I think trans women are women.....

[rabbitwoman]

i think transwomen are women.

i think that women that are not transwomen need a special set of laws and rights to protect them because they are and have been subject to many centuries of oppression. They need laws and protections around childbirth and breastfeeding. they need support around menstruation.

women that are not transwomen will be susceptible to cancer of the overaries and womb, endemetriosis, and also respond very differently to some diseases and medicines

It would be very useful to put all these women who are not transwomen into one demographic category so that these issues can be directly identified and tackled.
this need not conflate with transgender rights.

Aslo, women that are transwomen will have been subject to a unique form of sexual abuse, harassment and prejudice. they will require specialist medical treatment to negotiate things like prostrate and testicular cancer within their own identity. they will respond very differently to some diseases and medicines.

It would be very useful to put all these women who are transwomen into one demographic category so that these issues can be directly identified and tackled.
this need not conflate with women's rights

i propose that for these purposes we could use the words 'transwomen' and 'women'

as well as 'transmen' and 'men'

is this wrong?

I'm with you op, I have always rejected the label 'ciswoman'. I am a woman. What others call themselves is up to them, but there is no need to label me again. I am a woman.

I've always been keen to afford trans people with the same rights that men or women are afforded to in law, but still recognising we are different and it is not always appropriate to be treated the same.

I feel women's rights are being trodden on in the clamour to be a trans women's rights champion. It now doesn't feel possible to be quiet and let people live their life anymore, now they want to change my life.

I'm not smart or informed enough for debate but I should be able to say I'm scared to say I am a woman. I've never been a person to give offence, so careful to be inclusive but I think that's made me easier to bully down the order of importance.

coffeeteachocolate welcome to the discussion.

There's two reasons why women can't mean the stereotype gender role and female mean sex.

1. It's highly offensive to women. Stereotypes are just that, not material reality.

1. You think the men will let us keep female? Transwomen already post about what it's like to be female, a female role model even. Some even say that "trans" is a temporary state and once you have transitioned for long enough you are simply a woman. I have seen men claiming they are in fact cis.

Welcome to the true horror of trying to be reasonable in the trans debate.

Apart from the fact that TW want to share the definition of "woman", when you have something like menstruation, which has absolutely nothing to do with a TW, they lobby to have the word woman/female removed from that discussion. Whatever word you concede, it will never be enough. If it's not happening to a TW, then it can't be happening to you either. Menstruating people = yes, menstruating women = no.

2. You think the men will let us keep female? Transwomen already post about what it's like to be female, a female role model even. Some even say that "trans" is a temporary state and once you have transitioned for long enough you are simply a woman. I have seen men claiming they are in fact cis.

Indeed. Look at Morgane Oger's Twitter bio - says "female".

Too late, the word female is already being appropriated

www.spreadshirt.co.uk/shop/design/trans+woman+adult+human+female+mens+premium+t-shirt-D5ba7796e222509170703b3a6?sellable=wQDwwo82ZouYQDkxBjE4-812-7

Despite having appropriated the concept of intersectionality so that it's now understood to be synonymous with TWAW 'feminism', TRAs cannot countenance that having female reproductive biology is a distinct axis of oppression.

Taken at face value, a TWAW, intersectional perspective should acknowledge that female humans who consider themselves women are doubly oppressed as compared to TW, due to fitting whatever nebulous, circular definition there is that day of 'woman', in addition to suffering under the particular forms of oppression, violence, marginalisation and exploitation that people born female are subjected to.

Instead, of course, they assert that being 'cis' puts women in a position of privilege and power over the supposedly far more vulnerable (stronger, larger, invulnerable to pregnancy, born and socialised into male privilege) 'women' who have male reproductive biology. Somehow, even for people who believe they are two different things, the intersection of 'womanhood' and 'femaleness' doesn't count; in fact those two characteristics in one person form a double negative of oppression, cancelling each other out so that, actually, 'female women' are the privileged ones.

Which tells you all you need to know about how woman-hating this ideology is.

FOJN

I saw a female Scottish MEP say that transwomen were adult human females on one of those bonkers twitter feeds.

Raveon That's a really, really good point re the twisted use of intersectionality.

Look, you can take a dog and transform it completely so it will look like a cat. It is still a dog.

@andyoldlabour

FOJN

I saw a female Scottish MEP say that transwomen were adult human females on one of those bonkers twitter feeds.

I think it was the same SNP MEP who helpfully posted a Venn diagram, on proper graph paper and everything... which was just hilariously wrong. (Why doesn't MN have the weeping with laughter emoji I need here?)

No.

Yes, I've been thinking this about intersectionality too, Raveon.

Women will be discriminated against on the basis of sex (maternity leave, abortion, a world of artefacts designed for men), and also on the basis of gender in the sense of cultural roles deemed appropriate for one sex or the other (the consistent devaluing of caring roles and jobs like nursing, or of feminine gendered activities like sewing).

