Pregnant trans men Guardian article

[Todayissunny]

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/mar/22/story-one-mans-pregnancy-trans-jason-barker

I just find this so confusing....
It tells me that we should just be able to live how we want to. We should absolutely not be defined by gender.

Or am I just really, really old fashioned that this is just absolutely crazy.

Fair enough upstart

Re trans women not wanting the shit work, I’m just going to link that to my questions for Rat.

Rat, I’ll put the kettle on

“But it does seem to be only certain aspects of the roles gendered “woman” that are signalled IYSWIM? Even when the person transitioning is fully grown (ie a born man in their 30s/40s) we only seem to see the “signalling” that I would associate with teenagers. Including the selfishness of teenagers.

Is it something to do with having missed out on feeling desired/looked at with desire when young?”

I am absolutely sure Stillscreaming is in good faith. Challenging deeply held beliefs and being provocative can be part of being in good faith.

Before I went back to work post childbirth I would have agreed with everything stillscreaming says.

Also I am learning a lot from her.

Is there any point arguing with Rat? Think we are wasting our time

Feels like we ARE finally able to find a definition of women then:
... the ones who still do the shitwork.

By about four, they were pulling the arms of their beautiful dolls to use as pretend guns to shoot each other and taking great delight in peeing standing up. They are nice young men but they don't stand out as being particularly sensitive or unsullied by gendered behaviour.

Do you think pet, that our earliest cave dwelling ancestors picked up sticks and pretended to shoot each other?

I don't know if you've read Cordelia Fine's book Delusions of Gender, she references a study of mums to be who were asked to assess the movements of their babies. The ones who didn't know the sex of the baby there was no link between the reported activity rate and if the baby turned out to be a boy or a girl. However, mums who knew the baby was a boy used words like 'strong' and 'vigorous', gentler terms were used for girl babies. Even before a baby is born there are assumptions made about the nature of the child if sex is known.

Gender stereotypes are powerful things, I'm sure you know of that quite famous study which showed a girl baby dressed as a boy and vice versa. The differences in the way adults treated them was startling. Girls were cuddled more and shown the soft toys, later the adults would claim the child showed a preference for those toys. When the adults were told actually the child was a boy, they acknowledged that they were acting on an assumption that a girl would like certain toys.

@fascinated

Jayceedove, who is a trans women who posts on MN, was a long term carer for her mother after her mother suffered a stroke but we don't know what all trans women are doing, they might well be offering themselves up for the shit work and they might not.

I don't know how many women are doing the shit work, maybe the ones who don't mention it, are all living in elgalatarian households where everything is shared equitably but I don't think so.

Get you and your biological determinism.

Sorry, haven't caught up on the whole thread but thanksjanes;

I think that boys and girls both exhibit both the behaviours but the non-assigned behaviours get frowned on by society.

Yes, i completely agree with this. Stereotypical behaviours are circular, and circularly reinforced. It's like the question of the chicken and the egg trying to decipher how much of them is innate behaviour and how much is that external reinforcement you're remarking on there.

Rightly, gotta run, sport calls. Will catch up on the interesting discussion when we've won!

The ones who do have access to free contraception and abortion, are financially independant, who are educated and have feminist leanings; why are they still doing as much of the shit work as more vulnerable women.

I'm not sure what you classify as 'shit work'. In my experience women and men who live together before children divide household work pretty evenly.

However, if you mean why do women tend to be responsible for childcare, in the UK that is because until very recently there was no such thing as paternity leave or shared parental leave.

Have two or three children in the space of 10 years, take at least 18 months off along the way and it will impact on your career. One partner works more to make up for the financial loss and their career advances. It becomes logical for the less well paid partner to take on more domestic responsibility.

Why are men not stepping up more now that shared parental leave exists? Because of social prejudice. However things change. My grandmother thought it was 'unmanly' for my father to make up bottles of baby milk. My husband (before shared parental leave) took 6 months off to care for my son when I returned to work.

Do you think pet, that our earliest cave dwelling ancestors picked up sticks and pretended to shoot each other?

When men use terms like 'love' and 'pet', as feminists, we recognise it for the belittling misogyny it is. When women do it to other women, I consider how much of that misogyny they've internalised, how by aping their oppressors, they show their level of submission to the patricharcy.

Girls were cuddled more and shown the soft toys, later the adults would claim the child showed a preference for those toys. When the adults were told actually the child was a boy, they acknowledged that they were acting on an assumption that a girl would like certain toys.

I am familiar with that research and while it's fascinating, I think that too much emphasis has been put on the impact on the child. I think that it would be, at least, as interesting to consider why adult women behave in that way. Why do rational, intelligent women collude with this?

Thanks Rat.

So much Mimi on this thread.

Why do rational, intelligent women collude with this?

Because people have strong cultural beliefs and prejudices. It's one reason why people can be unreliable witnesses and also why it's uncomfortable for me to use a hairdryer in a bathroom even if I know rationally that it is safe.

Totally agree that the “pet” thing needs to go.

It’s (otherwise) a good point though.

There are quite a few specific behaviours that can be shown not to be inherent.

.... by which I mean that the gender thing is not entirely an evidence-free zone.

biological innate gender identity?

WTF?

It's like arguing with those people who insist that the world started 6000 years ago. And that men (never women) walked with dinosaurs.

The world isn't flat, even flat earthers will say that they have many supporters around the globe.

Even if you believe that gender exists, why would you need to group anybody according to gender? What is it that you are grouping?

Gender has nought to do with pure science and all to do with social science. The two may conflate now and again regarding disease spread but gender? No.

Regarding the spread of disease, for example a virus and it's an endemic, is to do with age.

Some may argue this is not the case regarding sti's but the spread of these sexual diseases is specifically sex and not gender.

There are limited public policy reason for segregating groups of people. One is safety. Another is to fight inequality eg AWS. All segregation must be tied to these objectives. If gender then what is the justification? That is what we need to unpick when we design a law. It is not the same in all scenarios

Trans males say they face discrimination and must therefore be allowed on AWS

They do but it is not the same as that faced by natal females. Because people do not read them as female. They gave trans specific discrimination

Disabled people also face discrimination. Not the same type as females. Gay men too. But if the nature of the discrimination is irrelevant, surely these groups should all be allowed on to AWS too? No one argues this.

a pandemic not an endemic.

Even if you believe that gender exists, why would you need to group anybody according to gender? What is it that you are grouping?

^^This.

Also, imagine that somebody does find a gene for ripping arms off dolls, and imagine they find that gene in people who have been identified at birth as women because they having uteruses and vaginas.

How do you go from observing that this gene is also present in women to deciding that the women are actually men?