DEBATE NOT HATE: WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT GENDER

[blackistheneworange]

Sorry if this is on here already but just seen it on twitter.

It's this Wednesday in Brighton which may be too short notice for me but you can book here. www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/debate-not-hate-we-need-to-talk-about-gender-tickets-38129665857/amp

Sure, be name gender, be your true self but what has that got to do with anyone else and why should it matter to them?

@clareflourish I’m sorry but that post made almost zero sense

You wonder if it might be good for whom? That's quite an assumption that no one you're talking to here is a 'millennial', not to mention a bit condescending don't you think? You keep framing it as 'us and you lot', now with the added assumption that we're all a bunch of doddering old bags with no idea what is good for us.

Self expression, great. Meet me and tell me your name is Frank or Susan and you prefer 'he' or 'she' pronouns, great. No problem whatsoever. I'll tell you my name and pronouns too if you like. However if you seriously expect a slot to discuss your current pronoun choices reflecting your special sense of self that everyone else has to respect at the start of every new conversation, on the understanding that tomorrow you may have changed your mind and expect everyone to enable that too? That is one person making themselves awfully hard work and making themselves stand out as requiring very special extra attention from everyone involved with them. Does that seem to you reasonable, bearing in mind people are reporting this experience on this thread?

I was away for a week when some people were writing their pronouns on their name badges: I wrote "she/they/he/it", leaving the choice to others though showing some preference. I prefer "she". I am not going to get wound up about it.

This is Mumsnet. Most people here are mums (though I'm not) and that is my guide to age of people here. I call Millennials they because I'm not one.

Pronouns, and ideas like "non-binary", embolden people to subvert gender, and are a tool to subvert gender. Gendered expectations oppress people. Surely any way of subverting gender norms or gender expectations is a good thing? You might have better ways yourself, but others find the ways that fit them.

Well, how about using "she/her" but breaking the connection that this in any way tells you anything about their personality, behaviour, expression and so on.

"How tedious and self absorbed"

That about sums up the most of the TRAs I have encountered.

There is no fucking way I would be asking which pronoun to use at the start of every conversion. Thank fuck I am self employed. Must be fun to be a HR person at the moment

Well, how about using "she/her" but breaking the connection that this in any way tells you anything about their personality, behaviour, expression and so on.

^^This.

Clare - ‘genderfluid’ ‘Genderqueer’ etc absolutely DON’T subvert gender in any real and meaningful sense.
Sure, they challenge the idea that males do X and females do Y but only by creating a category of people who aren’t ‘usual’ (‘cis’) males and females but are in fact a different and special type of person.

Still catching up on the thread, but this caught my eye:

Scrap the whole changing sex legally part and make Gender non conformity the protected bit - after all if you 'pass' you're not going to be discriminated against for being trans.

This would help women who don't want to wear stupid 'women's' uniforms at work which involve tights, uncomfortable high heels and skirts - they can choose the more practical men's uniform (eg Dorchester Hotel hoo-ha).

Slight deviation from the current convo here, sorry -

I’m posting this link to Lily Maynard’s most recent blog post here as it relates to the discussion at the debate about trans teens. It’s a heart-wrenching read, mostly focusing on the silencing of the parents of trans kids and the repeated fact that kids are pushed to transition without proper care and counselling.

lilymaynard.wordpress.com/2017/10/01/my-mother-heart-bleeds/amp/

Just read that, WeeWitch. I'm wondering if I should forward it to the latest friend to be going through this -- the third I've heard about since the start of the new school year.

'This is Mumsnet. Most people here are mums (though I'm not) and that is my guide to age of people here. I call Millennials they because I'm not one.'

Millenials are people currently between the ages of 32 and 17. So very many of them obviously are mums!

I’m right on the gen x/millennial (formerly called gen y - anyone know why that changed?) cusp. My eldest is 7 and I’ve been on mn longer than that.

There are even plenty of people at the other end of ‘millenial’ on mn.

Reported the research link so MNHQ can check it out. After a previous poster's info about geolocation of IP addresses, stay frosty folks!

What was posted?

A request to participate in research, something about children's books & targetting 13 year old girls for the study.

Thanks, and for the warning. Looks like MN zapped quickly.

Pronouns, and ideas like "non-binary", embolden people to subvert gender, and are a tool to subvert gender

No they don't - a non-binary person isn't asserting that the binary doesn't exist, they're just placing themselves outside of it, and therefore implying that the rest of us are binary.

If a person says that they're a special type of non-binary person who uses 'they' pronouns, what are they thinking about someone like me? Who is totally fine with admitting that sex exists that it's a binary, that I'm a woman, and that as an English speaker, people would generally refer to me as 'she'? In what way, apart from those above, must we differ in order to justify their 'non-binary' as something other than self-indulgent snowflakery?

@SpaghettiAndMeatballs

It seems to me that people who identify as non-binary are finding a way for themselves to deal with gender in society as they find it. Whether in general men are masculine and women feminine or not, that person does not conform. It is a personal thing. The person is non-binary, so projects gender as they wish, not the gender the conservative would say is right for them because of their gonads.

What are they thinking about someone like you? Well, given that they express gender separate from sex, I hope they would assert that right for everyone, including you who say sex is a binary.

My friend got to University and could not believe how compliant all the other women in her single sex hall of residence were. I don't know what your experience is. I experience men being masculine and women being feminine and apparently liking it, not finding it weird or constricting at all- not everyone, but a majority. And then there are people like me who find gender norms imposed on us in childhood really uncomfortable.

It seems to me that people who identify as non-binary are finding a way for themselves to deal with gender in society as they find it
If only that’s what was hapoening. Actual law is being changed to force all of us who reject gender identity to accept it as being primary over sex. So we will vociferously challenge ‘gender identity’ and non binary identities wherever we find it infringing on our rights and freedoms.

I experience men being masculine and women being feminine and apparently liking it, not finding it weird or constricting at all

You’re moving in the wrong circles then.

Define what you mean be 'men being masculine and women feminine and liking it'.

If you mean 'OK with being called She, having a normal female body and shopping in the Women's clothing section (mostly)' then I'm quite happy with being 'feminine'.

If you mean 'wears pink frills/flaunts her curves/pays attention to her beauty regime', then I'll opt out, thanks.

@ClareFlourish - I've mentioned upthread the woman I know who identifies as gender non-binary. That person absolutely conforms to feminine stereotypes.

I resent the implication that I am happy with gender stereotypes - I'm not. I don't identify as a woman - I am one. I cannot - and neither can she - identify out of sex-based discrimination.

And it is such a first world luxury and it makes me extremely angry. Women are being cut and raped and sold and murdered across the world simply because they were born female. The implicit assumption behind a woman who has the luxury of saying, 'oh actually, I don't identify as a woman' is that those women who are victims of sex-based violence do identify as women. It's egregious bullshit.

ClareFlourish Oh of course, women everywhere are thinking "no no, I'd absolutely never like to share the housework/caring/running around after everyone else jobs, I get so much joy from them and definitely never want men to pull their weight"

But of course, you don't mean that aspect of "femininity" do you? Shame it cannot be extricated from the one where women are pretty and decorative and playing the parts of mother or whore.

The only people that seem to get to choose the fun/decorative part of the whole "femininity" experience are the ones with penises. Us lucky "cis" women don't get a choice. And I suspect that the non-binary ones with vaginas don't actually get a choice either - they might hope they get to ID out of it, but unless they actually pass as men, not a chance.