TWAW

[Billi77]

Thought it might be an idea to start a thread for women who support TWAW. I understand ‘Feminism chat’ should also include us and give us our own space?

And that is that they don't have two X chromosomes and therefore cannot be biological women. And there ain't anything anybody can do or say to change that.

I don't know many people, trans women or otherwise, that disagree with that. It might be painful for them to hear it constantly yelled at them because of dysphoria but I've never seen anybody personally say that outside of articles designed to create outrage.

Hello. On personal experience it is mostly via having women throughout my life who have transitioned. It is impossible for me to see these people as men
Broadly speaking many trans people are also marginalised and compromised. I feel that welcoming them into feminist and LGB circles is a better way of healthier way of teaching them about the lived female experience than ostracising them
I do understand why many women do not hold the view that TWAW. I’m also aware that there is a lot hostility coming from both sides of the argument
But, but if you believe that transwomen are women why do you need to teach them about the lived female experience?
Unless you don't actually believe that transwomen are women.
Either you believe the dogma or you don't.

@PastMyBestBeforeDate

You aren't the first person to want a lib fem TWAW thread. I think someone ran one on here for a while. I don't know what happened to it. I wasn't a visitor to it.

It was here, but there was also a similar request in 2018 www.mumsnet.com/Talk/site_stuff/3807009-Liberal-Feminism-subtopic

I have trans and cross dressing friends. If I'm such a transphobe why do they keep coming out to me?

Maybe it's because they are the sort of people who actually want guidance with their identity issues.

Rather than the kind of "trans" person my ex is. If you want to call me anti trans for not wanting him in my bathroom go ahead. He outright TOLD me one of the best things about the GRA would be if I left him I'd have no where he couldnt access too. He also has the deluded idea that he will go for the same men as me if I date again and "steal them" because some of these people are THAT abusive.

Personally I'm STILL happy to share spaces with trans women. What I'm NOT happy for is to share spaces with people like my ex.

Also trans women have lived a different experience. In some areas it is simply not appropriate for anyone, least of all them, to lump them in with women.

The easy way for me (I am NOT speaking for any other women.) Is through psychotherapy and treatment for their identity issues. This allows you to achieve a healthy way of expressing your "gender identity". If that means living your life as if you were that gender, so be it. But you do the whole thing you do the therapy you learn self awareness you learn how healthy mature women behave and you seek out healthy female role models. You have wheels in motion for surgery.

Under these provisions I'm happy to share spaces with transwomen.

Now show me one who wont shout about "gate keeping" or "red tape". No it's not. It's going about building your new life in a healthy, proper manner. Like an adult.

To me that just shows you dont want a proper adult life you see women as some way to get an easy life with lesser responsibility.

I feel that welcoming them into feminist and LGB circles is a better way of healthier way of teaching them about the lived female experience than ostracising them.

Which part of my 'lived female experience' do TW want to learn about?
The bit where I was wolf whistled at by men in a van whilst walking with my mum. When we passed them again at traffic lights they shouted 'phwoar. Mother and daughter. I'd destroy that"
Or the bit where I was sexually abused, and repeatedly raped from the age of 12ish.
Or the bit where I had 2 abortions after my rapist got me pregnant.
Or the bit where I have to take medication to stop me turning into a suicidal monster when my period is due.
Or the bit where I bleed so heavily I have to wear 2 of the thickest pads I can buy at a time and still change them hourly at most...

I could go on.

(sorry that was re a sub board, not a thread)

But, but if you believe that transwomen are women why do you need to teach them about the lived female experience?

Because they've been presenting as male for a certain part of their lives and had male privilege for those parts of their lives. There's certain social parts of being a woman (and presenting that way, for trans women who are starting to transition physically) that they haven't experienced before and might not expect, namely the constant sexual harassment.

