I'm not sure I'm not a bigot

[wdywac]

I have never started a thread on here before; forgive me if I ramble.

I am a mother, a scientist, and a rhetorician. I'd like to consider myself fair and open-minded; liberal and progressive. But try as I might, I cannot resolve the issues around trans rights and self-ID. I'd like to hear perspectives from anyone. If you consider that I am a bigot, or not, please explain why.

The debate is so vicious in places that it is hard to find reasoned arguments that don't descend into name-calling and baseless accusations. This is a good place to come, and I have 'lurked' for a long time. I would like to point out that I am for equal rights for trans people in employment, housing etc. However, I cannot accept that trans people ARE the sex they identify as. Am I a bigot?

To start with, I was told that sex is immutable but gender is not; that masculinity and femininity are performed, and this was a fairly sound argument. However, it then became a problem as masculinity and femininity became replaced with the words man and woman. This opened an etymological can of worms because this is not how these words have ever been used. I uderstand that language is fluid, fine, but this is the start of the confusion. Later, these words were again blurred, and so male and female became performed. I cannot agree with this; sex is determined by physical markers. It cannot be performed; this is illogical. I've been told that makes me a bigot because I won't use the riht pronouns, which isn't true. I call people what they asked to be called. I know there are some who disagree with this stance, but it isn't fallacious on in individual level so I do it. In practice I genuinely find it very difficult to do; difficult to remember to do. Difficult to practise when said person isn't in front of me. Am I a bigot?

I'm often thrown arguments like 'what about....?' Trans women in sport, I fundamentally disagree with people segregating sports by gender not sex. Testosterone infers lifelong advantages from gestation. Transwomen have a distinct sporting advantage, even with reduced testosterone. I think the fair way is to have an open sex category, either as a third classification, or to replace the male classification. While I sympathise, this is where I would place Caster Semenya. Am I a bigot?

I think many services restricted on the basis of sex should remain so. Despite popular belief, this is not illegal. So female changing can be just that. Female prisons can be just that. I feel for trans prisoners but this is so open to abuse that allowing self ID to determine acces to services is in thsi case dangerous. I am asked how I'd police it, like demanding a genital exam at the door. I don't have a fully formed answer. Any policing essentially must function on an honour system. Intersex people; I do't have an answer. 'I don't know ' is a legitimate scientific standpoint. Am I a bigot?

I don't agree with issuing birth certificates in a 'new' sex is a good idea. If sex is immutable, it is simply documenting a falsehood. GRC already does this, but changes ones gender, not sex. Reissuing birth certificates can allow past identities to be 'forgotten' and means that crimes ca be categorised as committed by femakes when they are not. Am I a bigot?

I don't like the terms real women , cis women, true women. They are loaded. In the same way that we call mothers mothers, whether they gave birth to or adopted their children. We don't say real mothers, at least not in polite conversation. But there are times when it is important to distinguish betwee the two groups, and so we have terms to differentiate them. To say that differentiation is not required, or to simply state that transwomen are women, is intellectually dishonest. There are many instances where biological femaleness is very necessary. It needs protecting. Am I a bigot?

I do not see trans people as less; I do see them as different to being of the biological sex they identify as. I don't think they should be treated differently, except where biological sex matters. Remove sex-based protections demonstrably does harm females. Am I a bigot?

Sorry for long post.

I've always been sympathetic and accommodating with these matters because what harm does it do, its your body, do as you please and I'll be happy if you're happy.

However, the current climate of 'cancel culture' and public outrage/attack whenever anyone dare express an alternative view is disgusting.

This IS causing harm: adults with MH that aren't assessed adequately but allowed to transition permenantly, children who wanted to be firemen last week and are now on hormone blockers, grossly unfair advantages in sport.

Unfair as it may be I've lost sympathy and am growing to be more intolerant and rejecting of people expressing opinions shoving their views down your throat.

Honestly I'm sick of all the focus on it, it's not that deep, stop crying when one person doesn't hop aboard your woke train. The extreme public outcry is bloody ridiculous and there are so many more important things we should be upset about or focusing on. The world doesn't revolve around that community - much as they believe it does...

