Until we organise as well as the transactivists we're not going to stem the problem

[dorade]

Everyone, regardless of race, creed or sex is entitles to the same human rights.

I have three issues with much of the current trans ideology:

1. The erosion of women's spaces, sports, achievements and quotas by biological males who wish to identify as females.

1. The transing (and therefore subjection to lifelong medical treatments, invasive surgery and potential sterilisation) of children for failure to comply with societally-imposed gender norms.

1. The erasure of lesbians, either by transing of potentially lesbian girls or by transwomen claiming to be lesbians.

The trans lobby is vocal and well funded. They have found an enormously soft target in schools/government/social care, all of whom unsurprisingly associate transgender with gay and lesbian issues and don't want to repeat the bigotry that gay and lesbian people were (and are) subjected to. Identity is not the same as sexual orientation. A person's sexual orientation treads on no-one else's rights. The same cannot be said for gender identity.

When articles, such as the recent transgender rapist one, appear in the press, the vast majority of comments show that the public is not fooled. Yet people keep quiet so as not to appear bigoted, thus allowing the movement to steamroller on at the expense of women and children.

I believe that the main target for opposition should be in our schools. Organisations such as Gires and Gendered Intelligence distribute material that promotes ideas such as pink and blue brains and that any child can choose whether to be a girl or a boy to impressionable children, backed up by teachers. Opposition to this is needed and it is not happening in any concerted way. I think a backlash has every chance of succeeding as there is huge latent support for it.

The average person in the street knows little to nothing of trans issues, but is likely to believe that a transwoman will have had his penis removed. The fact that in 2 weeks' time the Government is going to be debating replacing sex with gender identity as a protected characteristic is way off the radar of 99% of the population.

Mumsnet is brilliant in debating these issues, but we need to take it to the next level.

I'm following with interest and totally support the idea.

I am plucking up the courage to be more vocal, but to be honest am only coming out the other end of a horrid few years of debilitating anxiety and depression (ironically a lot, if not all, of which was caused by men), and the thought of being branded a bigot or transphobe by people I think of as friends scares me.

I really need a local ally, but considering how fearful we all are of speaking out I don't hold out much hope of finding one.

Today I've woken up feeling like a man. It's triggering to know that some men think that only men have erections and ejaculate sperm. I would like sex education in schools to address this. I'm very upset. I also think we should legally only be able to say people who ejaculate. Are you with me on this. Discussing their dicks, balls and semen is so fucking exclusionary to me as a real man, the bigoted fuckers who do they think they are.

My feelings are so hurt, I'm not sure I can cope. It's probably the fault of you WIMMIM somehow as ultimately it always is.

Lets take this fight to the men. Why are everyday feminism telling women to be inclusionary about periods but not about male ejaculation. Lets bombard people with requests to stop saying prostrate is a male issue, lets call them out and make this an issue men experience too. Things would change fast.

I am thinking trans men [who haven't had gender reassignment surgery] will not feel comfortable in men's toilets/changing rooms/feel happy to give blowjobs. Wish we could involve transmen more in this conversation, as well as lesbians who feel targeted by the transphobia accusation if they don't want to have sex with someone with a penis.

Agreed Scissorsisters. Happy to identify as male from now on.

I had this chat with a friend and she's firmly on the "trans" right trumps all as they "suffer" more

Unfortunately this has been my general experience when I used to try to discuss this, as well as anyone who doesn't agree blindly that "transwomen are women" is a "transphobe". I'm somewhat ashamed to admit I don't voice what I really think about this now to most people, other than two of my closest friends one of whom thankfully firmly agrees with me (and would do with the posts on here).

Lets take this fight to the men.

I agree with this but in a different way. Educate our male children to challenge gender, not to blindly accept that they have to fit into masculine stereotypes and look down on those who don't.

Instead of teaching girls that they must accept males in female toilets teach our boys tolerance in accepting other males who have chosen not to conform to gender stereotypes in the male toilets (and do them for hate crime if they don't accept them). If male toilets are unsafe for gender nonconforming males we need to make them safer not send them to the female toilets.

along with 'cis' females are privileged because we identify as the same sex as our chromosomes do. Ah the privilege of being the female sex.

Lets contact the BMA to ensure they know they are not allowed to say men with prostrate cancer only people with prostrate cancer. If the trans men are not causing the same issues as the trans women lets do it for them.

Or do we let them get on with it and then just fight for new rights as wombers or XXs when womens rights as we know them disappear. We could redefine ourselves based on unassailable biology.

I've heard that said many times too Charlotta, it grates on me no end.

I don't seriously mean it of course. We have had the battle, why should we fight it again. It's just this problem is so invisible to the ejaculators and I think it needs to be highlighted.

@IAmAmy it's frustrating as I then asked "since when does suffering have a hierarchy?" and got a stupid comment about privilege. I didn't feel special privilege when I was sexually assaulted by a man. I didn't feel special privilege when as a teen I was bullied for not wanting to my nails or be girly. I didn't feel privilege when the boys in my economics class decided that the 3 girls in the class didn't belong and tried to have us moved to a different class as they didn't think we were keeping up with them. I gave up on maths after being told time and time again it was for boys. No special privilege there either.

A few things:

1. The most important thing we can do is to change other people's minds, one at a time. One thing which might be useful might be a playbook that people could dip into and use as a resource and source of suggestions and advice. Good links and URLs and research studies. Some suggestions on what phrases are good to use and which can end up alienating people and turning people off.

