"Cis allies" being asked to provide "protection"

[OlennasWimple]

Can we talk about something that seems to be happening a lot at the moment: "cis allies" (note the " " ) are being asked to, in essence, prove their ally credentials but also take the risk and do the hard work apparently in order to protect transwomen (in particular) and transmen from attacks by terfs.

Just in the last week or so, there has been the video of the protestors on the stairs at the Jam Jar venue, which Bristol Sisters has claimed are "cis allies". There was a call out for "cis allies" to escort trans people home at night because they were scared that the terfs were in town and thus trans people were at risk of violent attack. The Free the She Wolf campaign explicitly asked for "cis allies" to attend the protest outside court in order to provide a human shield to protect the trans protesters who were going to be there.

And it's not just in person that "cis allies" are expected to get involved. When I posted the NUS slide presentation on "How to deal with terfs", one of the authors tweeted something along the lines of "Urgh, can a cis ally sort this out", and lo and behold a few new posters popped onto the thread to object to it, and of course MsIntern tweeted that she would get some of her MNHQ pals to take it down. (The slides also contain the suggestion that delegates "put yourself in between trans people and the TERFS")

What is going on here? How is the narrative growing that trans people are a) at significant risk of physical harm from terfs whilst also b) being significantly weaker than "cis allies" so they need their protection? Why are so many people apparently so keen to do this - to prove their woke credentials? Because they are hanging onto the coat tails of an exciting new movement and want to remain part of the gang? Why are so many of them women, when surely if you were looking for bouncers and security guards to keep you safe, you would want big burly men? (Pesky biology meaning that they are stronger than terfs)

Is this a new phenomenon? Have straight women always been asked to sacrifice themselves to the cause for no reward? Or is this just the TRA equivalent of making the sandwiches and putting away the chairs at the end of the meeting?

Well said, Redtoothbrush.

Contemporary law (since 2004) recognises that there is a legal fiction that a person can be treated as the opposite sex for most purposes. However the existence of some exemptions within both the Equality Act and GRA mean that the law is well aware that they have not actually "changed sex". Males are not suddenly female. Because it's not possible. So you're wrong on all counts. And badly informed as well as dogmatic and naive.

I think the 'cis allies' are doing it for themselves. They probably don't even know that many actual trans identified males, but they all like an excuse to mask up and act like a testicle.

Misters Uncut transgender spox explained in a FB post that they train and send their allies to harras women because it is too dangerous for the transgender identified males mental health to go themselves.

I've seen plenty of similar justifications. That it's "unsafe" for trans people to expose themselves to such ideas.

Woman, like man, is a historical, social, biological and political construct. While humans as a species tend to cluster around two dimorphic poles, these spheres are not mutually exclusive, and no single characteristic can alone determine sex. For instance, human males tend to be 15% larger, yet on an individual level, there are many smaller men. Biological sex is a construct as it is actually the clustering together of five different features - chromosomes, gonads, secondary sex characteristics, hormones and reproductive organs - none of which alone determine sex, and three of which can change over life. Therefore biological sex, as well as being construct, is also fluid.

So both biological sex and social and experiential gender are complex constructs, interplay of innate and external influences. Because of this, the current medical consensus is more and more shifting towards recognising a persons experience as the most important factor in determining their gender.

The facts and practices of sciences, as well as those of law, are historical, open to contingencies, and formed through peer review and debate, consensus and dissensus. We don't live in a world of absolute and unchanging truths.

However, what is cissexist is to call peoples lived experience and identity into debate, refusing to recognise how hurtful, harmful and invalidating that "debate" is for them, while for you it's "just a matter of debate."

To take a parallel from my own life: When the equal marriage law was about to be passed recently in the country I live in, I was asked "in the name of debate" to discuss the validity of my own family, and my parental connection to my children. Fortunately our kids were too small to realise that in "public debate", division lines were being drawn between members of our family with arguments of "biology" and "nature".

Not a construct. There are only two human sexes : male and female, both of which are needed for human reproduction. There are also intrsex people who do not want SJWs hijacking their condition.

It has clearly not been difficult for human beings to figure this out prior to SJW insanity as there are 7 billion of us on planet earth and we all got here the same way.

Mumsnet is no place for such intellectual bullshit. It's a site full of women who have given birth and lived the very thing your telling us is a 'construct'. If you were prepared to be even remotely honest here you'd admit your children got here the same way, and are themselves either male, female or intersex. I think you'd be more at home on Twitter.

