Anti-Transgendered thread in Chat

[countessmarkyabitch]

Started off as a vague question about what makes you feel like a woman, lots of people started mentioning transwomen, naturally. Has now turned into some posters stating that transwomen are just men and shouldn't be allowed use female things like toilets and rape crisis, pretty much anything.

I find this really offensive and have stopped engaging. My personal feminism encompasses women who were born in male bodies, and supports their struggle to be recognised as women. I also think they need the protection and help of feminists as a particularly at risk group.

Is this an unusual stance? Does anyone agree with me?

Pilchard Not what I meant and you know it.
Ideally we could do away with gender constraints, but they do exist and we all deal with that the way we see fit. Some people are 100% comfortable within their gender constraints because it suits them, and that's OK for them.
Some people will fight against it and carve it out how they want. That's good and fine because it works for them.
Some people are so far removed that the only way they will be happy is to identify with the gender that doesn't represent their sex That's OK, as it works for THEM.

I think that's a better way of saying it? Hope so anyway.

God, it's so depressing to see educated women questioning why transgendered people "choose" to become the opposite gender. They don't. They were born with the wrong set of genitals.

They don't just wake up feeling a bit female & decide to pop a dress and a pair of court shoes on.

I know two transgender people - one male to female & one female to male. Both have had surgery to make the outside match the inside. For the posters who don't understand how someone born with a penis can know that they are truly female - can you imagine having to live the rest of your life as a man? Would you be happy with that?

How does removal of the penis make somebody a woman? Because they feel like a woman? What does that mean? Which woman do they feel like?

It's like the Emperor's New Clothes.

"A very very vocal minority of the trans world wants to entirely redefine what women can say and do. They do not accept us."

cailindana I am not aware of this but would be interested in finding out a bit more.

Countess there are transwomen out there who do literally nothing else except wear women's clothes - no surgery, no hormones. And yet they expect women to accept them fully into all female spaces.

Fuck that.

At least 85,000 women are raped in the UK every year. Many many more are sexually assaulted. 2 women a week are killed by men. Men are a threat to women. Women need safe spaces. Men don't get to walk all over that because they feel like it.

Archery and Crack, I said at the start that I don't know, and I'm more than willing to learn and expand my thinking on this issue. I'm by no means pretending I have all the answers, merely stating my starting point of acceptance.

Prisons, I really don't know. I'd have to defer to people with far more knowledge.
The gym, well, I very much doubt you'd see a penis, the experience of transwomen that I know of suggests that they would avoid such an environment altogether. Its not something you flaunt if only for fear of your own safety. But you didn't answer my question about the bathroom. I'll think about your counter question while you answer that? that seems fair?

I think that I would only feel comfortable talking about experiences to do with being a girl, with other people who grew up as girls. I would feel happy to have transmen in that discussion (whether they would want to be there or not is another question!).

I read a piece online written by a young transman who identified as a feminist and spoke very eloquently about what it is like growing up as a girl.

I really think that these experiences of growing up can't be erased. Girls and boys are raised differently and socialised differently. In some countries the difference can mean extreme damage for the females. We can't pretend this stuff doesn't happen, or how can we act to help with it.

can you imagine having to live the rest of your life as a man? Would you be happy with that?

My god, yes. My material situation would be substantially improved, and since I have neither a ladybrain nor a man's brain, just a brain, my insides would continue to match my outsides.

Wasabi your original comment about dresses made me gasp and
quite upset by it.
Do you really believe that someone was born a boy, underwent hormone therapy and surgery and now lives and identifies as a woman shouldn't be able to access rape support?

"Hubert, do you think transwomen should compete against born women in the 100m?"

Bigkid This is really interesting and has really made me think. I don't think I have a definitive answer. I don't know enough about sport nor am I transgendered myself so... I don't know. I'll be thinking about this for a while.

I personally do not have an issue sharing a bathroom with a man.
I have never been raped or abused by a man though. I suspect I would feel differently if I had.
Did you read up on Synthia China Blast? And Laverne Cox's public support of her move to a women's prison?

Hubert I don't know what you mean I'm only responding to what you write.

If being female is to do with being on a "team" then millions of women and girls the world over would like to get off the team thanks.

I'm sure that this isn't even an issue for the overwhelming majority of transwomen anyway, who are just trying to go about their lives and don't make a huge song and wah wah dance about being allowed in.

