I am a transwoman, ask me anything.

[AriadneRose]

I have been following what has been going on here and on twitter, and thought maybe it would be helpful to open a dialogue that is not reactionary or fueled by anger. So I am offering my own personal perspective as a transwoman, and am willing to answer any questions people might have, and I will try to answer them thoughtfully, respectfully and honestly.

Note: I did not create this thread to stir up trouble, I just feel open dialogue from both sides is necessary for us to move forward.

To add to tinkles post, third spaces would also be appreciated by parents of children of the opposite sex, so it could potentially be a campaign mn would officially get behind.
But no, "mn are transphobic scum" according to the MRAs, they think we wouldn't support GNC people...

I think a woman is someone with a vagina.
What do you think about that?

I will go further and say that if you have a penis you are not a woman even if you 'feel' it.
I am not speaking about those with gender dysmorphia. That is a whole different issue.

Trans people are afraid of losing rights and being murdered, which may sound very dramatic, but I am legitimately afraid to leave my house because I live in a rural area, and the only time local people discuss trans issues, are usually because a trans person has been harassed or beaten. And I think it is the same on the opposite side. Women are afraid that their voices are not being heard and are afraid of losing rights as well. Because women are also targeted for harassment solely because of their identity.

Be absolutely clear: women are afraid of losing rights and being murdered. And if you don't understand that you really know nothing about women. Far more women are murdered per year than transpeople.

Minimising women's concerns, and showing you had no idea about women's experience, does you no favours at all.

As Margaret Atwood said 'Men are afraid women will humiliate them. Women are afraid men will kill them'.

Oh, and assuming you are who you say and sincere in your explanation (not everyone is who they seem on the internet, etc), I have a great deal of sympathy for you. I would love to see a position that strengthens protections and acceptance for the dysphoric, strengthens and retains protections for single-sex spaces, and keeps the chancers and the takeover merchants and the woman-haters firmly out.

I don't know how we do that.

Are you on Twitter, ariad? Have you seen the movement of "old school transsexuals" under #TSRainCrew ?

Are you ok? I’m sorry people are so unkind to people like you. I have so much respect for you.

The "transwomen are women" mantra denies both the realities of being female and the realities of being a trans women - both of which are hugely different experiences. It is important to be able to discuss these different experiences.

So "transwomen are women" is not only obviously incorrect, but it is a transphobic statement. How does that resonate with you?

I also want to state I fully support transwomen/transmens right to be transwomen/transmen and to be treated fairly and equally in society. I just don't agree that being a transwomen makes you a female human (aka women) of that being a transman makes you a male human. I believe in biology and scientific facts.

@Bowlofbabelfish I am talking about GENDER too. I expect @Ariadne is too

I'm aware there is only one of you and many of us, but I would be very interested in your answer to my original question:

What is the definition of "woman"?

How do you know that you are a woman, according to this definition?

Also, agree with others that women aren't discriminated against because of our "identity". It's down to the physical reality of being female.

'Is transgender a mental illness?'
That is a tricky one, because again I can't speak for other people, but for me? Yes. It negatively effects my emotional well being.

It sounds as though you're in a different situation to many of the new 'trans' people, Ariadne. What do you think of their activism and ideas, such as the 'cotton ceiling'? Are you comfortable with transwomen like Laurel Hubbard competing in women's sports? Or would you rather that such people weren't pushing the trans agenda?

Oops, only posted half of that!

I meant to ask, would you support a "not in my name" movement against the misogynist activists? (misogynvists?)

A few people have called me out on problematic language, and I sincerely apologise for anything I have said that has come across that way, it wasn't my intent.

To finally address the 'feeling like a woman' and biological women not having that sensation, it is (in my opinion) because you are women. Your brain and your body don't have the dissonance. But I think the reason I am finding woman so hard to define, is that because there is no singular definition of what makes a woman a woman, she just is. And if that excludes me, that is rough, but it is a true statement. Does long hair make you a woman? Hell no. It just means you probably spend more money on shampoo. Does wearing a dress make you a woman? Nope. Fabric is not gender. I will admit my idea of womanhood for me personally is probably just a mishmash of stereotypes that have been handed down to me over the generations. To me women are usually more empathetic, less prone to violence. I know the women in my family are slow to anger, but when they do it is a fierce fire. This is all probably hippy dippy bullshit, and I am sorry if it comes across that way.

You are not a woman, you are a man. And until all of you can stand up and say, we are men, there is no conversation to be had.

And even then, there is no conversation to be had, because men have no legitimate claim on resources earmarked for women and girls or on protected spaces for women and girls. There is no conversation because men have no legitimate claim on any of the terminology or experiences that are specific to the biological reality of being a woman or a girl: whether that be 'vagina', 'period', 'lesbian', whatever.

You need protection from male violence? Many groups of males are vulnerable to male violence: the category 'woman' is not a convenient catch-all for all such men. The organisational abilities, political and media savvy of men such as yourself has been amply demonstrated. I am 100% positive that were the will there, you could effectively campaign for protection from male violence, as well as against toxic masculinity more generally. I am 100% convinced of your abilities and skills as a group to make that happen.

