Consquences of self-identification

[MrsKCastle]

Sorry if this has already been done. I've been doing a lot of thinking about current trans thinking in the media.

As far as I understand it, this is the predominant view:
Anyone can be man or woman, male, female or neither. It doesn't depend on your genes, appearance or potential ability to hear young. What's important is how you identify. We should always treat people as they identify, with regard to how we speak about and treat them, and what spaces/roles we allow them to access.

What I'm interested in, is how this self-identification will or could change society. I'd love to hear your thoughts as I think it will help me to get things straight in my head.

So far I'm thinking:
No more single-sex schools
No more single-sex hospital wards
No more single-sex clubs, whether that's Brownies or exclusive golf clubs
Anyone can apply for any scholarship or award, regardless of sex

What else?

OMG I want to throw my new fucking phone out of the window. SEXUALLY dimorphic species.
Stop being such a prude, phone.

Securely dimorphic doesn't seem to obtain any more

ATransMum, I don't understand parts of what you are saying because how you are using certain words is not clear.

When you say "gender" are you using it as a polite euphemism for sex? Often when I have conversations with transwomen they use "gender" to sometimes mean sex but sometimes mean sex role / sex caste - these are two different things so using the same word for them is obfuscating particularly as one of them (sex) is a material reality and the other (sex role / sex caste) is an oppressive social construction.

Like talking about an "assigned gender" - do you mean on birth, in male supremacist society, one's sex places one in a sex role / sex class (subordinated for females and dominant for males) ? Or do you mean parents and medical staff observing which sex a new born is?

Gender / sex caste is assigned according to biological sex. Biological sex, however, just is.

I remember Germain Greer being very firm on the fact that a woman is not a man without a cock.

I'm not trying to define what being a woman is - far from it. I'm saying I identify with a lot of the traits I see from my side. I'm not trying to reinforce a gender binary or stereotypes.

Is that sentence not contradictory? I'm not trying to reinforce stereotypes, but I identify with women's traits (ie. sterotypes) so I must be a woman?

I can see where and what ATM is saying is coming from.

I think there are fundamental differences in our approaches to the trans activists movement. But we do have a lot in common re the damage being done to women and tranwomen.

Five years ago we wouldn't have been so harsh in questioning why a transwoman feels like she is a woman. We would have shrugged and carried on.

What ATW and Silly(to an extent) have done has highlighted they are also not happy with the self identification route either. Because 1. they are being lumped with a group who are not the same as them 2. Because this lumping is now causing a backlash to them. Because quite rightly we as women don't want to be lumped with this group either as it damaging to women on so many levels.

What this thread shows is for the tiny minority of transwomen in the past has not had a detrimental effect on us, so we have been excepting. But as Winchester woman shows the line has now been drawn in the sand. The debate polarized.

I agree tramswomen should be standing up to the TAs not us, and I'd happily stand by their side. As AYW and silly have said, they themselves are out numbered and are critisied for the view on the TAs way of doing things.

I have issues with many of silly's views. But also bear in mind she may not be aware of the depth of pressure here in the uk on children and teens. We have the nhs which is being influenced by the TAs, where as in America there is no all in one government body offering free hormones, counselling and surgery to all and sundry.

I can also see why silly answered the question of what is a woman they way she did, and agree in part and only in part. (I'm still sparticus)

As silly transed when a teen and has gone on to be perceived as a woman a wife a mum, she has in a way experienced the sexism and gender stereo typing as much as we have in late teens and adulthood.

What I'm saying is we need to reconise our enemy(bit dramatic sorry) traditionally transwomen are not it. The enemy is the new wave of transgender. Which many transwomen are not happy about either. So we need to unify on the things we have in common, and set aside our ideals that differ for now.

The more we understand of each other (women and transwomen) then more we can both come up with a coherent and direct attack on what is jepodising us both.

There aren't any cases of trans people attacking women in bathrooms, and this is just trying to reinforce the massively incorrect perception that trans women are just male perverts wearing women's clothes!

That's not quite true is it?

allisonslaw.wordpress.com/?s=restroom

And unfortunately, there are plenty of male perverts wearing women's clothes, and we have no way to tell the difference until it's too late.

allisonslaw.wordpress.com

What I haven't seen is a report of a trans woman having any similar issues in a toilet - perhaps you have some references? - although I have seen this:

www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article84470277.html where not a single fuck was given (well, except for the camera crew), and there another MTT on Instagram who posted a load of pictures from the mens room - similarly being ignored.

