Clarification of rules

[MerlinsLostMarbles]

Asking in a new topic to avoid derailing any threads. Is it still against the Mumsnet forum rules to deliberately misgender/deadname a transperson?

Yes, cis and trans being meaningless is exactly right

if sex is relevant then I want to refer to someone’s real sex

if sex isn’t relevant then no need to talk about it

cis and trans are utterly irrelevant to me

GC people (and obvs I cannot speak for all) generally see ‘trans(gender)’ as meaningless a term as ‘cis(gender)’ is because to us trans(gender)+woman = a man who says he’s a woman and trans(gender)+man = a woman who says she’s a man 🤷‍♀️

I’d be perfectly content never to use the word trans again and instead refer to ALL adult males as ‘men’. I only use ‘transwoman’ or ‘transitioned male’ as a compromise (because MN’s rules are Nilsmouse’s ‘option 2).

FWIW, I don’t use ‘man’ and ‘woman’ as slurs either - they just mean adult human male and adult human female. No hidden meanings.

This. And no I don't care what Twitter randoms say.

Trans is their word not ours.

But you have a point. I'm never going to use it again.

Thanks for the guidance and direction.

That's right, offense is subjective.

For example, I find it offensive that Dylan Mulvaney uses the word 'woman' to describe themself.

I accept that apparently Dylan (or people speaking on behalf of Dylan, I have no idea how Dylan feels, tbh) finds it offensive to be called 'he'.

My compromise is to call Dylan, Dylan.

Nobody has the ability, let alone the right, to say that my offense is less meaningful, valid or important than theirs.

We live in a civilised democratic society, so we do our best to rub along despite differences of opinion and without causing unnecessary offense.

In some instances, offense is unavoidable, and that's unfortunate fact of life.

Merlin's posts are complete and utter nonsense. There is not a single one that has anything useful or constructive to add to the conversation.

Oh I don't know. It makes me realise for one thing that with some believers in this ideology it does not matter how often or how carefully you try to explain: you will just never be heard.

And that explanation and hoping for shared understanding and reasonability/capacity to recognise other people's needs too, is probably never going to be an option. Which leaves much blunter answers, firm boundaries and understanding of the kind of psychology at play. The relationship board has much advice on this which may be necessary at a societal level.

Good point well made

Most of us who don't wish to be described as "cis" don't use trans as a slur. We simply don't want terms applied to our identity that we don't agree or identify with. Surely if the trans argument is to have correct pronouns etc recognised, then that should apply to everyone not just trans people. If I tell you I am a Roman, then that's what I am. Not "cis" nor any other moniker or abbreviation you might want to apply. The hypocrisy you're displaying is astounding.
👏👏👏

Having just had a post deleted on one of the EHRC threads which was specifically about the problems of bulling allegations, I am confused about why I am not allowed to name a trans woman as a male. You have to be male to be a transwomoan so why the offence. It is hardly a crime to quote why he was offended at it being noted that he wears lipstick. @mnhq please explain. I am sick to death of being gaslit about the lie. We do actually know the truth, and in the words of Germaine, I am really offended.

Just to pick up on your false point that the word cisgender has been in English dictionaries 'for a long time'

December 2015. That was when it was added to the Oxford English Dictionary. Less than 10 years ago. And that's the first instance I can find in the UK.

The term 'cis', used in the context of 'cisgender', was first used in 1994 by a social science researcher who co-opted it when doing a call out for research.

The Latin prefix, despite the insistence of many TRA's that it means 'not trans', means 'on this side of' and was most commonly(and correctly) used to describe chemical bonds.

In terms of your initial post, you can't seriously be complaining to MNHQ about misgendering while gleefully and repeatedly using the word cis to describe people who have said they do not identify with it? That would be the height of hypocrisy, surely.

Ah, I remember reading about Julius Caesar and the Roman Republic when I was but young and easy under under the apple boughs.

