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?

Ok Tiggy... I'll use terminology which you say you have no problem with according to this quote Open discussions are know problem. If people believe trans people are all mentally ill then I'm perfectly happy for them to say it. "I believe they're men in dresses" is an opinion. "They're men in dresses" spoken as a fact is wrong.

I believe that you continue to attack women on this subject for effect and to ensure women you don't like are silenced. I further believe that you're entirely incorrect in your beliefs about women's conversations, not surprising really, given you are a man.

Some facts for you: You consistently refer to people as cis, without giving the tiniest or shiniest shit about whether this misgenders them. You do it even when other posters have asked you repeatedly not to do so. It would appear from this evidence that you are incapable of stopping misgendering people you simply don't like, while demanding that everyone behaves differently to you and never misgenders anyone.

Your double standards in this matter are breathtaking. I believe you started this thread maliciously, in the same way as I believe you post maliciously and in a manner that indicates that you deeply dislike any women who have the temerity to not fall in with your world view.

Crap title Tiggy.

Secondly I have no issue with transgender people.

I have a MASSIVE issue with Bruce Jenner. So I won't call him 'she'. He can get stuffed.

Everyone else gets called what they want to be called.

what's wrong with Cis? Genuine question

Well, exactly Sophie. It is impolite not to call people by whatever pronoun/name they wish to be called, no matter how irrelevant that is to the facts.

Caitlyn Jenner is problematic, and not just because she suddenly decided she wanted to 'be a woman' whatever the fuck that means at her age, but not give up any of her male priv. There are more and better reasons than that.

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

I agree with this and unfortunately Mumsnet have taken the same line on racist posts that I've reported in the past. Putting the onus on mumsnetters to challenge means we have to keep reading the crap and putting effort into responding and engaging with it. I've stopped using mumsnet for periods in the past because of racist posts left standing.

Has Tiggy answered the question about where he stands on women being mis-gendered by being called "cis"?

I find it deeply offensive to be called a cis-woman, I am a woman, not a cis-woman and no I don't identify with the gender a patriarchal society has allotted me so it pisses me off when anyone calls me cis. Lots of women (the ones with XX chromosomes) feel the same.

But you don't see us writing essays demanding that MN stamp out the cisgendering slur, because our socialisation means we don't expect to be listened to.

How nice it must be to have XY chromosomes.

I hate cis too. I am a woman not a cis woman.
Maybe the solution re changing rooms / toilets etc is for everything to be either unisex or single cubicles then the sex (cis, trans, whatever) is utterly irrelevant.

Or male, female and other

I think it goes further than changing rooms though.

I would guess Tiggy thinks transgender women should also be allowed to be in the women protected posts in refugees, sexual health workers/rape kit administrators etc as they are 'women'.

I disagree with that perspective.

Bangon? Don't get so defensive on the wrong forum

I have to say you have one of the best names I've ever seen on here Baking

The word cis passes me by. I don't use it, I don't like it and I don't see the point of it. It's not necessary. You're either born female, or male. The only word we might need is for those with no specific sex, biologically, because biology is what determines you as male or female - not how pretty you are or what you wear or like doing.

I agree Laurie, only people born as female should be allowed to work in the likes of women's refuges.

I also work in a women's centre where no men are allowed in (at all) and I don't think saying trans women are the same as women is helpful.

I think it's possible to protect their rights without infringing women's rights.

So, presumably, you could be a cis man who is attracted to women, but feel that you should have been born a woman, so identify as a lesbian transwoman? Or a cis man who is attracted to men but feel that you should have been born a woman, so rather than identify as a gay man, you identify as a straight transwoman?

The third sex??

The only possible explanation for a man with no skin in the game to be this wound up constantly about transgender issues is because they're using a transgender agenda to try to dominate women

This ^^

It's is so evil tiggy leave. You can't force women to say your women when biologically your not.

But you don't see us writing essays demanding that MN stamp out the cisgendering slur, because our socialisation means we don't expect to be listened to.

Partly. Partly I don't bother complaining about it because I tend to consider those using it to be not worth listening to, or engaging with on any matter of importance relating to gender or sex.

I just think of them as people who enjoy playing games, which puts them directly into my spam folder.

I don't think anyone should be third spaced! they should be where they want to be & included fully wherever

'Third spaced'? What is that when it's at home? And no, people shouldn't just 'be where they want to be' because then you would have to allow adult men into female changing rooms where teenage girls are naked, or allow sexual predators into nursery schools, or rapists into women's shelters, or in face men into women's shelters...we have segregated spaces for good reasons, and that is to protect more vulnerable members of society from more powerful and dangerous members.

I appreciate that trans people can be vulnerable too. I'm not a complete heartless bitch. That doesn't follow that every male who self identifies as a woman has the right to enter women's spaces.

Ok I am going to ask..... What is cis?

I very much disagree with the label of cis. I am a woman. I find it really odd that a trans woman is to be called a woman but a geneticly born woman gets labled as cis. That's not right.

I am a woman, I hate the MN trans threads and used to argue on them loads before I gave up/left people to fester in their hatred.

Previously a poster boasted that after having a post deleted for transphobia, MNHQ contacted her to tell her how to edit her post so that it passed guidelines. I queried if they did this for racist/disabilist posts and they got a bit sheepish.

MNHQ need to make up their mind, you can't go about supporting Pride and having endless threads about "mutilated males in dresses".

Also, it's not only trans people who find the threads distressing, parents of trans people do too, maybe some parents are more worthy of support then others.

you could be a cis man who is attracted to women, but feel that you should have been born a woman, so identify as a lesbian transwoman? Or a cis man who is attracted to men but feel that you should have been born a woman, so rather than identify as a gay man, you identify as a straight transwoman?

Or you could be a heterosexual man who is sexually aroused at the thought of himself as a woman or as a lesbian, so identify as a lesbian transwoman.

The word cis can be illustrated by a group of men walking into a woman's changing room, or toilet, or area of any kind, saying

'here, look, we're a sort of woman now as well, don't you know - you've got to go over there and have a new name, that is, your old name with a prefix on it, and we're going to take your old name too and add a bit on it for ourselves so now we're the same as you - none of us is a proper woman.

You have no right to be proper women, because we're not proper women and we don't think that's fair.

We both have to be 'sort of women'. Ok? Ok. Thanks. Sorted.'