I think Winchester posted a youtube link summarising reports of men cross dressing to gain access to these spaces and attack women....can't find it, gah.

This may be the youtube link - 'Women: decide for yourselves':

Good post welly

Most non-trans people are pretty comfortable in their gender identity - no, that's not why I don't mind being misgendered. I'm actually profoundly uncomfortable in my "gender identity", because according to the transactivist logic, the gender identity I ought to have is made up of ruffles and sparkles and ladybrain, ie femininity. But I don't mind being misgendered because I am a woman and there is nothing that anyone can say or do in the world that changes this fact.

Whereas conversely, being misgendered hurts a trans person because it reminds them that the world does not necessarily share their view of themself. It is a flimsy identity, to insist that you are a woman in the face of biological fact that contradicts that. So you have two options: you fly in the face of reality and insist that it is literally, actually true, and fight the world at every turn and perceive bullying and aggression everywhere. Or you can do as Helen does above (great link, btw), and embrace the actual reality of your existence, accept that being a transwoman is a legitimate identity, and deserving of acceptance and understanding, and all of that need to fight just falls away...doesn't it? I don't think insisting on option one, rearrange reality to avoid hurt feelings in the long term helps anybody. I don't tell an anorexic to get liposuction because they're right, their arse IS fat. And I don't think saying to a transwoman "we are the same" does either of us any favours either.

For me when I identified as male I was depressed, withdrawn and a shadow of the person I am today. Coming out as trans has lead me to be a vibrant person, able to do things I never imagined doing as a boy and discovering a whole new part of myself that I had been hiding pretending to be something I wasn't.

This is really sad to me as I have tried and simply cannot read it any other way than you could not be yourself without 'being' the opposite sex? And being the opposite sex is impossible..its not a thought or anything, it is concrete and cannot be changed. of course you can do things to yourself to appear more like the opposite sex...but again this is just aesthetics really?

What do you mean by when you identified as male? When you 'acted' like a male and looked like one? Do you not think there is a possibility that you could have just been yourself, as a non gender conforming male and the depression would have went away?

Sex-dysphoria is different IMO. This is craving a womans body. But when we are talking about 'gender identity' as your post did, I don't feel dysphoria actually comes into it? You may also have dysphoria, I don't know you and haven't seen you mention it. But the gender stuff..I honestly see as denial that you can simply be a feminine bloke. And by subscribing to this theory, in turn this means 'masculine' women must also be men...which is wrong.

I'm not someone who is likely to be 'misgendered' based on exterior appearance, so I can't comment on that. However, misgendering based on gender stereotypes makes me cross - not personally upset but riled by the persistence of stereotype. WTF would anyone assume that a scientist Dr E Dragon is a 'he'?

In fact deciding where you fit on the gender spectrum is one of the challenges trans people face once they figure out they don't fit in their assigned gender.

Also this..is where I feel so much of the misunderstanding grows from. Noone is assigned a gender at birth. We are assigned a sex. 'Gender' comes later. In coming out in personality traits, and how you are perceived from birth as and treat due to your biology.

My thought experiment from earlier..I will repeat here as I do think it kind of proves my point. If we took a bunch of newborn babies and isolated them from the world..and brought them up in a totally gender-neutral environment. On reaching adulthood, would they 'know' any differences between themselves and the opposite sex besides biological facts? If no, then this is proof that society creates 'gender'. If yes, I would be interested to hear how you think this?

I can understand your desire to live and present as female and that's OK with me. But insisting that transwomen ARE female is just incorrect.

See this 'presenting' as a female is yet again enforcing gender rules though. Or thats how I see it. A lot of women I know do not 'present' as female as they look stereotypically masculine, do not conform to the ridiculous notion that women need to be pretty and such, say a big fuck you to society by refusing to shave body parts. And so on. This does not make them men. It just means they reject rigid gender stereotypes.

Working together to abolish these stereotypes is the way forward. This way noone would feel the need to 'present' as anything. Surely this is the best solution ALL round. For both women and transwomen. Might suck for blokes a bit though...if/when a time comes when women are not seen as inferior and are not there just to grow their babies and look pretty.

As people have pointed out, the use of "gender" as a synonym for biological sex is problematic here. It is not used or understood in that way by everyone so it causes comprehension problems and obfuscates what is actually being said. And this benefits certain agendas.

Gender is the cage that women have been fighting to free themselves from for centuries. And you are reinforcing the damned locks.

Damn right

Don't think that by mentioning the patriarchy it will make the woman of the year posing in a fucking corset with a penis seem like a good idea. It really won't

I would like this on a tshirt.

