Trans women are women answers to Terfmore's questions

[SupermatchGame]

Terfmore. I don't want to override the ASD discussion that's developed...
but SupermacthGame: you gave your explanation why "trans women are women". I was hoping for a coherent argument.
Could you respond to my request that you clarify your position; I found it difficult to understand tbh I found it incoherent.
You could start a new thread if you like.

Ok, as you suggest:

upthread you say -
"Trans women are women because 'woman' (or female) is not only a legal designation but having a gender identity of 'woman' is a legitimate female gender identity with some basis in biology and physiology. No-one said this is an exact science. It's pragmatic." -
Could you break this down -

1. what do you mean "woman" is a legal designation? what law are you referring to? do you mean "adult human female"?

I mean the category ‘female’ not only has a biological definition, but it is also a legal category that can be conferred to a person following GRC. I’m using ‘woman’ and ‘female’ interchangeably here. Eg as specified in the Royal College of Psychiatrist’s Guidance on gender dysphoria:
"Once a Gender Regulation [sic] Certificate has been issued, the applicant must, in accordance with the provisions of that certificate, be identified as a man or a woman and not a ‘trans man’ or ‘trans woman’. "

Quoting the Gender Recognition Act 2004:
"Where a full gender recognition certificate is issued to a person, the person’s gender becomes for all purposes the acquired gender (so that, if the acquired gender is the male gender, the person’s sex becomes that of a man and, if it is the female gender, the person’s sex becomes that of a woman)." (my bold)

2. what does "gender identity of woman is a legitimate female gender identity" mean.

It means that regardless of natal sex, if a person identifies as a woman, and they have been diagnosed or confirmed as having a ‘female gender identity’ then to all intents and purposes they are classed as having a female gender identity that legitimises medical and legal transition. I’m not sure taken in isolation this clause makes much sense because it is part of a larger sentence.

3. in what way is an identity legitimate (and presumably there will be non or illegitimate identity?)

Legitimate as in confirmed by psychiatrists and/ or psychologists. As in a (cross sex) gender identity that is not caused by some co-morbidity or underlying pathology. (Not caused by anything other than GID/ or 'transgenderism'). An identity that can then be further legitimised by changing legal status.

4. do you mean identity "has some basis in biology and physiology"? what do you mean by identity? (it means different things to different people).

I mean gender identity (the sex with which an individual identifies with or feels they are) has genetic, biological, environmental and societal causes. (Although you could say that about most aspects of identity - using the biopsychosocial model). What evidence there is points to this. I’ve highlighted a lot of it on the other thread. I was abbreviating my language and focusing on the non environmental causes - by biology I meant genes and biochemistry including hormonal influences. By physiology I meant the physiology of the brain as in brain structure. Is There Something Unique about the Transgender Brain? www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-there-something-unique-about-the-transgender-brain/

5. What is "pragmatic"? I think you are referring to "trans women are women" not being exact but we just have to live with it. but I may have that wrong?

Not 100% perfect solution. No-one has yet found a way to ‘cure’ transsexualism. Treatment alleviates dysphoria. In many cases it supports the person to lead a happier life in which they can function better psychologically, emotionally, socially and occupationally. Sometimes also in terms of sexual relationships. It’s not a perfect transition - trans women do not acquire wombs, trans men do not have real testicles (not that they all want to?) Not all trans people can resemble their new sex as much as they would ideally like. But it can be good enough. It can support improved health outcomes for some individuals. It is also a solution that most of society (and it’s main organisations) seems to accept. Hence pragmatic, not perfect, solution.

This is a dissociative disorder. It's not possible for humans (or any animal) to be born in the 'wrong body'

On what authority do you categorically state this? Because I don't believe the debate has been settled has it, or we simply wouldn't be where we are today.

and in any other instance where people feel their body is fundamentally 'wrong' (e.g., anorexia), we recognise that this is a severe condition and don't validate the belief.

As an ED survivor I can tell you with absolute certainty that transgenderism and eating disorders are nothing alike.

If a transgender individual indulges their transgenderism through to its fullest conclusion, transitioning as far as possible and living as their strongest desires demand, a good many would appear to become "cured"; they find their distress to be greatly lessened and finally they can live a "normal" life without their previous "condition" having any further impact.

If an annorexic indulges their anorexia through to its fullest conclusion...

THEY DIE.

No one cares what you are or aren't personally convinced by. It's irrelevant to this issue.

So why are you banging on about it?

This is what Rat and Peak want. The are 100% behind protecting males and just drone on and on and on about it.

Absolutely.

So why are you banging on about it?

You do seem very exercised about my challenging your words, why? Lost that breezy insouciance?

On what authority do you categorically state this? Because I don't believe the debate has been settled has it, or we simply wouldn't be where we are today.