I feel I've entered a new speak biology textbooks.
While humans as a species tend to cluster around two dimorphic poles, these spheres are not mutually exclusive, and no single characteristic can alone determine sex.
There are biological men, biological women and intersex people. That's biology.

Now GENDER is a social construct, but increasingly word use is being rewritten. (E.g. woman doesn't refer to an adult, human who is biologically female, they need a new prefix / sex and gender are the same thing, whilst trying to remove biological sex from the debate)

Like many people on here, I will defend tje righy of trans people to live free from harrassment and have safe spaces, but I don't accept the rewriting of facts and the attempt to shut down any challenge of the TRA agenda as being transphobic or bigoted.

I'm starting to feel like the entire 'conflate sex and gender' is fast becoming a go to stick of choice to get women (yet again) to bit and argue back, purely so TRAs can go see! Look everyone. Women are so awful to us.

Biological sex is a construct as it is actually the clustering together of five different features - chromosomes, gonads, secondary sex characteristics, hormones and reproductive organs - none of which alone determine sex

And yet the vast majority of mature humans have chromosomes, gonads, secondary sex characteristics, hormones and reproductive organs corresponding to their born sex, unless they have a medical condition or have gone through medical intervention. That includes transgender people.

Biological sex is only a 'social construct' in the same way age is. Not all 2-year-olds and not all 70-year-olds are the same, but there are significant differences between the two groups that go beyond social construction. That's known as 'biological reality'.

www.nature.com/news/sex-redefined-1.16943

Biological sex is only a 'social construct' in the same way age is. Not all 2-year-olds and not all 70-year-olds are the same, but there are significant differences between the two groups that go beyond social construction. That's known as 'biological reality'.
I like that way of putting it.

Also, trans women are women. Contemporary law, medicine and biology all recognise this. To imply otherwise is either incredibly ignorant or incredibly bigoted. There's really no excuse to be either.

Biology?! Oh dear, it looks like it might be time for this little reminder again. There really is no ambiguity about this stuff. We all know what a woman is and we all know what a man is.

Therefore biological sex, as well as being construct, is also fluid

Errrr no

Dont disagree with the last few paragraphs of your post but...no

Oh god

We're not going to have a link off are we?

"So if the law requires that a person is male or female, should that sex be assigned by anatomy, hormones, cells or chromosomes, and what should be done if they clash? “My feeling is that since there is not one biological parameter that takes over every other parameter, at the end of the day, gender identity seems to be the most reasonable parameter,” says Vilain. In other words, if you want to know whether someone is male or female, it may be best just to ask."

Nature 518, 288–291 (19 February 2015) doi:10.1038/518288a

www.nature.com/news/sex-redefined-1.16943

"Some men are small, therefore biological sex doesn't exist"

When you're reaching this hard maybe it's time to stop and ask yourself if determining your desired conclusion and then working backwards in the attempt to find arguments that support it is really the best way to go, intellectually speaking?

Can we have a dance off instead, Rufus?

That linked article is about two things, the first being that determining sex is more complex than just your sex chromosomes, which is correct. Just because something is complex to determine doesn't make it fluid or changeable.

The second theme of that article is about describing a range of intersex conditions. The existence of intersex conditions does not mean that humans are not sexually dimorphic/that there are multiple sexes.

Before you invoke biology, you may want to check what peer reviewed science is actually saying, folks.

Stop appropriating intersex conditions. The scientist is clearly referring to situations where an intersex person has conflicting sex characteristics. In which case it makes total sense to ask them how they identify and respect their decision. Do you think that the same logic should apply for non intersex individuals?

Folks?

A dance off might be the way to go angry as long as its not me doing the dancing

Before you invoke biology, you may want to check what peer reviewed science is actually saying, folks.

Have done thanks.

We're not going to have a link off are we?

Sorry too soon! It would seem so.

Ffs.

That nature article is AN OP ED PIECE

It’s someones opinion. It’s not a peer reviewed article, or a review, or anything like that. It’s the equivalent of the fluff sidebars that the DM puts out screaming Are our kids turning into knife wielding maniacs?!?!? when there’s another stabbing in London.

I am a scientist. The science says that humans are sexually dimorphic. The pseudoscience and ignorance and general lack of understanding over science in the TRA community is stunning. Any 16 year old with a halfway decent biology A level could demolish their arguments, so think how utterly foolish they look to anyone who is a scientist

It’d be like me weighing with my ‘opinion’ on what kind of structural materials to use in a bridge. I know chuff all about it and I’d look like a twat.