When did they stop using the words transsexual and transvestite?

[AnotherAdultHumanFemale]

I noticed that a key part of their movement is language. Transexuals and transvestites have been around for years but I don't ever remember anyone, including themselves, insisting that they literally were women.

These are the exact same men, except now everyone is insisting that they literally are women.

They have basically rebranded themselves, cleverly, with language being a key part of this, because I can't imagine anyone shouting on twitter or on pride marches 'transvestites are women and anyone who disagrees is a hateful vestphobic bigot!'

It seems they knew nobody would be fooled by that so they changed both transsexual and transvestite into 'transwoman' to gain sympathy and then use that sympathy to drive their ideology forward.

I'm not sure if this is accurate, but I've found a a history which seems to make sense... up until the 1990s

www.them.us/story/inqueery-transgender

Thanks ErrolTheDragon that is an interesting article despite is being so propaganda-y.

I am now wondering, when was it that they started insisting that they are actually women, denying their biology reality and the fact that they are and always will be male?

And how did they get so much power, so that they not only have changed all of the language that medics created to describe their condition, to now creating words that define the rest of the society (cis), that governments are adopting it and writing into law?

It's a bit like if as a group, Anorexics got power, and everyone was forced to say 'yes of course you are fat and need to diet' (rather than acknowledging their illness, helping them to accept the reality of it to adopt healthy eating habits as well as getting counselling). And then the anorexics decided all non anorexics are 'non-anas' and all language in policy and law had to be 'pro ana.'

They could make anyone criticising their ideology as anaphobic and get it recorded as a hate crime. All literature now had to have ana characters in it and academics would not be allowed to even ask questions.

Same with diabetics, epileptics, schizophrenics etc etc. Non-dias, non-epis and non-schizis. Diaphobic, epiphobic, schizophobic etc.

The main difference is that men and women would be equally as negatively affected if any of the above groups gained the power to change language, policy and law but transgenderism only targets the rights and has seriously negative consequences for women and children.

I am now wondering, when was it that they started insisting that they are actually women,

It only feels like 2-4 years since it became prevalent, which is why to those of us who see it’s nonsense find it so bewildering to find others actually seem to believe it.

The ever changing wordscape, where the meanings change so fast nobody but a true believer can keep up, is a deliberate tactic. India Willoughby’s recent claim to be a ciswoman is the latest change I’ve seen. It’ll be interesting to see if it catches on.

And there’s been various suggestions about how they got power. There’s a business technique for takeovers that requires putting in infrastructure without announcing it, then by the time anyone becomes aware, it’s almost too late for anyone to do anything, and this seems to be the situation.

There’s been a lot of quiet infiltration, male transitioners working towards key advisory positions in women’s refuge provision, perhaps the civil service and other influential positions (e.g. the BBC has way more than the number of trans people than you’d expect.

Lobby groups have targeted governments, again without it being obvious. It’s been an almost silent campaign, but sometimes the mask slips and we see it’s been deliberate. Christine Burns boasting the GRA had been brought in successfully under the radar, for example.

I think there’s a lot of wailing and gnashing teeth as women woke up in the U.K. before they were supposed to.

It’s not like the anorexic example though. Anorexics don’t claim to be part of an existing group and them referring to non-anas would not harm anyone. Anorexia is an analogy that can be used when discussing treatment for gender dysphoria but it’s not like the TRA movement. The TRA movement is literally as if white people claimed to be black and wanted to apply for scholarships and jobs reserved for black people and said that ‘cis-black’ had privilege because they were born black and nobody questioned whether they actually were. Race, like gender is a social construct but people react in horror to white people seeking to usurp resources designated for black people. And rightly so. I am so baffled as to what makes it so different for the transgender movement.

It was a master stroke coming up with the term transgender because it’s more socially acceptable than transvestite. I’ve seen people on social media claiming to have a trans child & the responses are all positive. I doubt that announcing “my son is a transvestite” would get the same.

There are still men calling themselves transvestites and transsexuals, and not claiming womanhood, but they get slapped down and called 'truscum' by trans ideologists.

I think the race analogy works better, as does 'transablism' - because in most developed countries there is protection and an attempt to level the playing field for groups that have been disadvantaged.

I think it's misogyny and male entitlement, now being manipulated and stoked by forces that thrive on and crave disruption and instability.

That saying 'when you're used to privilege, equality feels like oppression'... Fetishism and misogyny found a common ground and have exploited a tiny group of genuinely dysphoric people (sweeping up those with intersex conditions along the way) with the collusion of the pharmaceutical and cosmetic surgery industries.

And it's all been so well managed propaganda-wise that individuals who have taken the Hippocrates oath or work in other helping professions have been blind-sided into becoming colluders too.

It's now one more division in society that the disrupters/destroyers can gleefully magnify.

Terrifying.

*Hippocratic

I remember watching a TV show, maybe 15 to 20 years ago, where a "trans" person was carefully defining and explaining the difference between transvestite, cross dresser, transexual, etc.
The whole piece was about educating us about the correct terms to use.
Funnily enough the whole piece would be considered hateful transphobia now.

First dates had a transvestite, by his own admission, on last week. He said, I'm a man, I just like wearing womens clothes, and sleeping with women, no big deal. It was quite refreshing to see.

Iam that's exactly what Eddie Izzard used to say, but now he says he was a woman all along at the forefront of trans issues.
He's a liar

I have been thinking about this recently and I think it only serves to highlight that we should not give up the word woman (AHF).
Ive no doubt that the change of language is so that the unsuspecting public think of transsexual when then see the word transwoman, rather than cross-dresser.
I cant see many people agreeing that cross-dressing males should be allowed into female only spaces, hence the change of language.

