Transexual voices - twitter thread

[OnThisHill]

twitter.com/tsvoices/status/1029863492197785600?s=19

Please read this, I really feel the tide is turning.
We are being heard. The message is getting out, but sadly, I think the gender activists have created a climate where a backlash will come, and these guys are saying the same.

BUT - I think we're reaching tipping point...... What do you all think?

Well they're not GC feminists, they're TS. They're not speaking up for women they're speaking up for TS. That's absolutely fine, everyone knows it's only feminism that has to fight for the rights of every other group too. Other groups are allowed to campaign on their own issues and centre their own needs, which is what's going on here. It's just business as usual.

TS have a lot to lose for themselves if self-ID goes through. Regardless of what we think about them, they have a legitimate voice in this debate, and much as it might piss us off they're more likely to be listened to than we are.

I get the impression the person who wrote these tweets is not a native English speaker so I'm not sure it's fair to pick apart the specific words or phrases they use.

Lisa Muggeridge is spot on, it's too little too late and they haven't properly addressed the harm to anybody but themselves, but in terms of this specific consultation, this specific battle, voices like theirs might just swing it.

I've been saying for ages there needs to be a TS voice speaking against self-ID for themselves, on their own terms (as opposed to just using the platforms provided by women's groups), so I'm pleased to see that voice growing from a few quarters. I'm pleased this group are making these statements, even if they don't give much thought for women or our rights, or children and safeguarding. Even if it's too late to prevent a backlash.

They're not our 'allies' but there may be political alliances to be made and the two are different. I felt the same about #tsraincrew and about the signatories of the TS letter in the observer. I feel the same about the right wingers some GC feminists are forming alliances with.

I don't really trust 'allyship' as such, especially between groups with natural conflicts of interest. A lot of cracks get papered over and things become unsayable in the effort to be 'good allies'.

Political alliance is different. You can join forces to campaign on just the issues where your interests happen to intersect while never having to compromise on the other stuff. You can table your differences rather than pretend they don't exist.

Miriam Ben-Shalom talks about this in an for DGR Women's Caucus where she discusses the founding of Hands Across the Aisle.

They're not our 'allies' but there may be political alliances to be made and the two are different. I felt the same about #tsraincrew and about the signatories of the TS letter in the observer. I feel the same about the right wingers some GC feminists are forming alliances with.

Agree, Pencils.

Yes to everything you say Pencils. I'm resolutely determined to stay hopeful on this one.

Agree too.

Don’t feel naive. It’s good to have hope. It’s why we are fighting, after all. For that hope.

Agree agree. This is a positive development but it confers no obligations on us whatsoever.

Update:

"Following lengthy debates, majority of the members of TSVM have seemed to agreed on the following more neutral and better balanced statement" (continues)

twitter.com/tsvoices/status/1031286943047458817

OK - here I go again with my tigger-like positivity but I think this second version deserves appreciation. Much clearer about the context, about our different biological starting point, about the attacks on GC feminists and on women's rights generally. Direct response in the follow-up tweets to Lisa and Miranda acknowledging their criticisms. It's bloody difficult to get a group of people to agree on a complex and important text, and to do it quickly. All credit to them. More .

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3340188-MN-is-a-Hate-group-apparently

To be clear, the problem I had (have) with TSVoices was whether this group, which claimed moral authority over rank and file transgenderists, was any different. As I pointed out in my short critique, it really wasn't (isn't) because when things get close to the bone(r) they have been threatening ('choose your enemies'), gaslighted and even, as putative allies, delineated women into 'reasonable' and 'unreasonable'. If they would like to be honest and address the points I and others have made, fine. If not, I wish they'd just piss off and stop wasting everyone else's (and their own) time.

I don't know that they have any more authority than anyone else.

They're a group of TS who have taken a stand against self-ID because it's bad for them. That's fine as far as it goes and I never expected to agree with them further than this.

I agree with your critique Miranda but because I never considered them 'allies' as such in the first place I haven't wasted any time with them. I don't think they're wasting their own time because they're speaking up for their own interests. This looks like TS infighting and not much to do with women.

Even if I disagree with some things they say, they're another voice against self-ID so I hope they don't piss off, I hope they keep fighting.

Well they appear, sadly, to have imploded. Stephanie Hayden was a member (inclined to T*rfy talk as far as I could see) and has issued a rather self-serving statement blaming the break-up on the founders' 'attacks' on the trans community. Likely to be more to it than that but it's a pity that the GC transsexual voices have lost a platform. One step forward, two steps back.

Through here I have found other GC TS, on twitter links provided, but to be honest they are few and far between in comparison to the TRA's on Twitter, I have to be careful as my employer would sack me in a heartbeat if ever exposed, not hard for them to expose me as I follow fellow seafarers and related organisations.