So much confusion over transgender issues

[Shockedandbefuddled]

Hello - I realise I am here under a new user name.

I am now on a feminist board, having never described myself as a feminist.

My university friends would laugh wildly to hear me described as such.

I feel strongly transgender people need to be looked after and are vulnerable. I do not believe acknowledging transgender people exist poses a threat to womanhood.

However, I am scared that there are a lot of bad men, perverts, abusers and fetishists out in the world (far more than transgender people) who could abuse self ID.

I’m afraid to post this away from Feminist boards because of the backlash but am genuinely confused how the argument has become so fractured.

I think its ok to say I want full support for transgender people but it cannot be at the expense of women, kids, those of religious belief etc?

I regularly use different sports facilities which have both segregated and 'village style' change. I have to admit that before, during or after transition, I have never come across inappropriate behaviour. So my view is that it must be very rare indeed.

The above claim is one of the most classically male statements imaginable. I've heard men make it over the years about rape, domestic abuse, and abortion prevalence. If they haven't personally been affected, then it must be rare. The arrogance in assuming knowledge about women's lives, while ignoring their voices, is quite breathtaking.

Events do not require your personal supervision in order to occur. And predators don't tend to seek third party, unplanned, unknown witnesses.

Lived experience matters. Women's voices matter. And our voices are saying no. We do not consent. We do not consent to male bodies in spaces where we are unclothed, or sleeping, or vulnerable.

And males say that we have no right to withhold that consent. That to do so is hateful.

The misogyny is so obvious.

Female things aren't something females are allowed only if the Main Humans don't need or want them.

I don't understand why the misogyny in this isn't starkly obvious.

This, and what Floral said.

justhad
It would seem that now the only obvious solution is third spaces
But why should somebody who has lived as a particular gender for over 30 years have to highlight their difference even now ?
Physically, externally, they look like their current gender (I believe, according to those who have been in changing rooms with them)

TBH its the pre surgery self ID folks who are the problem.
Those like the person I'm thinking of just want a quiet life as the individual they now are
the militants have poisoned the whole discussion

Floral
I promise I'm not trying to find loopholes
I'm just trying to work out how to make the multiple things I read fit with the reality I see.
In a way that protects the vulnerable of all kinds

Those like the person I'm thinking of just want a quiet life as the individual they now are
the militants have poisoned the whole discussion

Many of the people who campaigned for the original GRA are now campaigning for the self-ID changes - people like Stephen Whittle. I'm not sure there is a distinction to be made between the different factions which is as clear cut as you seem to think it is.

It doesn't bother me to distinguish between AGP and other reasons for a male to desire entry into spaces and rights designated for women only.

Me neither. But given Robin's legal history, I wondered how far they would go to defend their position. It seems, not that far.

oldcrone
TBH the person I know is against self ID
and has turned against Mermaids despite supporting them in the past
I'm also pretty sure they do not count themselves as part of a faction

if we label everybody as part of factions then we become as poisonous as them

As Keir Starmer very cannily phrased it
trans rights are human rights
no less, but also no more

TBH its the pre surgery self ID folks who are the problem.
Those like the person I'm thinking of just want a quiet life as the individual they now are
the militants have poisoned the whole discussion

Important thread about the history of trans rights activism in UK.

AngryAttackKittens wrote:
"I'm going to point every "but the nice, harmless old school transsexuals whose movement has been unfairly appropriated by the nasty transgender people" person to this thread from now on.

All the same elements we're seeing now were there in that old BBC roundtable from the 70s with the 4 transwomen, the politician, and the doctor. None of this is new."
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3463920-Lets-go-back-to-2007

Which is why a mixture of cheaper open plan facilities and some private facilities is the better solution.

It was certainly the approach taken at work to enable support of a transsexual (how they described themselves). They always recognised that they were actually male and would say so if a situation arose where it might be relevent and not immediately clear ( eg arranging something via email where males and females would be separated) . They were frequently welcomed into the female event but women were always given a genuine choice. To be fair, it was her self deprecation and willingness to step back that made her one of the women.

