This is a good thread about female trans allies

[Doyoumind]

twitter.com/overpow_erin_g/status/1156003798898241543?s=19

Thoughtful insights into how some women get drawn into the wrong side of the debate.

I don't believe your identity as a woman is compromised by another woman's identity.

Again, you cannot perceive anything outside the individual.

Collectivism is beyond you.

This is why the ideology you espouse is rooted in the libertarian right. And why Jennifer Pritzker gives it millions of dollars.

I feel a bit mean asking the queer theorists to define 'woman'. it feels like demanding that a christian prove that God exists

I'm going to disagree with you there Bernard.

Christians can't prove the existence of God, but then I as an atheist can't disprove it either.

I can, on the other hand, prove transwomen are male and therefore not women. So I don't feel mean at all asking Queer Theorists for evidence, any evidence at all, to the contrary.

true Arnold

I was trying to see it from their point of view, to understand why it makes them so angry and defensive and hard to pin down

damn you female socialisation!

I wanted to ask her about Alok, are the things BickerinBrattle says about him true?

Here you are. It's not pretty.

Vaid-Menon once wrote a Facebook post under the name Darkmatter, criticising the idea of little girls as “pure, innocent victims” in sex abuse cases, and arguing that in fact little girls could be “kinky and deviant.” Alok also claims to have once been a “cute little girl” despite identifying as neither male nor female.

medium.com/@GappyTales/an-open-letter-to-topshop-d7351ef932ab

m.facebook.com/feministmemes/posts/1868481300041574

I was trying to see it from their point of view, to understand why it makes them so angry and defensive and hard to pin down

Not speaking for anyone else, but it doesn't make me "angry"

Again, you cannot perceive anything outside the individual.

Exactly, so how are we supposed to repeatedly "prove" what we are?
I know for me there's something else too.
Even if people don't believe me or don't want to hear it.

Not speaking for anyone else, but it doesn't make me "angry"

that's great Roses. How are you defining 'womanhood'?

and urgh OldCrone

I presume Vivienne will now stop regarding Alok as any kind of authority on anything

The whole no debate thing is very strange to me.

I've never met a Christian who wasn't willing to debate their view point, nor an astrologer, nor believers in the healing power of crystals or all sorts of other things for which there is no evidence.

So why the difference with Queer Theorists? I can only assume it is because deep down they know human beings can't change sex and they are desperately trying to convince not me, but themselves.

I don't believe your identity as a woman is compromised by another woman's identity.

My identity formation was based on the known stable things of having a brother.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_formation
Identity formation, also known as individuation, is the development of the distinct personality of an individual regarded as a persisting entity (known as personal continuity) in a particular stage of life in which individual characteristics are possessed and by which a person is recognized or known (such as the establishment of a reputation). This process defines individuals to others and themselves. Pieces of the person's actual identity include a sense of continuity, a sense of uniqueness from others, and a sense of affiliation. Identity formation leads to a number of issues of personal identity and an identity where the individual has some sort of comprehension of themselves as a discrete and separate entity.

Identities are formed on many levels, micro, meso, macro, and global. The micro level is self definition and relationship to people and issues as seen from a person or individual perspective. The meso level is where our identifies are viewed, formed, and questioned from our immediate communities and/or our families. Macro are the connections among and between individuals, issues, and groups as a view from a national perspective. Lastly, the global level is connections among and between individuals, issues, and groups from a worldwide perspective.

So when my brother decided, without warning, that he was now my sister this had a rather profound affect on my own identity.

I can not help this, because of how identity formation occurs.

It affects not only your own identity, but also how you relate to others

'Do you have any brothers or sisters?'

Its an innocent and bland enough question for most people. For me its now a sharp intake of breathe and trying to decide whether i go with 'its complicated' or decide whether to explain. The reason people ask you the question is because they want to relate to you 'oh i have a brother too' or 'oh thats how girls and boys get on as children'. So your lived experienced is a pretty big deal in this context.

Then there's your place in the family. Being the eldest. Being the only daughter. Whether you are equal or come second to your brother's identity and told to submit to their belief of what a woman is.

Then there's how you relate to other women in terms of all those other lived experiences as a woman. Those shared experiences in your formative years are important.

Its funny, because when you explore this subject, it soon become apparent that this ideology is utterly toxic because of how many families it destroys. Its like a grenade being thrown into a family.

Family identity are very much intertwinned and can not just be changed without having an effect on other members of that family. When ones identity is more important than anothers and others are forced to deny or erase their past in language and how they relate to others, this is something of a big deal.

This isn't bigotry, this is a natural response to a distruption in identity formation in others.

We know transgender people exist. We know how they feel about their gender. We know that for most transgender people, they are aware from childhood of the gender they know themselves to be. We can recognise the reality of this, even if we can't explain it yet.

@VivienneHolt
'Gender' is about culturally and socially acceptable behaviours and appearance for each of the sexes. Are you really arguing for the idea that certain behaviours and standards of appearance should be associated with people of one sex or the other?

