My daughter perceives me as 'bigoted' re transgender issues.

[FunderAnna]

Two days ago I posted the following on Facebook

"A survey from employers asks 'What is my gender identity' and gives 4 possible answers.

1. Male (including female to male transmen)
   
2. Female (including male to female transwomen)
   
3. Non-binary (for example, androgyne)
   4)Prefer not to say.
   
   There is no option for me just to state that I am female."
   
   Within minutes I got a Messenger response - including screenshot - of this post from my daughter saying she couldn't see why this was an issue and she'd like to understand at some point.
   
   I messaged back saying yes we could discuss it at some later point and adding a bit of chat. I tried three times to send it and then realised she had blocked me.
   
   Yesterday after I'd emailed her she said that my posting that had made her feel incredibly upset and that she perceived the post as 'bigoted'.
   
   I think I'd find responses from feminist Mumsnetters quite helpful at this point. My daughter has just started her final term at university so it's best if I remain fairly calm about this one. We generally are close and get on well. As I only have a PAYG mobile, messaging each other by FB had worked well as a way of having the odd quick chat. Email feels more distant.

[Teacuphiccup]

I had to block my grandma from seeing my posts on Facebook and I have hidden her so I don’t see hers.
I love her to pieces but she posts really awful things from Britain first about Muslims and things about how all young people are lazy and we need another war to toughen them up.

I have blocked her not because I don’t love her but because I don’t need to argue with her about it. That’s not the relationship I want to have with her, she’s in her 80’s and she sees the world very differently to me.
I’ve blocked her from seeing my posts because she once publically told me off for saying ‘shit’ and I didn’t want to have to filter everything I was saying with ‘would this upset grabdma?’.

It’s not because I don’t love her or I think she’s a bigot it’s more that before social media she would say these things and id ignore her and move the conversation away, and she knew that I probably didn’t go to church and swore but she didn’t see that side of me.
It’s a bit different when it’s all in black and white in front of you.

[chocatoo]

Leave your daughter to her principles...she will get in touch when she needs money.

[SirVixofVixHall]

@BarrackerBarmer - just what I was thinking.

[velourvoyageur]

She's a student and dramatic, it's nothing new.
Blocking a parent for this is rude and that should be calmly addressed as a separate issue.

I've had arguments with my parents where I totally overreacted. We have little perspective as young people and can give ourselves permission to be OTT dramatic when we know this will not fundamentally damage our relationship with someone (i.e. most often with a parent who loves us unconditionally). We also often tend to overestimate the scale of our emotions when using language to describe them, as well as not having the tools to manage them or realising that we cannot make other people wholly accountable for what we're feeling. We find it more difficult to prevent our current impression of a person eclipsing stable, past impressions of them - so in the heat of the moment might see someone as 'all bad' or 'all good' (bit like splitting maybe).

It is not bigoted. You are stating that, if it is necessary to separate employees into M or F, you would like this to refer to sex categories, because you think this information is fit-for-purpose (I also don't see how someone's 'gender identity', assuming any employee feels they even have one, could at all be relevant information in the work environment). However, I can imagine that people who don't see that knowing the sex of an individual has any use at all could think you're shit stirring for the sake of it.
It's not that surprising. We're constantly told that sex-based oppression isn't a thing & we're supposed to keep all the ugly truths about what exactly is involved in possessing a female reproductive system under wraps, so in the end why should we expect young people to understand the relevance of sex?

I would ask her to please contact you when she is ready to discuss the topic calmly, and out of respect for you as her parent could this be sooner rather than later (i.e. make sure that you expect some sort of a discussion at some point given her extreme reaction - this shouldn't just fizzle out).

[Zeugma]

Welcome to the influx of new posters.
How interesting to see you've all found the feminism boards.

Exactly my first thought, Barracker. Funny, that

[Branleuse]

i noticed the new influx of users too. Mumsnet is more popular than ever. Its cool. Be great for their advertising revenue!

[Italiangreyhound]

I think the word 'bigoted' has lost all its currency; since now an understanding of biology counts as bigoted!

However, OP I would open lines of communication with your dd. She may need you. It's sad to allow this issue to divide you.

Find other ways to communicate with her.

Her blocking you is wrong. But I guess she is head strong and of course, young.

[Beyond11cisRetinol]

Not bigoted.

[Italiangreyhound]

Yeah totally suspicious so many people on Feminist chat think biology is bigoted!

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

Of course, you are not bigoted. I don't know what to do re your daughter though, as it is clear she has bought the kool-aid. Hopefully, she will see sense and peak in a year or so. I have a secret suspicion that the Emperor will soon be revealed to be nekkid and with a penis.

[Kyanite]

I'm really sorry, I do feel for you over this, I have a teenage daughter and we have had our moments too. Your daughter is going through a really stressful period so any extra pressures are just too much and, as has been said before, she's in at a place where the slightest thing is regarded as transphobic. All you can do is assure her that you're not being bigoted and happy to talk about your ideas of feminism when she has some time.

I wouldn't have answered that survey because I don't identify as anything except myself...I simply am. My sex is female, I am aware that I am female but I don't think in terms of gender, I like what I like and do what I feel happy doing without concern about whether it complies with society's idea of what women and men should do.

