Trans Park Run Deletion

[TheUterati]

Poorly played, MN, very poorly played.

The perspective that when male athletes identify as female athletes and on the basis of that are eligible to compete against women, they are cheating is an absolutely valid one that is deserving of discussion.

Points in its favour are:

1. The context of cheating in sports as a whole - those self-harming activities that athletes willingly participate in to give themselves a competitive edge.
2. The evidence that mediocre male athletes who identify as female manage to then carve out glittering careers where those would not be available to them had they continued to compete as males.

It is an absolutely valid perspective.

Accusations of cheating against specific individuals may well be against talk guidelines, in the absence of supporting evidence, but those individual posts can be deleted and a friendly warning from MNHQ posted on the thread.

Males identifying as females and competing in female sports is a key issue in GRA, whether it occurs at the 'social, fun' end of things or at at Olympic level. To silence this debate is an appallingly heavy-handed.

AngryAttackKittens

also this

spontaneousgiventime - I think on the contrary it is you who has shown true colours, assuming that trans women are nothing more than superficial imitations and completely disregarding that we are actual people who experience actual hardships the same as natal women.

I will be over here supporting my natal female friends and family and even woman I do not know whilst you @spontaneousgiventime - I think on the contrary it is you who has shown true colours, assuming that trans women are nothing more than superficial imitations and completely disregarding that we are actual people who experience actual hardships the same as natal women.

I will be over here supporting my natal female friends and family and even woman I do not know whilst you spit and seethe that all I want to do is barge in an erase you. that all I want to do is barge in an erase you.

Ok, lets get some facts established here shall we? As a human being I strongly believe you and all other trans people have rights that are absolutely not negotiable. I would stand and wave my placard in support of trans rights if they ever chose to fight for their own rights and not just take over womens.

Simply due to biology, trans women will never be women, in 100 years if someone checked your DNA they would state they had found a male skeleton, that cannot be changed, nor can the things our biological bodies are designed to do. I cannot impregnate anyone, you cannot be impregnated, that is perhaps something you wish were different, but it is fact.

The internet is wonderful for many things but one thing where it lacks is in being able to tell the mood or personality of any given poster unless they choose to disclose that. You accuse me of sitting and "spit and seethe". I don't think I've ever spat or seethed ever. Sure, I can have strong opinions on many issues and I will voice them, I have the right to do that, however spit and seethe made me howl laughing. You can insult me or try to belittle me and my experiences as much as your want, it truly doesn't bother me one little bit.

The penis sure does like to come forward and introduce itself.

So if you're going to stick around, Nat, I would like to know what the woman's role is that you believe that trans women are living. What does that role consist of? What are its challenges and its rewards? When you look at the "cis" women around you do they seem to you to be living that same role?

Yes, I am a trans woman, but trans women live and breath the role of woman.

Role. I think this is part of the problem.

In some ways my experiences are different from a lot of the women on this thread because I'm a single, childfree lesbian. Back in my 20s I got mistaken for a boy on occasion. But I was born with a vagina & XX chromosomes so that now makes me an adult human female, & that's what a woman is.

It's not a role. Not a badge of honour. Just biology & everything else stems from that.

Not being a woman doesn't make someone better or worse, more or less important or valid, just different. There aren't degrees of womanhood - degrees of femininity yes, but that is a role or a social construct.

@Datum - I think that I do not view being female as being 'better'. It is the fact that all social and pragmatic stuff aside, I know that I was not born right. And I know people will argue that but that is irrelevant. I think a lot of this contention is coming from the fact that most women in this thread are using the word woman as a strict biological identifier, I am using it only in the sense of a collective. I have conceded many times I am not biologically female but that colloquially I am a woman, a trans woman. Does that make sense? I am not offended by the coldness, it is a truth in the sense you are referring, I just do not think it has to invalidate what I have said either?

I do not agree with you that the issues faced are superficial. Are you saying a trans woman would only be raped or sexually assaulted if they pass? Not trying to argue this, it is a genuine question.

I appreciate there are rights that are innate solely based upon a natal woman's biology and that there are many things that need to be improved upon for natal women. Wha I a trying to get across is that sometimes, there is no reason why feminists and TRAs cannot join forces for the good of both. But yes, there are many issues that if in the room, trans women should either stay respectfully quiet or contribute if it is conducive to furthering those rights, not hindering them on the basis of 'you cant say clit or period because that is transphobic to me and my feels'. Obviously silencing a natal woman's RIGHT to talk and discuss issues surrounding her body is absurd. I would shake my head at any TRA or trans person who tries to censor a natal female that way.

I am not saying that by having a compromised male endocrine system I have ceased to be a male. But I am saying that my bodily processes are female?

