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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

8 year old boy wants to change with the girls

749 replies

FairytaleofBykerGrove · 06/03/2020 02:45

I’ve been informed that a boy in my daughters class ‘feels like a girl’. He’s been wearing dresses to school for a while (fine) and now wants to change with the girls for swimming. Apparently the children will all accept it no problem and they’d like the parents to do the same. He will be under a poncho towel so we don’t have to worry about his privacy(?) I am really very unhappy with this. Which is why I’m up at 3 in the morning. The other parents I’ve spoken to don’t seem to care either way. I can’t understand it at all. Do you have any advice for me?

OP posts:
DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG · 08/03/2020 19:33

Of course you all assume transwomen are predatory, because you all assume men are predatory,

This is about an 8 year old boy. The girls have a right to a male free space to change in after swimming. Ie, when they are naked.

It’s not about predation, it’s about privacy, dignity and the right to boundaries.

The statistical likelihood is this boy will be a happy gay boy by secondary school.
Shame on your for your internalised misogyny and homophobia

Thisismytimetoshine · 08/03/2020 19:35

The child is not a she, arraye. It’s an 8 year old boy. Wanting to change with the girls doesn’t make him one.

Michelleoftheresistance · 08/03/2020 19:35

Hence the constant misgendering, I've yet to see anyone in this thread refer to this child as a "she"

No one knows the bloody pronouns, the child hasn't been on the thread to specify and they don't necessarily identify as a girl. You're assuming gender as much as anyone else.

No, people born male aren't women or girls. They are transwomen and transgirls. Sex segregation for privacy and dignity and safeguarding is on the basis of sex not gender identity. The feelings and needs of female people matter too.

midgebabe · 08/03/2020 19:35

No we do not assume all men are predatory. Again you are making assumptions.

I assume that most sexual offnences are carried out by men and that men's physical strength puts women at a disadvantage should a man decide he wants sex with her.. 20 to 25% of women have suffered some type of assault. And the nature of these assaults mean that it is much harder for a women to be believed and even harder for anyone to be convicted

Next assumption?

Justhadathought · 08/03/2020 19:41

There is absolutely a parallel that can be drawn against "I fear trans people in my changing rooms" and "I fear gay people in my changing rooms

Women are not generally fearful of other women, it is men who tend to be feared - by both other men and by women......Women have specific vulnerabilities, which is why single sex spaces exist. Sex is instinctively registered. One cannot change sex.

It is deeply offensive to suggest to a woman that being a woman is just an 'inner feeling' - rather than a real, measurable reality as well as a lived experience.It seems astonishing to have to assert that this is the case. Would you honestly suggest the same to a black person ( that it would be possible to identify as black, even though white?). If not, why not?

Male pattern offending does not cease with transition.......and males are seeking access to female spaces, not only for reasons of validation, but also out of fear of other males. Why do you not consider women to have equal right to such consideration?

It is deeply contemptuous of the actual reality and experience of women that you do not even centre women and their needs in the context of their own protected spaces?

Why might this be?

Deliriumoftheendless · 08/03/2020 19:41

Where does the 8 year old gay lad change?

Where does the 8 year old boy with hippie parents who sports long hair change?

Why does this one boy go in with the girls? Why is he the only one wearing a poncho?

Seriously, we need a better explanation than “he feels like a girl”. Even if he grows up to have full sex reassignment surgery why should he be in with the girls now? What reason allows him in and keeps the others out?

(No I am not actually expecting an answer.)

DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG · 08/03/2020 19:42

WANTING TO WEAR A SKIRT DOES NOT MAKE YOU FEMALE!

Fuck sake, what a load of sexist claptrap.

We were meant to be past this.

Deliriumoftheendless · 08/03/2020 19:44

What if all the boys identify as girls and all the girls identify as boys?

StampMc · 08/03/2020 19:47

There is no doubt that gay men and lesbians have had a fuckton of discrimination, including sneery remarks and outright social exclusion.

It has nothing to do with this. If the boys were refusing to allow this one boy into the boys changing room because he was a “trans child” then fair enough, that would be transphobia and exactly the same as what has happened to gay men in the past (and now still, probably). However, that is the opposite of what is happening with the OP, who wants to exclude the boy from a female only space, not because he is trans, but because he is a boy. How is that not obvious to the woke crowd? Trans activism is inherently homophobic. It removes the rights of lesbians to define themselves as same sex attracted and be protected under law for that same sex attraction. If this had come in before the equal marriage act people would genuinely be saying “lesbians already can marry if one of them has a penis and one has a vagina so they are equal”. Transing gay and lesbian youth is conversion therapy and it stinks.

Justhadathought · 08/03/2020 19:48

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OldCrone · 08/03/2020 19:51

you don't see the difference between transwomen and men, and don't respect transwomen are women.

What is the difference between transwomen and men? At what point does a man become a transwoman and therefore a woman? What changes does a man need to make to his body (if any) in order to be recognised as a transwoman? How can we tell the difference between a transwoman and a man pretending to be a transwoman?