[Moxiebelle]

I think the problem is that you were being a bit disingenuous in saying you don't understand the way gender is being used on the form. It's understandable that most young people want to support trans people in living their lives without prejudice from others hurting them. To make them understand the important issues for women's rights that might be at stake you need facts and evidence and intelligent and compassionate debate.

[Ekphrasis]

I don't think it's bigoted but I do think it's of no valuable use to an employer in an applicable way.

It completely confuses sex and gender. It would be pointless from a pay gap POV due to not clarifying when a tw or tm transitioned and also as you're able to 'prefer not to say.'

It's a totally tick box exercise to fulfil a woke 'diversity' criteria or just an employer being nosy

[FunderAnna]

I've been on Mumsnet for some years, though I'm not sure of the relevance of this. (Are only people who have been on for x or y years, real Mumsnetters, who can decide what is up for discussion and how it should be discussed?) Like many people I'm an intermittent poster, who will post on different bits of the boards at different times.. Sometimes I just read things on the site. Sometimes I get on with my life.

Special thanks to those who are offering constructive advice/insights re my daughter.

[UpstartCrow]

Our children are being groomed into thinking womens rights are irrelevant.

[Ekphrasis]

I'm sorry about your dd; I'm not really sure how to advise other than seeing if she'd read anything by Debbie Hayton or Seven Hex on twitter or Miranda - all trans women who don't subscribe to this newspeak.

[ShellyBoobs]

Why would you post it on Facebollocks other than to be inflammatory?

What were you expecting from it?

I assume you hoped for people to come along, agree with you, and tell you how the country has gone to the dogs because of how the form is worded.

I will never understand this obsession with posting crap on social media to get a reaction.

[MsBeaujangles]

Dancingbear
My problem with: people whose gender is not the same as, or does not sit comfortably with, the sex they were assigned at birth

This implicitly reinforces a gender binary- which neither gender radicals or gender critical support.

For equality monitoring, organisations should collect data about sex and gender reassignment, beyond that it is difficult to see why they need to k ow anything else.

[Merchfach]

Read the Julie Burchill article in the Spectator: you'll find it on the Julie Burchill thread.

See, you're not bigoted. You have an informed opinion which you're perfectly entitled to hold. Your daughter holds another opinion. She's a young adult at university, so in a situation where she's probably never been required to think critically about this particular question. I would have made it a point of honour to think my parents were bigots when I was her age. The tide is turning and you're on the right side of the argument.

The survey was asking about gender. It probably thought it was asking about sex but the person/ committee that created it didn't understand the difference and didn't think the consequences through. You are informed and intelligent enough to spot the difference. Contact the people who devised the survey and ask them what exactly they mean: sex or gender? Do they realise the potential for offence? Transwomen are not women, they are transwomen. Conflating the two is wrong. As a natal woman you do not identify as transwoman and you don't want to be included in the same category.

Your daughter's a grown-up. Let her cut you off for a week or two while she does her finals. I went to university in the days before mobiles and computers and didn't speak to my parents for weeks at a time. It'll do her no harm. Enjoy being yourself and having your own thought-through opinions. Channel your inner Julie Burchill.

[busyboysmum]

It's hard in social media as your friends will all have different views and opinions. My brother is aethiest. He is always getting annoyed by religious friends who post memes about their belief in God. So he posts aethiest memes.

I kind of see this TG stuff as a religious cult that has brainwashed the young people. So they fully buy into it. You won't be able to critique it without them taking it as a personal attack. Obviously it's not a personal attack. But your daughter has reacted as if it is one.

I have many religious friends and whilst I think they are deluded in their belief in God, our different views don't affect our friendship. But they have never told me I have them or want them to not exist because they do believe in God.

I think the hyperbole of the Transactivists does them a disservice. It shows their youth and inexperience.

[PositivelyPERF]

Don’t worry OP, I don’t think Barracker was referring to you. Has anyone else an image of a little group of posters, sitting together and all determined to ‘prove’ how bigoted 😴 we all are. I care not one jot if I’m called a bigot, re trans’ issues. Like you OP I’ve been through it with my kids. Don’t worry she will eventually wise up.

[TheFallenMadonna]

I have lots of discussion with my 14yo daughter over this. She, like lots of teenagers, struggles with gender stereotyping, with sexuality, with finding and being confident with her own identity generally (cool, nerd...). She is compassionate, and passionate, and her experience of trans issues is in supporting other young people. There is no "punch a terf" agenda in her school. She isn't brainwashed. She can do critical thinking. She is simply coming at this from a different perspective to a middle aged woman.

[FunderAnna]

I think sharing news items and/or small incidents from one's life on social media isn't inflammatory any more than posting a picture of one's cat is. It's a way of passing information - often on important topics - around and also about getting to know more about other people's thoughts and feelings.

I had a number of interesting responses from friends on Facebook. And I am getting some interesting response here. At it's best this sort of sharing can help me get better insight into alternative points of view.

[Teacuphiccup]

I wish they would elaborate and explain why they think it’s bigotted

[mirialis]

Send her a note/card/letter telling her you love her, and if she'd like to talk about things at some point - about this subject or anything else - you are always there. Maybe include something like the recent article by Debbie Hayton about protecting trans rights without denying biology as an insight into your feelings on the subject.

quillette.com/2018/03/30/plea-trans-activists-can-protect-trans-rights-without-denying-biology/

Then I'd let her be until she wants to get in touch.