Mixed sex wards and trans women.

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I've opened a new account as the old one was too full of personal bits and someone could've connected the dots.

I am a medical student and we have a diversity lecture coming up, so I had a look at the LGBT slides. A lot of this seems to focus on trans.

I got curious about the requirements for sex-segregated wards, as I know this has been an issue for a while. Women want single-sex wards, both on wards for physical illness and those for mental illness, because they see themselves as vulnerable to abuse from men, especially whilst ill.

Fine. Nobody seems to oppose this, and it's become a requirement in pretty much all hospitals.

And then you see this: uktrans.info/attachments/article/5/trasngender_booklet_low%20res.pdf

"• Trans people should be accommodated according to
their presentation: the way they dress, and the name
and pronouns that they currently use.
• This may not always accord with the physical sex
appearance of the chest or genitalia;
• It does not depend upon their having a gender
recognition certificate (GRC) or legal name change;
• It applies to toilet and bathing facilities (except, for
instance, that pre-operative trans people should not
share open shower facilities); "

There's an example in the leaflet of a young female nurse refusing to wash a trans person because it was against her religion. This is held up as an example of trans discrimination.

I am struggling to square this away with feminism. In fact, I don't think it does square. Women have fought for this segregated space, based on female sexual characteristics (not a preference for make-up, long hair, but XY/vaginas/generally smaller in stature and weaker). But now, apparently, if you decide you feel like a woman, you're entitled to be on a woman's ward when women are at their most vulnerable.

It means if you're sectioned under the mental health act and a trans woman with a penis is on the ward, you have no legal argument to get them removed to make you feel safer.

How is this right?

I was all for 'equalism' in my 20s. I experienced a bit of sexism and discrimination, but not enough to really impact me. I joined the public sector which in general is structured in ways that make it harder to discriminate and did well. It wasn't really until I had children and watched so very many people treat them differently because of their sexes that I realised how skewed the world still was towards men and boys. Oh and how much stereotypes were pushed at them both, limiting their natural individual charateristics into boy = masculine, girl=feminine.

Why shouldn't women be angry? Why is women being even the tiniest bit aggressive about things that affect them seen as so very bad? Being passionate about your beliefs is important, and playing nicely (as girls/women are expected, there is no girl equivalent of 'boys will be boys' applied to them after all) gets us nowhere.

Pink

Rationally and factually

Wear men can become women, compete against him in sport, get scholarships meant for women...

E.g. that boss, may well be a woman, not a man, discriminating against you because you chose to become a mother

So? Ask yourself why??

So....where do you think trans people should go on wards?
Would you apply any particular criteria as to which section they should go on?

pink

So I've been doing feminism and fighting for LGBT rights for longer than you've been alive.

I think it's extraordinary that instead of thinking "hang on, here are some of the women who got us things like equality legislation and have bags more life experience than me, perhaps I can learn something" you decide to come on here and tell us how to be the right sort of feminists.

Telling women not to be angry/bitter/aggressive is part of the problem. Part of our societal gender role is to safeguard emotions of others . Well I won't. I'm angry as hell as rights I fought for being rolled back and women and girls suffering, and make no mistake there are ones who have already suffered greatly as a result of the TW are women ideology. I'm more surprised you're not angry frankly as every woman I speak to is appalled.

But being a funfem is so much easier, because it's not threatening to the boys.

hermione

You articulate that so much better than I can. I've been fuming about feminists reaping the rewards of second wave feminism, then sitting back and going, so what?

Trans men with beards have to go somewhere if they need medical treatment.

Trans women with breasts and who may have had GRS (or may not have had it) need to go somewhere.

Is the only option a private room?

Pink, you said 'But this can be done rationally and factually. Not bitter angrily.'
And I understand why some people call for rational discourse -- but you are the one who was calling people scum!

It's astonishing how quickly rights are taken for granted by people who didn't have to fight for them, isn't it, Hermione? I can't remember the exact quotation but the one about every generation being doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past seems about right here. I am pretty convinced we're now in another full scale backlash against women's rights at the moment.