In a way that protects the vulnerable of all kinds

But what you mean by that is in a way that makes females protect vulnerable males. You still regard males as having a right to female spaces that females should not be allowed to say no to, but you'd like to try and define which males. It illustrates who you see as the main humans and the subordinate humans, the owners of space and provision and those who are there to help. You're drawing those lines based on sex whether you're able to admit it or not. Female people are not the support humans.

The only way to protect the vulnerable of all kinds equally is to provide additional spaces. There are many other ways to move provision on and create new spaces and meet these needs without anti-woman activist action such as removing female rights to be alone in a female only space.

Unless the main goal is to remove female rights instead of to try and meet other professed needs.

I've just caught up on this thread with a show about 70s music in the background.

It's had:
Rolling Stones - Mick resplendent in a skin tight pastel pink satin suit and long hair
Queen - Freddie in a massive fur coat and shag cut
David Bowie - in full on ziggy regalia
And as I type, Elton is hammering away on his piano in a white suit bedecked with enormous ostrich feather shoulders.

Not a single interview, speaker, caption or individual commenter in between the songs has been confused about their sex, despite overwhelmingly gender-bending costumes.

How odd.

if we label everybody as part of factions then we become as poisonous as them

You seem to be reading too much into the word faction. I was using it simply to mean the different groups of people who identify as trans (see the Stonewall trans umbrella).

But read the thread R0wantrees linked to.

Michelle
Please do not put words into my mouth.
In the light of the thread title I was trying to work out how a complex shape might fit into a simple slot.
There are no easy answers in those unusual cases
BUT
In the mean time the default has to be to protect the 50% of the population
and to seek ways to support the 0.001% that do not contradict the above.

That still means third spaces.

There isn't another way to do this without removing female spaces from females.

A few thought this thread raised.
What is my definition of gender dysphoric? Those diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
This is a horrific statement in light of the number of children diagnosed with gender dysphoria and put on the path to transitioning based on the toys they play with or the clothes they wear who have desisted or detransitioned.
It also raises the question of why no other body dysphoria diagnosis is treated with affirmation. It would be gross malpractice, that's why.

The argument often made that trans and cis are adjectives that modify woman was easily refuted yesterday, and I wish I could remember who I am paraphrasing. Ginger woman, Black woman, tall woman are are all adjectives and the nouns they modify. Seahorse, hot dog, transwoman or even trans woman, are compound words that have meanings significantly different from the words they combine.

I was shocked that a person in this thread would admit to disregarding the most basic principles of safeguarding while employed to apply them. This is the person a child sometimes faces when they go to the adult responsible for safeguarding them.

I would like to return Robin's 'compliment' by saying thanks for filling my BINGO card.

In the light of the thread title I was trying to work out how a complex shape might fit into a simple slot.
There are no easy answers in those unusual cases

Humans are male or female
Single sex spaces are part of Safeguarding for girls & women from male sexual abuse & violence.

If I as an adult I became aware that something I was doing in good faith or without awareness of consequences increased the risk of predatory males abusing young girls how long would I need to decide to change my behaviour when it became apparent?
All adults are responsible for Safeguarding children.

Single sex spaces are part of Safeguarding for girls & women from male sexual abuse & violence.
Indeed

So should a person who was born male but is now no longer physically capable of rape
and has passed an enhanced DBS check, be barred from being around girls?
I fully admit that this scenario is the 1% of the 0.01% but to hold the higher ground we need to preempt the query

The answer is no.

The only males (of whatever gender presentation) I trust are those who understand and respect the above.

No. Complete sentence.

No. Many females do not want males in their (incredibly limited provision of) same-sex spaces. Their 'no' overrides the 'yes' of women who don't care and who are happy to give these provisions away, and overrides the 'yes' of males who wish to use female provisions for personal reasons.

This is basic consent.

People who do not understand or respect basic consent are not trustworthy.

It's really not very complicated at all.

Transwomen remain male. Their problem is with other males, who cannot accept their feminine presentation. Their struggle is not our struggle, and frankly, they need to respect our struggle and stay the hell away from appropriating it, and focus on their own challenges from their own sex.

So should a person who was born male but is now no longer physically capable of rape and has passed an enhanced DBS check, be barred from being around girls?

