I don't understand, like 'trans issues'. Like issues around female only spaces. What I have found helpful is to talk to individuals. So threads like this may help some, but it's one to one talk that is very helpful in understanding where other people are coming from.

Egosumquisum I will pm you.

I'm searching Ego but can't find anything.

I would love to know if we have a word for human with a vagina. Do you think we need a word to define these people? DO you think they suffer discrimination based on their biology (having a vagina) or do you think they suffer discrimination due to their 'gender'?

Can you answer these questions and I promise never to ask again?

That rather reads as though you want women to STFU about issues that affect them, because you don't like what they have to say. I'm sure you didn't mean it like that, did you?

Ego a blog is a good idea.

Or answer it once? It would be the polite thing to do as I always answer your questions.

It was what i was told when I worked in NICU 10 years ago.

As for what makes you a woman....I guess the fact that I was born with female sexual organs. I liked climbing trees, mecano, army cadets, etc., but never once doubted my gender because of it.

Maybe we can call ourselves "XXer raised and identifying as female". No worse than cis to me.

If there were no stereotypes about gender.. no special words defining people as male or female..just humans with a vagina and humans with a penis.

Would there still be trans people? I used to think there would be as genital reassignment surgery was what people thought of 'transexual'. BUt now we have 'female penises'

People with penises saying they don;t need a vagina as they are women with penises. So what the utter fuck does that mean? If it isn't to do with vaginas or stereotypes how can you feel like something What do you feel like it? It's all meaningless.

But isn't that a bit like saying 'Caucasian people raised and identifying as white'? What's the bloody point.

Ego, you've set yourself an impossible task re raising awareness. Because your drive to not be a man sets yourself directly in conflict with those who will respond "hang on a minute, that doesn't make you a woman". And I understand why that would be too damaging to you. It's not for you to fight, alone, the constrictions of gender imposed by society, particularly those pertaining to the male half. We are on the same side in that battle. Do you understand that?