Even dear old Wiki hasn't managed to eradicate actual Latin yet. Here's an example:

Cisalpine means "on this side of the Alps" (from the perspective of the Romans), as opposed to Transalpine Gaul ("on the far side of the Alps"). Gallia Cisalpina was further subdivided into Gallia Cispadana and Gallia Transpadana, i.e. its portions south and north of the Po River, respectively.

The Roman state loved a good old categorisation of the colonised.

In my experience you can use 'male' as a factual description of a transwoman, but using 'man' may get comments deleted. If you want a direct answer, though, report your post and ask MN, tagging them with mnhq doesn't do anything.

Oh, sorry, Rambling, I missed that this was on 'Site Stuff'! Presumably things are different in these parts.

Thanks Arabella…I have never really known about how to query a deletion. Is it really the case that male is allowed and man is not? I must have missed the ruling.

Hi there @Ramblingnamechanger. We can see that we've been in touch off the boards since you posted and explained that you have perhaps misremembered exactly what you wrote. We hope that has cleared this up.

Generally speaking though, rather than thinking in terms of words or phrases that are or aren't ok, we operate the same policy across all topics: if you're posting genuinely and in a civil way it won't be a problem; if you're taking a side swipe at someone or perhaps being uncivil where a bit of politeness would go a long way, we might delete it.

We know that it can be a difficult subject to navigate and there is certainly grey area, and we do always bear this in mind when moderating. If it helps, you can have a read of our guidelines on moderation of sex and gender threads here, where there's a bit more information than there's room for here. You're always welcome to drop us a line if you aren't sure, too, or hit the report button on a post if you think it might break guidelines and we'll always take a look and see if we can clarify or explain.

or perhaps being uncivil where a bit of politeness would go a long way

You know what's really "uncivil", @HebeMumsnet ? Forcing women to pretend that men are women, to their own detriment, and to turn our language into a pretzel if we want to avoid lying about material reality.

The right to believe in the immutability of sex is now enshrined in UK law. There is nothing inherently wrong or offensive about being a man, by no definition whatsoever is it a rude or impolite word. There is no good reason these days why the only time we can be relatively confident in calling a man a man or using he/him about any male-born individual without risking deletion is when they've been put on the naughty step for being convicted of criminal activity, as part of the 'no true Scotsman' fallacy.

Personally, if we could correctly sex people, but it meant cis was allowed, I'd go for it in a heartbeat.

I'm guessing, and this is just a hunch, that calling transwomen, men and using he pronouns, is going to give marbles a far greater fit of the vapours than women being called cis.

We all know that 'cis woman' means female, and 'trans woman' means male. So, woman and man, in old currenc.

What on earth is the point of all this? Even for transgender people? Surely, surely it would be better to get 'transwoman, meaning a man with feminine identity' solidly into the nation's consciousness and offer such males every protection needed to carry on using male facilities while presenting as feminine if they like?

There's no validation to a male in having an 'identity' that accepts his sex and results in using facilities for his own sex.

Sex is real

gender is a concept

i don’t have to ascribe to other peoples beliefs

Dylan refers to their “girlhood”. Despite being in their 20s. So Dylan does not identify as an adult, but as a young person who has not reached maturity.

a woman is, by definition, an adult human female

by Dylan’s own definition, Dylan cannot be a transwoman , far less a woman.

And now the second of two threads about US Target and children's Pride wear has been deleted for 'breaking talk guidelines'. I have no idea why.

Particularly since a number of the people posting are LGB (as opposed to politically LGBT+) who were attending Pride back when it wasn't yet a corporate jolly. Unfortunate that the views of actual LGB people are not acceptable for not being politically compliant, particularly as it supports the spin that "Look, all LGBT+ people are pro this political position plus homophobia because we've deleted, excluded and silenced all the ones who weren't "

I would like an explanation for how that Target thread broke talk guidelines also, nothing jumped out to me. I missed the first one so I don't know anything about that one.

I’d say most people here have no issue with the term trans- it’s not Mumsnet that believes being trans should be kept secret.

Can someone explain how I can post here but not on the main boards ie where I have posted before but not on the pages with all the other threads?I am confused.