"What makes a women" NY Times article

[iisme]

Nothing very new here but it expresses most of my feelings around the trans debates very clearly and well. I want to put it on Facebook but I know it will kick off a shit-storm and I'm not sure I have the strength ...

mobile.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/opinion/sunday/what-makes-a-woman.html?referrer=&_r=0

What a great thread. Thank you.

As to what makes a woman... The physical realities of being biologically female affect many women and girls all over the world catastrophically. For example, sanitation in many developing countries prevents girls from getting an education and places them at risk of disease. It seems absurd to me that this goes on and at the same time we are having the discussion about if the terms 'vagina' and 'FGM' are exclusionary.

Lived experience outside of the expressly physical is also important. For example, my partner and I are expecting our first child, and we've been reading various books on the subject. This has been a bit of a revelation for him, as he's been reading material specifically aimed at women, and has been able to experience that awareness that the author isn't talking to you, because of your sex. We have since discussed how I have frequently come across texts that assume I am a man as if women don't do the tasks involved, and often enter a room where I am in the minority as a woman and am taken to be in a more junior role because of it. I have also worked in areas where the opposite is true, and the men who have worked there have described the experience of being a minority as new and a little disconcerting, but they were often embarrassed by being assumed to be the manager, when they were the junior member of the team.

As far as what it feels like to be a woman, I don't have any thoughts beyond this. For me there is the physical body, and the way society has treated me because of it. I don't see enough credible research suggesting that there are male and female brains so I don't like to hear this used by transactivists, but understand it's a very complex issue and any simplification is going to lose something. I clearly have a different concept of gender than they do. Philosophically this is fine, 2 opposing ideas can exist and be discussed by people who do and don't subscribe to them, but politically it's much more difficult. All I really know is that some people say they feel like a woman, and I don't feel anything other than I live in a female body and am treated in certain ways by society.

I'm sorry not to have commented too much on the thread after starting it. I am really enjoying reading all these erudite and fascinating comments by people expressing things far better than I could.

I am also very socially liberal politically and so are a lot of my friends, some of whom are very committed trans allies. Feeling on the 'wrong side' of the debate is very jarring and to begin with I found it hard to reconcile. I now feel very passionately about it and find it hard to believe that others in a similar position to me can just ignore the other side (pro-women) side of the argument. But with some of my friends these arguments are impossible to make; they just aren't interested.

I work in STEM and spend a lot of time supporting women in STEM and lecturing my colleagues and students (both literally and figuratively) on unconscious bias and how this arises from the gender roles enforced in society, especially on children. Being engaged in these issues makes it almost impossible to accept the trans position to gender - it really feels like the polar opposite to it.

I also used to think that the bathroom issue was not worth making a fuss about and the 'bathroom panic' meme had a valid point, but after reading quite a lot on mumsnet and beyond I now see that view as very closed minded and view the 'bathroom panic' meme as a mean-spirited dig at rape survivors, and women who are aware they could be the next victim, wanting to maintain some level of security in a place where they are very vulnerable. Not very open-minded to single them out for mockery.

I'm really grateful to all the contributors on here who have helped educate me.

BertieBotts love he little picture of the chains, where did you get it?

It was on page 2 of Beachcomber's link to The New Backlash.

As an aside, do you like DS' nail varnish? It took me bloody ages

That's awesome Bertie! Can you do mine too?

The chains graphic was done by a radfem on Twitter called @secret_sass who has since deregged (not sure why). She said she was okay with it being shared.

thanks.... what does deregged mean?

Nice nails.

Sorry deregged means deregistered.

lightningsprite thank you. Can I ask about the religious element (I am Christian). No worries if you would rather not say.

Yonic, Beachcomber et al. Sorry, my post are too long, and thanks for making the effort to read them and respond to them. I do appreciate that some (or all) of what I say may be taken as STFU, and just another man telling you how you should be thinking. I didn't mean to come across like that but I see it must have done. And I can see I'm intruding, so I'll make this my last post. Obviously, I don't know what its like to live with the continuous sexism visited upon women and that I can't appreciate just how hard it is to have your voice heard. Maybe there's a hard limit on how a man can understand feminism, and I'm just going to have to accept that.

At least I've reached a position on trans women. Trans women like Jenner are trying to achieve happiness in the same way teenage boys buy the latest Apple products. They see an image of success and aim for that, and fail to understand that the people they are trying to imitate aren't fulfilled individuals. In striving so hard, achieving her change and gaining accolades, Jenner, and the society that congratulates her, perpetuate the myth that looking good is the same as feeling good, and that being a successful person is the same as being a good person. It isn't true. It's a lie the rich and powerful tell us to get money from us and to keep us under control. Jenner is not a poster-girl for libertarianism, minority rights and personal freedom - she, and trans-women like her, are the literal embodiment of the worst type of social conformity.

