Paris Lees acknowledges that women are oppressed on the basis of biology

[Haworthia]

But don’t get too excited, because she dismisses that entirely: transwomen are oppressed too. So, women need to stop moaning because Paris is just as vulnerable to attack as they are.

twitter.com/parislees/status/1101846615994834944?s=21

Paris doesn’t acknowledge that women are physically smaller and weaker, and vulnerable to rape and sexual assault. Paris is only interested in oppression one upmanship.

Just one thing though Paris - if you and I were both set upon by a man in the street, who’s going to be able to defend themselves better? You or me? I’m 5’ 3”.

The screenshot I posted really grinds my gears. Apparently women aren’t sympathetic enough to the shit transwomen get for having trans bodies. And transwomen have the same worries as women when out in public, except transwomen are also in fear of their lives.

Someone remind me of the relative murder statistic of women vs transwomen again?

Paris is a rare example of a transwoman who passes. Most don't, so if they are harassed (which of course they shouldn't be) it's because they are trans, not because they are female.

that was just weird

so Paris says males who like to comply with the gender stereotypes typically associated with women and may or may not have taken hormones and had cosmetic surgery have all the fears women have plus 'what if people find out i'm trans and kill me'

two things immediately spring to mind

1. I seriously doubt if Paris has dealings with anyone who doesn't know they are trans. Paris is professionally trans

2. the murder rate for males who identify as trans is considerably lower than the murder rate for men or women who don't identify as trans. meaning on average people who identify as trans are safer than those who don't

why does Paris have this irrational fear?

I’m happy to sympathise with transwomen who feel they are at risk of harassment or attack in public. But why denigrate women to prove your point?

I have no issue accepting that trans women are harassed in the street and have that fear.

I do however think Paris ought to appreciate that women being oppressed based on their biology goes further than being harassed or attacked - the effects on women as a class of periods, pregnancy, childbearing are profound. Those issues and that oppression will not affect trans women, and Paris ought to respect that. (Same way I respect she will be discriminated against for being trans, and I won’t. It isn’t a competition, but our issues are not one and the same).

I don't know why anyone reads PL tweets tbh.
It is all self-promoting/professional trans spokesperson guff.
So dull.

I bet Paris doesn’t worry about accidental pregnancy, a fucked pelvic floor, menopause and how to fit unpaid caring duties in alongside a day job!

Exactly McTufty

I don't think anyone on FWR would deny that transwomen are liable to face street harassment on the basis of their appearance - both because anyone dressing outside the norm is liable to be shouted at by nob ends, but also because nob ends will shout at people who appear to be men dressed as women (and people who appear to be women dressed as men, of course).

The bit that PL is missing - as TRAs always do - is who it is who is threatening and harassing (and potentially murdering) transwomen. Clue: it ain't GC feminists

Throw your outrage at the door of the men who abuse, harass, harm and kill transwomen, not at the people who aren't afraid to point out the differences in male and female behaviour, risks and threats

I don't get it. Paris has said objectification is hot and being treated like a piece of meat is sexy.

The complete opposite of what women say.

if you and I were both set upon by a man in the street, who’s going to be able to defend themselves better?

Given that Paris Lees spent 2 years incarcerated (as a juvenile) for attacking and robbing a man, I would bet on Paris.

Transwomen worry about all the things every other woman worries about

Figuring out which contraception is best to use to avoid pregnancy
Finding yourself pregnant and figuring out whether or not to get an abortion
(assuming you can access one in your country)
Being 15 and trying to figure out how you will keep your parents from finding out you are getting an abortion
Peeing on a stick a few weeks after being raped (which you didn't report because you knew man and had gone round to his house willingly)
Worrying about why you still are not pregnant after a year of trying
Worrying about whether you should be breastfeeding in the cafe or whether will people think its disgusting
Feeling like the doctors are not taking your excrutiating abdominal pain and irregular bleeding seriously
Feeling that when you had your missed miscarriage, the sonographer was totally insensitive with how they dealt with it.
Worrying about whether to apply for that new job whilst you are pregnant
Worrying about whether you are going to be able to get flexible working once you return from maternity leave
Knowing that you have consistently performed better than your male colleague who has just been promoted over you when you happen to be at child bearing age
Being 5ft1 and walking home alone

Just for starters....

Paris doesn't have a fucking clue. Not a clue.

I am not saying that transwomen don't face oppression and obstacles, they do of course. But it's different to what women face, and it comes from a different place (it's homophobia, not misogyny.)

Paris has no empathy for women at all.

Plus, i thought Paris loved getting catcalled and 'eye fucked on the escalator' anyway?

Apsolutely fucking spot on RockyFlintstone!

I was just about to say there's more to being oppressed then fucking street harassment and fear of being attacked.

I don't know why anyone reads PL tweets tbh.
It is all self-promoting/professional trans spokesperson guff.
So dull.

Excellent point. Paris never usually appears in my Twitter feed. She’s appeared twice this evening, thanks to being “liked” by Nigella Lawson.

I read that tweet and can't see where paris says women are oppressed on the basis of biology - is there another one?

The assertion that transwomen have all the same worries as cunty women misses risk of pregnancy, which has massive consequences for women all over the world every day. If we are raped there is an extra massive worry - and in many parts of the world one where the law curtails our options. Recent case of girl denied abortion after being raped by grandfather in argentina is a case in point.

