What constitutes modern day feminism

[katienlisa552]

What does it mean to be a feminist in the 21st century? When I and indeed the members of my family who I would consider to be feminist were growing up it was about fighting for equal rights for women such as equal pay and better representation of women in high powered jobs and given that the Labour Party has yet again elected a male leader says to me that there is still along way to go. However I and my family members find ourselves becoming more and more uncomfortable with what some might call the more extreme side of feminism.

I fear that certain views of feminism are allowing a rather unhealthy and quite hateful form especially in relation to trans rights. As a member of the lgbt community and although I’m not trans myself I do have friends who are and I also volunteer for a local charity who support and offer counselling to trans teenagers. I see first hand the damage done by the attitudes promoted and supported by some sections of the feminist community dressed up under the guise of ‘free speech’. The trans right issue is a complex one. I don’t think children should be allowed to transition or be given hormone blockers to prevent puberty because I’m not convinced a child has the maturity to make those kind of life changing decisions although that doesn’t mean I don’t believe that children can’t be trans because I see it everyday through my work with the charity and it’s a fact of great shame that at least 70% of young trans have self harmed or tried to commit suicide because of the prejudice they face.

The biggest contentious issue appears to be that of self indentification. I fail to see how it erodes my rights as a women if a trans person chooses to self identify and personally I find the notion that people chose to self identify because they want to harm others somewhat far fetched. Yes I accept that there are some sick indivuals that do this but the fact is the majority of sex offenders offend as men not men who are self identifying as female or the other wan around. I remember mixed sex changing rooms when I was growing up and I don’t remember a vast increase in sexual assay because of it.

Now despite being accused of it on here several times by people who hide behind the guise of feminism to attack anyone who dares to defend trans rights as someone who condones sexual assault I do not in fact as a surviour of sexual assault I find that extremely offensive. Anyone trans or otherwise who commits any kind of sexual assault deserves to be castrated and strung up. Maybe one way around the shared changing room or toilet issue would be to have single cubicles or toilets as we do at our charity so it doesn’t matter who uses them because there’s only u on there. As a parent and someone who works with children who have been absued I can totally understand the argument for parents wanting to know who the child is sharing a changing room with. Personally I wouldn’t allow my son or my nieces who I regularly look after our without a grown up until they were of teenager age and then allow in groups of friends.

I’ve no doubt that this post will either be ignored or removed as mums net seems to remove anything that resembles some who supports the rights of trans people but just as the people who use feminism to try and erode or stand Agasint trans rights I to have the right to express my opinion.

The debate of feminism and trans issues needs to be less toxic and more about open discussion and tolerance of others opinions will allowing healthy debate because trans people are people and have the same right to be heard and to be given the same freedoms as any other member of society. Do I think that all feminists are transphobic absolutely not and neither do I believe that all of the trans community min are good people. There’s good and bad in everyone and every group of society but since when is that a justification for the discrimination of a whole part of society

[katienlisa552]

Not really many people have worked in charities for years indeed I have worked in kids charities for many years

[katienlisa552]

I’m what used to be called a nursery nurse some call us teachers I think the exact phrase is early years practitioner

[YippeeKayakOtherBuckets]

You’re not a teacher, you’re a nursery worker. Which is an admirable job but it is like me calling myself a nurse because I put a plaster on someone’s skinned knee.

How old are these young self harming trans kids you’re working with?

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

How come the original post was literate and the OP's updates aren't?

[katienlisa552]

The children I work with at the charity are teenagers

[MarieQueenofScots]

I’m still waiting for a link to your stats. Or your definition of a woman.

Surely as a nursery nurse you’re good at answering questions?

[ScapaFlo]

You need a good memory to be a convincing liar storyteller. Just sayin'

[BovaryX]

although that doesn’t mean I don’t believe that children can’t be trans because I see it everyday through my work with the charity

You see trans children every day? How old are they? Do you encourage them in a belief they can change into the opposite sex?

[katienlisa552]

They are all teenagers who don’t cater you younger children because of the nature of the work you we do

And again your wrong teachers do work in preschool education in fact there is a push for more teachers to go into nurseries

[MoleSmokes]

"How come the original post was literate and the OP's updates aren't?"

Gerund-fluid ?

[ByGrabtharsHammerWhatASavings]

You do know that something isn't a human right just because you say it is, right OP? Human rights are an actual thing, not just "any demands made by my favourite minority group". Look, here you go:

www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/

These are our human rights. Which of these specifically do trans people not have? Which of these specifically do you think are being eroded by women saying that mammals are sexually dimorphic and cannot change sex?

[BovaryX]

Gerund-fluid

[katienlisa552]

my trans friends are just as a much a women as I am

[Seventyone72seventy3]

my trans friends are just as a much a women as I am

How? You never explain this, do you? What does being a woman mean?

