Trans unpeak moment

[Sunflowersforever]

Have really been tuned into the whole self-Id issue and subsequent discussions through mumsnet, and appalled at the encroachment into women spaces and the silencing of women's voices. Was so glad to have read Hadley Freeman's article and how she summed up concerns in such an articulate way that reflected my views.

Ok. Here is the unpeak trans bit.

On HFs twitter feed, someone posted about selfid saying. "It means swearing a statutory declaration that you are living as a woman (and there are legal consequences if you lie), changing your name and documents, telling friends, colleagues, family".

Is that correct? If it is, I didn't know that and it changes the whole 'any man can enter a woman's space unchallenged' argument a bit as surely documented proof can be produced if challenged?

Someone else also said Ireland had adopted this law with no consequences? Really?

Anyone aware if any of this is true?

Susan, some of your posts do read like attacks upon the group who are talking here. That is how I have read them, too, so I'm not surprised people have challenged you. If you are sincere, maybe look back at your posts and see if they say what you intended to say?

As to everyone else, well done, THLWGH!

RE YT threads - I agree that the distrust was directed at the media more than the individual. It's so unusual for women to commit that kind of crime that it's not surprising that people wondered if it might not have been a woman, but the thing is, the idea that it might have been a TIM instead is a direct result of the media refusing to identify TIMs as people born male who've transitioned in news reports, so you get things like that case where someone was breaking into women's homes and wanking in their underwear and wanted to be transferred to a women's prison, and it's confusing because when have you ever heard of a woman doing? And then you dig a bit and understand that the perp was a male person but the fact that the paper that wrote it was withholding that information leaves you with a distrust of media reports about crime that seems atypical if the perp was female. So everyone is on edge and suspicious, and it's not because they're transphobic, it's because they know that the media is withholding information from them. Not being able to trust what you'd assumed were reputable news organizations to give you the full picture is disorienting and people are reeling a bit.

@tallulahWaitingInTheRain

Thanks. It means a lot.

Not being able to trust what you'd assumed were reputable news organizations to give you the full picture is disorienting and people are reeling a bit

I have no doubt that if the shooter was trans, then there would have been certain mainstream media outlets who would have mentioned it and named the original name. No doubt at all.

Cheers

Taking a break when we feel misunderstood by everyone is an excellent idea, @SusanBunch

Sometimes it feels like there is no answer to the is it me or is it them question. That is the best time to take a break.
I do think your participation here has always been in good faith in spite of whatever misunderstandings we may have had.

I'm not sure which outlets you assume people are reading, yet, but until recently my main source for news was The Guardian, and they most likely would not have, at least not in the way you seem to be implying.

Many women say they don't feel female and without referring to genitalia cannot explain being what a women is, it's not a 'feeling'... but at the same time ask trans women to explain it, something some cis women say they can't do themselves
Loads of posters have quoted this line but I'm doing so again to highlight the doublespeak we are meant to accept. Oh no I can't explain wood without mentioning trees! Fuck that bollocks.

@SusanBunch I have been off line all afternoon and evening. I found my question to you. I did not accuse you of anything. I asked if this case of workplace bullying (where I admit bullying is, of course, never right) and of the media speculation (that the shooter was trans) was enough to effectively stop you being concerned about the gaslighting that is going on.

I said it because although individual posters being rude or speculating on a crime case or individual incidents of bullying may be wrong (bullying is always wrong) but it is not a tit for tat and actually these things do not make up for the way women's rights are being eroded. Self Id is coming on through the back door.

I have no doubt that if the shooter was trans, then there would have been certain mainstream media outlets who would have mentioned it and named the original name. No doubt at all.

Not necessarily yet. Click on the links I posted (I have more if you need them).

TBF in this case there probably would have been accurate reporting from somewhere in the world because it didn't happen in the UK. We have the IPSO guidance here which prevents a lot of accurate reporting. It also prevents trans people being made a news story just for being trans which is obviously a good thing.

IPSO guidance needs tweaking IMO.

It's like being asked to write articles for a hiking magazine without being allowed to mention feet, or boots, because why would you assume that that's important to the experience of hiking and can't we just appreciate the serene beauty of nature without all this nasty talk about blisters and sweat and the special socks that one might buy to help prevent this?

For women who're currently menstruating, or pregnant, it's like being told this while in the process of dealing with the blisters that you just got while on your totally non-embodied nothing at all to do with anything as base as feet which are obviously not suitable for conversation in polite society hike.