There is no way to 'present' as female other than by adopting socially constructed gender markers and mimicking a female body.
Removing facial hair and adding breasts without dressing in women's clothes and makeup isn't 'presenting as female' as it is commonly understood. You need the dresses, jewellery, makeup, wigs etc to 'present' as female.
You aren't presenting as female you're presenting as a feminine gender stereotype. Which is NOT the same as female.

Trans and Silly

You need to listen - not lecture

I have finally found something that fully expresses my views on why trans in many cases is homophobia..or contains homophobia

purplesagefem.wordpress.com/2016/09/19/ftms-and-internalized-homophobia/

Just came across this now.

Very much fits with this convo too as it says a lot about how 'girls should think and behave' and such.

purplesagefem.wordpress.com/2015/05/24/a-linguistic-analysis-of-woman/

Also..wow. Well worth a read. How do we define woman? And how ...no matter how you put it it has to come back to adult human female.

I believe it is not useful to destroy the words ‘man’ and ‘woman’ by making them meaningless, and in fact, it is downright dangerous, since women are oppressed by men in our patriarchal system. Anyone who is in the trans cult and is saying that there is no difference between trans women and women need to consider the following questions:

<span class="italic">If there is nothing distinguishing trans women from other women then why are we calling some women trans? How do we know which women to call “trans” if there is no way to tell them apart?</span>
<span class="italic">Assuming that transgender means transitioning from one gender to the other, then what did trans women transition from? If they were born women and have always been women then why did they need to transition?</span>
<span class="italic">Do you think we need a word that describes the set of all adult humans who can produce ova and bear young? Why or why not? If so, what do you think this word should be?</span>
<span class="italic">Can you define the word ‘woman’ without using the word in the definition? (i.e. without using a circular definition.)</span>

I welcome answers to these questions from anyone. However, I think you’ll find that if you are holding on to the idea that trans women are women, you won’t be able to answer them at all.

I've just been on a different train of thought which involved homophobia, arising from WMs 12:09 post re abolishing gender stereotypes. A very obvious reason why a lot of blokes wouldn't be happy with it is because of their propensity to view 'females' as sex objects, combined with their own sexuality... Ever seen a normal bloke watch The Crying Game for the first time? The panicked oh-fuck-what-was-I-thinking reaction.

The idea of a transwoman looking forward to the Pap smear letter is nauseating. Heads up- you ain't gonna get cervical cancer. It's not a validation game.

Going on one of silly's blogs about brains. There is a lot to learn and use for our evidence gathering in apposing the TA movement.

I may have read it completely wrong and am happy to be corrected. I have over simplified below only to keep it short.

In her reviews of male/female and trans brains studies. She is basically saying there is no lady brain. No pink and blue brain. There is however small similarities between homosexual men and transwomen attracted to men, and the trans movement is cherry picking facts and overlooking things to fit their agenda, she then claifies how they have and then shows the whole picture, instead of cherry picked facts.

The fact that from what I can see, she has done this on ever paper to come out. Means there is a wealth of information all in one place. Surely if we are to try and get government to really look at whats going on, and the differences of body disphomia(sp?) and self identification of a cross dressing man. Then these reviews are essential.

The TA are pushing with there own 'scientific evidence' people are listening. So we need to have somthing to hand to counter it. silly's reviews are comprehensive in content and cover each one of the TAs 'scientific evidence'

We need to work together, we need to break up threats imposed by TAs into smaller battles. We concentrate on winning one battle before moving on to the next.

Getting the Womens and equality department to look closer and have a better understandingt of trans brains is a large first step, and as these come from a Transwoman should hopefully have extra sway.

I've just clinked on one of Sillys links and according to that there is a high prevalence of AGP among late transitioning MtF. Have I got this right ? Does that mean that most men who transition late are sexually aroused by being around women in a women's environment (loos, changing rooms, etc)? I'm a bit new to these threads and I signed the spartacus thread due to me being a woman and not wanting that appropriated. But AGP ? Why is that not talked about more ?

It's controversial because it can portray some peoples transgenderism as a fetish and that makes people uncomfortable because of other things that are fetishes.
I think Blanchard is done a disservice because I read his portrayal of autogynephilia as more like a compulsion.
Obviously it doesn't fit at all with the "born in the wrong body" narrative that society currently favours.
There's an in depth critique here
www.crossdreamers.com/2010/07/on-mosers-critique-of-blanchards.html?m=1

Virtually all the blogs by late transitioning transwomen I've read come across as that they are autogynephiles. Whatever we want to call it, it is a thing.