We've lost this divide between overall issues and taking things personally.

This is a very astute observation.

I have also noticed over my lifetime a switch from the idea of 'tolerance' to a demand for 'respect' which I have long found problematic. It is one thing to ask that we tolerate others religious views for example, quite another to demand we respect them. I respect that which is worthy of my respect. That doesn't mean I don't tolerate all sorts of things I have no respect for because we all have to do so for society to function.

What does everyone think about this?

etcanada.com/news/481879/karamo-brown-disappointed-after-mario-lopez-says-parents-letting-children-transition-genders-is-dangerous/

TRA's make up new meanings for words. According to transgender people:

Woman means anyone who wants to call themselves women.

Transphobe means anyone who disagrees with that.

Bigot means the same as transphobe.

So who really cares what they call you. They are meaningless labels.

I've seen that all over Twitter, Frou. It's a good example of the level of stupidity the debate has got to.

For someone to be criticised to suggest a 3 year old can't know they are trans is unbelievable. For him to then give in and issue an apology shows the power of the trans narrative.

You forgot fascist Fairenuff. That also = transphobe/bigot.

a speaker whose words are primarily intended to impress or persuade.

I'm not that impressed, TBH.

Froucornball

Know nothing about who he is or what he said, but I've seen all over twitter that he's apologised and vowed to be educated. He knows the gulag is waiting otherwise 😂

People tend to take things very personally these days. And there is a wild increase in polarisation in almost any contentious issue you care to name.

A couple of years ago, most of the women who are now called 'GC' were posting endless caveats about trans people of course needing to live their lives free of harassment, but our main concern here was the clash of rights that occurs when a group demands access to something which has been set aside for women.

A couple of years of being told that there was no clash, or if there was, there were women who didn't mind anyway, being told to be more conciliatory, being told to think of the suffering of others more than our own as a class, and flat out being told we're bigots for putting women's needs and desires first and being concerned about safeguarding, most of us have dropped the caveats.

Not because we don't think that everyone should be free to live their lives as they which, within the rule of law. We still do. But because every overture of dialogue, every attempt to explain where compromise was possible and where it absolutely wasn't, was met with more and more coercion, demands and cries of bigot etc.

Anti women activists, be they in a dull old MRA mould, or coming from the Trans movement, may complain about how 'radical' we are here, because so many of us no longer patiently add our caveats, but you reap what you sow. Coming here with your earnest desire for dialogue rings very hollow when trans activists themselves have refused to do so until it became expedient to look like you're reaching out.

Women don't have to have endless patience. If a group has been utter dicks to us, we owe them no extra chances to prove they aren't dicks anymore.

I used to be vaguely in support of surgical transition but now that I know a lot more about what it entails and the horrific complications that can occur, it's not something I can support with a clear conscience. I wish I could erase the stories and pictures from my memory.

I definitely oppose any surgery on those under 18.

It is heartbreaking to see adults post about being suicidal because of their surgeries, especially SRS. What these surgeons do is nothing short of criminal and experimenting on healthy human bodies.
It might turn out well for some trans folk, but there are so many stories where it doesn't. I'm not surprised suicides and suicide ideation is still high after SRS.

I'd much rather trans people avoided SRS as much as possible, unless absolutely necessary. People are not transphobic for not wanting to have sexual contact with surgically altered body parts, especially genitals.

Adults can choose to surgically alter their bodies as they wish. However, just as it is very concerning when women die from horrible injections in their butt cheeks because they want some celebrity looking body and we as a society as well as the medical establishment ask questions about what drives women to undertake such risky procedures and what safeguards can be put in place to ensure vulnerable people aren't exploited by dodgy surgeons. I don't see anything wrong with questioning and criticising SRS and how we can protect and support people who have been deeply affected by such procedures.

He should not have apologised. Appeasement never works.

The climb downs are always so... I don't know the word.

“The comments I made were ignorant and insensitive, and I now have a deeper understanding of how hurtful they were,” he said. “I have been and always will be an ardent supporter of the LGBTQ community, and I am going to use this opportunity to better educate myself. Moving forward I will be more informed and thoughtful.”