OldCrone · 08/03/2020 19:55

However, that is the opposite of what is happening with the OP, who wants to exclude the boy from a female only space, not because he is trans, but because he is a boy.

If it was a girl who identified as a boy, she would be allowed in the girls' changing rooms, just like all the other girls. She wouldn't be excluded because she was trans.

The changing rooms are segregated on the basis of sex, because girls' bodies are different from boys' bodies, not because girls' brains are different from boys' brains. It's nothing to do with any 'gender feelings' they have, which are in their heads and don't affect their bodies at all.

Justhadathought · 08/03/2020 19:55

Hence the constant misgendering

To be guilty of such a 'crime' one has to buy into the ideology in the first place. Sex is real, visible and measurable. Gender is a social construct; invisible to the eye, unable to be measured; only a real and actual thing for those that believe in it; usually demonstrated by exaggerated gendered stereotypes and performances of the type that that both the women's and the gay liberation movements were seeking to be freed from.

Dress however you like, and call yourself whatever you like...but don't try to impose a whole world view on others, by forced linguistic change; and please don't try to colonise women's spaces, services and sports. The word woman is taken - and is universally recognised.

Deliriumoftheendless · 08/03/2020 19:55

you remember, it’s the souls!

DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG · 08/03/2020 19:57

Imagine being a 14 year old gay boy and all your classmates take the piss out of you because back when you were 8, your parents asked for you to be allowed to change with the girls? Because you liked dresses and my little pony? And everyone was so sexist, they agreed?
And now all the girls won’t even look you in the eye? And the boys think you are batshit?

Because statistically that’s far more likely than this kid having a trans identity at 14.

FrogsFrogs · 08/03/2020 19:59

'because you all assume men are predatory'

This claim is made whenever women try to talk about the violence perpetrated by men as a class.

We are supposed to ignore the stats and our own experiences and pretend men and women are just as likely to be sexual predators.

Even though, of course, they aren't...

If they are, and men and women have the same risk of being predatory/ creepy etc to women and girls, then why are girls and women warned against getting lifts/ going home with men they don't know etc? It's a real conundrum isn't it. In the one hand, men are lovely and women are mean when we say that they are a higher risk to us than women. OTOH, go back to a room with a male friend/s and there's an attack, it's all, what were you thinking, what did you expect etc etc

Seems we now have to ignore the risk that a significant minority of men present AND accept responsibility if they do something. At least before we didn't have to do the first bit.

FrogsFrogs · 08/03/2020 20:01

Most men identify as nice, safe men.

Do we need to respect their identities too?

What if a girl identifies as a girl who doesn't want to take her clothes off in front of a boy or boys?

WorriedAcademic · 08/03/2020 20:05

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Justhadathought · 08/03/2020 20:08

When rational and reasonable argument fails......simply 'no-platform' or 'report' seems the easy solution for those ill equipped for debate. In the long run, though, all you are doing is creating the mother of all backlashes.There is nothing inherently unreasonable about campaigning for third spaces - rather than seeking to colonise the spaces of another group. Get to it!

Lordamighty · 08/03/2020 20:16

Why would anyone refer to an 8 year old boy as she?

FloralBinting · 08/03/2020 20:18

Gay men and lesbians have indeed faced much prejudice and discrimination. It's not accurate to suggest that there have never been any women who were askance at the idea of a lesbian in a female space. I remember unpleasant experiences and being called a lemon, and all the self hatred that kind of thing creates.

However, the reality is that these attitudes are not borne out by evidence, and so gradually, the attitudes have rightly diminished, though there is still work to be done. Key in that is looking at the statistics about the risks women and girls face, and why. It is overwhelmingly men as a class that are a risk factor, due to a number of factors, including physical aspects like relative size, strength and possession of an inbuilt potential rape device and social aspects like a culturally ingrained massive sense of entitlement over women.

Lesbians have none of these risk elements, as they are themselves, women.

And no, there will be hardly anyone here who 'respects that transwomen are women', because they're not. You're welcome to your private beliefs about gender, but you don't get to enforce them on others, and you certainly don't get to tell girls they are not entitled to boundaries around males, however those males identify, because that is grimly rapey and anti-Safeguarding. Cheers.

arraye · 08/03/2020 20:23

"You're welcome to your private beliefs about gender, but you don't get to enforce them on others"

Super, super ironic.

Also to the person that asked, I'm not going to go into detail about my sex life fucking hell why would you ask someone that? Totally weird.

FrogsFrogs · 08/03/2020 20:29

Are you going to answer why you think that because women are ok with women who happen to be lesbians in their changing rooms, they have to let men in?

Why do you think the single sex rules for toilets and changing, in schools, by law, should be changed?

Would you be ok with a 15yo child going in the opposite sex changing room, on their say so? Don't you think the boys and girls would be uncomfortable with that?

DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG · 08/03/2020 20:29

Super, super ironic.

Please, show us definitive proof that gender is an actual thing.

We’re waiting. Breath baited.

FloralBinting · 08/03/2020 20:30

arraye, why is it ironic that you cannot enforce your unprovable belief that some men are women on me?

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