Alice Roberts - what the hell?

[GenderApostate19]

I can’t tell you how utterly disappointed I feel by her comments about Sex and reproduction not being binary. She knows the truth, what the hell is she doing? I’m even more upset by her than by Sarah Champion, she’s a Scientist ffs.

I saw no hate, bile or misogyny on the thread. Seems Prof Roberts is a teeny bit over-sensitive.

How I feel in myself has no bearing on what someone feels. If someone who looks like a man and has XY chromosomes tells me he feels female - I cannot tell her she is ‘wrong’. Would you?

I wouldn't tell him his feelings were invalid, but I'd sure as heck tell his that what he concludes as a result of his feelings was incorrect.
A man feeling female (whatever that means) is not the same as being female. Even if that man transitions to the full extent of surgery available, he is a man with a trans identity, someone who may or may not pass as a women socially, but someone who is nonetheless male.

It isn't actually kind to lie to people about major issues that can pose a risk to so many aspects - physical, sexual, reproductive, emotional, social - of health.

I'm just a dumbo with only an undergrad degree in bloody creative writing, who was a SAHM for 15 years. How frustrating it is that I know this, and yet someone who appears to far more intelligent than I, based on her career trajectory, is so fucking stupid ?

When men who identify as transgender start displaying their empathy for the women they mimic, then I may dig deep into my been-fucked-around-by-men for the last 30 years heart, and find them some empathy.

Until then, nope. Your identity is not a reason for me to spare you emotional labor.*

*the children I birthed with my female body excepted, but even then, there are limits, and trust me, I've drawn them, because contrary to popular belief, mothers are human beings too!

Did anyone see hatred, bile or misogyny on that thread?

You can never be sure how your own twitter view is filtered... but nope.
I mainly saw people either asking her to justify/reference her conclusions, or pointing out the gaping holes in her logic.

Has she never had a viva?!

Alice Roberts? She who sexes dead people by their skeletons? And writes these findings up in her scientific papers? [Hmm]

''How I feel in myself has no bearing on what someone feels. If someone who looks like a man and has XY chromosomes tells me he feels female - I cannot tell her she is ‘wrong’. Would you?''

People feel what they feel but it doesn't make it true or rational. Anorexic women feel overweight, some people with OCD feel that someone may die if they don't complete their ritual, some people with paranioia feel that their tv is sending them messages. These are all very distressing beliefs/fears/feelings but it does immeasurable harm for anyone to reinforce that they are true and valid, and harmless ideas to hold. It is no different for a person who believes they are or should be the opposite sex.

Ah yes, "empathy", heard that one before, too, from a politician. It's nice to be empathetic. But to be truly empathetic, you actually have to recognise the true nature of someone's distress. If that someone is distressed because they are unhappy with their sexed body, you have to recognise that sex is a reality, and that it is dimorphic. There are many, many trans people who understand that.

This is amazingly put realdoctor. And as you say janeskettle..

As well as being spot on with the recognition of sex, it relates to MH really well. My DH is very ill with mental illness and it does him no good whatsoever when he sometimes comes up with bonkers ideas for why are the way they are.. his brain has made a mistake, a misdiagnosis. Actions based on misdagnosis will never give people what they need. I have to gently put him straight if they persist and it hurts his brain (and requires careful doing) but it would be cruel of me to let him in his desperation and illness believe things that are not true and that can never help him (and will make things worse). It would make me weak and unsafe if I would bend reality to suit him and helped him find (much needed) security only in lies. How would he know where sanity was if I and others were so unreliable and inconsistent?

Alice Roberts has always been far too fond of her own visage and making herself the object of the tv show for my liking so although disappointed, I am not 100% surprised. Wants to be popular more than anything. And yes, sells out more vulnerable women.

I wish more mental health professionals would speak out about what is going on underneath.

50 years ago she would not have been able to have the jobs she has, solely because of her sexed body.

She has it solely because people who have the same sexed bodies fought for her right to have that job — not for themselves; for many, it was too late for themselves, but for succeeding generations of women.

