Jenni Murray "Changing sex can't make a real woman"

[Freddorika]

'Those who have lived as men, with all the privileges that entails, do not have the shared experience of growing up female.'

Brave and interesting article in the Times.

Link here behind pay wall I think

Just in case anyone's interested India is making an appearance at Teesside university next week - it's a free event.
www.tees.ac.uk/sections/news/pressreleases_story.cfm?story_id=6481&this_issue_title=March%202017&this_issue=286

When was the last time you nearly lost your job because your employers resent paying you a maternity pittance?

When was the last time you felt threatened when being cat called in the dark on your own in the street?

When was the last time you heard 'calm down user, are you on the blob?'

When was the last time you had to flee your house with your children with nothing but the clothes on your back because your husband was beating you senseless and scaring your children?

Please. Please tell me.

I think I would phrase it as saying that there is an extra factor for people assaulted by a female, the betrayal of trust by someone that we are taught to see as a protector. Sloppy wording to phrase this as sexual assaults by females are 'worse'.

But this does make the illustration for the article even worse. Because a convicted rapist presenting as a woman could either be seen as trying to add this extra factor to their own assaults, or trying to use that same trust assumption to try and gain access where they could not if they were presenting as a man. I'm sure that wasn't intended, I think it was just a quick grab at publicity, any publicity, any link however tenuous...........

And also, if offences committed by female are seen as 'less serious', then we could also have a male trying to tap into that as well. And I seem to recall we have already seen a case where a transwoman sexual offender 'got off' because there were no treatment programs aimed at women.................

All links that were brought to mind because some grad student was desperate to get her name in the Telegraph.................

Totally off topic but do the hormones reverse male pattern baldness? I couldn't help noticing she had a receding hairline when she was a bloke.

This is all possible somedyke but also assumes women somehow can 'get over' terrible things, like violent assault and rape, more easily than a male can get over female assault of some kind. I just find that so glib. But i get your point.

Can we please ignore the user guy. Let's not get diverted by some troll.

Bronte I'm sorry but I can't let somebody insist that male privilege doesn't exist. Either he is amazingly stupid, or like you say, hiding under the bridge.

so. According to twitter, apparently Darling's stats don't include trans women. And paper chose to lead with that pic. How very cynical and nasty of the telegraph.

it is just Diana that it is a bit fitting, women have a conversation, some bloke comes on with zero knowledge on anything, puts himself at the centre of the discussion, we try to talk to him, and stop discussion.

When was the last time your boss asked if you were on your period because you wanted to discuss something he'd rather not bother with?

That is true Bronte. It's very typical. I just couldn't help myself! This topic has certainly got a rise out of my fiery side

me too Diana!

so. According to twitter, apparently Darling's stats don't include trans women. And paper chose to lead with that pic. How very cynical and nasty of the telegraph.

But Darling specifically refers to Hauxwell in the first para, it's not just the photo.

Whilst I think it is of benefit to talk about the different dimensions of trauma suffered by those who have been sexual abused by a female perpetrator, to quantify it as 'worse' than abuse from a male perp is pretty bloody dismissive to all the victims of male sexual violence.

Surely it depends upon the circumstances and the type of abuse suffered. I hope they are not trying to infer that any sexual abuse by a female is worse than all abuse by males.

very sorry to hear that user. Please ring the Samaritans. Someone is always there.

jellyfriz she says paper chose 'lead' which i assume means they drove first para. Bit of a cop out though. But at least, or at least she says, her stats don't include trans women in terms of female sex abuse.

yes BenLinus quite. Without any detail or context it sounds that way.

They can't explain either what cuttlefish have to do with the reproduction of those mammals called HUMANS

Borrowed from FB:

'My point by point response [in parentheses]...

I just commented this on a transphobic post that was all like, "In a sexual species, females have two X chromosomes and males have an X and a Y, I'm not a bigot it's just science." I'm a science teacher so I responded with this.

~(Biology isn't bigotry... and thanks for letting us know that we should now have an expectation of scientific objectivity from you...)

First of all, in a sexual species, you can have females be XX and males be X (insects), you can have females be ZW and males be ZZ (birds), you can have females be females because they developed in a warm environment and males be males because they developed in a cool environment (reptiles), you can have females be females because they lost a penis sword fighting contest (some flatworms),

~(all of these examples are false equivalencies. None of these animals reproduce how mammals do.)

you can have males be males because they were born female, but changed sexes because the only male in their group died (parrotfish and clownfish), you can have males look and act like females because they are trying to get close enough to actual females to mate with them (cuttlefish, bluegills, others), or you can be one of thousands of sexes (slime mold, some mushrooms.)

~(Again... not mammals of any sort...)

Oh, did you mean humans?

~(Yes. Because we are humans who reproduce just like other mammals reproduce)

Oh ok then. You can be male because you were born female, but you have 5-alphareductase deficiency and so you grew a penis at age 12.

~(Sexual developmental defect a-typical and so rare that there isn't quantifiable data to produce occurrance rates...)

inYou can be female because you have an X and a Y chromosome but you are insensitive to androgens,

~(genetic sexual development defect which occurs in roughly 2 of every 100k males. Still male bodies however.)

and so you have a female body.

You can be female because you have an X and a Y chromosome but your Y is missing the SRY gene, and so you have a female body.

~(Swyer syndrome. Another sexual development defect. Occurs in 1 of every 80k people.)

You can be male because you have two X chromosomes, but one of your X's HAS an SRY gene, and so you have a male body.

~(Also Swyer syndrome occuring in 1 of 80k people)

You can be male because you have two X chromosomes- but also a Y.

~( Klinefelter syndrome which affects 1 in 500 to 1,000 newborn males. Most variants of Klinefelter syndrome are much rarer, occurring in 1 in 50,000 or fewer newborns)

You can be female because you have only one X chromosome at all.

~(Turners syndrome... female with a frequency of about 1/2500 live births. Often those children do not survive. Turners is most frequently diagnosed after stillbirth or miscarriage.)

And you can be male because you have two X chromosomes, but your heart and brain are male.

~(This is woo. There's no such thing as a male or female brain. Actual physical hearts are different between male and female bodies. Male hearts are significantly larger. Female hearts beat faster. Symptoms of heartbattacks present very differently between males and females.)

And vice - effing - versa. Don't use science to justify your bigotry.

~(dont use science to justify your political feel good agenda. That's not the job of science.)

The world is way too weird for that shit.

~(The world is way too weird and you just keep making it weirder by pretending this is more complicated than it actually is.)

ACTUAL SCIENCE MIC DROP

Also you failed at the expectation set at the beginning that you know anything about biology or how to employ Scientific Method.

Pretending that genetic abnormalities that have a ridiculously low frequency are any sort of validation that subjective feelings makes people change sex is actually ableist and super misogynistic."

PS ignore the troll, any dude that INTERRUPTS women talking about epidemic sexual assault of women and girls to tell us he doesn't have privilege, whilst EXPECTING TO BE LISTENED TO AND ANSWERED (ie derail, and then direct the conversation)

Clearly has no grip on irony.

Cos that's male privilege right there.

Confused handwringing handmaiden libfems should be directed to:

liberationcollective.wordpress.com/2015/03/03/leaving-liberal-feminism/

And (this is brilliant)