Jenni Murray Woman's hour today (trans)

[Notwhatiexpected]

Hey,
Did anyone hear Jenni Murray on woman's hour today, her guest was India Willoughby. India is trans and was advocating that it was correct for the Dorchester to dictate that their female staff shave their legs.

India was very spiked in her conversation and implied Jenni was transphobic because the panalists didn't agree.

Again, a woman being called transphobic because they didn't agree with a transwoman's opinion.

Thank you Jenni for standing up for women!

I believe a vagina is objectively different from a penis, so your point about all the other bits makes no sense unless you are trying to say that there is some universal experience attached to the possession of said system which can be extrapolated into a set of political goals.

Not sure I fully understand you flax, having this system is in itself a universal experience - and you will be treated differently than all of the people who don't have a female reproductive system. This is why feminist goals are usually focused around female biology and the issues that arise as a direct result of female biology (someone who can be identified as having a female reproductive system will be discriminated against for reasons to do with biology and reasons that have nothing to do with it but this biology is central to the life experiences of the group).

But there is the problem, there is no such thing as a "female perspective" !!

Taking the time to understand, on a daily basis, what it might be like to not consider walking the dog in the dark, booking a taxi beforehand, not going home with a strange man, understanding PMT, menopausal dryness, hormone mood swings, etc. Most men can understand the horrors of FGM, and honour killings, they can get their head around gender pay gap. Understanding and sympathising is completely different from experiencing. I believe it takes a rare man indeed to spend the time to fully appreciate what it's like to experience certain aspects of everyday womanhood. And keep it in their heads. Why would they?

There is no universal shared female perspective, but there are some things that you can only experience if and because you are biologically a woman.

Equally, there are some things that can only be experienced if and because you are biologically a man.

Merry.

Totally. And not all women are feminists. It might depend on your personal experience, or how much empathy you have for the women who have experienced something that you haven't. But the fact is, there is no man who will have had a female experience. Likewise I cannot have a lived male experience. It doesn't preclude us from trying to understand each other. The point I am making is for a man to be a feminist, he will have to have a fairly large imagination. It doesn't mean they can't support feminism and understand it and sympathise and help.

The point I am making is for a man to be a feminist, he will have to have a fairly large imagination

I'm sorry to keep going at this - but this isn't logical. If you have no idea what it is like to "be a man", how can you even be sure that the experience of that, whatever it is, is so markedly different to your own ? In any significant sense that is ? It seems to indicate that all women have more in common with each other than they do with men, simply because they are women. This seems reductive.

Yes, I agree with Merry and Datun.

There is a definition of what a human being is.

There is also such a thing a human experience.

The former is universal, but the latter is not. And there can be collective human experiences without them needing to be universal.

That applies to being female, just as it does to being human.

It isn't indicated in that statement that women have more in common with other women than with men.

I do have some idea what it is like to be a man. Men cannot get pregnant and can almost never breastfeed. They can't have miscarriages. They can't give birth.

So no man has experienced those things that I have.

I'm sorry to keep going at this - but this isn't logical. If you have no idea what it is like to "be a man", how can you even be sure that the experience of that, whatever it is, is so markedly different to your own ?

Um. Talking to them ?

A woman may not speak for every woman, but no man may speak for any woman.

Are you all aware that Danielle Muscato is getting rather famous?

I don't think you should be sorry Flaxen. You're making a case, being polite, not engaging in hyperbole.

But I disagree with you.

It is entirely logical to state that there are experiences that are shared only by some of group A and are not experienced by anyone in group B.

You don't have to know what it is like to be in group B to state that.

I'm not a hunter gatherer, for example. I have never had a hunter gatherer experience. That does not indicate a. the hunter gatherer experience is universal or b. that non hunter gatherers have more in common with each other than with non hunter gatherers or c. the hunter gatherer experience cannot be explained to others.

I didn't hear R4 but was JM asking the trans person about leg shaving because they were on the show generally? We have milions of women in the UK who could have spoken on the issue (I've been on Women's Hour myself on women's issues a few times over the years) and it's a pity if we let men speak for women. However if they were on the show as a general guest and and women were asked about the issue then that's fine.