Completely agree that it is good to have discourse and it is nice to talk to you! I think that in an ideal world where I am not replying to a million and one people and then being complained at for walls of text, we could have quite an interesting and targeted discussion :) Looking forward to discussing other things too in the future.

Hi NatLuc, I'm appreciating your attempts to explain the possibly indefinable. But I don't get why, in the face of women telling you that womanhood is just a biological fact, identifiable in the dead or unconscious, you and other transgender people insist that it is more important to define it as an inner feeling.

I'm also baffled by this: I am not saying that by having a compromised male endocrine system I have ceased to be a male. But I am saying that my bodily processes are female

Surely it's the other way round? I'd be very happy to call you something other than male, given how strongly you clearly want NOT to be male. But that doesn't make you female, and the bodily processes unique to females are the ones you don't have (lucky old you, frankly, but that's a different thread) - otherwise they;d be shared human bodily processes, not female ones.

That's where my preference for being kind, inclusive, understanding etc. smacks up against the need to know what we're talking about.

Why is the terminology so important to you? Is it so that you can stay safe rather than being seen as trans, or is it something more fundamental?

Hi @NatLuc what do you mean by your bodily processes are female?

Please don't try to tell me that you have periods 'in all the essential ways except for the bleeding', by the way, or I might blow a gasket.

I imagine you have more sense, but that Twitter thread was a doozy.

Had a conversation with DH about the having periods in every way but the bleeding thing. If a straight man with no genderfeels whatsoever can grasp the concept that the bits that hurt are the bits that trans women don't have...

Basically Ada I need you to identify with us, not as us, because we have nowhere else to go and nothing else to be than women.

@Thanksforthatamazingpost, I know you won't see it, but that is exactly the situation I'm in. I'd much rather have been just like any other woman out there, but I drew the short straw, and I'm a woman that is rejected by my own, because my body unfortunately makes me look like someone I'm not, and caused me to be treated like someone I'm not for a long time.

But no amount of socialisation, no amount of being told I'm a man, none of that changes my identity. I don't identify as a woman. I don't think I'm a woman. I am a woman. It's been who I am as long as I can remember. It's part of who I am, and I can no more deny that than anyone else can deny their own selves. That being said, I did try and deny it. I spent many many years trying to deny it. But, it can't be denied, because I don't have a choice in who I am. I just am who I am.

@LangCleg - I do not think it combative at all, I know that I take too long to get to my point sometimes but only because I am trying to put my entire point across. I think it is a result of often having been interrupted in conversation whereas in written form I can get out exactly what I wish?

Again I genuinely do want to have thoughtful conversation with all so I will take it as constructive criticism lol.

@Scabbersley - Thank you, and I do understand that I am not the same, but I just do not see us as wholly different. As I have said in another comment there are issues you face that I do not have any bearing on. I do however believe that natal women should have a right to comment on trans issues a lot more because often changes to our rights do affect natal women.

@Baroquehavoc - I will give it a watch tonight when I get home from work. :)

@spontaneousgiventime - If I mistook your intent in your words then I apologise however they were patronising. To me at least. I apologise for striking back with the 'spit and seethe' statement. It is not a case of trying to belittle you. I genuinely took your comment about dress wearing, makeup blabbing and hair flicking to be quite stereotypical. which is not fair. Neither is referring to an appendage that I have as personifying me. Let us just agree that there are some rights which on both sides of the fence should be fought for but that in trans rights, these need to be carefully considered so as not to infringe or endanger natal woman whenever possible?

@AngryAttackKittens - I am happy to answer this or at least attempt to though I do not think any of you will find it satisfactory when I have seen others try and fail (not necessarily on MN). I will come back to you with an answer typed out if that is okay?

Sure, no rush!

I don't identify as a woman. I don't think I'm a woman. I am a woman.

. So a women isn't an an adult human female. What do you call adult human females?

Annoying, probably, Baroque.

Hi Lucy.

Can I just ask - to what level have you actually studied biology? As a science?

Because your bodily processes are not female, they can't be.

Same for Ada. You say you "just are" a woman, not that you identify as a woman or think you are a woman. Only you're not. Biologically you can't be.

Now me, I "just am" a woman. Because my biology makes me female, and adult human female = woman. In no other way. No gender role, not thoughts about it, I just am. But your biology is different to mine so we cannot be the same.

I'm not excluding you, belittling you, "othering" you or discriminating against you. I'm just saying that our fundamental starting points are different. Sometimes our needs and lives will overlap, and that's great.

But I would prefer to freely accept you for what you are and live alongside you than be forced to accept you as something you're not and feel bitter and resentful about it, and that to me is the heart of the current self-id debate.

I do not think it combative at all, I know that I take too long to get to my point sometimes but only because I am trying to put my entire point across.