@crispbuttyfan

"Italian greyhound
you are posting links from an explicitly anti-trans propaganda group"

Links plural from which organisation? I think I postsed only one from Stonewall and one from Fair Play for Women.

Do you want to critise the facts of what I posted?

Because I can probably link to another source saying a really similar thing, if you have issue with the source from where that info came.

"Agp is now decades old quackery that relies on stacks of evidence and further understanding that we have gained on gender identity in the meantime, like proponents of ROGD, it relies on the conclusion that gender identity doesnt exist or is transient"

If AGP Doran't exist what explains cross dressing?

If ROGD doesn't exist what explains record numbers of young girls coming out as 'trans' or identifying as boys?

If gender identity really is an innate 'thing' rather than a social construct, explain how it works biologically. Links please.

And if gender does exist wholly separate from biology then why not allow for it within society's existing sex segregation for safely, dignity etc - prisons, hospitals, sports?

These are based (or where until very recently) on sex segregation. So males with a woman's 'gender identity' are still male so still get to use male loos, not compete against women in sports, etc.

It seems from all tanssexual people say they do not really have a 'gender' dysphoria but a sexual dysphoria, which is why most genuine transsexuals do want to transition to look the opposite to birth sex. Which seems different from 'identifying' as someone. Maybe a transsexual person can explain for me.

Men who don't want to be men, or masculine, only have one place to go. But even if every fibre of their being tells them that their sex is wrong, it doesn't make them the opposite sex.

I totally understand how gender dysphoria forces them into this position. And I have bottomless empathy. Truly. It must be a fricken nightmare.

This. I completely understand the born in the wrong body narrative as a coping mechanism for the severe distress caused by dysphoria. If that's what gets a person through the day, I'm all for it.

On a personal level.

What it isn't, is a basis upon which to reorganise the whole of society or to abandon women's sex-based protects and the safeguarding of children.

@AngryAttackKittens You are absolutely right. There has been so much misreporting over the last year or two that now people have become suspicious. Not just about crime either, about anything 'untypical'. I remember learning about Briannu Wu, the woman who ran a successful software company. I thought great, a role model for us women working in tech! Ok, her image is a bit 'sexier' than the average developer but maybe that's how female techies style themselves in America! Then it turned out... not.

Agp is now decades old quackery

You're not keeping up with the latest trends. Transscribe (Katelyn Burns) claims on Twitter than AGP is normal for all females. There's a survey to prove it.

et, but until recently my main source for news was The Guardian, and they most likely would not have, at least not in the way you seem to be implying

I try to look at a range of news websites from around the world - even Fox - just to see what other news and perspectives are being reported. Al Jazeera is fascinating.

The Guardian wouldn't have reported it - but I bet Fox would. And Breitbart.

I mentioned this before but here seems a god place to mention it again.
In Canada the law requires journalists to report transgender identified males as women. While the news media has failed miserably in standing up for truth they have begun publishing pictures with the stories so that people can see that the perp they are reporting as a woman is actually a transgender identified male.

@crispbuttyfan

Not that I think you'll read this but thanks to your statements in this thread I now understand where you were coming from in the other one.

May I just say - and I do so in good faith - please do not reject the now prevalent definition of transwoman on trans activist websites. Or at least please prepare yourself for a nasty backlash. I was called a transphobe at the very beginning of my journey to being gender critical for defining transwomen as you do and rejecting crossdressers as falling under the trans umbrella. You would most likely be called truscum if you are indeed transsexual.

My kids got taught about gender identity in school and if you google "trans umbrella" and look at the images that come up you will find much of the material used at schools today. They all include crossdressers, drag queens, feminine men etc etc - not what you understand to be trans at all.

I am sure that there are British papers who do exactly the same and would continue to do the same.

Some British papers had plenty of issues with the trans community even before self ID.

There was a flurry of interest over that shooter. Precisely because of the misreporting of sex in terms of perpetrators of violence.

No one, in their wildest dreams, would have thought of speculating three or four years ago.

But it was the swift changing of accounts that really spurred it on.

Things on social media were deleted and altered.

And whilst that could have been for any number of reasons, it certainly looked odd. But only because of the current climate.

Al Jazeera is definitely worth watching, though doing so in the US probably means ending up on a government watchlist.