There are certainly a good few things men have no idea about. I have 3 feminist sons but they do not believe the comments I get from men when I cycle. They cycle all the time and just about never get any one ever shouting at them. I get on a bike (and this has happened from age 14 to now - 50s even and last week yeg again) and just because I have female legs and large breasts men shout or open a window or slow down. My sons think I am making it up (and no it's not a huge deal or bothers me enough to cry about but I don't make it up). It is the every day sexism we have to tolerate and it does make women think twice about going into a public space as if men want to feel they own that space and can decide how you look where you go when and where you cycle.

"I have never had a hunter gatherer experience."

Not surprising, since "hunter gatherer" is a concept, not an experience.

Hunting is an experience. Gathering is an experience.

If you have never hunted, you shouldn't pretend to know what it's like and try to lecture actual hunters about what hunting is all about.

Ditto re gathering.

I'm a feminist because there is a class of people that:
Are killed as babies or prior to birth because they aren't as desirable to many societies
Are mutilated so they can't enjoy sex or safely reproduce
Are trafficked to service another classes needs
Can't be educated in parts of the world because their natural body functions are considered dirty and taboo so they stay at home one week in four
Run the risk of giving their own lives for the continuation of the human species
Are routinely groped, catcalled and sexually assaulted
Are paid less for the same work
Are more likely to have serious health concerns dismissed and inadequate pain relief when I'll
Are not recognised for their contributions to history and society

All these people have vaginas and are women. How much I have in common with them and how similar I feel to them is irrelevant to those facts.
One of the reason the TRA agenda infuriates me is because it's so dismissive of the absolute shit most women in the world put up with.

Not sure, what you mean here, Cote.

I am talking about the experiences of people who live in societies where the primary mode of subsistence is hunting and gathering rather than farming, including those in the society who don't hunt or gather.

If you'd rather I use another example, I can.

It was clear to me what you meant Almond

but no man may speak for any woman

But men speak for women all the time, and women for men. This state of affairs being far better than the alternative, it's called leadership.

Devi and almond and Tiger

I kind of see what you are saying, but I still feel that there is an expectation of some kind of sisterhood to feminism that makes me uncomfortable.

Yes, maybe you should use another example, almond.

Because you were referring to a social order, an anthropological concept as an experience.

It doesn't work as an example (in your favour) because you can talk about what it is but not what the experience of living in one such society is like, if you have never lived in a hunter-gatherer society.

Just like a man can talk about what a woman is (= an adult human female, as any dictionary will show) but not what it feels like to be a woman, what the experience of living as a woman actually is.

Flaxen, do you find it uncomfortable in the sense that:

A. It makes you personally not want to be one.

B. You believe it is a barrier to women exercising their rights.

C. You believe it is a barrier to someone else exercising their rights.

D. Something else?

What it feels like to be a woman and the experience of being a woman are not the same thing, Cote.

I definitely think men can talk about that experience. Talking about something isn't a claim to have had the experience yourself.

It's bit absurd to say that we can't talk about other people's experiences. We all do, all the time.

I still feel that there is an expectation of some kind of sisterhood to feminism that makes me uncomfortable.

I'd agree there is a bond between women who recognising women are oppressed yes. Not sure I would call it sisterhood. If it makes you uncomfortable, well I'm not sure what you expect to happen? Do we not talk about women's oppression as it's upsetting to you? Do you say the same thing about gay people talking about their community? Or BAME groups?

But men speak for women all the time, and women for men. This state of affairs being far better than the alternative, it's called leadership. Not sure what you mean. Can you give an example where women have spoken for men?

gay people talking about their community

Actually, this has always been a pet peeve of mine as well (I sound like a right laugh), that because of your sexuality you are automatically part of a community. You aren't, you're gay that's it. You may wish to socialise mainly with other gay people, and if you choose to call that a community then fair enough, but there is no "gay community" it's just media speak. Again IMO.

almond

Will need to think about that and get back to you :)

"What it feels like to be a woman and the experience of being a woman are not the same thing, Cote"

Huh?

How on Earth would you know (really know, not just remember what you are told) what something actually feels like if you have never experienced it?

Do you know what windsurfing feels like? If you have never done it, all you can do is imagine or repeat what you've heard.

I don't know what it feels like to spacewalk. I've read astronauts' accounts and watched Gravity. That doesn't mean I actually know what it feels like to be an astronaut.

A woman may not speak for every woman, but no man may speak for any woman

Really? I wonder what David Steele, Roy Jenkins and Lord Silkin of Dulwich were doing in 1965/66 then.