Banning the term "cis"

[OlennasWimple]

Apologies if this had already been done, but can MNHQ consider banning the term "cis", given how horrifically offensive so many users of MN find it?

I don't think I need to set out the background and reasoning to this request (but can do so if it would help!)

Thank you Garlic, that is what I meant. And I'm glad it's how it is.

What if someone who was unable to walk referred to themselves as a cripple, how would that be dealt with?

How does one "live as a woman" ?

And everything MaryZ said

Yes GarlicStake, "male" and "female" are interesting in the context of this debate because there has to be a biological absolute that can't be subverted by culture. For instance, if you die and your remains need to be indentified by a forensic scientist, your skeleton will be determined to be male or female, even if you've been living as the opposite for most of your life. And there will always be medical conditions unique to each sex.

And I know what you mean about being disappointed in Eddie Izzard. I am after reading that quote! I've seen 1970s David Bowie mentioned on here before as a great example of a person rejecting constructs of gender and sexuality, yet never feeling the need to reject his identity as a man. It seems like the current state of affairs is a regression.

Use it or don't use it. No need to get all buthurt about it. The transphobia on this site is astounding.

Congratulations on such a mature response to serious debate Gipsy.

Why does not wanting to be referred to as "Cis" make someone transphobic though? I'm not denying that here have been some transphobic comments on the thread, but plenty have also said that they have no problem with trans people, they just don't want their own identities to be redefined.

I am neither transphobic, nor a cis woman, thanks. Can't deny I'm a bitch, mind.

You, however, are behaving in a goady, antagonistic manner, and look to be shit stirring, with absolutely no interest in the actual topic being discussed.

They won't do it because cis isn't offensive, it's a fact. If people take it as an insult then that's their problem

'Cis', is absolutely not a fact. It is a very recently made up term for something that already has a perfectly apt descriptor. A woman.

I completely reject the notion that I am 'cis', or indeed anything other than a woman, as I have always been.

Cis is made up bullshit designed to push women back down the pecking order. I'm a woman and don't need a prefix.

Not sure I've ever needed to state 'I was born a woman', 'I've always been a woman' or 'I've never been a man' ( might be highly fucked off if I had to make that clear in a conversation) so can't see me or my fellow women ever needing to define ourselves as anything other than WOMAN.

If you're a trans whatever say you're a trans whatever what does that have to do with how I'm defined. You can't claim that we aren't allowed to use man or woman to define us just because you need a special sub category.

Transwomen use cis to still maintain their difference by subcategorising the very group of people they are claim they have every right to join.

Cis is made up bullshit designed to push women back down the pecking order. I'm a woman and don't need a prefix

This from a poster called ladyballs
Reminds me of the female penis mentioned upthread.

Yet another here confused as to how not wanting a ridiculous and unnecessary adjective applied to ME makes me transphobic.

paranoid some people try to claim that stating simple facts (ie it is impossible to become a woman) is being transphobic.
Ignore them.

They won't do it because cis isn't offensive, it's a fact.

The term is based on the premise that we are all born with a gender. That is a theory, not a fact.

Assumptions about 'female brains', have done women huge amounts of harm in the past and still do today.
Accepting the word 'cis' is accepting some very questionable 2+2=5 science.

Of course it is impossible for a man to become a woman. He can put on a dress, he can wear makeup, he can change his name, he can even have his penis removed and skin reshaped to create the appearance of female genetalia. But he will never have the possibility of carrying children. Those organs just will never exist in that persons body.

I don't find it offensive. At all. As others have said, it serves a similar function to 'straight' or 'neurotypical'.

I would like to stop the use of cis because the term is inaccurate!
Women and trans women are more like enantiomers than trans/cis geometric isomers - theres a mirror image symmetry and they cannot be superimposed

trans women define themselves as women by their internal gender identity and adherence to female stereotypical roles, and not their male genetics/biology

most women born women seem to have a less strong sense of a gender identity, often regard the stereotypical gender roles as an imposition and find their biology, while not defining them is a strong part of their role as a woman eg fertility, menses etc

What right do you have to stop me defining myself as cis?

I'm another that rejects being called a cis woman.

I find it incredibly dismissive and arrogant for others to presume that I accept being placed in the feminine gender, when the majority of my adult life has been battling against that very thing. gender is not an equal sum game where on the one side we have male/masculine and on the other side we have female/feminine. it is a hierarchy, the enforcement of which is what has kept women down throughout human history. masculinity is deemed superior, and femininity inferior.

when you call me cis, you are saying that I accept and embrace my position in this hierarchy, and I DO NOT. my identity as a feminist, as the person that I am is a person who rejects the limitations of being forced into a destructive and constricting gender role , so damn fucking straight I won't roll over and say "oh yes, my internal sense of identity aligns nicely with my societally enforced submissive role, and this has never caused me a moment's bother in life so I am grateful". Nu-huh.

Another vote for banning the term cis. Everywhere. I'm a woman, I need no further definition.

It's not like straight or neurotypical, because those terms don't imply a particular theory about how the brain works that is harmful to those groups. At a stretch you could say that 'straight' sounds boring, but straight people haven't suffered discrimination.

'Cis', specifically tells a woman that to be a woman, she must get back in her box and identify with the feminine gender.

transphobia my arse as jim royle might have said.

I agree with dutch courage and maryz. other people to identify as a woman shouldn't force a new label on women who are women.

and in my own opinion trans women (will the trans be dropped over time, with lbgt power to evolve the language, because now born-women are cis women there's no need to use the trans) may think they identify with cis women but how can they know for sure. they do, up to a point. it's only EVER up to a point because they didn't share our alleged cis privileges. hmmm.

Like another poster says, there's no such thing as a cis man.

Did I see someone referring to male and female brains being measurably different?
Hasn't that been well and truly debunked?
Male and female brains are largely the same.

I am not transphobic, I'd love to live in a world where anything goes and people stop being shitty to each other, but in a world where women have had to work bloody hard to reach a point where we are a bit less marginalised than we were several years ago, it's not on that a sub-group of men can come along and turn all that over and claim our defining pronoun and force another one onto us.