[BovaryX]

they are all teenagers who don’t cater you younger children because of the nature of the work you we do

Great that you are in a profession that matches your skill set. How old are the teenagers you see who are self harming and trans?

[HorseRadishFemish]

I've missed out quite a huge chunk of this..

Has the OP answered the question?

I'm betting not.

As an aside, the punctuation thing doesn't bother me that much but I am guilty of getting far too worked up over the use of the plural for woman being used instead of the singular aaargh just my little bête noir and our new friend is surely not the first and won't be the last to do that and look now I'm doing it too do you see what I did there this is fun #wearemenandwedontlikeyou #ohalrightthen

[R0wantrees]

I’m what used to be called a nursery nurse some call us teachers I think the exact phrase is early years practitioner


You'll be familiar then with the points made by Dr Katie Alcock (Lancaster Developmental Psychology lecturer)?

(extract)
"This is a rough summary of a talk I gave on April 27th in Lancaster as part of an event I and other members of For Women Lancashire organised entitled Gender Identity: Safeguarding Children and Young People. The talk itself was recorded and this isn’t a transcript, it’s more me writing up my notes and adding some thoughts. (continues)

What have psychologists found out about children’s developing knowledge of sex and gender?
Well, this research has been going on for a loooong time. All the studies I’m going to talk about are really robust — well replicated — this means that lots of researchers have found the same thing time and time again. We have known about some related aspects of children’s thinking since the 1920s or earlier and some of the main, older studies in this area are from the 1960s. This is not a flash in the pan.
What this also means is that terminology has changed. When this area of research first started, everyone knew, and was clear, that they were talking about children’s knowledge of biological sex. The terms “sex identity” and “sex constancy” were used, to mean children’s knowledge of whether they were a boy or a girl, and whether they or others could change into the opposite sex. Around the 1990s everyone started getting squeamish about the word “sex” and started using “gender” as a euphemism. Researchers, however, still meant a child’s knowledge of biological sex.

“Categorical sex is an essential, immutable attribute of people that is maintained (by self and others) independent of changes in physical appearance (e.g., in hairstyle, clothes, or make-up) and of changes in behaviour (e.g., cross-sex play behaviour or homosexuality).” (from Trautner et al., 2003, in the International Journal of Behavioral Development)
Nevertheless, it takes children some time to work out both whether they themselves are a girl or a boy, and that both they and others cannot change sex. Working out which they are themselves happens earlier, and is based in all the studies that have been done on physical appearance and stereotypes. Have a look at what James, aged 3, has to say on the matter:
www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLd6suGdLIPWWnUIXHJYllSnnpWB7oeONx&time_continue=62&v=_BFDgO_y9cc&feature=emb_logo

James is firm that having short hair makes him a boy, and that it also makes other people (and dolls) into boys. My own child aged four was convinced a teenager we knew must be a boy because she had short hair.

Now these days we are all anti-stereotyping and we are convinced we have not raised our children to know what sex stereotypes are. If the only influences on children were things people said directly to them, and especially things we as parents said directly to them, this might work out. But children don’t grow up in a vacuum — they see the other children at nursery, they see toys that other children play with, obviously they hear what other adults than their parents say but most of what children take in is not from people talking to them, but from what they see.
Making generalisations is a very useful skill for a baby or child — if they couldn’t make generalisations, they would never be able to work out that a new cat they saw was in fact a cat, or a new apple was just as good to eat as the last one, or a new car is likely also to go places. Children can work out at a very young age that there are men and women, boys and girls, in the world — it’s probably quite useful for them to work this out in the general scheme of things².
So when they see all the girls at nursery wearing pink and having long hair, well, that’s what girls do! And they also realise, from what people are saying, and from how their parents dress them, what toys they are given, and what toys other children who look like them (same clothes, same hair) what they are supposed to like and do based on what sex they are." (continues)

medium.com/@katieja/young-children-reality-sex-and-gender-3421f4f165f1

[Vaginandtonic]

my trans friends are just as a much a women as I am

How?

What is a woman?

Won't hold my breath for this answer tbh...

[katienlisa552]

All the trans women I know don’t have male genitalia

[R0wantrees]

my trans friends are just as a much a women as I am

Are your trans friends male or female (identify as transwomen, transmen and/or non-binary)?

[scotsheather]

By heck OP you're a lot more confident in your TWAW from your OP in such a short time.

[DixieFlatline]

If a man gets penis cancer and has to have the whole thing amputated, is he now as much a woman as you are?

[BovaryX]

all the trans women I know don’t have male genitalia

Doesn't that make them statistically very unusual?

[R0wantrees]

All the trans women I know don’t have male genitalia

Do you mean that all the trans women you know have had their (male) genitalia modified by plastic surgery?

(Its still male)

[scotsheather]

All the trans women I know don’t have male genitalia

So what? Men without male genitalia, men with it who still say they are "women". They are the same thing. Men.