God, I had no idea Eddie Izzard was trans now. And apparently in 2004, he said he was "a lesbian trapped in a man's body". So has Eddie come out as a lesbian now too?

Wikipedia says Eddie prefers he or she, please don't delete me.

Sorry for detail there. Yes, I prefer the word transsexual. Makes me think of nice people who just want to get on with it, like the rest of us. Transgender makes me think of gender performance.

Regulatory capture:

threadreaderapp.com/thread/1126466517082804224.html

The TRA movement seems fairly sudden to the general public, but I think it's emerged on the wave of several different strands.

Obviously the foundation is post-modernism, which has influenced a lot of intellectual debate and thinking over the years.

Many in sociology are wedded to the idea of social construction and seem to dislike biological sciences or explanations.

Then you had the rise of Queer Theory and ideas like it is the 'performance' of femininity or masculinity that makes one a woman or man.
And any societal norms are meant to be 'queered' or transgressed.

Courses like gender studies seem to push a lot of queer theory from what I've read.

It's all been brewing since the 90s. With the rise of social media like Tumblr, a lot of these ideas and concepts coalesce into quasi belief systems that are quickly adopted by people because they have a mystical allure.

The decline of organised religion doesn't mean people these days actually engage in more critical thinking. They just transfer their need for a belief system onto another medium. There's growth in neo pagan beliefs, crystal healing, food fads, eastern exotic and mystical stuff like tantra, reiki etc and a growing skepticism of science which leads to anti vaxxers, flat earthers and so on.

Belief in human souls and the afterlife seems to have morphed into belief in a gender identity soul and the transformation into your dream body via hormones and surgery.
People want to find meaning and an explanation for their fears, discomforts and frustrations and are tempted by offers of cures and redemptions. Ideologies that offer simple explanations on the surface ( even through wracked by logical inconsistencies and incoherent woo) are very easily absorbed.

People are also sensitive to being perceived as racist or homophobic, so many folk reflexively say yes to anything related to transgenderism even if they don't know much about it or understand what it's about. It's much easier to take the least path of resistance, especially if you are constantly told that doing so will mean that you are 'on the right side of history'.
As we've seen, this means government officials and public servants will quickly adopt or change policies without giving it any thought due to the worry of being labelled transphobic.

A salesman that's trying to push you into buying something you aren't sure of.... they tell you today is the last day of the offer, it's a great deal and if you don't buy it, you're going to lose out and regret it. The tactic is to exert pressure into making a decision by implying time is running out.
The TRAs use a similar method by invoking stats that Trans people are dying left, right and centre and if you don't push through a policy or change NOW, you will regret it.

Wikipedia says Eddie prefers he or she, please don't delete me.

Izzard's own website says 'he' right the way through.

Eddie izzard always said he was a lesbian trapped in a mans body whereas the likes of traditional drag artists were men who liked wearing women's clothing aka transvestite. They are not the same. Not sure about transsexual, it's a line from rocky horror of course ...

Transvestites are men who identify as men, but who like to dress as women. There is often a sexual element to this, but not always.

The term transsexual has fallen out of favour in recent years, because it is inaccurate and causes confusion. Sex is biologically determined, gender isn't. Transgender is seen as a better descriptor of what's actually happening.

Some people still prefer to use the term 'transsexual' of themselves, but it's much rarer these days.

Race, like gender is a social construct but people react in horror to white people seeking to usurp resources designated for black people. And rightly so. I am so baffled as to what makes it so different for the transgender movement.

Because generally speaking, with a few obvious exceptions, most people now accept without question that black people are people, deserving of all the same rights that white people have historically held. I also believe there is a vague collective guilt about the injustices visited on black people by white people, a sense of "we've done enough damage, we need to make amends and not transgress any further".

Sadly the older I get, the more I firmly believe that a very large proportion of the population don't see women as deserving of equal rights in the same way. Scratch the surface and the misogyny, both classic and internalised, is all too easily revealed. Men as a class don't have that same collective nebulous guilt over oppressing women for centuries that white people do re their oppression of black people, so there is no corresponding desire to atone for it and act as gatekeepers for women's rights - I think they genuinely feel justified in their misogynistic behaviour, particularly as there is a subset of women who will act as enablers and supporters. Women as a class mostly just aren't respected.

if you don't push through a policy or change NOW, you will regret it

Worse: the implication is that you will have the blood of the transpeople YOU PERSONALLY drove to suicide on YOUR hands.

It only feels like 2-4 years since it became prevalent

Yes, it was rumbling away for a while, but 2016 seems to be when it really hit mainstream consciousness, perhaps with Kaitlyn Jenner.

www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/03/19/transsexual-transgender-transvestite-what-should-you-call-trans-people/

The important thing is to let trans people, as the all-too-often marginalised minority being spoken about, lead the discussion and dictate the terms in which they are spoken about.
This is my favourite bit, so presumably natal women get to dictate the term woman?

Yes transwoman is used to hide the blatant sexual and creepy (to women and kids) elements behind the words Transsexual and Transvestite. There was no hope for those two words, they couldn't really be saved.

Enter transwoman. To me, I get a visceral "spooked" reaction at the word trans, like some weird Frankenstein science experiment , transgenic monkeys or something

That's why they had a big hoo haa about trans not being allowed to stand alone. So you can't write trans woman. It has to be always transwoman.

I always write trans woman to annoy them and it's one of the things you can't get banned for as far as I know

• That's why they had a big hoo haa about trans not being allowed to stand alone. So you can't write trans woman. It has to be always transwoman.

I always write trans woman to annoy them and it's one of the things you can't get banned for as far as I know*

I thought it was the other way round. While they may not want 'trans', alone, they usually want 'trans woman' as it tries to imply they're a subset of women (cf 'black woman') rather than 'transwoman' as a separate classification.