Even if we do have choice, it adds a massively difficult complication to an already bad situation.

By missing this pretty basic thing, Paris reveals that she doesn't really understand women, our experiences, our concerns.

Having said that I am sure that Transwomen if they do not pass are at high risk of violence from men - this is based in homophobia, ideas about masculinity, it is a man to man problem, nothing to do with women.

Transwomen who pass presumably get the same shit women do ie plenty.

Men kill women all the time for being women >
We also get raped, assaulted, harrassed etc in massive numbers from when we are young.

We have giant lists of things we are supposed to do to "keep ourselves safe". We are supposed to understand that we are prey.

I don't think Paris really gets it TBH. it's not a competition but it's not the same.

Plus I have never got over the whole thing about how fab street harrassment is, and women and girls who don't like it, shouldn't complain as they will spoil the fun of those who do.

Paris's hands simply aren't big enough to hold all their conflicting, illogical viewpoints at the same time.

'Sex positive, loves talking about getting gangbanged, eye fucked, objectified and being treated like a piece of meat.

And thinks that women who are worried about men is the same as people who are frightened of escalators.

But petrified of being harassed on the street?

Because they have to compete with women over who is more oppressed.

This stupid duplicity is clear for everyone to see.

Leave women alone.

Sorry skimmed thread see am repeating what others have said!

The difference is, Paris, you can identify out of your womanface and all that goes away. Women can’t identify out of their biology.

The reason why the likes of PL always reduce the sexism, discrimination and oppression women face to street harassment, sexual assault and physical violence is precisely because they do not experience sexism, discrimination and oppression as women on the basis of their female sex.

Men claiming womanhood:

-don't lose out on jobs because the employer thinks their small children make them a liability,

-they're not told to feed their child in the toilets, because breastfeeding in public is disgusting,

-they're not told by their thesis supervisor (a man of course) not to contest an unfair exam result coz surely that toddler they brought along to discuss the issue means that their focus ought not to be on their career but on that lively boy babbling on the floor,

-they're not ignored as hormonally unbalanced morons when they're trying to tell the doctor that there is something wrong with the baby they're carrying because they know when they conceived but the male doctors refuse to listen

• or that their next due date is not what the consultants think it is because, oh no, the learned doctors will not believe them how long their cycles are,

-they don't get ignored when they tell a series of increasingly senior doctors that just because they're in control of themselves and not out of their mind with itching, doesn't mean they don't have cholestasis of pregnancy,

• they don't get ignored when trying to tell the builders that they're constructing the fucking roof wrong coz women couldn't possibly know anything about engineering,

-they don't get ignored when telling a client that the advice they're following is wrong because the one who gave the advice is a man, the client is a man and they're just a woman.

And that's just a small selection of what being female has meant for me. Although I'm no stranger to street harassment or male violence, those other things are by far not the worst problems of course.

For women and girls in other countries, being female has far worse, often life-limiting or even lethal consequences. From sex-selective abortion to FGM to being starved and denied medical care in childhood because their brothers (who unlike them are considered an asset to the family) are prioritised; to servitude and sex trafficking; to menstrual huts, to kidnapping and forced marriage and on and on and on.

That's what sexism, discrimination and oppression on the basis of our sex means to women and girls and PL will never ever understand it because PL is male.

Another fucking male in an endlessly long line of fucking males who doesn't know and wouldn't dream of making the slightest effort to understand what it means to be female in a male-dominated world.

It's so cringe, this push to engulf women's experiences.

Paris is incredulous that people don't realise they get attacked because of their body.

Lots of people get attacked because of their body. Disabled people are frequently targeted on the basis of their disability.

If a tw passes, they might well be targeted as a woman. But I have seen plenty of transwomen drop the feminine act, and become incredibly intimidating to the men who are cat calling them.

And most transwomen do not pass. They might well be targeted, because some men cannot bear other men who aren't doing 'masculinity' properly.

It's awful. And should be addressed.
But Paris is far too busy trying to appropriate women's experience to bother.

Oh not Nigella Lawson

There's a certain type of person who finds it arousing to be humiliated. Even the thought of being humiliated would probably work. Just saying.

CharlieParley

That was a much more grown-up and well thought out post than mine. Thank you.

It's so alienating when these people talk such guff.

It's almost too banal to address. It's one of these things that's banal and infuriating at the same time.

One of the most difficult things about all of these TRA points is that so many of them start from a standpoint which assumes most trans women pass as women. That's really not the case. Even with those who do look quite feminine there's usually still little things that spark a weird sort of in-built instinctive re-evaluation and tell you to look again. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, but it happens.

Paris, like so many others, just plainly doesn't get it. Unsurprisingly.

It’s all me me me with Paris isn’t it. “it’s not Faaair, I’m more important and special than everyone else”.

Pathetic though coming from an adult.

Oh not Nigella Lawson

TBF there are plenty of issues where I agree with PL - the dearth of working classes voices in the media, Brexit etc

I just don't agree that TWAW

(I find it helpful to remember this when I come across someone like Zuby or Piers Morgan, where we have wildly divergent views on many things but align on others)

I thought Paris Lees was the person who thought that being catcalled was a compliment and us 'cis' women should lighten up about it? Or am I thinking of someone else?