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?

[DuLANGMondeFOREVER]

How can we look more nuts than Lisa Nandy?

As Lisa Muggeridge would say, ‘she’s nuttier than squirrel shit’

🥜🐿 💩

[Thinkingabout1t]

But Listening, they are still men. Even if they have had surgery to make them appear less masculine. There is no real quandary here.They have every right to dress and use make-up as they wish. But they are not in any way women, and they have no right to use women’s single-sex facilities.

I have changed my views over the past few years. We have given an inch and they have taken a mile.

[DuLANGMondeFOREVER]

You can’t make penis/no penis the dividing line because some people just cannot have major surgery like that due to illness/age/disability (and in other countries, low income).
Plus, a policy like that might encourage some vulnerable trans people into irreversible surgery they go on to regret. It’s a op that comes with a lot of potential complications and requires hours of upkeep. Genital surgery has the potential to ruin lives, for both male and female transitioners ((there is a transman called Scott who occasionally posts here who has been essentially left disabled due to botched phalloplasty).

The only sensible place to draw the line in terms of access to spaces, services and positions reserved for female people is no males at all.

There is no way to write laws that let your friend in and keep Karen White out.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/society/2018/oct/11/karen-white-how-manipulative-and-controlling-offender-attacked-again-transgender-prison

[WhatKatyDidNot]

so do we treat them like 19th Century Eunuchs and castrati?

Not necessary. Men need to accept the members of their sex class who like to present in a stereotypically feminine way and those others who suffer from body dysmorphia and sometimes need medical or surgical interventions. It has nothing to do with women. The onus is not on women.

[FloralBunting]

I very strongly reject the line between pre and post op as having any significance. Partly, as I've said, because no means no and it's utterly grotesque to suggest the only way to overcome 'no' is to cut your knob off.

But also actually because I do not want anyone to have physically unnecessary experimental surgery in the first place, and it would be devoid of integrity to make such surgeries a condition of accessing women's rights.

That's why the no must be firm, and that offering to waive the rules like that is absolutely not kind, it's actually verging on monstrous.

[CatalogueUniverse]

It’s men who see other men as not men or lesser men due to appearance, behaviours, being gay, stature, virility, fertility or possession of testes.

There are some incredible histories of just how much sex (including penetrative) was going on in harems between “eunuchs” and women. But because the women could not be impregnated it was not sex that counted to the male owners of the women.

Women see all men as men. The vast majority of men from late adolescence would be able to overpower all but a very small percentage of women.

[TheProdigalKittensReturn]

Women see all men as men.

I certainly do, and used to assume all women did, but the last few years of watching women turn up to argue about this have made me wonder if some women are so sexist that they also see men who're a bit small or a bit fey or just generally not Action Man was being somehow unmen too. It's bollocks, obviously, and anyone who has bollocks is clearly a male human, but there really do seem to be people so sexist that they simply can't process the idea that a man can be a man without being a walking stereotype.

[TheProdigalKittensReturn]

I also think that if there are any women who claim not to see all men as men they'd change their minds pretty sharpish if stuck in an enclosed space with one who was angry with them.

[CherryPavlova]

Surely to suggest a man who has had surgery to remove his penis has become a woman is akin to suggesting a woman who has had a double mastectomy has become a man?
It’s ludicrous to suggest someone is less of a woman because of their breast cancer risk, isn’t it?
There needs to be ways to ensure all men remain safe in men’s spaces.

[testing987654321]

The other day I was in a bar with a few women discussing a book. Next to us were about 6 men wearing skirts/dresses, make up, and had their hair in side bunches or just long.

Strangely enough I would never describe that group as a group of women because, well, I can plainly see that are men.

I cannot fathom why anyone expects me to pretend they are women. It really is an emperor's new clothes scenario and I will not submit.

[R0wantrees]

Interesting article by Katie Alcock (Psychology lecturer Lancaster University)

'But HOW CAN YOU TELL'
(extract)
"I was privileged to attend Maya Forstater’s employment tribunal last month which was incredibly interesting and also gave me some helpful pointers for my own legal case.

Sadly members of the public are not allowed to stand up in employment tribunals and say “Please sir, please Mr Judge, I know the answer” but I was sorely tempted to give it a go. Maya had persuaded the barrister for her ex-employer to stop saying that sex is “assigned at birth” but rather is observed from a baby’s genitals (and, rarely, if necessary, through DNA testing).

The barrister went on to ask how Maya could tell that someone is male or female without having been present at that person’s birth. Happily the rest of us live in the real world where it is pretty easy to work out whether someone is male or female: and no, it doesn’t depend on whether they have highlighted cheekbones and manicured fingernails.