You’re welcome, Alice. We were glad to do it. It would certainly be a shame, though, if all that effort we’re to go to waste because the following generations of women took the effort and the win for granted.

I loved this reply to her 'I'm flouncing' tweet:
"Telling women that you're willing to pretend you don't believe their sex class exists as a separate category to men, & you're going to take the side of men who "feel like women", is likely to piss women off. But then you knew that, & did it anyway. Then you blame women.

Classic."

Classic is right. Third wave feminism in a nutshell: “I’m happy to reap all the benefits that second wave feminism won via female solidarity, and now I’ll disdain that movement, female solidarity, and women in general for cool girl points from the same male power brokers the women before me were courageous enough to stand up against.”

And when courageous women point to their lack of courage, they prove that lack of courage by their own response.

Hate = people expressing a different opinion to me.

You ask questions of someone denying the fact there's two sexes and it's hateful, bile, misogyny.

So is this something we aren't allowed to say anymore? There are two sexes?

It's very disappointing to see her spouting this view. She's a humanist who (rightly) criticises the privilege of those with religious belief but is happy to suspend reality and reasoned thought when it comes to men imagining they are female? She seriously needs to reflect on this. Can't have it all ways.

But she has a point though. There are people who not wholly one sex or the other. You can't just pretend they don't exist. That's not the same as anyone can be a woman if they feel like it. Anyway, Alice Roberts is a saint and I'd take her word above a bunch of transphobics on mumsnet any day.

But she has a point though. There are people who not wholly one sex or the other. You can't just pretend they don't exist.

How does that mean that sex is not binary?

Also, humans are classed as a bipedal species, does that mean that that is pretending that people born with one leg don't exist? Or aren't human?

Roberts has previous. She reacted furiously to David Attenborough's follow-up radio programme about the growing evidence in support of Elaine Morgan's hypothesis about human evolution not being defined by hunting on the savannah, suggesting that it had no right to be broadcast.

There's a gold-mine in them thar tv documentaries provided you stay on the right side of history and commissioning editors.

Thinking people with DSDs are not wholly one sex or the other is what leads to IGM, where parents are pressured to mutilate their children’s genitals to appear more like one sex.

Besides which, DSDs are sex specific - kleinfelters only affects males, turners only affects females.

I have always enjoyed Alice Roberts' documentaries, and will still watch any future ones. I hope she gives some thought to the reaction she has caused, though.

Oh to be clear, she is wrong!

She’s been a complete hypocrite before apparently - campaigned for religious education to be removed from schools but sends her kids to a church school , really stands by her humanist principles there then 🙄

She’s my Dh’s tv crush. He’s going to be very disappointed.

It’s bloody sad though that women like her, automatically think anyone stating biological facts, is unkind (I’m sure she’d rather say Terf).

Roberts has previous. She reacted furiously to David Attenborough's follow-up radio programme about the growing evidence in support of Elaine Morgan's hypothesis about human evolution not being defined by hunting on the savannah, suggesting that it had no right to be broadcast.
Why did she think that?

But she has a point though. There are people who not wholly one sex or the other. You can't just pretend they don't exist. That's not the same as anyone can be a woman if they feel like it.

Tell that to her! Because that's pretty much what she said.

Aquatic Ape hypothesis is one of my favourite hypotheses in human evolution hypothesising. It might not be true but it's still fun to discuss it. When has science become so restricted?

I haven't read what she said. She's a bloody scientist. They deal with empirical evidence not feelz. She digs up skeletons and determines what sex the skeleton is. By empirical evidence.
But I guess money and return series are more important to her than standing up for women.

She’s a biologist?😂 where did she get her PhD?

I always get her muddled with the nice archaeologist off time team! So glad it’s not her.

It's a shame that people are so superficial. If your biggest political commitment is your hair colour, well then ...

I don't think that's what I said. But vividly dyed hair does have certain social connotations.

She’s a biologist?😂 where did she get her PhD?

No she's not... her undergrad degrees were medicine plus an intercalated BSc in anatomy. She worked as a junior doctor before moving to the university of Bristol where she worked in the anatomy dept. and got her PhD in paleopathology.