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Original poster

Why did the whole tone on trans issues change here?

105 replies

Magpiesarehuge · 11/05/2018 18:16

Was reading the Dittany thread and made me interested in how trans issues were viewed and discussed quite a few years ago. I did dn advdnced search from 2010 to 2015 and the threads way back were completely differently than today. Nearly every voice totally accepting and supportive of transwomen are women and even “a TW with a penis is a lesbian of course if they are attracted to women”

I’ve totally changed my views in the passed 3 or 4 yrs but just strange to see what seems to be a complete about turn. I wonder if the hugely pro trans posters then- still ferl the same now. It’s a bit more understandable why some claims of mumsnet being infiltrated and taken over are made.

OP posts:
InfiniteCurve · 11/05/2018 19:48

Looking at that first thread,there's a post from ElephantsandMiasmas,where she says "But TBH I think the fact that some people who were born male want to identify as female is the least of our worries. That's as long as transsexuals don't claim to have an equal or superior view of what "womanhood" involves - rich as that concept is in the experience of being identified female from birth and encountering the biological facts of being female"
At the time I thought of course they don't.Only now it feels as if many do Sad

BeyondParody · 11/05/2018 19:49

Early "hello, I'm a transwoman" thread
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1212528-transexualism

Terfing · 11/05/2018 19:49

Caitlyn Jenner peak-transed a lot of people when they started explaining feminism after being a "women" for 5 minutes.

Terfulike · 11/05/2018 19:50

it was seeing PL on Question Time I think. And like others I've always been on transexuals' sides. And yes hearing about Rapid onset in girls, the cotton ceiling, clit sticks/ladydicks.

I peek transed a friend today. She didn't have a clue about any of it.

blinkowl · 11/05/2018 19:51

Most people here started from a position of being pro-trans rights.

What happened?

We learnt

  1. what trans rights activists actually want (e.g. the erasure of woman as a meaningful term)
  1. that transwoman doesn't meant post-op transsexual any more, or even a transsexual who want the op - it includes anyone who wants to say they're a woman including those we used to call transvestites / cross dressers / fetishists
  1. That many deeply misogynistic MRAs have infiltrated the trans rights movement, including many who call themselves transwomen and even lesbians and are openly aggressive and threatening towards women who disagree with them and lesbians
  1. That although it may be a minority of TRAs threatening women, the rest of the TRA movement does not publicly condemn them.
  1. That those who believe transwomen are women have no logical arguments, their modus operandi is to threaten, silence, block and slur
  1. That women who are challenging this are being silenced and need our support

Also, we thought it through. Do we really, in our hearts believe transwomen are women? No we don't. We were being polite.

I've been here 10 years btw, haven't "infiltrated" from anywhere.

Potplant2 · 11/05/2018 20:02

I’m another one who came here, oh, at least five years ago, under a different name, and at first was arguing that TWAW, etc, and I couldn’t believe the transphobia, etc. I very quickly realised that people here were talking a lot more sense than I was and so I very quickly changed my viewpoint.

I don’t recall a time when the majority viewpoint on here was any different from today. There’s certainly not been an influx of naughty transphobes to lead astray the mild-mannered baby-talking mummies on here.

Greymisty · 11/05/2018 20:05

I think it's really unfair to say mumsnet feminism is anti trans, it's not, it's pro women.

This is what it can look like when you centre topics around women.

Sick of people pitting women and transpeople against each other.

Get on the fucking bandwagon everyone, women are allowed to care about themselves and other women. Women have a right to debate.

GardenGeek · 11/05/2018 20:08

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

spontaneousgiventime · 11/05/2018 20:19

I joined MN years ago under a totally different account. I read mainly as at the time my DC were still at home and DH still alive. I remember vividly posts saying "keep away from the feminist section". I had a peek but a lot went over my head. When my DC left home and hubby died I found myself at a loose end and came back to read. I read some of the fearsome feminist threads and joined again with this account.