So, how do we tell whether someone is male or female? Well, we are very good at it and — like a lot of human cognitive skills — we base it on a number of cues (pieces of information). In fact, we’re very good at it from the time we are tiny babies.

One of the best ways to tell a male body from a female body is gait — how you walk. You don’t need a whole body in front of you, or even the outline of a body, to tell male from female bodies. A nice little point light display will do the trick. Adults and babies aged 4 months or older can tell male from female in this type of video " (continues)
medium.com/@katieja/but-how-can-you-tell-7901324d0919

[InflagranteDelicto]

Katie writes so clearly. She's spot on, gait, hands, mannerisms.

I follow mostly on here, because others are usually more coherently.

This morning I had an acquaintance post this on fb. How can holding this view mean they can do their job safely as a social worker? Trans rights, if they're a thing, mean the demolishing of women and girls safety. Sadly, I fear that this person's views would prevent them from being able to safeguard a young vulnerable female effectively.

[Justhadathought]

Toilets aren’t really the issue though, people nip in the opposite sexes loss all the time

Really? I can't say i've ever nipped in to the men's.....I'll use the disabled toilet if i really have to when faced with a queue at the ladies.

[R0wantrees]

Sadly, I fear that this person's views would prevent them from being able to safeguard a young vulnerable female effectively.

Based on the sceen shot alone I would question their capacity for evidenced based practice & sound decision making.

Yes, they should talk about the number of people who identify as trans & comparative deaths around the world. Before talking, they should do some research, be able to use data accurately & analyse.

[AskingQuestionsAllTheTime]

It depends on whether we talk about absolutes or percentages.

If in this country there are (for the sake of argument) 5000 m->f transgender people, of whom one is murdered in a year, that is obviously not as many individuals as the three women a week who are murdered.

As a percentage of all trans/all women? That is more difficult, isn't it.

[Datun]

It's 5000 who have a GRC. The estimate is half a million and counting. One in fifty, if you go by prison statistics.

[R0wantrees]

It depends on whether we talk about absolutes or percentages.

Not just this but the context in those parts of the world where murder rates are particularly high for transwomen. There are other very significant & relevent factors which must be considered.

[DuLANGMondeFOREVER]

The vast majority of trans murders take place in Central and South America. None of the ‘trans rights’ demands made by UK trans activists will make the slightest jot of difference to the murder rate of trans people worldwide (in the UK in the last ten years there have been more trans murderers than there have been trans murder victims).

If UK trans activists were lobbying the government to do more to pressure South American governments to stop these awful crimes, I would happily stand shoulder to shoulder with them. Same if they were concerned about the astonishing HIV rates amongst black male born trans people in the USA, but they aren’t.

Instead they are convincing Lisa Nandy that any rapist who says he’s a woman should be held in a female prison (even if he only decides he is a woman after incarceration).

Trans activism doesn’t give a flying fuck about murdered transwomen in Brazil, or Mexico, or Columbia. It just uses their tragic deaths as a lever for letting UK sex offenders do whatever they want.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/oct/08/trans-women-in-colombia

[Aesopfable]

Though why would you start with transwomen in South America when they have the lowest murder rate there? Why not focus on other young men who have a murder rate an order of magnitude larger? Indeed, young men could reduce their risk of murder several fold by identifying as transwomen.

[Teateaandmoretea]

If in this country
All of the murders are horrendous. But what relevance does it have to the discussion about what a woman actually is?

My 70 year old dad is honestly horrified by the lack of respect for women trans women have. And he is far from a feminist ....!

[midgebabe]

In the Americas isn't the transwomen murder rate very similar to the murder rate of prostitutes , and is believed reflects the career "choice" rather than their gender status?

I do suspect that gender non conformant males will be subject to much more violence than women and more than men in general. It's just the solutions need to be thought through.

[TheBewildernessisWeetabix]

Transgender murder rate in the US is the lowest of any demographic.
It is Black men and Indigenous women who murdered most often in the US.

[wellbehavedwomen]

@GinUnicorn you're just like me with this.

When I started feeling concerned about safe guarding and did some research (a lot on mumsnet) I started to become aware of the wide reaching consequences. It’s not just about us being kind it’s about an erosion of rights. I completely see that now whereas before I felt it was good to be kind and inclusive even at my own discomfort.

That's what happens with most most women with basic reasoning ability, when they start looking into this properly. Which is why there is such a furious effort to prevent that from happening.

The confusion, like the lies: deliberate.