My bolding. It's very similar to other public apologies for daring to question the transgender narrative. The need for being educated.

I feel like WInston Smith.

Still can’t see how OP is a ‘rhetorician’ unless you count writing each point in a separate paragraph and then ending each one with ‘Am I a bigot?’

No you are not. I largely agree with your points of view.
But we will be called Bigots by some who need an easy insult to throw at us, instead of reasoned arguments.
Bigot means nothing to me any more as a label.

'and I am going to use this opportunity to better educate myself.'

Hope he does like Martina, and comes back with 'I have now educated myself, and am more certain I was right in the first place.'

The climb downs are always so... I don't know the word.

Full of cringing self abasement?

DickKerr

I posted this the other day, having come across it on twitter. It should be posted as a reply to everyone who grovels and vows to be re-educated.

Struggle sessions are also popular in Gilead for the handmaids to debase one another.

What are the consequences? Can they be reversed? Are the same for boys and girls?

There's lots of information about the dangers of puberty blockers in this thread, Greeve.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3651543-Michael-Biggs-paper-on-the-Tavistock

I am finding myself more and more upset about the tendency to look everywhere for things that could be construed as evidence of wrongthink, and label people bigots. I think there is something much more malevolent at work. This apparently makes me a bigot of course, which I still find upsetting.

Mumsnet is not the place to ask if you're a bigot re trans rights.

Intolerance of others opinions.

Thanks, namechanged!

In the same way, the fact that (a tiny minority) of ostensibly trans-identifying individuals cause problems is not a good reason to deny the rights of trans folk generally.

Robin, which rights do you consider are being denied to trans people currently?

I been offered transition as a teenager I would have jumped at it.

Many gay and lesbian people have said they would have too and are glad it wasn’t available.

We do not ban mobile phones because some criminals use them.

Rhetoric is right. This argument has a surface veneer of reasonableness, but look closer and you see it’s a falde equivalence.

This is a person born male. In the past, when this person grew up, they would have had the same rights as all other adult males. So this person would be excluded/banned from women’s spaces.

So the equivalent we need to look for is someone who would not aitomatically have the right to female spaces or for the purposes of the analogy, who does not have the right to a mobile phone.

As Robin used the criminal analogy, I will too. Prisoners do not have the right to mobile phones.

We have to add a GRA equivalent. So, for example if in 2004, prisoners with diabetes had argued successfully that they should have mobiles as it would make them safer if they felt unwell.

So now most prisoners don’t have mobiles, but a tiny minority do.

Another group of prisoners then points out that all prisoners who want a mobile should be able to have one. Sometimes they feel ill too. It’ll be safer to have one. All the prisoner has to do is sign a form to say they need one and that they promise not to use it for nefarious purposes.

So this is Self-ID’s true equivalent. Arguing for self-ID is like arguing all prisoners who feel entitled to a phone should have one and the fact that some prisoners will misuse this privilege does not mean it should be denied to all.

Rose of Dawn is worth following on Twitter/You Tube. I dont always understand or agree but respect her perspective and accept her dysphoria.

There are others: Fionne, Miranda etc - who interestingly do not claim to be women despite living as women.

In short be reassured by rational intelligent people who are exploring transgenderism and who are not afraid to express their own concerns about the cult aspects.

I'd be interested to hear more about why you feel you have been happier due to transitioning later rather than earlier. This is quite contrary to what most TRAs say.

Apologies OldCrone I cannot have been clear enough. Mt transition (in my 40's) has made me a much happier person. I believe, with the personal hindsight that gives me, that I would have been even happier had I transitioned in my 20's or teens.

I plainly cannot speak for others' personal experiences, but I can say that I personally explored alternatives (having met openly gay people only for the first time at university) and that wasn't me. I have never been pressured or persuaded to take any gender step that wasnt entirely my choice, and indeed I fought a personal battle against transition, and lost.

The suggestion that I should now use male change at sports centres or male facilities in my work places or public buildings, which some contributors here would argue for, or the female pronouns which express my transition, is what I mean by denying rights.