Is the trans lobby a force for good for XX women?

[PosieReturningParker]

I'll set out my stall for any new posters or visitors to this topic.

Transgender individuals, I'm sure, have a very tough time, suicide rates are high (although there's no conclusive reasons as to why, some are compounded with other mental health issues, some need validation, sometimes transition doesn't provide answers and so on, it's hugely complex). We owe it to the individuals and those close to them to find out why.

Bottom line transgender individuals deserve the same human rights and respect as all human beings.

The trans lobby does not represent most transgender people who want to live their lives in peace and happiness, without harm.

Here's some things to be aware of:

If there's a trans child at school who wishes to change in the opposite sex changing room, if your child feels uncomfortable your child will be asked to move.

There are numerous support groups for women whose husbands transition late in life due to a high rate of misogynistic mental/physical abuse once these men decide they want to be/are trans.

A transwoman without any surgery can compete as a woman at the olympics, there are already late transitioned trans in women's college teams in the USA.

At the moment in parliament a trans bill is about to go through that legally recognises transwomen as women, woman becomes meaningless. So diversity in companies that require women to be employed can employ a transwoman, refuge and rape crisis centres will have to accept transwomen. Transwomen will have access to all women's space.

Remember transwoman can be someone who simply says I'm a woman, self identity.

It's worthwhile noting that sexual and violent crime rates do not alter with transition, studies in both Europe and USA confirm this. Studies also show transgender women commit sexual violence 6% more than men, according to a Californian study of inmates.

Children who are not taught about homosexuality will/can be taught about transgender at primary school.

Now you know.

Feminists are routinely being silenced with accusations of bigotry or transphobia for asking that women only safe spaces remain for women only, obviously if transwomen are recognised legally as women there won't be any.

Are the trans lobby hell bent on erasing women?

That's very interesting Thumb, just confirms to me that a one size fits all approach on these things is very dodgy

The last couple of paragraphs in that piece caught my eye.

"I think that regardless of all of this, counselling and therapy is so important for us. Transition and GRS does not cure shame and low self esteem. Conversely, dealing with the shame and self esteem issues does not cure gender dysphoria. Both hings need to be treated together. Of course the issue is that there is very little therapeutic support available for any mental health issues

"It also strikes me that we are moving into a very different era and younger people have very different experiences to those of us that grew up in the seventies and eighties. Young people are growing up with a sense of entitlement rather than a sense of shame and fear."

Completely agree those who need counselling and other MH support should get it slugs, lots of trans people also have MH conditions (although of course many don't).

I've skimmed some of this, but I think we need to focus on the idea that there are a huge range if types that are OK within existing genders.

My worry is that we are in danger of saying feeling less lumpen mysoginistic men are 'men' and more rounded secure emotional men are 'showing female gendered attributes' which is actually more bigoted in my view than accepting you can be female with massively clichéd 'feminine' traits or massively clichéd 'masculine' traits and still be a normal female.

In the 80s that I remember the cliched feminine woman was in the minority, and ridiculed as a 'nasreem' or a 'tracey' and there were Goth, punk, alt, twee, geek, tomboy, dungaree, hippy, rap, pagan, selfridgettes etc and similarly 'masculine' guys were also seen as a negative, throwback type, not as an ideal.

I speak as someone who used to be considered normal(ish!!) Who was then considered metro, but definitely hetero, sexual, but now, the same me (but weirdly after doing some very clichéd 'masculine' jobs) is seen as 'definitely gay' by younger women, as 'potential dogsbody/physical worker' by retired women, and 'just a bloke' by my direct age peers, for whom being 'just a bloke' includes emotions, collaborative conversations and no (unless knowing humorous) mysoginy. If a peer said 'my girlfriend and I swap clothes' I'd think that was a normal sex life not an agonising about gender placement.

I think we are weirdly(as a culture) becoming simultaneously more widely accommodating of behaviours, but also more minutely defining each gender's 'core' attributes, and then more finely slicing what was normal gender behaviour, and sliding these about over the MF line, and then panicking about it, which I think is worse than chiling and relaxing about being either a man with 'femake' traits or a woman with 'masculine' traits.

Are the trans lobby hell bent on erasing women?

Yes, they are. Very obviously so. The threats they make against feminists show this.

I have come to believe the trans lobby is patriarchy's latest attempt at fighting feminism, and it is a very efficient one because it works like a virus, causing feminist groups to copy and spread misogyny.

Everything that effectively protects women from male violence is destroyed by the transgender lobby. Separate locker rooms, separate prisons ... not a thing anymore. Women are now exposed to the male gaze everywhere.

The law, as we all know, is not a very good protection from male violence, especially not rape. The only thing that really 99.9% efficiently prevents rape is the absence of males.

While one can, to an extent, avoid locker rooms, saunas, etc., that is not possible in prisons, and the percentage of males in women's prisons are going to be very, very high very, very soon.

That's true, the number of out transgender males is huge, and they are always criminal. Whenever I see a woman who is committing crime, there are usually three or four transgender men watching and learning how they do it. Its like day of the triffids round here.

lanark your unwillingness to engage in reasoned debate only damages your cause.

Trans women commit crime at the same rate as biological men, which is far greater than the rate at which biological women offend. You can argue the statistics and evidence all you want, but it won't stop being true.

Don't just shout that at me.. Show the figures. How many transgender men would what you say need?