1. "Limited focus--broad base of support" needs to be the golden rule here. No matter how much any of us might care about refugees, marine pollution, support for learning disabilities, racism, etc. etc. I think the cause will remain simpler and clearer here if we can just focus on this core issue, and do not let it become a laundry-list of everything else we care about. A narrow focus will mean a much broader base of public support.

By the same token, this should not become "Let's abolish gender and convert everyone to radical feminism!" That's utopian and is not going to happen. Keep it simple and achievable.

1. A march would be great at some point (those who have to hide their identity could use masks--let's face it, it's been done in marches before!). I think we need to wait till there is a greater critical mass of support, however. And... again, hate to say it, but we may need to wait for more gay men to start getting fed up with this shit (from what I have seen on Datalounge and other places, this is already happening but has taken longer to get started than among gay women). Because a march with guys in it will be in a safer position if the TRAs turn up and behave in a genuinely scary manner. Can we reach out to more gay men? Speed up the waking-up process?

1. There needs to be a short, sharp list of concrete suggestions. Here are a few:

a) Get rid of the stupid "gender fluidity" shit and require that to use women's spaces transwomen MUST be passing some fairly strict criteria. Having this rule ALONE would do an awful lot to keep out many of the part-time cross-dressing opportunists.

b) No exposure of male genitalia EVER in public spaces. There needs to be rules about this. You flash a dick, you are out of the ladies' changing room, period. TW with intact MG need to either be extremely discreet or find gender-neutral facilities to use.

c) More gender neutral facilities, which would help out a lot of people as well as providing a safe place for TW who do not feel that they can completely avoid showing male genitalia.

d) We need an official public policy statement that is evidence based about children and non gender conformity--ie, which states clearly that most children who are GNC grow up to be gay not trans provided they are not tracked into trans-dom from an early age and then put on blockers. Gender identity therapists must be free to use non-affirmative approaches when dealing with children and this should NEVER fall under laws which criminalize gay conversation therapy.

e) All highly-sensitive female-only situationsrefuges, prisons, rape crisis centers, female HCPs for those requesting themneed to be able to refuse or segregate TW based on their own free choice.

Instead of teaching girls that they must accept males in female toilets teach our boys tolerance in accepting other males who have chosen not to conform to gender stereotypes in the male toilets (and do them for hate crime if they don't accept them). If male toilets are unsafe for gender nonconforming males we need to make them safer not send them to the female toilets
This

I didn't want to be a girl/women either when I was a teen, not because I "felt" like a man but because it was hard being a women and I didn't see any alternatives to suffering through it. None of that is because of my gender but because of the patriarchal system we live in

Sorry, that should be "No exposure of male genitalia EVER in female spaces."

BirdyBlue I said similar, also asked why that meant we needed to centre everything on trans rights and if it negated rape culture, rampant misogyny etc, and was told that we "need to be aware of our cis privilege" and that all these things are worse for trans women so we need to focus on them not "minor middle class cis concerns". I'm very sorry to read of the sexual assault you suffered. That's exactly the kind of thing which makes me enraged about all this. I don't feel very privileged to be quite obviously a "cis female" when I'm being harassed in the street by men (for being a "cis female"). It's infuriating.

"If male toilets are unsafe for gender nonconforming males we need to make them safer not send them to the female toilets"

Totally agree in principle and as a long-term aim.

But we can't wave a magic wand and make male toilets completely safe.

If we are talking about "practical suggestions to propose right now," then more gender-neutral spaces are essential if we want to either stop TW using female spaces, or at least tighten up the criteria.

yes - there is an inherent assumption that men can't change [they are victim to their 'sex'] and therefore male public spaces cannot be made safer - and so of course all the responsibility falls to biological women, even when this leads us incredibly vulnerable/the whole system open to abuse and to predators.

sorry leaves us.

Can we agree to stick to the term "unisex" when that's what we're talking about, rather than "gender neutral"?

Just saw this article - it's long (and a bit academic) but has lots of good points and references/links!
www.feministcurrent.com/2017/03/10/invisible-woman-gender-identity-age-neoliberalism/

I'm definitely in. I've just read the thread and there are some excellent points made. So glad it's not just me worried about this. I've just emailed my kids' head teacher to find out what the school teaches about trans issues and I plan to take action if it is harmful.

I also emailed my MP and got a positive response.

Is it worth reaching out to groups like the WI, women's advocacy groups, Refuge etc?

Isn't the 'cis' privilege & males privilage describing different things though?

Male privilage being a social thing where males are socialised to put themselves forward more, speak up louder etc & socially, educationally, financially are advantaged because of it.

Where are 'cis' privilege, or the lack of it, is a psychological thing? As in it must be psychologicaly very challenging to deal with feeling like you are in the wrong body, but that is an individual, internal difficulty rather than a socially constructed one- isn't this how to counter those claims?

Any mtt may have had a huge personal struggle but up until the point they transition they have still socially experienced male privilage.

I appreciate that mtt are often targets of violent crime (as welll as the perpetrators) but there must be other factirs involved also- sex work for example- but how much actual stigma is there out? YArdley says transphobia is mostly a myth. It's certainly cool and trendy with anyone young. My Twitter feed is full of very left learning American actors etc who make very interesting, intelligent points on everything else yet show blanket support for gender self identification. Where is all the social disadvantage for those who are trans? (As opposed to the psychological disadvantage)