Transwomen will be discriminated against on the basis of being trans (there genuinely are unpleasant slurs thrown at them and physical attacks).

Occasionally the discrimination may come from the same place - a sexist bastard may catcall a woman and a passing transwoman for the same reasons (a toxic combination of sexual entitlement and display of male power). Passing transwomen may find men in meetings talk over them (while non-passing transwomen may find men in meetings exhibit genuine transphobia towards them).

What isn't helpful is to try to reinterpret intersectionality as some form of top trumps, or to frame it as "transwomen are women therefore any axis of oppression which applies to women must apply to transwomen too, and if it doesn't we'll air-brush it out of existence." The most rage inducing instance of air-brushing I've come across recently was re-interpreting FGM to stand for "forced genital mutilation" rather than "female genital mutilation."

To me the only way that trans women are women is if you render the word woman or women completely meaningless.

A woman is an adult human female. Trans women are trans women they are male and they present themselves as women.

I don't know whether it's just me but I feel that is really important that words continue to have meaning.

Women that are not trans women? That would be women then. I couldn’t get beyond this I’m afraid.

I really can't see what's the problem with woman and trans woman man and trans man. Why do they want to deny such a major part of themselves which is the trans journey that they have been on?

i propose that for these purposes we could use the words 'transwomen' and 'women'

as well as 'transmen' and 'men'

is this wrong?

Ultimately your post is wrong and transphobic because we are not allowed to identify nor name difference as that others transwomen by excluding them from services.

This is part of the problem.

Women can never satisfy demands of activists until they are subservant to transwomen and they submit to everything them want on their terms.

The fact that women are not allowed to describe themselves on their own terms and must use the language dictated to them is part of the point.

OP do you also think

• lions become lionesses ?
• stallions become mares ?
• cockerels become hens ?
• buck become a doe?

For the record I don't believe the male animals listed above can become the female animals listed above and I don't believe it for humans either.

What even is trans?

If you’re of, say, the feminine gender (according to the gender ideology you are what you are and it’s your sex that’s ‘assigned’ at birth) what are you transiting from and to exactly?

It’s all just such utter BS.

I was ... was told that segregating toilets into men and women was like apartheid and not necessary for safety.

Well in that case I propose we segregate them into biologically female-born only and unisex. That way those of us who feel we need the protect have it, and those who claim not to think it matters can share with the men. I bet I know which way most women would gravitate.

OP why did you say nothing about Trans men until the very end? Is it because they are less important for some reason?

Transwomen are men. End of story.
Transmen are women. End of story.

I would support any men facing oppression to have protection but its their issue to fight thank you. As long as it doesn't effect the rights women have fought for for decades and men could learn from.

Testing and still, thank you so much for taking the time to elaborate. I am just completely baffled by this still. I just find that sex is (except for intersex) so absolutely binary and that you are one or the other - from birth until you die with actual physiological, undeniable differences. Then as an overlay to that, there are various gender constructs, most of which I find incredibly sexist (But I am probably not allowed to use that word?).

I just don’t understand a) how anyone can argue biology and b) how anyone can have any problem with people living in whatever gender construct they feel comfortable with, regardless of biology .

And some protection is based on sex (female). I am very happy to help argue for gender based rights and I think that trans women appears to be very vulnerable to assault and obviously in need of protection. But why confuse this gender based need of protection with a sex based need of protection? And why erode those sex based protection due to a need for some gender based protection?

Am I even using the right terminology here?

I think the OP is onto something here.

Transwomen get the validation they want and women get the rights and protections they need. Everyone's a winner.

Well what's with with women and transwomen?

Woman = adult human female. Like cow or bitch or sow or mare. Just a descriptor.

Although note those descriptors are all used to denigrate women. Men are insulted with words that compare them to women, or question their sexual ability or ability to get a sexual partner. Women are denigrated by comparing them to animals. Hierarchy, see.

Anyway. If women said ok you can have woman, girl, female. They can all mean anyone who says they are it.

Women and girls can be called snurbles.

Next thing, snurbles would be taken too and defined as anyone who identifies as a snurble.

The whole point is to remove the ability of women and girls, human females, to be able to describe themselves as a group.

Note that male, men, boy is not being altered in this way.

Hierarchy.

We get told we are 'cis'. Even though most people don't 'identify' with any kind of internal, subjective, unverifiable gender id. Most feminists have spent years fighting against rigid gender roles. Now we are told we are 'cis' a subset of our own sex. Often using sexist, racist reasons.

Plus some transwomen say they are cis.

The whole point is that the 50% of the world's population who have been oppressed globally for as long as we know, thousands of years, and are still subject to subtle or obvious oppression everywhere must not be allowed a term to describe themselves. Because a small number of men have decided that they want to be in this group. Often, seemingly, for reasons that are a bit peculiar to most women and bear no relation to what women and girls are actually like.