Can we have a general Trans thread?

[Brugmansia]

Sorry for another trans thread and I feel this is a bit of an imposition given I don't post really.

Anyway reading FWR over the past few months has re-radicalised me. I've been reading lots here and wider.

Anyway just now been watching TV and there's been some stuff that's given me the rage but didn't seem to fit in existing threads or it's own thread.

Anyway thing that gave me the rage.
On BBC3 program on transgemder teen's the doctor just said "creating a vagina". Are doctors redefining vagina as pocket rather than a passage? Makes me want to screem.

Also Sarah Ditum being no platformed.

Oh and I hate that transgenders, so far as I can see, promote girly stereotypes
I would love everyone to wear what they want a like any colour

I read that article about Jaden Smith earlier. Is it a parody? I thought it might be. Surely no can really as far up their own arse as that writer.
But then, a lot of transgendered MTT have an issue with drag queens, so it is possibly genuine.
Got to disagree with them on one point though. I would say most women wear trousers nowadays, rather than dresses and skirts. At least in the winter.

Well that 'article' was a load of total shit. Talk about reinforcing gender roles.

Why are trousers, which are almost always one layer of unlined material, probably worn with socks, better in winter than a thick skirt with a lining or an underskirt and thick wool or cotton tights and knee boots?

I disagree most women wear trousers.

Melanie McDonagh's comment in the Evening Standard on the proposed law change. I do hope she's prepared for the backlash, she's already been called an 'ignorant witch' and a 'TERF cunt' on Twitter.

It plays into all of those stereotypes... and makes it far far too easy to create examples

I want all TW to be kept out of female spaces, because there is no way of knowing which ones are sexual deviants / have penises

I want all blacks to be kept out of Indian spaces, because there is no way of knowing which ones are sexual deviants / have black(??) penises

I'm less bothered about which statement is true / more or less offensive. I am more interested if statements like this help or hinder the overall outcome and reflect on the whole movement.

lass they do where I live. You rarely see a woman wearing a skirt, in fact I remember my Mum commenting on it when she visited me.You also don't see many women in high heels either. We're probably just a slobby lot. That's during the day, might be different for going out at night of course.

Why are men not allowed in female spaces then Slow? Or should everything be unisex? Toilets, changing rooms, shelters, medical services?

Privacy I guess. But I read the comment example to be broader than places where people need to get undressed.

But even then...

*I want all gay guys to be kept out of straight mens changing rooms because there's no knowing which ones are..."

My theory is that there is a reason, or several, why men shouldn't be in safe, women's spaces and no one has managed to convince me otherwise. When rape is non-existent and female bodies aren't fetishized and male violence is gone, then unisex facilities will be fab. Until then I see no reasons to allow one set of people with penises in and ban another.

I'm sure you're right but you can make that argument without deliberately seeking to offend.

And I think feminists have to make their points without spending too much time seeking not to offend. Because you can't please all of the people all of the time and be effective.

I think we need to get loud about legislation which seeks to give any man who just says they are a women access to protected jobs, DV shelters, prisons, my vagina! Because I can't have a guaranteed women conducting my smear test if any man can merely say they are a woman.

Does anyone have any reliable or informed estimates of numbers? How many TW there currently are (as percentage of the total population)? What proportion of them are "sexual deviants"? How many of them actually want to go into female only spaces?

On 4 December 2015 the male prison population was 81,933 and the female prison population 3,962. GIRES estimate a transgender prevalence of ‘600 per 100,000, of whom 80% were assigned as boys at birth’. www.gires.org.uk/assets/Medpro-Assets/GenderVarianceUK-report.pdf (0.6% of the total population: 1% of the male population and 0.2% of the female population). On the basis of GIRES figures and under the principle of self-defined gender determining location within the prison estate, we should anticipate a need for increased capacity in the women’s estate of around 800, with those assigned boys at birth constituting close to 20% of prisoners in the women’s estate. Conversely, we might estimate that just 8 prisoners assigned girls at birth would be housed in the men’s estate (constituting just 0.0001% of that population).

So we're talking 800 and 8?

This is just in reference to the implications for prison housing (a topical issue, currently under government review). In terms of the women's estate, we're talking about 800 transgender prisoners (the total population of prisoners housed in the women's estate is currently 3,962). In terms of the men's estate we're talking about 8 out of close to 82,000. The impact on women's prisons is obviously very significant, whereas the impact on men's prisons barely registers.

And that is just people who are transgender. Were I a male offender, who now only has to sign some forms and get into a much safer place, I would, even if I had no other motives. Male prisons are pretty horrible places. Rape statistics are horrific in male prisons. Making 20% of the women's prisons population male doesn't sound safe to me.

Because I can't have a guaranteed woman conducting my smear test

Any idea how many nurses /gynaecologists (etc) are TW ?

Depending on the numbers, I guess your preference for a "guaranteed woman" would have to be weighed up against the employer's needs to provide a reasonable working environment for that trained professional.

Many Asian doctors will share stories of patients who have said "I don't want to be touched by a Paki doctor" . Thankfully this is getting much more rare than it used to be. Friday / Saturday nights in A&E can still be a problem.

Slow

False analogy. Black men or Indian men are not inherently a danger to other men of different colour. Men are an inherent danger to women. Trans women are male bodied. I do not care whether they are offended by being called male bodied or trans women or having it pointed out that they are not women.

Women are entitled to protection in female only spaces from men and trans women and men who will pretend to be trans women.

Would you like to defend the labelling of women who are not trans as cis? Or as fish? I find that offensive but, of course, I am a woman with the alleged privilege that brings so my feelings do not seem to matter.

Or how about the death threats levied at 'TERFS'? I have never once seen a feminist wish death or any harm upon a trans person but I have seen threats like that made towards feminists who even dare to suggest what we are saying here. Maybe you'd like to pop over to Twitter and have a word with the sort of people who makes rape and death threats towards others in the name of trans.

Neither to give a shiny shite about whether this gives others a stick to beat me with, it doesn't make me wrong. As a woman and a feminist I have dealt with sticks that beat me all my life, so why stop now? As MrsTP points out, feminists have been labelled rude and shrill and unlikable, so in other words unladylike, for decades. It does not make us wrong.

Are you seriously comparing racists who don't want to see Asian doctors with women who don't want to be intimately examined by men, whatever their 'gender identity' is?

SlowFJH, are you suggesting that women are wrong to request a woman to carry out intimate procedures, if that's what they want? And you're comparing it to being racist? Or have I misunderstood?

My objection: my whole life i have been told it is women's fault they were raped, they weren't wearing the right clothing, were being too forward, too drunk, not having sex with their husband when the husband wanted it, as no man can be expected to wait( in case you are young that was legal well into my teenage years).

Well how is any man to be expected to handle himself next to a naked woman in a changing room, who is just chatting to him like any other woman. How can he not get an erection and rape her there in the room and it would be her fault, you can't wear less clothing than nothing.

Slow I'm not sure that comparison quite works.

I have no preference for the sex of the person carrying out gynaecological procedures but many women do for reasons which are not trivial.

How do you square that circle?

So we're probably talking about making special provision for about 800 people. Society / government would need to estimate the cost of doing that versus the TW's rights to safety. We are able to make special provision for classes of sex offenders and terrorists so I am guessing it would be doable.

And what about biological women who would want gynaecological procedures to be carried out by other biological women ?