Ah yes, Alok, someone who lives a trust fund lifestyle that allows him to ruminate about kinky children and write endless self pitying screeds about how terrible it that nobody will fuck him.

It's true, I have learned a lot from Alok. Just probably not what he thinks.

www.holyrood.com/articles/news/scottish-trans-policy-detrimental-women-and-girls

Transgender people do exist. It doesn't automatically imply they are women though.

Gender is a socially constructed role given to people. Usually there are only two because it is mapped onto biology i.e. men and women.
The more stratified a society is along the lines of gender, the more restrictive the roles. Having more than two genders does not imply a particular society is 'better' or more 'progressive' than one that has two for example.

Gender roles are very useful in patriarchal, sexist and homophobic societies.
For example, in India the gender roles for man and woman are very conservatively defined and any deviation from these roles is strongly discouraged or even punished.
Men who are gay or who love effeminate clothing are not allowed to be men. A separate category of hijra evolved for such men because it is considered inconceivable that a man should want to wear clothing and makeup that is usually designated for women. Siphoning off gender non conforming men into a third category absolves men from actually accepting that the gender of 'man' can encompass homosexual, cross dressing or transsexual men. It pushes the 'undesirable' ones into a separate gender category that can be ignored or given 'safe' roles like giving blessings etc.

It's intriguing there's no gender category for women who may want to become men. Then again, Indian society is deeply patriarchal and sexist and has generally been unconcerned about women's needs. They exist to produce babies and serve the men. That is their gender role.

It's also quite telling that Indian society tolerates the existence of a third gender, but there was never any movement to insist that this third gender are actually women and should be classed as women. Biological reality matters even in deeply patriarchal and sexist cultures.

I don't know about other cultures, but I suspect those with more than two genders have similar stratification. Men who do not conform to their gender role are given another category but they do not claim they are women because that gender role is only occupied by females.

And becoming or taking on a third gender role is not some expression of individual identity like the western phonemenon of transgenderism. You have to take on the role that comes with that gender. This can be castration to become a eunuch, taking on spiritual roles as shamans or providers of blessings and so on.
The purpose of multiple genders in any society is to stratify people into tightly regulated roles that have strict criteria for dress, behaviour, professions etc. Not exactly a liberating concept.

I presume Vivienne will now stop regarding Alok as any kind of authority on anything

When I saw the name Alok in Vivienne's post, I'd assumed it was a different Alok - surely nobody would use this one as an argument for anything. Trans allies really do live in a different world.

Again, you cannot perceive anything outside the individual

Exactly, so how are we supposed to repeatedly "prove" what we are?

Bernard you conveniently missed this bit in the same post

This isn't bigotry, this is a natural response to a distruption in identity formation in others.

Oh and power and control. Its always about asserting power and control over others. You can not get away from it, anywhere you explore transgender ideology.

Bernard

MN thread re: Alok: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3475477-Alok-V-Mennon

I know red. It’s like don’t believe your eyes. It’s like being coerced and if you don’t coerce to that control then you are dreadful person and need re-education on the correct way to think

Exactly, so how are we supposed to repeatedly "prove" what we are?

What you are is based on material reality.

This libertarian concept of sovereign self perceived identity has nothing to do with proving what you are. It's an exercise of social power while denying social power exists. Which is why it defaults to a) penis (sex with social power) and b) bourgeois (class with social power).

As Red keeps telling you: any authoritarian ideology, including an authoritarian ideology where the self reigns supreme, will default to extant power structures. That's why it's as far from left wing as it gets.

sorry, I don't understand your reply RosesAndRaindrops

humour a simple person here - how are you defining 'womanhood' if not by biology?

So Vivienne's answer to the question of how womanhood should be defined was

Good question. Not sure there is a clear answer yet

but she is so sure that (say) Jane Fae or Paris Lees are women, that she's happy to come here and tell us we're wrong for not agreeing with her even though she's not sure what a woman is

Am I the only one who finds that really weird (and a bit sad)?

humour a simple person here - how are you defining 'womanhood' if not by biology?

Why can you not understand what I said, it's not in Greek
How are you supposed to repeatedly "define woman" if not all the answers are there yet?
I've said REPEATEDLY that there is more for ME, and it's clear there is for others too.
How the fk do you define it?
For ME it is not JUST my biology and nothing else there's MORE.

(Caps to see if it makes it any clearer, knows it'll be nope but ah well)

Regarding childhood memories of feeling oneself another gender:

Every psychologist knows that memory isn’t a video recording. It’s constantly being rewritten and recast, and is always seen through the lens of now, telling more about the state of the person remembering than the state of the remembered person.

It’s not at all surprising that those claiming a different identity state that they felt that identity as far back as early childhood. Such statements, though, aren’t proof of anything, because of the way memory works.

As Red keeps telling you:

Sheesh. Maybe keep telling me some more until I think right then, I must be mistaken with my experience of womanhood.

And, back to the primacy of self we go.