I am a woman because I say so

[Darrowisred]

Bought Grazia not realising it was a special gender issue.

Paris Lees has three pages of editorial.

Gems include;

'I don't need permission to use the label 'woman', I'm a woman because I say so'.

And

'Womankind is a broad church, and it's time to celebrate our wonderfully diverse congregation'.

And

'When my win (as female comment writer of the year) was announced, it unleashed a barrage of transphobic abuse. 'What a farce, Lees is a man' wrote one'.

Finally

'I love being a woman'.

Aaaargh.

But Eddie Izzard has never claimed to be a woman either, has he?

www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/celebrity-news/eddie-izzard-gives-inspiring-speech-on-being-transgender-as-he-takes-a-break-from-marathon-to-get-a3204136.html

I suppose his saying he has been transgender for 31 years could be interpreted as his saying " I am crossing gender conventions" but “I've got boy genetics and girl genetics".... Really?

From his wiki page He said that he knew he was a transgender person at the age of four, after watching another boy being forced to wear a dress by his sisters

and

He identifies as "a straight transvestite or a male lesbian". He has also described himself as "a lesbian trapped in a man's body", transgender, and "a complete boy plus half girl"

Calling himself a "male lesbian" is so insulting, patronising and belittling to lesbians.

Just posted on the other thread

Trans man banned from male changing rooms in the Mail

I am a man because i say so isnt working very well for him is it

That's because he was encroaching on male territory, Rufus. Men don't get out of the way for trans people- it is only women who are expected to surrender their rights.

"Calling himself a "male lesbian" is so insulting, patronising and belittling to lesbians."

I was cool with Izzard before because he didn't encroach on anyones elses space, and claim anything about womanhood. He was just a bloke who liked to wear clothing of a sort usually associated with those of a different sex.

But this 'male lesbian' nonsense -- he can fuck right off, just another entitled male who getting even more brownie points by jumping on the trans bandwagon.

I'm just so angry about this! I thought that Izzard got it, that he at least was for gender non-conforming males being okay, and not encroaching on anyones elses space just because of how you like to dress up. Except seems he is just like all the rest of these entitled males. Women, under the bus you go, lesbians too!.......

'male lesbian'? I mean, if someone tried to describe themselves as a 'white black person', most people (well, Rachel Dolezal excluded), could see straight away how that might be a bit problematic to those suffering from racism. But those suffering from sexism and homophobia? No problem at all, because their issues are insignificant compared to those of a TV celebrity who is a straight bloke who likes to wear nail polish because of some 'forced femininity' fetish he picked up as a kid....................................

It's so disappointing. Eddie Izzard is so smart, and I've had a crush on him forever.

Bah.

I know. I was really disappointed when he changed from being transvestite/gender non conforming to identifying as transgender. I never saw him as anything but male and certainly no less masculine when he wore a skirt. Well there's my crush down the pan

Boy genetics and girl genetics? FFS Eddie! How very disappointing from him

I think Eddie Izzard is mostly being flippant with the 'male lesbian' line. He also says he's 'whole boy, half girl'. I've never seen him claim to be a woman or female - even his 'lesbian' is qualified.

I suspect he just is and is fed the hell up of having still to fit in other people's labelled boxes.

He doesn't need to say anything though.

Or he could say what Grayson Perry and Andrew O'Neill say- they are heterosexual transvestites.

As for it just being a flippant remark, he seems quite serious in this interview. It's an old interview when called himself a transvestite who fancies lesbians. Now he is calling himself transgender.

He has also taken Ian McEwan to task.

Eddie Izzard Interview 6
izzardnet.tripod.com/int06.html

m.huffpost.com/uk/entry/eddie-izzard-ian-mcewan-transgender-comments_uk_57035dbbe4b069ef5c00a9ed?edition=uk

That old Eddie Izzard interview is quite sad. I always thought the male lesbian thing was very tongue in cheek, a way to say that although he liked wearing the clothes he did, he was still attracted to women. But that section about gay men liking their own bodies and 'male lesbians' wanting to dress up as a woman to 'create a look that they're attracted to' sounds like it's veering towards autogynephilia, and to state that he's only attracted to women who are themselves only attracted to women is a recipe for misery, surely? That, or the foundations of all the 'cotton ceiling' bullshit. It's fetishising women's sexuality. Yuck.