The interesting consideration, is that given women's sentences are three times shorter, and imprisonment three times less likely for women, will transgender men move female imprisonment move towards equality?

For transgender male to female to achieve sentencing equality with women, 1/3 of the male population would need to be transgender I reckon. What do you make it?

here is the study where crime rates were researched.

Second, regarding any crime, male-to-females had a significantly increased risk for crime compared to female controls (aHR 6.6; 95% CI 4.1–10.8) but not compared to males (aHR 0.8; 95% CI 0.5–1.2). This indicates that they retained a male pattern regarding criminality. The same was true regarding violent crime.

If we are moving towards self identification, then there is nothing stopping male prisoners who are not really trans saying they identify as women so they can get moved is there?

Yes so this means a third of the male population would need to identify as trans to meet equal sentencing. (Not the same as equal imprisonment). It would be interesting to see if sentencing of trans male to female follows a female model ( shorter sentences, a third the likelihood of acusrodial sentence for the same crimes) or a male one.

lamark you've lost me.

However, I'll play. Let's assume that the incidence of transsexuals in prison in England and Wales is the same as estimated in the USA population as a whole at approximately 0.3%. It's hard to judge accurately, because the definition is changing, and self-identification may result in a higher incidence both through reduced stigma and 'false' identification for various reasons.

In May 2014, there were approx 80500 men, and 3800 women in prison in England and Wales. Using the estimation above, there would be approx 240 trans-women in male prison and 11 trans-men in female prison.
If those 240 trans women had been housed in female prisons, and the 11 trans men housed in male prisons, it would have increased the population in womens prisons by 6%.

That doesn't take into account whether offending rates of trans-women are higher or lower than the population as a whole.

The interesting consideration, is that given women's sentences are three times shorter, and imprisonment three times less likely for women, will transgender men move female imprisonment move towards equality?

Can you provide the source of your statistics to substantiate this statement please. I am interested to know whether you are comparing like with like. My understanding is that women are much more likely to be imprisoned for non-payment of fines, shoplifting etc whilst there are more men in prison proportionally for more serious offences. There are also aggravating factors, such as use of violence or intimidation during the offence, which increase the length of the sentence. If you are going to make such bold assertions, it would be good to know we are comparing meaningfully.

So if all the offending trans women move to womens' prison, the percentage is 6% .. The argument is whether this is a 'very, very high' percentage or not, but the sentencing inequality is very important as crime rate for men is only three times as high, not 20 times, so if sentencing achieves parity with the transitioned-to gender, the percentage increase would be 3x the trans-men figure, ie 33 prisoners, less than 1%.

85% of the difference in prison population in male prisons versus female prisons is due to sentencing inequality of custodial sentences being more likely for men, and sentences to be longer for men, for exactly the same crimes. If we sentence trans women in the same way we sentence women, the likelihood of trans women having more than a negligible presence in women's prisons goes right down. Its only if we maintain male sentencing inequality that trans women's presence in women's prison would go up dispropotionately.

85% of the difference in prison population in male prisons versus female prisons is due to sentencing inequality of custodial sentences being more likely for men, and sentences to be longer for men, for exactly the same crimes

Are you suggesting that if men were sentenced in the way women are, there would be fewer men in prison and there would be spare capacity in the current male prison estate?

No, what you say romcom is myth. Even Richard and Judy have addressed that!

Almost any serious gender analysis of the penal system confirms that imprisonment is far less likely a sentence for women for exactly the same crimes with exactly the same cimplicating factors..or not

Look at home office figures if you like, or any number of sources online. Don't read gossip and gender war sites..there's loads of the 'women are imprisoned for nice crimes helping their families and being nice but misunderstood, men are knowledgeable rational criminals who steal everything including food for their family just to be deliberately evil and intentioned' crap. Just look at stats!

Yes pretty bright. I wasn't making that point but yes, that's true.

We could solve the housing problem too.. And maybe poverty. , Since insecurity homelessness and poverty are main drivers of crime anyway, we could really be on to something here..

Males commit a majority of all crimes so I don't see how lighter sentencing would result in less of them in prison.

Some stats from the U.S. The only
Crimes that even come close to being fairly equally split are those related to fraud or embezzlement.

-Males comprised 98.0% of those arrested for forcible rape[46]
-Males comprised 89.0% of those arrested for robbery[46]
-Males comprised 85.0% of those arrested for burglary[46]
-Males comprised 83.0% of those arrested for arson.[46]
-Males comprised 81.5% of those arrested for motor-vehicle theft.[46]
-Males comprised 81.7% of those arrested for stolen property.[46]
-Males comprised 81.7% of those arrested for vandalism.[46]
-Males comprised 79.7% of those arrested for offenses against family and children.[46]
-Males comprised 77.8% of those arrested for aggravated assault[46]
-Males comprised 58.7% of those arrested for fraud.[46]
-Males comprised 57.3% of those arrested for larceny-theft.[46]
-Males comprised 51.3% of those arrested for embezzlement.[46]

So the idea that women commit the same types of crime as men but are sentenced more leniently is bollox.

I've quoted this on another thread Lanark. UK stats: if only 3 transwomen who had committed sexual offences were incarcerated in women's prisons, it would double the number of 'women' in custody for sexual offences.

It's as much the blurring of statistics as the numbers of prisoners.