“Transwomen are women”

[BertrandRussell]

I’ve tried this before-but please can someone explain the thinking behind this to me. I am naive enough to think that there must be some- is it the “male brain/female brain” thing? And where did it come from? Where did it start?

Please-no abuse from either “side”. Just statements of fact. With links to evidence if possible.

It can only be that the liberal feminists who're so angrily supporting transwomen on women-only lists aren't thinking too deeply about what it actually means. Trans ideology rests on the idea of fixed male and female brain types. TRAs would answer the thread question by saying 'transwomen are women because they have female brains'. That's obviously quite reactionary from a feminist perspective.

No one on this planet can scientifically define 'being born in the wrong body'. It's an impossibility. It's like scientifically trying to define that God exists.

Neither would never pass a meta analytical study.

“No one on this planet can scientifically define 'being born in the wrong body'.”

I agree. But if there was evidence of significant brain differences in men and women, it could be an explanation for the feeling.

Because so far the only explanations I have read for the feeling are all about not fitting into a hugely stereotyped view of what it is to be a man or a woman, and surely there has to be more to it than that!

A person who is born a man cannot become a woman. People aren't seahorses. Not yet anyway. Maybe some future science may enable it. But certainly not now,

Bertrand, one of the really confusing things about all this is the difference between transsexual and transgender. Transsexuals have an agonising sense of being in the wrong body. They need surgery to feel better. Transgenders might not suffer such crippling dysphoria but have a powerful urge to be treated as members of the opposite sex. There's a lot of tension between the two groups, and transsexuals end up being called 'truscum' and 'transmedicalists'. The other side get called 'transtrenders'.

I know what you mean.
The truth is your are either born male or female.
You then get to choose...
Male. identify as male.
Transexual identify as female in a male body. pre or post.
Transexual identify as male in a female body. pre or post.
Woman identify as female..

Sorry but unless your were born female, your not a woman,

Your DNA proves this...

How can a 'feeling' be scientifically defined though?

Your problems regarding this are, quite frankly, your problems. If you think that 'surely there has to be more to it than that!' is your problem.

It's stereotyping but it's also a socialised construct.

Are the following socialised constructs?

Oxygen.
Water.
Food.
Shelter.
Sleep.

Some will argue that they are.

Your chromosomes prove your sex, not your DNA. There are chromosomal disorders pertaining to sex such as haemophilia

www.nhs.uk/conditions/haemophilia/

DNA is cross sex with many human conditions whether it be male or female.

Brain biology is such a red herring, I don't care if there is some difference in their brain that makes them think they're a woman. If I am competing against a TIM in sport their lady brain is of no relevance to me. It's their superior size and strength that makes things unfair. Having a pink brain, even if there were such a thing, doesn't suddenly make pregnancy, abortion, breastfeeding, menstruation or endometriosis an issue for them. So they still don't merit the same biological category as me.

There isn't any logic to this Bernard. TRAs are bullying males wanting no less than to make everyone agree 2+2=5. Just like in 1984.

I read Bertrand's OP as a challenge to those who believe in gender to argue their case.
And of course no one ever offers an argument, because there isn't one.
The options for gender activists to address sex seem to be:

1. "ERADICATE IT"

Circular 'definitions' which literally are meaningless. Boils down to "I've decided we should render women meaningless because then my mates/children/bullies get their wish granted and I care more about them than the consequences to the people who called themselves women when it had a meaning. In short: we should ignore and pretend.

1. "FAKE IT"

False premise of sexed brains and or "identity". Boils down to "if I can convince myself that sexed brains/gender identity exist, I can contend that they are more important than sexed bodies. No one can verify what sex of brain/identity anyone has. I can ignore the obvious sexed body, and compel an invisible and unverifiable distinction of sexed mind, using fake science. This makes me seem credible, whilst allowing no refutation of an individual's brain sex." In short: fake a new definition of sex that allows no refutation to overpower reality.

People who aren't terribly logical or good at critical thinking stick to the circular argument position.

People who recognise logical fallacy go with pseudoscience to argue other stuff is more important than sex.

It's ignore, or lie. Or some combination of both.

What you'll never get, is objective reality and reasoned argument. There will never be a silk purse from this sow's ear.

"nobody knows what their own chromosomes are".

... apart from anyone who has had their chromosomes tested by a genetics labororatory.

... and, much more significantly, apart from the hundreds of millions of female people who have gone through pregnancy and childbirth, which are biological processes that tell these women that they can be 99.99999 percent certain that their chromosomes are XX. They can know this without any genetic testing, even in the most remote human settlements hundreds of miles from the nearest biologist or doctor.

