Trans Understanding Help

[Itsallveryconfusing]

Hello.

Please be gentle as I'm not very knowledgeable about this but I'm trying to learn.

My eyes have been opened due to the recent threads like the I am Spartacus ones. I have always been very liberal and believed that someone can be born in the wrong body when it comes to makes feeling like a woman etc. I've come to see that gender is more a social concept.

I've been speaking with DH about this who, again, is very liberal and believes in equality and is pro women rights, although his workplace is very male orientated. He's not afraid to argue against the party line that women are weaker emotionally etc. His view on trans is very much live and let live he firmly believes that if someone wants to identify as female or male then they should be allowed to, as it must be awful to feel trapped. He was shocked that my view is changing and that my views are more in standing with hard right wingers who look at equality is a dirty word.

Sorry for the essay but I'm struggling with what I know is correct in my head with the concept that people should be happy and if that makes them happy then I should respect.

And Mermaid's departure was some of the most spectacular virtue signalling I've ever seen on MN!

Yes. How nice that she comes from a place of empathy. I come from a place of fear, and I don't want to go back there, put my dd there, or force lesbians there.

Follow through on those comments about 'there's a few arseholes in every population'. Yes there is, and trans are not exempt. Mermaid and Toyshop seem to dismiss those few arseholes as if they don't matter, aren't real. There have been links to studies on here before about how male-to-female trans retain patterns, ie quantity, of male violence (can anyone link them quickly?). How can you honestly think it's a good idea to put the same potential for rape in every safe women-only space? Girls and women forced to strip off in front of, or in the case of lesbians, forced to have sex with men, men with the normal propensity for sex-related violence, or be called names? It doesn't really matter whether that name is 'transphobic' or, as it used to be when I was growing up, 'posh'.

That's before you get onto the existence of sexual predators who will use any excuse, especially this gift of 'I am what I feel like'.

I am bored of virtue-signalling and being classed as an unkind bitch.

The truth is that this country's political and media elite are also virtue-signalling like mad. Aren't we progressive? Aren't we modern? Aren't we with the zeitgeist?

And this is leading head-long into a lack of protection for women in vulnerable spaces - not just healthy strong women but children, the sick, the old, the weak, the nervous, the abused, the frightened...anf also the "treatment" of children of extremely young age, potentially leading to damaging drug treatment and life-altering treatment and surgery to remove or alter perfectly healthy body parts.

Quite frankly we should be fucking terrified.

There is nothing wrong with questioning whether the move towards self-definition might stop us focusing on 'women's issues' like FGM, reproduction rights etc.

There is nothing wrong with challenging the idea that all women experience a more privileged life than all trans people.

There is nothing wrong with criticising trans people who commit crimes and asking whether a male-bodied sex offender is best placed in a women's prison even if they identify as female.

However... there is something wrong with using insulting terminology to discuss trans people (criticising clothes, hair, voice, using patronising terms such as "special snowflake").

There is something wrong with saying "trans activists do x" when you mean "trans activist misogynist nutjobs do x and most trans people or those fighting for trans equality would be disgusted by that behaviour."

There is something wrong with talking about sex offences every time gender identity is discussed as if the two are inevitably linked.

There's room for calm, rational discussion. I only occasionally see that on MN. I mostly see fear, anger and ignorance - and an echo chamber that stokes those feelings.

the wishy washy liberal left has a long and dishonourable history of disregarding women and girls in the name of pandering to minorities they deem worthy of their esteem/concern.
The mentality that left teenagers in Rotherham exposed to predatory paedophile rapists is the same mentality that is accepting the trans agenda now
wherever and whenever it happens, there is only one rule - women come last.

Hear hear Vashta.

"I come from a place of compassion". unlike you bigots

There's never any compassion for the women who don't want to share intimate space with males, for whatever reason, is there? No thought for women who might not be able to access services they're entitled to.

Also Tara Hudson was put in a women's prison without at GRC. It was just because they looked feminine

Hear hear Hermione.

And Karlos, again you've nailed it.

People are worried about women's privacy, dignity and safety, Vashta. That's the primary reason they are concerned about the move towards gender self-definition, not "less of a focus on women's issues". Sorry if that offends you, but we can't actually discuss it without talking about the reasons we feel unsafe and uncomfortable. You want to sit on the fence, I get that. But it's not possible.

There is something wrong with saying "trans activists do x" when you mean "trans activist misogynist nutjobs do x and most trans people or those fighting for trans equality would be disgusted by that behaviour."

Can you point me in the direction of some non-misogynistic nutjob transactivists, Vashta?

I would also be interested in finding some transactivists who have reasonable, moderate views and don't advocate violence and/or rape. I'm a bit worried that there aren't any, but surely there must be some??

Even the moderate TAs who don't issue rape and death threats still insist that TW are women. It's a pretty mainstream position - it's the stance of the Green Party and the WOMENS equality party. And it's inherently problematic, because if TW are women then all the rest of the madness logically flows.

I'm listening to Any Questions right now. I heard the leader of the Women's Equality Party on it, and I did think she was full of utter ordure.
Always comforting to be reassured that one's bullshit detection system is still in working order

but you have to laugh. She's going on right now about how all senior appointees in the labour party are male and how awful this is. But presumably if they all starting wanking on about how they self-identify as women it would magically be fine.
Why can't these people see how stupid they are? Probably because they are stupid, I guess.

karlos the WEP have been such a disappointment. Their leader did a webchat here and confirmed that "woman" is anyone who "identifies" as such

Loads of individuals Maud who I can't easily name because they're friends, but also Stonewall and Gendered Intelligence don't advocate violence or anything.
And I'm not offended Venus, I'm just disagreeing with some of the things I've read here, that's all. Privacy, dignity and safety should be basic human rights, we don't disagree there.

Yes, like the Green Party who asked to hear from women and this happened and we're supposed to think this is progress?

I'd also add myself to the list of transactivists who have reasonable, moderate views and don't advocate violence and/or rape although I do less campaigning on trans issues at the moment (due to changes in work/family commitments not due to a change in beliefs).

Oh that's funny Hermione.
Without wishing to make this party political, I do have to say save us from the wet lefties.no-one has done more damage to this country with the possible exception of Nigel Farage. give me Teresa any day.

What do you advocate with your reasonable moderate views, Vashta? How can we resolve the sex segregated spaces issue?

That is a beautiful acknowledgement Hermione, thank you for sharing.

Vashta can you link to some moderate transactivists so I don't lose all hope please? Thanks

MermaidMartian wrote - "These poor people are just trying to deal with not being abused and murdered on a daily basis"

Yes, worldwide, 1 transwoman or transman is murdered almost every day. The statistical rate for murder of trans people is about 0.69 per day or 1 per 1.45 days. (The total murder count for the world's entire population is about 1,400 per day.)

Most murders of transwomen occur in Brazil. The murder rate for transwomen in Brazil is about 100 per year. The murder rate for (non-trans) women in Brazil is about 4,000 per year.

In the past 8 years, 8 trans people were murdered in the UK. In the same period, more than 800 (non-trans) women were murdered in the UK.

(my source for statistics about murder of transmen and transwomen is: transrespect.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/TvT_TMM_TDoV2016_Map_EN.pdf )