Who's up for a self-ID day of activism?

[YesItsADebate]

Following on from my swimming thread, I'd like to guage interest to see who would be interested in taking part in a day where we all self-ID as men and take part in various forms of activism.

Some ideas from the other thread:

• a mass swim in the men's pond in Hampstead;
• manspreading on public transport;
• sunbathing/sauntering around in shorts and flip-flops;
• using the men's loos;
• using men's changing rooms;
• applying for membership of men-only golf clubs, gentlemen's clubs, the Freemasons' men's lodges etc.
• going to men-and-toddler play sessions (with bacon butties!);
• mansplaining, interrupting other participants in meetings and generally acting with a chauvinistic sense of superiority.

I'm sure you can come up with more. Vaguely planning for the summer when it's a bit warmer! Anyone up for it?

Disclaimer: while the law on Exposure (formerly indecent exposure) only applies to genitals, exposing breasts in public may amount to a public nuisance if it's done with the intent to shock, upset or annoy. I'll have a look a bit later for better guidance.

@SomeKnobend I really like no penis - no problem

Good morning! I’ve started adding people who’ve sent me PMs as friends on FB. Once accepted, I can then add you to the group. I’m on there under my real name too.

ladymelbourne126 I would welcome your friend.

belfastbloke every Friday, with a possible bigger event in the summer if we get enough people interested.

I think the swim is a great idea

Hipsterfun love the swimsuit.
I'd be more than happy to buy the T-shirt.
I think International Women's Day would be a good day to invade men's spaces.

@WiggyPig I've been told categorically (on here too, no less!), that whether a barber can cut your hair or not depends entirely on whether their insurance covers it or not. Apparently you can get insurance only for cutting men's hair, but also insurance only for cutting women's, so I imagine that's at the root of some of those silly excuses. OTOH, they could just say that they're not insured for it.

I’ve just informed dh that I am going to self ID as a gay man. He took it quite well!

Dd has female to male trans classmate so she has always been very pro trans rights but I think I made her understand the issues a bit better.

Sarahjconnor - not pathetic at all.

@Sarahjconnor that was brilliant! Go you!

Would she be welcomed at the pool?
I'd say Yes, definitely
Trans women with GRCs are not the problem, self I'D is.
So a trans woman who identifies as male on Fridays but maintains feminine gender presentation would also show the craziness

sarahjconnor I deleted my whole profile on here after a comment I made was screen shot on a TRA account on twitter. It is scary. I'm more careful what I post here now, I keep it to stuff that I could defend should my employer find out.
It is annoying when there are TRAs posting about sucking lady dick or their sexual fetishes (or even #girldick porn clips on twitter, bleeeech) and that's perceived as fine. Scary times.

I'm practicing being a man. I'm leering at my own breasts

Sarahjconnor I think I’ve just had my first girl crush. 😘😆

Sarahjconnor that's not pathetic at all, go you! What did they say?!

:o BreakfastAtSquiffancys. You've just given me an idea. If we're gym members, we could go into the heavy weights section on Fridays and grunt loudly, shout 'yes!' and 'come on!' at ourselves and admire ourselves in the mirrors. It would be amazing :o

Hi all

Have you seen the Basil thread in Feminist chat?

Might be worth getting some cross fertilisation of ideas. They seem to have come up with a couple of slogans that would probably be difficult to argue with: Sex Matters and Let’s talk about sex.

Can we go into Sports pubs on fridays and demand that the TV channel is changed to dunno ITV3 and get a dozen of us to watch TOWIE yelling "Get in!" and "did you see THAT!" whilst demanding that the nice young man behind the bar "give us a smile, love" ??

I am not going to shave my legs or my pits from now on. I may stop dealing with my 'tache, too.

I think turning up presenting as female but asserting one's maleness is the way to go.

I can promise if I did the swim at Hampstead (which I would love to, but it's quite far, about 150 miles) I would scare away any actual men anyway. Old, fat, hairy, even I don't want to look at myself unclothed!

I'm sorry to tell you that you are already failing at being men.
You have a female apologist mindset, you are already worrying about the feelings of those whose space you are invading.
The whole problem of self ID is NOT caring about the feelings of those who previously thought of the space as "theirs"

It's fascinating seeing what women feel would be mannish, and from which we are not technically excluded (we self-exclude).

I already

• go to the barbers
• use the proper weights section at the gym
• wear men's clothes (pockets!!!!! and the length isn't dictated by the waist size!)
• don't shave anything anywhere

I'm going to have to roll out something more for #ManFriday or nobody will notice I'm doing it

wear men's clothes (pockets it seriously pisses me off that women’s clothes, including coats, usually have so few pockets. I was over the moon to get a lovely woman’s coat with no less than NINE pockets in it. I’m so pleased I’m buying two more in different colours. I don’t carry handbags.

I'm going to have to roll out something more for #ManFriday or nobody will notice I'm doing it

I’m having similar thoughts, Wiggy when mulling over how I might come out as a transman.

I don’t wear make up and I’m not interested in hair styling so that leaves me with going over to trouser suits.

Then I thought I might ‘do a Bunce’, except flip it so when I’m a man wear super feminine clothes and make up, and stick to the trouser suit and bare face on my girly days. That, as I understand it, would be queering gender

It’s tiring just thinking about it, tbh.

Isn’t the whole point that we don’t change anything about what we do, how we present etc, we just self-identify as male without making any attempt appearance wise/behaviourally to ‘pass’, and access sex-segregated male spaces?

Yes.
Although please note that I am enormously in favour of Datun’s Flowery Swimming Hats. I promise that I don’t usually wear one, but it’s different enough to cause a double take, plus I’m quite partial to a bit of hat-based signifying. Which works well in a pool. And a knitted pussy hat would get soggy. The idea of women self IDing into the men’s pond is grand. The idea of them doing so straight faced in a flowery swim cap is even better.