I'd always been 'live and let live' after reading here a while I changed, it was the women here so clear and concise and also the TRA threats that #peaktrans'd me. I have now changed my views again (thanks to posts here). I was of the opinion transsexual woman should be allowed some leeway, now I don't. Transsexual's, even fully transitioned are still men, so for me they firmly come under the umbrella of transgender that I fight to keep out of women's spaces.

The good thing, due to the Dittany thread, I know it's fine to have opinions that might not be forum wide so don't have any problem sharing them. An echo chamber is no good to anyone and I'm glad we don't have one here.

thebewilderness · 11/05/2018 20:20

The idea of being "born in the wrong body" was an excellent hook for a story. Not surprisingly the story was taken up and repeated often by the media.
That is how the shift took place from widening the bandwidth of what it meant to be a man to men born in the wrong body are women.
It was a long con. It appears that MN Feminists became aware that it meant an erosion of women's rights about five years too late to do anything about it at that time because it was settled law. That is how a well designed con works.
At some point the metaphorical and the real frog feels too warm and tries to jump out of the pot of rapidly heating water. It has been interesting to look back and see the history of awareness that women are at the sharp end of the stick once again.

WomaninGreen · 11/05/2018 20:22

I honestly cannot recall any threads from way back where the majority would have agreed a woman can have a penis.

I do recall a lot of threads talking at cross purposes due to confusion between transsexual and transgender.

AnyFucker · 11/05/2018 20:25

sakura had it on those early threads

What happened to her ?

OlennasWimple · 11/05/2018 20:26

The back threads are really interesting. I can't find myself on any of them yet, but I'm going to go back and read properly later, but I think I've always been in the TW are TW camp - I've certainly never believed in pink lady brains or any of that gubbins

What happened? I think that TRAs happened. Nothing quite like seeing fellow women being told to go and die in a fire, messages that they need raping with a broken bottle and and lesbians being told to suck lady dick to make one question exactly what is going on here

SaltyPeanut · 11/05/2018 20:27

I've never posted on this part of the site before, mainly because I feel out of my depth intellectually as the majority of posters here are so obviously more knowledgeable and eloquent than I.

I am willing to stick my head above the parapet for a moment though and am going to say where my switch in attitude in regard to the trans issue came from because I very much used to have every sympathy with people who were transgender.

It's the vicious element amongst TRA's, the M to F ones in particular.
It's violence towards women they regard as TERFs or gender critical.
It's self ID to the detriment of women's safe spaces and usurping women's place in the world (jobs, sport etc.).
It's calling a lesbian who does not want to engage with a "lady penis" a bigot.
It is calling it transphobic to use names and words pertaining to women's unique to sex body parts, natural processes and sex specific illnesses.

Mainly though, it is because I realised that a lot of TRAs don't seem to want to be a woman like me. They despise me alongside every other natal woman. They want to replace me, erase me. They want to shape themselves into the image set out by most mens narrow idea of what an ideal woman should be, not the broad tapestry which women really are. I know there are trans women who are not like this because I've known a few but I struggle to see them now as the TRAs are standing on top of and obscuring them.

I hope I've made myself understood and don't sound too much of an arsehole.

CertainHalfDesertedStreets · 11/05/2018 20:27

I loved Elephantsandmiasmas. She told me to come over to FWR and reassured me that nobody would bite me for not knowing much theory. If you're here with a n/c elephants then hi

Sorry to derail your thread OP. Although I suspect it's not quite going according to plan anyway...

BeyondParody · 11/05/2018 20:28

Starting to get more frequent in 2012...

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1481205-Radfem2012-banning-trans-people

AnyFucker · 11/05/2018 20:33

That's exactly how I feel, salty

I was completely tolerant of transgender individuals until a couple of years ago. I used and still use the correct pronouns, never had an issue with transitioned folk using my same sex facilities etc

And then along came the likes of that bloke with a beard, still got his dick and demanding we all deny actual biology

Fuck that, said I

BeyondParody · 11/05/2018 20:38

Ha I just found my first post in fwr - september 2012

thebewilderness · 11/05/2018 20:40

I am somewhat taken aback by the dismissal of the mild mannered Julie Bindel on those old threads.
It reminds me of how right Germaine Greer was when she said women have very little idea how much men hate them.