Please lay out the evidence for being "born in the wrong body".

I think it's slightly untrue that in 1988, pregnant women were supposed to hide. How so? As I said, there are extensive employment rights based on pregnancy, but using terms such as parental leave rather than maternity leave is actually beneficial because it removes the assumption that infant care can only be carried out by a woman.

My mum had a baby in 1988 and started a job in 1990. She had to lie that she had no small children to get it.

Rat "I think insisting that all and sundry must know the sex of those ..... allows women to be stereotyped and discriminated against with far more ease."

I genuinely don't care what sex people are unless they are:

• In spaces where I or other women's/girls safety and privacy is compromise (toilets/prisons etc)
• Taking women only roles/ jobs or awards or places away from women
• Speaking on behalf on women (any more than I would expect to be asked to speak on behalf of trans women, or men, or boys, or black people, or people with PhDs etc etc, because I could not speak on their behalf

I'm also not happy with anyone telling women at women's rallies or women's conferences what they can speak about or barring the entrance to any event that women and girls legitimately have a right to attend. But those people could be male or female so it is kind I'd a side issue.

There may be more things but off the top of my head, that's it.

@SupermatchGame "I don't think human aspects of identity are tangible and I don't really know what a 'soul' is anyway. Does anyone? I don't think it's about stereotypes either. I also believe that regardless of how it develops, once gender identity is established, it is generally immutable. So do most of the medical and mental health professions."

Plenty of religious people believe in a soul, I do, and no, mine doesn't have a gender or a sex.

And if things are not 'tangible' how can one legislate for the non-tangible?

It is all based around stereotypes.

Males do not need any more rights over females.

Why not argue for a third space?

If you are talking about sleeping arrangements, I am pretty sure the leaders never share tents etc with the children.

Whyever not? How many incidents have there been where leaders have attacked children?

@AllyMcBeagle

Thanks for clarifying what happened with the GRA. So the UK government could have challenged the ruling, but decided that it either wasn't worth fighting or that they wouldn't win.

Is this the Garcon case you mentioned?
www.humanrights.ch/upload/pdf/170425_Medienmitteilung_EGMR_Transmenschen.pdf

It's quite clear from this that the ECtHR think that requiring a diagnosis of gender dysphoria before being allowed to change legal sex, is not a breach of human rights. So why are governments going against this? Resolution 2048 of the Council of Europe, which recommends self-ID, seems to get mentioned as their reasoning, but if the Council of Europe is of lower standing than the ECtHR, why would they go with the recommendations of the lower level organisation?

Middle class, white, heterosexual women who are convinced that this is the end of the world because they might have to lay eyes on a trans bra fitter, not so much.

I don't think the problem is that they don't want "to lay eyes on a trans bra fitter". I think the problem is that their feelings are considered of such little consequence that if they book a bra fitter and get a man they are supposed to keep quiet so as not to hurt the man's feelings.

And yes, believe it or not black working class lesbian women have the same problem with this, and white middle class heterosexual women have rights.

Rat I don't need to convince you. If this was all about convincing you I'd have packed up long ago, honestly.

"the not knowing someone's biological sex despite knowing their gender presentation could actually be theoretically good for freeing women from sex-based oppression, BECAUSE how the fuck would anybody know who the hell to oppress??"

Read that back slowly to yourself Rat. It sounds like what you are saying is if men do not know we are female they can't oppress us? Is that how you want us to escape oppression?

We are over half the world's population! What chance for genuine minorities if the only way to avoid oppression is assimilation into some indistinguishable mass of humanity. Do you really think this is the way ahead?

Do you also really think people presenting in female clothes won'tbd oppressed? And is if so why are trans women saying it is a safety issue? Gender non conforming men are at risk, I agree, so are weak men, effeminate men, gay men. None are women.

How is isolating things normally associated with one sex and the opposoue sex using these things to suggest they are the opposite sex about getting away from stereotypes?

think it's slightly untrue that in 1988, pregnant women were supposed to hide. How so? As I said, there are extensive employment rights based on pregnancy, but using terms such as parental leave rather than maternity leave is actually beneficial because it removes the assumption that infant care can only be carried out by a woman.

As recently as two years ago, I was acting as a union rep and had at least three women tell me that they were frightened that they would lose their jobs if their boss found out they were pregnant. At least one was actively hiding their pregnancy. They were in insecure positions and worried that their contracts would not be renewed if their pregancies were revealed. It shocked me. This was with an, on the surface, progressive employer with excellent maternity and parental leave policies by most standards. That's the impact of biology right there. Nobody born male will ever have that problem.

Speaking on behalf on women

Agree.

There is a difference between being legally recognised as something for a particular purpose (I think here we have agreed it is the right to privacy?) and actually believing you are that thing.