I'm in my early 40s. When I was 20 I too thought that women had equality with men, that we would be treated identically in the workplace etc. But as I lived and learned I discovered that I was wrong. Sometimes it's only looking back that I can see it. I went to a very pushy grammar school. Yet girls mostly only did science at A level if they were intending to study medicine. Not a single girl in my year studied computing or economics, those were for the boys. We weren't forbidden from doing them, but we were steered away from them. Then I graduated and entered the workplace where I discovered that ownership of a vagina apparently meant that my duties included running errands for the managers, answering phones for the managers, typing the odd letter when the manager's PA wasn't there etc. All of this in addition to my actual job. So male colleagues got half the workload and then at the year end they got a higher payrise because they got through their workload quicker than the females. So the gap started...Of course, you're going to think 'easy, I'd just refuse to do those things'. And I thought that too. But then you get a reputation for being difficult and guess what, come your year end review you still get a lower payrise because although you completed your work, you had a poor attitude. These things are happening in workplaces around the country. Not in every workplace of course. But in enough workplaces for it to still be an issue.

Also, re anger. I don't think it's automatically a bad thing (not even touching on how and when women and men are permitted to be angry, which is a whole other thread on its own). Anger changes stuff! Anger can be channeled into action! Anger can be a positive force for good. Let's have more anger - anger at injustice, anger at complacency, anger at the glacial progress of change.

"Calm down there kitty cat"

No, you calm down with the patronising crap.

Welcome to MN, PinkIsRad

I see Ego is trying to get the thread back on topic.

Ego, gynae wards are definitely the right place for trans men in for gynae issues and vice versa for transwomen and urology. From what other posters have said about inappropriate behaviour from some transwomen when placed on women's single sex wards coupled with respecting the dignity of men and women at a vulnerable time, there does seem to be a strong case for retaining sex segregated facilities, especially in psychiatry settings where bathrooms etc do not have locks. However, I can see this presents a difficulty for trans individuals who also want privacy and may feel vulnerable. As numbers grow, particularly if self identification gets the go-ahead , it's going to be increasingly difficult to fudge the issue by using side rooms. Aside from the equity of access & clinical need issues, my understanding is that private rooms provide a source of additional income for cash-strapped hospitals, so it isn't a particularly sustainable option.

There are no easy answers, but I know I would had not have slept well (if at all) in my women's ward if there had been MTT on the ward when I stayed in a surgical ward recently. In the small hours when I was awake in pain & still vomiting, there was very little staffing presence or visibility in my 6 bed bay & I was in a dark corner at the back. I felt vulnerable enough in the presence of women. As others have said, I would have discharged myself home early rather than spend a 2nd night in those circumstances.

I thought we were doing pretty well, until I had my kids.

I had my first in Canada, where I was treated as an adult, consulted on my own care, given information and allowed to make decisions (including saying no, or choosing a home birth despite some contra-indications), where pain relief was neither withheld, or pushed. Everything went to pot, but I was treated as a human being throughout, and have nothing but thanks and good thoughts for everyone who cared for me.

Then I had my second in the UK - where I was routinely patronised, told that I wasn't allowed to do things, expected to take medication with no explanation (and thought awkward when I told them that I'd done some research and didn't feel that some of it was appropriate in my case) - where I was bullied by midwives when in labour and had more than one consultant be very rough when doing internals (including an un-consented sweep), only able to get pain relief because DP went and camped out at the desk (they did that thing that waiters do when they avoid looking at you as they walk past for me - and being in labour I couldn't exactly chase them up the hall) the surgeons did a terrible job sewing me back up, and the facilities once I was on the ward (Have you ever tried getting up an 8inch step into a shower through a foot wide sliding door, holding your catheter bag, having just had an EMCS? It's not easy), and then returning to a bed straight from call the midwife.

Yet the children's ward at the same hospital was FANTASTIC when my elder son had been in there, so I know they can do better care.

Sorry, we're not there yet. Women are still subject to institutional sexism, and but I'm glad you haven't encountered it yet.

There is an easy answer.

Wards are segregated by sex, which one cannot change. Males go to male ward and females go to female ward.

In cases where some have altered their physical appearance to the extent where they feel unsafe/uncomfortable with their own sex (MTTs in male wards) or cause distress to other members of their sex (FTTs in female ones, like the bearded one in OP's example), they can be moved to a side room.