I am as sure as it is possible to be without actually testing what my chromasomes are.

Agree with BlindYeo "Brain biology is such a red herring, I don't care if there is some difference in their brain that makes them think they're a woman. If I am competing against a TIM in sport their lady brain is of no relevance to me. It's their superior size and strength that makes things unfair. Having a pink brain, even if there were such a thing, doesn't suddenly make pregnancy, abortion, breastfeeding, menstruation or endometriosis an issue for them. So they still don't merit the same biological category as me."

The brains thing is a massive red herring. I am female, and was a girl and am now a woman. Based on when I was born people spotting a vulva and saying "it's a girl", then socialising me as such (clothes, treatment) and then at puberty I grew breasts and got periods and then it was time for an additional layer of socialisation of my place as a member of the sex class.

It is all about biology and how people treat you, for me the way men treated me after puberty affected me particularly strongly.

This brain stuff is what? what even is it. Sex has been about biology and gender role. The sex is observed and the gender role is enforced. That is it.

What even would this pink brain stuff mean? Is it flowers and kittens? Deference? Personality of a laydee? A desire to be sexually dominated? Liking of the trappings of femininity? Many people feel that their bodies are wrong, it doesn't mean that they literally ARE.

Massive massive red herring.

Is the male/female brain like all those online quiz things?

I come up as 90%+ male on all of them. My interests are male, I'm good at traditionally male activities and tasks (map reading, building Ikea furniture, maths), I don't conform to female appearance (makeup, high heels, dresses).

That doesn't make me trans. It makes me a traditionally "masculine" woman. But still a woman.

lol yes the ones where I am a man and DH is in the middle

Re brains, I've often seen TRAs say it's all to do with the hormones everyone is exposed to in the womb, that they get too much or too little testosterone, but I've Googled and I can't find much on that.

I consider that having conceived, gestated and given birth is a pretty reliable test of my chromosomes. I haven't had my DNA tested to see if I'm human either, but I can make a fairly confident guess...

This is my favourite quiz on male vs female brains: victoriads.blog/2017/12/30/quiz-do-you-have-a-male-or-female-brain/

That is a very excellent quiz

That quiz, how did they know? And nothing about knitting or cooking.m

Re brains, I've often seen TRAs say it's all to do with the hormones everyone is exposed to in the womb, that they get too much or too little testosterone, but I've Googled and I can't find much on that.

I was washed in utero
It really isn't fair
My mother cruelly laundered me
And now I've too much hair
She didn't read my label
For proper foetus care
And rinsed me in testosterone
Then spun me for a dare
It's why I am the way I am
A willy like my brother
But I have got a ladybrain
I blame it on my mother

Science, innit?

Bertrand, I've often wondered where "transwomen are women" came from. I don't think that people who say that weighed everything up and then came to that conclusion, I think they started with that view and then used motivated reasoning in order to justify it.

T got associated with LGB*.
Progressive types (I don't know what word to use!) obviously supported the T as the LGB, as they would women, ethnic minorities, other oppressed groups etc.
TRA's then start saying "transwomen are women".
Some people went "hmm, hang on, they don't face quite the same problems, their rights could conflict with women's..."
Others went "transwomen are part of LGBT so must be supported, listened to (and perhaps not questioned?) along with everyone else, thus we should accept what they say - after all, we wouldn't argue with/talk over black people re. civil rights, gay people on section 28, etc. The unwillingness to question TRAs for fear of seeming right-wing/backward/on wrong side of history prompted motivated reasoning as to why transwomen were women, including co-opting intersex narratives, brain sex, etc. in a desperate attempt to justify this view as well as an urge to squash any dissenting views.

That's just what I think though. Maybe it's bollocks.

*How much the LGB has in common with the T is debatable, other than (perhaps) gender-nonconformity and being on the receiving end of abuse/discrimination (actual; not "lesbians won't sleep with me, OMG transphobia!").

The flaw is, racial equality, gay rights, etc. are not analogous to the TRA movement.

There's an article here 'debunking trans women are not women arguments'. It's incredibly disingenuous. All the usual 'biology isn't a factor because some cis women also don't have periods' kind of thing. medium.com/@juliaserano/debunking-trans-women-are-not-women-arguments-85fd5ab0e19c

53rd - thank you for that brilliant, brilliant link. I love the way all the answers are the same, except for the fact that person B is effectively "doing it backwards, and in heels." And the punchline is just... fab!