I used to like him very much and I hope he's happy, but that interview makes him sound very messed up. I hope he's sorted himself out since then.

"womanhood is all about a feeling and has nothing to do with their genitals"

Surely a huge part of being a woman is ovulating and having periods, and the ebb and flow of hormones. Puberty and being a teenage girl and how that shapes the woman you'll be one day. Using hormonal contraceptives too, I have the implant in, and have noticed a lot of very unsexy side affects over the years. I've been steadily pumping Progestin, or Synthetic Progestogen into my body for 10 years now. Minus the 40 weeks I was pregnant when the pill failed (why I'm on my second implant). Pregnancy and birth have a huge affect on your body and mind. As do female orgasm's/masturbation/sexual orientation. Male lesbian? What a crock of shit. Do most MTT's not have an average amount of testosterone? So really until they take the hormone replacement drugs, they have no idea how it actually "feels" to be a woman? They all make the decision to "become" a woman, while they are men? Women have been accused of having penis envy for years, I think this is the first time men have had vagina envy? Where did the lady boys in Thailand tradition come from, and where did it start? Don't most of them keep and are quite happy with, their penises?

"I've got an ever increasing moustache, a wonky tit, cellulite and a bikini line that has seen better days." I found a hair on my boob last year. I just shave it now, when I'm doing my legs and goody trail (below belly button but above lady garden).

Reminded now of the bearded lady who won Eurovision a few years back. She sang "rise like a phoenix". Never quite worked out what was going on there. (Fab song btw! ).

This blog puts it well, I think (in her comments on Jaden Smith):

"There are generally two types of MtF transgender. There are gender-non-conforming men, who are often gay, and there are fetishistic cross-dressers. If we stopped punishing men for being feminine, the gender-non-conforming men would benefit. But as long as we keep punishing men for being feminine, the fetishists can get off pretending to be part of an oppressed class of people."

Saying that womanhood is a feeling is one of the most misogynst things I've heard.

I have absolutely no idea how you can define womanhood as a "feeling" that's separate from female biology.

Not without resorting to the sort of rigid gender stereotyping that you would hope a progressive society could rise above.

It would be interesting to know if male gender norms evolved and changed to accept 'female-style' dress and 'effeminate' behaviour as a valid norm, whether the group who are fetishistic cross-dressers would still get off dressing this way.

I strongly suspect they would not, the point of the fetish is to be like the woman, the object of their sex interest. There is really no incentive for them to change male norms because they want to feel 'naughty'.

There, I suspect, is the crux of the problem, women need to accept as always that men's sexual needs subjugate the rights of women.

I went to a brilliant talk on gender identity last night by Rebecca Reilly-Cooper.

One of the points she made was that a clear definition of woman is absolutely not in the interests of people who spout this crap.

She also compared the concept of gender ID to Wittgenstein's concept of a beetle in a box: I hadn't come across this before but it was the idea of a world where everyone has a small box, nobody can see inside anyone else's box, and everyone calls the thing in their own box a beetle. Which pretty much robs "beetle" of all definition.

Reminded now of the bearded lady who won Eurovision a few years back. She sang "rise like a phoenix". Never quite worked out what was going on there. (Fab song btw! ).

That was Conchita Wurst, who, IIRC is not transgender, more like drag. Conchita was a man called Tom in normal life. The name Conchita Wurst is made up of slang terms from different languages which mean Cunt Cock.

Ah, Shiny just read the blog you linked to, makes the point I was trying to make much more eloquently

Am torn between saying how eloquent you are, Silver and the risk of a slap down for being too hun

Going back slightly to last night, I also thought the Grayson Perry interview in the Guardian was great. He always comes across as so thoughtful and erudite.