I should clarify: there are bo easy answers which will please everyone. Actually, the AGP side of things puts me firmly in favour of single sex as I don't someone frotting their lady stick in the next cubicle. However, if all medical & ID records are overwritten as implied on other threads, how can one tell?

I don't remember "pleasing" me being anyone's priority during the few times I stayed in various hospitals. What they cared about was safety and proper care.

"how can one tell?"

Oh we can tell, especially in the case of MTTs, thanks to millions of years of evolution (including sadly, natural selection) where the ability to tell if a stranger coming towards you is male or female was literally a survival skill.

It is very VERY rare for a MTT to pass as female for more than a few seconds of interaction.

Pinkisrad, you seem unaware that feminism is a political movement rather than a book group. Would you tell socialist or ecology campaigners to "calm down, kitty cat"? Would you advise any group seeking to make gains against the status quo not to be angry or bitter?

Answer, no, you wouldn't, because political movements have to have passion and commitment. Only fired up people get political change.

Otoh, the group who have always been told to be sweet and docile, not to rock the boat and always colour in-between the lines are women.

Accusing feminists of being angry is like accusing decorators of painting houses. We have to be angry, to have fire, to achieve anything. Waiting for men to register that patriarchy exists and deal with it for us has been a total failure so far.

Sisters have to do it for themselves. Sadly there are always some women who think this is unladylike or, even worse, that men might not like it. And that would never do

It needs addressing properly rather than being fudged as at present. The current situation seems to be one which isn't good for either trans people of either type or women.

What I'm certain of is that self-identified trans people being put in the opposite sex ward as a right is not an acceptable solution, from the POV of their own medical needs as well as the rights of women and men to single sex wards. Personally I think I'd be ok with a transitioned transwoman with a GRC, though others may disagree. Transitioning individuals (including those on hormones with altered physicality) probably need treating on a case by case basis, and unless there are specialised facilities there probably isn't much alternative to side rooms. I'm not sure how much of a problem this would pose in practice- there really aren't huge numbers of transitioning transsexuals needing medical treatment at any one time, surely?

If a hormonally and physically unaltered self-identified trans person wants special treatment then I'm not sure why the taxpayer should pick up additional costs.

When I was younger I thought feminism had won all its battles because everything was okay for me, then I grew up a bit and realized it wasn't actually about me, but women as a class many of whom weren't as fortunate.

On the wards I work on (mixed sex with male and female bays) trans patients are accommodated in side rooms. As HCP compassion and dignity are paramount, and I don't think that any religion would advocate refusing care to a person in need. IMO that nurse was descriminatory and appropriate action should be taken to deal with this. Having said that forcing her to care for someone she is openly predudice towards is probably not in the best interest of the patient...

Are nurses allowed to care only for one sex in the NHS?

No.

The early 90s are already two decades ago. And yes, stop being so bitter and angry. I don't know about you, but personally I started a job with a guy, and I got promoted first, and no he isn't a fuck up. I have never been put down because I was a girl. Teachers encouraged me just as much, professionally I am treated as an equal. We have it better than ever. So yes, stop being such a victim. No one is going to listen if you just cry and moan about how evil men are.

What a nasty post. No one is crying and moaning about how evil men are. Getting the vote was a century ago, but some women only got the vote recently. We have it better than ever. Better than ever (how many decades/centuries/millennia?) isn't good enough.

As HCP compassion and dignity are paramount

It would seem that some require more dignity and compassion than others.

Datun it's perfectly rational choice to choose someone who won't suddenly disappear for a year or two.

Hermione how good for you. Want a medal? Yes, I am, because it's time for you to step aside. Your time has gone, your idea of feminism is dead. I would tell the exact same thing to Bemoaners and Hillary voters. This has nothing to do with women. And maybe you should ask yourself and challenge yourself to not see everything in gender stereotypes - you were the one who assumed I said that because of some "societal gender role". Angry, yes, there are certainly things to be angry about. But throwing a tantrum isn't working anymore.

And it's not about being fun, it's about what works. And in this day and age it doesn't work anymore.