As for crossdressers and AGP

Not all crossdressers have autogynephilia but all autogynephiliacs started out as crossdressers. Developing AGP often takes many years which is why the median age at transitioning for transsexuals with AGP is mid 30s to mid 40s.

Blanchard in his taxonomy of transsexualism did not judge the non-homosexual transsexuals (ie the autogynephiliacs) as any less valid or worthy than the homosexual transsexuals (ie the transkids). I will quote here the excellent Kay Brown, a life-long trans activist and transwoman who has an informative and meticulously referenced FAQ on gender dysphoria and transsexualism, because she says it far better than me:

>>The two type transsexual taxonomy is the result of many already fully tested and retested hypotheses and observations that are actively guiding additional research.

There have been efforts by various members of the Western (English speaking and Northern European) transgender and transsexual communities, especially “late transitioning” transwomen, to attempt to “discredit” this research, often by false characterizations of the research, researchers, and educators involved.

They often mislabel the theory, “pseudo-science” and the people “transphobic”, “crackpots”, “quacks”, and “fringe”, all without a shred of evidence to support their claims other than dislike for the theory. They often mischaracterize the scientific literature as being “dated” and old (in spite of the fact that the papers with evidence supporting the two type taxonomy continue to be published at an accellerating rate).

Rather than the science being transphobic, the denial of the taxonomy is itself part of an internalized transphobia, call it “autogynephobia” that leads many transgender people, especially AGP transwomen and cross-dressers, to deny their own autogynephilic sexuality and experiences.

*Autogynephobic denial also is the root cause of “identity politics” that seeks to disparage transwomen who acknowledge autogynephilia, and to disparage cross-dressers, from whom they wish to distance themselves.

Katelyn Burns thread on AGP.

I'll read everything but Breitbart. I follow on twitter and read the headlines and leave it at that. I do so as not to lose my marbles and risk my health via my blood pressure.

Fox, I will look at to look into the minds of others within reason. Similar thing for RT.

Al Jazeera I do recommend though. I've watched some utterly fascinating stuff.

Italian, my perspective on the question of 'gender dysphoria; v 'sex dysphoria'.

Transsexuals believe their bodies are just somehow wrong. It is focused on the body, not on personality, or hobbies, or likes or dislikes.

We don't know how or why. So we come up with words like 'born in the wrong body' because that's how it feels.

It is the body, not the mind, or personality or self expression.

We KNOW that biologically our sex is one thing as defined by various obvious features but we FEEL innately and deeply that it should be different.

So it becomes a necessity to bridge that gap by whatever physical means are available.

Hence we remove all visible signs of maleness, sex organs, facial hair, adams apple removal if necessary, even altering voice pitch by surgery, facial reconstruction and so on. And, of course, alter our hormonal make up to match female normal levels as best as possible.

The amount done depends on many things - cost, availability on NHS, etc. But we do it even though much of it is extremely painful with possible complications because it is a necessary step to us towards the only end goal we have to reach.

We know it does not change biology. But we almost certainly would do that or any new procedure made available to push us further along the path if it became available.

It is very strange - because we understand the apparent madness of what we are doing. We recognise the futility of it as in it being a literal transformation. We could be told it will shorten our lives (as we often were) and that the outcome will be uncertain (as they often are). Possibly permanent body malfunctions and so on.

Yet we do it because it is a necessity to achieve that balance or harmony between body and how we feel our body should have been.

It is a bit like having a tumour inside that you notice all the time as a pain deep within your body and you just have to remove this in order to survive regardless of the risk of doing so.

I don't get the sense that there is this level of physical transformative necessity about transgender people.

They seem really to want to express a gender identity that they feel they possess in the easiest and most adaptable way. They tend not to be that risk friendly so any work done is likely to be the soft kind.

One question we usually get asked by psychologists seems to be if there was a magic cabinet you can walk into and emerge from as one sex or the other, which would you choose? Transsexuals always apparently give the same answer. Transgender people say one, then might say the opposite the next week. They have no such surety.

Transgender people do not always feel any kind of physical anomaly at all and that is why you hear the absurdity spoken of a woman happy to transition and retain her 'lady penis'.

A statement that I (and I suspect most transsexuals) find impossible to comprehend and - well - absurd.

Much as I am sure you find what I am describing to you about being transsexual as absurd.

Because I know perfectly well it will appear utterly bonkers. And it is bonkers. But it is what somehow happens and when you have it you know that it just will not go away, because you hope it will and it just stays there all the time unless you deal with it.