Ok. Well, in that spirit, let me break down this dynamic - which, as I say, is very typical and not unusual or peculiar to you hereabouts - as feminists perceive it:

• You arrived on this thread with a thousand word-plus post that was all about yourself with lengthy autobiographical details that most people would be sympathetic about. You ignored the interests of women even though you expended all those words

• To a feminist, this is an appeal to the female socialisation of women, designed to manipulate them into putting their interests in the topic of this thread below your own.

• When you got some pushback on this you became rude and demanding and made a number of offensively sexist remarks (eg "natal women should helping to protect us").

• To a feminist, this is a display of male entitlement and anger at encountering the word "no".

My assumption is that you have joined this thread in order to persuade feminist women out of their view that Parkrun participants should categorise themselves by the correct sex, or at least mark themselves as assisted so that women can accurately compare their performance with other women.

I hope this helps explain why your approach is less productive than you may have hoped.

@spontaneousgiventime - If I mistook your intent in your words then I apologise however they were patronising. To me at least. I apologise for striking back with the 'spit and seethe' statement. It is not a case of trying to belittle you. I genuinely took your comment about dress wearing, makeup blabbing and hair flicking to be quite stereotypical. which is not fair. Neither is referring to an appendage that I have as personifying me. Let us just agree that there are some rights which on both sides of the fence should be fought for but that in trans rights, these need to be carefully considered so as not to infringe or endanger natal woman whenever possible?

Sorry, they were not patronising at all. I write here by what I learn here and elsewhere. When I first heard about self ID I wanted to learn from the women here and also trans women so I could form my opinions on my own. I read two trans forums, Angels based here in the UK, Susan's place based in the USA. I felt by reading both I could get a better idea of the trans issue. The vast majority of things I read were about HRT, boobs, make-up, hair, shoes and clothes. I also read how women should do as they're told and give up their spaces and also how spouses of trans women (yes, just trans women) should put up and shut up and accept their husband was now their wife and accept being a lesbian. I have purposely named both forums so people can judge for themselves.

You may have an 'appendage' you don't like but you have it. That means, should you decide to go into women's spaces then again, women and children (young girls) have to put up and shut up about people with a penis in their spaces - that is misogyny.

If you want rights as trans people, that's fine, let us know and we will all come and support you. We will not support you appropriating women's spaces - ever!

So hold on a wee moment...

I was probably a bit too harsh on the previous thread by saying she was cheating by entering as a woman. With a male anatomy, and despite oestrogen she would have advantages over other natal women. So what should she enter as... well what about just running and not scanning her code? That'd be a solution instead of taking other women's times.

Just be careful with your "to a feminist" points there Lang, and also when you say "as feminists perceive it".

You don't speak for all feminists.

And it looks like you mean to.

Ada you say you feel like a women , and more, you are a woman. However, we women don't "feel" like we are women , we watch our womanhood emerge as teenagers. We see that we are women when we menstruate. We acknowledge that we are women when we buy pregnancy tests. We suffer as women during childbirth. We nurture in the best possible way as women when we gestate and breastfeed. These and other issues did not and will not happen to you. These things, and many others, only happen to women and that's why we know we're women. It's evidence based Ada. Your feelings are not evidence-based. In fact all evidence strongly points to maleness. Be a feminine man by all meano but face facts.

Or as I suggested earlier Parkrun could collate data for trans runners, split by "gender", and make that available. Obviously this wouldn't be much use on a local level because of small numbers but if national data was offered then people could actually get a sense of how they're doing in comparison to other people with the same physiological factors impacting their performance without stepping on the toes of women runners.

I'm just saying that our fundamental starting points are different

I acknowledge that @Yambabe. And I'm going to avoid debating the details of the nature of identity. We both know our own positions, and I'm pretty sure we know each others arguments as well. Neither of us is going to convince the other to change our understanding.

The way forward is going to involve juggling those disparate perspectives

But I would prefer to freely accept you for what you are and live alongside you than be forced to accept you as something you're not and feel bitter and resentful about it, and that to me is the heart of the current self-id debate.

You're right of course, that is the heart of it. And as much as I would love universal acceptance of my identity, that's not what you're talking about. You're offering acceptance as long as I pretend to be someone I'm not. And I can't do that. I tried to do it for so long, I really did. And I simply can't anymore.

Parkrun could collate data for trans runners, split by "gender", and make that available.

I've just looked at the Park Run website and it appears that they do split by gender.

Perhaps natal women should ask Park Run if they would kindly do an additional split for natal sex?

I'm OK with Ada calling herself a woman. She's probably had to go through a lot to get here. I'm fine as long as it is the whole deal... no identifying as a woman because they put on a bit of lippy but the full oestrogen and chop it off deal. That shows commitment. What I don't like is the them competing against natal women as the same physically... because they are simply not. That's not bloody fair.