If you start letting any males into female only spaces, first of all you say just people like your friend, and then there's someone else who doesn't tick quite so many boxes, and then someone else who's a bit less safe again and so on.

Where do you draw the line? If the line is firmly drawn at 'no males', you don't have to start making arbitrary decisions.

So should a person who was born male but is now no longer physically capable of rape and has passed an enhanced DBS check, be barred from being around girls?

If the Safeguard is to be a same sex worker then yes of course.

Are you suggesting that the only form of male sexual abuse is rape? Are you denying girls & vulnerable women's dignity & privacy on the basis that a male has had genital modification surgery?
Really, what next employ impotent males too?

I am surprised anyone would ask
I would also regard any male who sought employment in female only intimate care etc on the basis they had genital mofification surgery as being wholly inappropriate. That has nothing to do with them being transsexual & everything to do with their failure to understand the needs of the client group/ have respect for & understanding of Safeguarding.

be barred from being around girls

girls be allowed to have a female only space.

The word barred still weights the male vulnerability and the female meanness in saying no. Which still puts no value on females. Not having a go here, but the language betrays the weight on sympathy with males and their greater importance every time.

So thank you for all your answers. I really dislike the use of pile on. If you enter in to a discussion and everybody else or the majority disagree with you it isn’t a pile on, it isn’t bullying, it’s that people have a different view.

Apologies in advance for a rambling post but I have been thinking about what it feels like to be female.

My initial thought was I don’t know, I just know I am female. I did not feel any less female today because I was walking in the park in men’s jogging bottoms, unisex sweatshirt, no bra and man’s coat.

I do sometimes have times when I feel more female, if that makes sense. However those are times such as during menstruation, TTC, pregnancy, menopausal symptoms. These things are all to do with biology.

The reality is the times I feel feminine are things people who are not biologically female cannot experience or feel regardless of surgery or pharmacological intervention.

I worry about issues like pay disparity, sexual assault, glass ceilings, objectification and know they disproportionately females concerns. But they can and do happen to other groups so my feelings about those are not exclusively female feelings. And I cannot imagine any man thinks ‘I want to transition so I can experience greater levels of discrimination or higher risk of DV or assault’.

So all that leaves about feeling female seems to be presentation. I certainly feel more feminine when I put on make up and wear female dresses, skirts and heels but more feminine is not the same as more female. In fact most of the female feelings are quite unpleasant such as flooding and hot sweats or birth, not pretty or feminine but female.

If I don’t understand what it is to feel female in anything other than a biological concept I don’t really understand how a man can. I see a conceptualised version of feeling female.

I would really like a man who wants to transition to explain to me what he believes being female is.

So if a male cannot be female a man cannot be a woman.

The reason I said in my opening post I did not call myself a feminist was relevant because I have realised my views would now have me labelled a TERF by many in the Labour Party which would make me a radical feminist.

Apologies for the length of the post.

So should a person who was born male but is now no longer physically capable of rape
and has passed an enhanced DBS check, be barred from being around girls

Nobody is 'barred from being around girls' on the basis of their gender presentation. That's hyperbolic. 99% of public space is unsegregated by sex.

This hypothetical person has the same obligations as any other human to behave ethically. Is it ethical for a male to utilise the provision of female same-sex facilities because it makes him feel more comfortable ? That's his issue to work through. If he decides his needs override the principle of consent, well, that's what he's decided. And I have my own opinions, stated upthread, about males who selfishly overide the consent of females, and I would feel free to be open about that opinion.

Of course, objecting women have very little power to prevent the trashing of their boundaries when it comes to limited same-sex provision, so our hypothetical 'I gave up my penis, let me in' male is likely to be utterly unchallenged and to get what he wants at the cost of what women want. So, win for him, I guess.

Oldcrone
Fay Presto, Jan Morris : is it not arbitrary to decide they are men again ?

the language betrays the weight on sympathy with males and their greater importance every time

So true. You'd think in a feminist space, people could self-interrogate their use of male-centred language.

Maybe posters overwhelmed with compassion for the hypothetical old school transexual could just put that to one side for the time they are in a feminist space, and try to use some of their abundant empathy on women and girls.