Countessmarkybitch they were born biologically male and thus were born with priviledge that is rarely acknowledged. That is the problem.

The refusal to acknowledge that many transwomen often grew up priviledged in a way that seems to lead some of them to feel that they can tell women what to do, and think, in order to make the lives of other people better, with no apparent hint of irony negates much of the empathy I once had.

Also, why are the problems of trans people a feminist issue? Why not an LGBT issue? A lot of violence against transpeople is homophobic/queerphobic motivated violence surely? Or do you think it is 100% misogynism?

How can we say that women have been oppressed for the entirety of recorded history purely because they are women and then wake up one day and say, Oh but actually woman doesn't really mean anything, anyone can be a woman?
How does that even make sense?

The gym, well, I very much doubt you'd see a penis

I've seen posts by trans women on twitter - people who have platforms, long follower lists, get invited on panels, etc - boast about showing their penis in women's changing rooms.

I've been at conferences which have women's loos, men's loos and large amounts of gender-neutral loos - and even when the women's loos were more physically difficult to get to and out of the way, I saw trans women use them in preference to the gender-neutral loos. If you walk past loos in which you are very conspicuously welcome and safe, to get to the more inconvenient loos where you think you may not be welcome, that has nothing to do with safety and everything to do with establishing your right to that space, whatever other women think or want.

Have I shared a loo with a trans woman? Almost certainly. Do I want more gender-neutral single stalls available for everyone? Yes. Do I think trans women should be encouraged to use women-only loos? No.

I personally do not have an issue sharing a bathroom with a man.
I have never been raped or abused by a man though. I suspect I would feel differently if I had.

Seriouslyffs if trans-accessible shelters and rape crisis services are needed, why don't trans people put the work into setting them up, instead of taking over what women have worked to create?

Pilchard I guess I was using the word 'team' in a similar way that my gran would use 'sisterhood'.

I sort of think I could have used a better term because team implies we're pitching against each other, and I don't want everything to be boiled down to 'Men vs Women'.

ethelb I believe trans issues are a feminist issue because feminism is about equality and fair treatment for all humans, and they are human. LGBT issues are also feminist issues. I understand that not everyone feels that way and I think that's a shame.

@archeryAnnie or why not men? Transwomen used to me men afterall. Why don't they protect men after transition?

Ethel from personal experience (through my DH who had the misfortune of supervising a student doing research on the topic) there is a definite sense that there is a strong core in the trans community of born men who grew up seeing women around them who weren't "perfect" enough, and thought "I can be better," so became women and fell to the earth with a bump when they found how badly women are treated.

But instead of saying "this is awful, women are treated like shit!" they just said "actually women are doing it wrong, this is how women should be" and just seek to redefine entirely what "woman" means, erasing entirely born women's experiences so that transwomen have the last say on what being female is all about. It is misogyny at its ugliest, a complete erasure of women.

The reason that I mentioned transmen upthread is because I find it strange that there is so much talk of transwomen and how women and feminists and lesbians must do x, y and z but where is the equivalent talk around transmen? There is very little. I am sure there are reasons for that.

FWIW in my day to day life I call people by what they want to be called and have no problem personally sharing facilities etc.

However I do have an enormous problem with a lot of the more extreme ideological stances from some trans activists as those stances if accepted have massive consequences for women and girls everywhere. I simply cannot agree with ideas like, there is no such thing as biological sex only gender, that there are male/female brains, that anyone who isn't trans is cis and therefore perfectly happy with the role ascribed to them etc. A lot of this goes against really fundamental tenets of my feminist beliefs and obfuscates the fact of female oppression.

There are a fair few stories (which I'll look for) of born men becoming transwomen, seeing how shit it is to actually be a woman, and transitioning back.

For some reason I can't copy and paste, the text box won't let me right click, I'm not sure why

ethelb, I suppose I could argue that its not a privilege if it feels like you have been given the wrong body? AS if you can't utilise that privilege because its not yours, it feels all wrong? I don't know, I've never been in that position. I just can't see the privilege of living a life filled with prejudice and difficulty.

Annie, you talk of people on twitter with big audiences etc...aren't you only talking about literally a couple of people? And do you really think that translates to the daily experience of the rest of the trans population? Its dangerous to focus on the extremes of any population and use them as justification for treating everyone in a certain way.