I can't get my head around the phrase "Transwomen are women".

[nikkinack]

Sorry for another thread on the topic, but I was looking at my local candidates and the only female candidate is for the Green party, and she has retweeted that phrase (with the addition "Transmen are men) a couple of times today.

It seems like doublethink to me, every time I try to unpick the statement I get all messed up in the process.

So, if transwomen are women, why call them transwomen? Surely just by defining them as transwomen you are saying they are different to women? Transwomen can't insist on women using the label cis and then lay claim to the standalone word 'woman'.

So transwomen are women, ciswomen are women. The word woman applies to people of either category, but they are still separate categories within the single word, which we can't describe. We are not the same, but to state 'Transwomen are women' is to insist that we are.

I don't know how anyone who makes this statement can square all of this. It hurts my head just trying to work out what they mean.

nymag.com/news/features/martine-rothblatt-transgender-ceo/

I refuse to use "cis". There is a perfectly good term to describe women who were born as women - it's biological women.

Borrowing obscure terms from molecular chemistry helps nobody in this debate.

alex "cis" is taken from chemistry. As I understand it you have "trans" functional groups within molecules and their opposites are "cis" functional groups . Like 'trans fats'.

I was also referring to a very successful boxing promoter
www.mirror.co.uk/news/real-life-stories/frank-maloney-sex-change-boxing-4030910

Was cis borrowed from chemistry or from Latin?

Cis in chemistry means the same as in the post below. On the same side as.

Thanks, Hermione. My background is in linguistics, and so of course my mind naturally went to Latin on seeing the word used in reference to women (I mean, why would I think of chemistry anyway??)

As far as I know, from chemistry.

But it's all nonsense as we already have words for these things that people actually understand and don't spend the whole debate scratching their heads going "what does 'cis' mean?"

I've been reading trans threads fir a never of years now on mumsnet and usually they get very heated and all discussion is lost.

I'm not a bigot. I consider myself a feminist. I am an ordinary working mother not really into the whole radical feminist thing.

But whole 'cis' thing troubles me...I feel like it's a way of demoting me even further - referring to my biology to define me makes me feel like I am being defined as some sort of passive breeder. Perhaps I am wrong but I can't shake the irritation with the whole thing.

I think cis in chemistry is taken from the Latin. Functional groups are described as cis when they are on the same side of a double bond, and trans when they are on opposite sides of the double bond.

here

Still, chemistry or directly from Latin (chemistry took the term from Latin too), the point is that it is an odd term to use.

Chemistry takes lots of terms from Latin.

I think albadross summed it up pretty well for me. I don't like being defined by a label I didn't choose. I don't routinely refer to myself as a white woman, or a short woman, so why should I need to refer to myself as a ciswoman?

It pisses me off for 2 reasons

• it derails debate. Language should help clarify and talking about "cis women" when you can simply say "biological women" is completely illogical.
• as an ethnic minority gay woman, I've had enough labels imposed on me to last a lifetime. I reject this one.

There is no need to even say that, Hermione. You can say "women" and "trans-women".

I've never heard of the term ciswoman before. You live & learn on Mumsnet. still don't see the need for the term ciswoman though

Yes Alex, but I get that trans people might not want to be "othered" in that way, and because I am willing to compromise on language to avoid hurting marginalised groups, I don't have a problem saying "trans" and "biological" women. I wouldn't talk about "disabled people" and "people". But "cis" is just a nonsense.

I am uncomfortable with cis because it feels like it is being used to denote "less". As though my muddling through life as a not especially feminine woman means I am failing. Because real women are 100% feminine even if they are born men.

Techgirl, can you say more about what feeling female means? How do you define the experience to 'feel female'?

I wrote an article on the etymology of the word "woman" some time ago. I wouldn't like to do similar for "cis" or "trans", simply because I don't want to deal with any aggravation there might be, and I know that trolls have attacked other linguists who have tried to address these points.

I agree with you, Hermione - cis in relation to people is a nonsense!

Women and transwomen aren't the same as people and disabled people though - people with disabilities and people without disabilities are all still people. Women and transwomen are different categories, they're not two categories within "women".

Hermione, there are lots of discriminated against groups of people who don't have a word to describe the rest of society. I am not asked to have a label because I was never in care, never raped, not a Hindu and so on.

I really struggle with some of this.

TBH as a woman and a feminist, I think a lot of the current around what is a woman, a transwoman, a ciswoman etc. is a bloody great distraction.

There are so many important topics that can be looked at from a feminist perspective. The rights of a relatively small number of biological males who wish to be accepted as female is somewhat niche, but seems to be getting a disproportionate amount of attention at the moment.

Language is important, but at the moment far too much effort seems to be expended on semantics or what is / isn't cissexist.

I would also prefer not to be labelled 'cis' as an individual. I will label / refer to others as they so choose but that is some distance from holding a belief that a transwoman with a penis is a woman in the same way that I am.

Well, that's the fundamental issue isn't it? Whether transwomen are a subset of the group women? Looking for a term to describe "non transwomen" stems from that assumption. If you don't accept that assumption, the need isn't there.