I would like to know - if there was treatment or counselling which could make you comfortable and happy with your body and gender as it was, would you have preferred that to surgery and hormones? Do you see people trying that as equivalent to a "gay cure" and transphobic? What about people saying, "you can be a man and dress any way you like," is that insulting to you?

I suppose I am trying to understand as the closest I have been to this feeling was being very ill and physically disabled for a few years, then (thanks to wonderful drugs) suddenly, overwhelmingly, better overnight. For a while I still felt like a disabled person in disguise or that I was just pretending to be like other able bodied people. I'm glad nobody encouraged this feeling and I got past it (instead of coming off the drugs so that my image of myself matched my body and my body worked less well - does that make sense)? I can't imagine a disabled rights group criticising me for taking treatment or criticising the people trying to help.

I guess I'm asking in a roundabout, waffly way how you feel about the recent activism and push for instant validation?

Could you elaborate on the 'access to healthcare' problem. I've heard this before in relation to trans people, but had assumed it referred to the situation in countries like the USA, where people's health insurance is linked to their job, and if employers discriminate against trans people they can be left without access.

But in the UK, surely trans people have the same right to NHS treatment as everyone else? Or is that not always the case in practice? Or do you mean trans-specific things such as sex reassignment surgery/hormones, and psychological therapies for gender dysphoria? If so, are you worried that the current push for transgender identity to be seen as normal (and not an illness in need of treatment) will actually work against attempts to improve access to these services?

If I look like a woman, and call myself a woman, I am erasing a target on my forehead

This is a very non female perspective if you don't mind me saying. No woman would say that they are not a target. We are the target for male violence.

You really shouldn't be subject to male violence at all - either as a man or as the transwoman that you now are. But to think that becoming a woman makes you not a target is to demonstrate a lack of understanding of what it is to be a woman.

You have been very restrained and thoughtful in your replies but I hope you can think about women's experiences more deeply.

I note by the way that you told us we could ask you questions in order to further understand where you are coming from - it being for us to understand you. I note that no one has asked women if they can ask them questions in order to further their understanding of where women are coming from.

As this is the feminism forum... if you were given the choice between an extra gender clinic in NI and repealing the eighth, which would you choose?

The illegality of abortion in NI and the penalty of Life Imprisonment is separate to the situation in Ireland. The 8th Amendment to the Irish Constitution and penalty of up to 14 years imprisonment is applicable only in the jurisdiction of Ireland. There are some very restricted situations in which abortion is permitted.

As a man, how on earth can you know what being a woman "feels like"?. You seem to fit more female than male stereotypes, that's fine. Doesn't mean you are a woman though. Why not accept that you are who you are without saying that you're something you're not?

I'd always taken the live and let live approach until someone shared a facebook post on here, where a woman had been accused of minimising the transwoman experience by saying that the transwoman wasn't having a period. It's just fact that she wasn't having a period. The hate the woman got for pointing that out was shameful. To my mind, the transwoman minimised female experiences by suggesting that whatever she was going through was in fact a period.

As a man, how on earth can you know what being a woman "feels like"?

I'm guessing it's more a physical than a personality thing in this case? A severe discomfort with the body itself. Whether in the future the treatment would still be surgery is another question. Maybe in 50 years there will be some drug you can take, as you can for other mental disorders, and the whole idea of surgery will seem antiquated and cruel.

Hi Ariadne
Are you gaining the impression that the continual framing of 'gender issues' as a battle between feminists and trans women is being pushed to advance an agenda that benefits neither women, nor feminists, nor trans people? There was an interesting suggestion upthread about part of the reason for pushing self-ID might be to enable further cuts to the NHS - but I have also heard mention of it being a way to promote the agenda of het-cis men to the effect that het-cis men are the only people who can be trusted with power, authority and privilege, because all other categories of not-quite-human are too busy fighting and crying...

On the mental illness point - for me it is not whether this has an impact on your mental health (clearly it does - which is horrible) but the question is whether you consider your considering yourself to be a woman and the mismatch between your identity and your biological reality to be a mental illness?

I understand why this is very emotive - because of the stigmatisation of mental illness. But to my mind the answer then is to destigmatise the notion of having this mental illness and establish protections and acceptable social practices to respond to people who are dealing with it. Not simply denying it and somehow trying to rearrange language to accommodate the mental illness.

In other (many more sorry...) words. To me there seems to be two broad category of people falling into these "trans" camp:

• people with gender dysphoria who have a genuine discomfort with their body.

• people who don't want to change their body but want to express their identify in ways which are not acceptable according to gender stereotypes.

Oh, hang on, and a third:

• controlling arseholes who want to use the movement to control other people and achieve their own ends.

The responses to each of these groups should be very different - but it seems to me that everyone is all rolled into one and in fact being largely dominated at least in public discourse by group 3.

Oh, balls! Yes caill, of course. I did know that, but it got muddled in my head while typing

As this thread is discussing identity, a strange situation crossed my mind. If you identified as pregnant and then took abortion inducing pills, could you be imprisoned? It is life in NI.

Being a woman doesn't 'erase a target on your forehead'.

It makes you much more likely to be the victim of abuse, assault, harassment, sexual assault and violent crime.

It's really unhelpful to minimise the reality of male violence towards women in these discussions.