Just marking my place and lurking. to all the brilliant posters.

I actually think I agree with a lot of your last post, TheQuestforUnderstanding.

I think that at least in the past, feminism has looked at women as a class. I'm not saying that any one feminist or group of feminists has necessarily got it right in how they included different groups of women and their concerns, but as a whole the analysis and criticism came at being a woman as being part of a class.

I don't believe class doesn't matter anymore, but in the present day identity politics has somewhat replaced analysis of class structures. The current ideal is choice, which is completely at odds with the older philosophy. I'm much more personally able to understand the class analysis than identity politics but I do think if you're an identity person you would also have trouble understanding my position which is where a lot of the calling opinions 'phobia' comes from I think.

On the site stuff thread some posters are complaining our trans threads are "demonising" trans people.

So we musn't be so cruel as to quote scientific research & statistics.

We are demonising if we don't let everyone who claims to be female into womens' safe spaces.

What was irritating was to be told to check my cis privilege. Compared to someone who has enjoyed male privilege most of their life ?
I'm astonished to read that apparently women are now considered privileged.

Yes indeed BigChoc. We are women, we must therefore not have the temerity to question men. Including people born biologically male who have enjoyed male privilege while growing up, even if they don't feel male inside their heads. And who are therefore very used to silencing women, and not very used to getting told that their gender is a reason they can't do something.

Probably a lot of MTF trans people didn't really enjoy male privilege. But chances are they're not the extremist activists.

Errol, I think basically everyone (who receives it) enjoys male privilege. It's not the same as enjoying being treated socially as male, or enjoying being expected to behave in a 'male' way or getting to join in with groups of lads. It's stuff like getting more attention from the teacher, have people make assumptions that you are able and likely to achieve rather than vice versa, not having people talk over you or shout down or ignore your opinions, etc.

I've heard many people say that transwomen never really had male privilege because they didn't feel male and they didn't want to be treated as male, but this is completely ignoring what male privilege actually is.

That's why I italicised the word. I know that in the context of 'enjoying privilege' it just means 'possess and benefit from' but the commoner meaning tends to colour it (maybe this is just me) - makes it sound like they've been having a jolly time of it.

I was trying to explain what male privilege is to dh. He laughed when I said he had privileges that I don't. For him, he heard the word privilege and thought of money,high social status etc.

I told him it's things like, my mum giving the men two Yorkshire puddings and a pile of meat, leaving the women with one (often none) at Sunday lunch. (Dd wised up to this quickly and intercepts the food before it gets anywhere the men's plates :))

It's my brother being able to stay out til 9 while I had to be in at 7 despite being three years older.

It's spending hours in front of the mirror before going out, because if I did what dh did, fling a shirt and trousers on, I'd be judged massively.

It's not having to repeat yourself several times because you are listened to the first time and not spoken over.

It's being able to walk home alone at night with very little fear.

They might seem like little things to DH, that they are un noticeable, unless you're the one not getting them. He definitely sees what I mean now.

yy, Inicked excellent explanation.

An analogy to male provilege is white privilege: yes many white people have shitty lives too, but on average within most countries they (often unconsciously) benefit from being white. Like this:

I'm mixed race and in the 1960s I was the first non-white child at our village primary school. So, on umpteen occasions I was surrounded by other kids (many bigger than me) screaming "wog", hitting and spitting.
This was before Race Relations Acts, so the teachers didn't give a damn. In fact one of them delighted in smacking me and sending me to be caned just for being in school while of mixed race.

Other white folk my age grew up very poor too, but that particular shit they didn't suffer, without their being aware that was privilege.

BigChocFrenzy I am very sorry to hear about your experiences at school.

Hi guys. I am very torn on trans issues. Like a lot of people have said I don't agree with the idea of a female brain and I am unhappy with female only spaces being threatened. But I also want to be compassionate to trans people too. I came across this amazing item and just wanted to share it. It raises all kinds of issues in terms of how to treat people fairly.

www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/opinion/transgender-at-war-and-in-love.html?_r=0

There are two trans thread at the moment on feminist chat and I am posting this one first.

If I get no replies I will try the other.

Please do not let me kill of this thread, please??

PS re-reading what I just wrote 'compassionate' is the wrong word, I mean fair, just, giving people their human rights. Not because I want to but because they deserve human rights. So sorry if the word 'compassionate' sounded patronising. That absolutely was not my intention.