Hadley Freeman: Identity is the issue of our age: so why can’t we talk more honestly about trans women?

[IllBeBackmaybe]

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/18/identity-issue-our-age-talk-more-honestly-trans-women

Though some of you might be interested in this.

I'd love to know Alice Roberts view. In a Horizon programme she was overwhelmingly for the side that gender is a social construct, with the science to back it. Michael Moseley on the other, that it was evident in brains, which Alice argued was developed through socialisation, and demonstrated how this works.

Though there was no final conclusion. Could do with watching it again actually. I think Simon Baron Cohen needs to re-label his research into systemiser and empathetic brains rather than gender linked. It's been striking me that Temple Grandin would / could have been labelled a trans man under the current climate. She has autism.

Women like Hadley simply cannot speak out so this was a sanitised version of her opinion (I am guessing).
If more of us do it then things will improve but this will take a long time.
If mumsnet, the guardian and politicians cannot clearly address the issues I don't see how the rest of us will manage.
Miranda yardley is a loss to the discussion.

I'm new to a lot of this.

In a nutshell:

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/sarahditum.com/2014/08/12/no-platforming-and-newsnight/amp/

Totally agree that this is brave, and it's sad that that's the case, with something so gentle.

I also think that a lot of people, and she might be one, were very 'of COURSE we should support all trans rights' when the issue first started coming up, and it's only now that certain aspects of the trans activist agenda are more well known that there's some re-thinking going on. I mean, it's all moved pretty fast, I remember when Greer was talking it was 'how dare you say trans women are men' - whereas now I actually can't imagine a prominent woman saying that. Now you're on thin ice if you say that trans women weren't always women, pre transition. I think a lot of people are hitting a bit of a tipping point.

Really mixed feelings. I'm a big fan of Hadley Freeman and I applaud her for putting her head over the parapet but I'm so disappointed in the 'maybe they are' (bigoted ol' bitches) comment.

There's a big difference between pulling your punches and sticking the boot in. If Freeman felt the need to distance herself from Germaine Greer she could have done so, as Jenni Murray did. There was no need for the odious, ageist 'cool girl' wink.

I'm also disappointed in the way it's being shrugged off - as if 'a little light ageism' is seen as a price worth paying.

Yes flo. There was really no need for her to use words like that. I've gone right off Hadley lately.