We have discussed this before in the thread, but I don't think this is analogous to adoptive parents because an adoptive parent is actually the child's parent. (And I think Oleanna explained how adoptive birth certificates work).

It's more comparable to a company being recognised as a person for legal purposes (and I don't intend to be dehumanising here - I just can't think of a better example).

It's a big jump from accepting that somebody has a gender identity of being a women and the legal reality of a GRC to believing that that all women have a common gender identity or that sex is something to do with something in your head. However this is what is suggested by recent decisions by the Labour Party.

PeakPants - "There is no reason to have girl guides as a separate club from scouts. In many other countries, children of both sexes"

Except that that was what the girls wanted, they asked the girls.

Why should girls not be free to meet away from boys?

And guess what, now it's changed by stealth. Girls who are struggling to identify as their natal sex will be encouraged to go elsewhere and boys who identify will be free to join.

"I am sure the tent thing can be appropriately managed by the scouting staff." They have said how it will be 'managed'. The trans girl (natal boy) will chose to do what they want and the girls will put up with it or perhaps be moved elsewhere.

The parents will not be told.

I don't know if you have a daughter but I do and I am glad she has left Guides (of her own free choice before all this locked off).

And your under 18 girls not happy about of this will be called bigoted while the others may or may not call me mad!

Google Lila Perry school school walk out and see how the girls got treated at their discomfort at having a natal 17 year old boy in their changing/locker room. They were called bigots. So of girls in the UK keep quiet it may not be because they feel no discomfort at changing alongside a male, it's because the gaslighting has convinced them they should be ok with it. For me this is the worst bit of all. Girls are being lied to by adults.

convinced them they should be ok with it. For me this is the worst bit of all. Girls are being lied to by adults.

Lied to and guilt tripped and emotionally blackmailed. As you say, by adults. And some of the adults on this thread think that's acceptable.

"There is no reason to have girl guides as a separate club from scouts

Well there is

They are completely different organisations

Juzza- they’re not real lesbians? What the hell does that mean? Just because they don’t indulge in your scaremongering about women being erased, you’re denying their sexuality?? How about yes they are and they are free to make their own minds up about what they think about self-ID.
Who precisely is pressuring them to sleep with trans women. Because there actually aren’t that many trans women out there and most lesbians don’t even know any trans women. So who is putting all that pressure on them? On all of them?

Italiangreyhound @SupermatchGame and @RatRolyPoly why are you so keen to defend the rights of natal males over natal females?

It's not about that for me at all. It's about recognising that gender identity (the sex with which one identifies) is likely to have biological and sociological determinants and once established, so far, seems to be immutable. Therefore the identities and lives of trans people are credible and valid. As are the laws that protect them.

Peak Lesbians are homosexual.
That means same sex attracted.
Not gender, sex.

If you are biologically male, you can not be a lesbian.

Trying to gaslight women into believing they should be same gender attracted is conversion therapy.

Thanks for clarifying what happened with the GRA. So the UK government could have challenged the ruling, but decided that it either wasn't worth fighting or that they wouldn't win.

I might not have been clear - it's not exactly a case of continuing to fight. There's no appeal from the ECtHR. It's just that the ECtHR relies on the UK to change its laws when they decide that there has been a breach of human rights, which we almost always do. As far as I know, the prison voting case is the exceptional instance where we have really dragged our heels, continued to incur fines and basically defied the judgment for over a decade.

Is this the Garcon case you mentioned?
www.humanrights.ch/upload/pdf/170425_Medienmitteilung_EGMR_Transmenschen.pdf
Yes that's a summary of the case.

It's quite clear from this that the ECtHR think that requiring a diagnosis of gender dysphoria before being allowed to change legal sex, is not a breach of human rights. So why are governments going against this? Resolution 2048 of the Council of Europe, which recommends self-ID, seems to get mentioned as their reasoning, but if the Council of Europe is of lower standing than the ECtHR, why would they go with the recommendations of the lower level organisation?
Absolutely. I'm a bit confused too, but I suppose the Council Resolution was from 2015 and the judgment came out in 2017 so it's possible that the Council thought that human rights would require self ID or they were just trying to say self ID is the gold standard so everyone should agree to it. Fortunately, the Council can't impose legislation on the UK, so we should keep fighting against it.

It's about recognising that gender identity (the sex with which one identifies) is likely to have biological and sociological determinants and once established, so far, seems to be immutable

Hmmm that's quite a number of claims. The evidence?

If at some point in the future they've realised that loads of women don't have kids anyway, some don't even have the equipment, and the last two men they hired both took lengthy maternity leaves, it puts a rather different complexion on the decision.

Yeah, they'll just get rid of the pregnant ones, like they do now: 54,000 mothers a year