I was bemused to see a number of transwomen bemoaning on Twitter that they hadn’t had Mother’s Day cards from their children, as their belief is that identifying as woman makes you a mother instead of a father. @Billi77 I find this cognitive dissonance hard to accept - that somebody born male is a mother, do you think transwomen become mothers rather than fathers after transition?

@Billi77

I feel like I’m really swimming against a current here. People are already make huge assumptions about me and my background already, so it feels a little pointless. It also feels like i’ve incited an echo chamber of self-declared enemies voices , engaged in a contest to see who hates ‘us lot’ the most. I get it, our views our different. But we are all feminists.

Are you surprised?

The turkeys might be dumb enough to vote for Christmas but we women know we deserve better .

@Billi77
I know very little about all this but I find there seems to be a lot of aggression towards woman.
And what is with this terf and cis bollocks.
There must be so many trans people who are so upset by the actions of these aggressive and threatening activists

I don’t believe that feminism should give space to people who are biologically male. That’s not what feminism is about. Why should women have to shuffle over and give space to men?

Billi77 to make sure we're talking about the same concepts, I'd love to know the following:

When you say TWAW and refer to transitioning, what does that mean?

Pre- or post-op transsexuals who suffer from sex dysphoria and wish to, are or already have medically transitioned all the way to genital surgery?

Crossdressers who may or may not suffer from gender dysphoria and who permanently present as the opposite sex, but make no changes to their bodies?

Or individuals who have neither condition, and make no changes whatsoever but identify as trans via a verbal statement of identity alone?

Do you know why single-sex legal set asides* are required to remedy the disadvantage, discrimination and oppression females experience in our world?

Do you understand why including some males in these legal set asides for females leads to the exclusion of various groups of females and therefore renewed disadvantage, discrimination and oppression of at least these groups females?

Can you talk about how working against the interests of at least some groups of females for the sole benefit of one group of males is a feminist endeavour?

I'm not asking you to defend it, to have a detailed cost-benefit analysis or solutions to the issue, I am merely interested in how prioritising the interests of one group of males (however vulnerable) over the interests of various groups of females is rooted in femininism and not, say, in egalitarianism for instance.

Do you accept that other women can chose to campaign to uphold the rights of female people without being motivated by any animosity towards males who identify as trans?

*Such single-sex legal set asides are women's and girls' sports, domestic violence refugees, rape crisis services, prisons, hospital wards, scholarships and awards, all-women shortlists etc. and the right to organise, assemble and campaign as a sex for our own interests.

Rather than the kind of "trans" person my ex is. If you want to call me anti trans for not wanting him in my bathroom go ahead. He outright TOLD me one of the best things about the GRA would be if I left him I'd have no where he couldnt access too. He also has the deluded idea that he will go for the same men as me if I date again and "steal them" because some of these people are THAT abusive.

I'm incredibly sorry your ex-husband was abusive to you and I hope you've gotten away from him in as much as you can, but it's unfair of you to paint all transgender people with the same brush based on your experience with him.

There are bad people everywhere. There are lesbians that have abused women, there are abusive gay men, there are abusive trans men and women. I've been abused, so I'm speaking from a place of understanding.

but it's unfair of you to paint all transgender people with the same brush based on your experience with him.

I think the point was SHE was being tarred with the 'anti-trans' brush based on her not wanting to concede anything to him. The rest of her post literally spells out how she doesn't treat all trans people like that.

@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander

I feel that welcoming them into feminist and LGB circles is a better way of healthier way of teaching them about the lived female experience than ostracising them.

Which part of my 'lived female experience' do TW want to learn about?
The bit where I was wolf whistled at by men in a van whilst walking with my mum. When we passed them again at traffic lights they shouted 'phwoar. Mother and daughter. I'd destroy that"
Or the bit where I was sexually abused, and repeatedly raped from the age of 12ish.
Or the bit where I had 2 abortions after my rapist got me pregnant.
Or the bit where I have to take medication to stop me turning into a suicidal monster when my period is due.
Or the bit where I bleed so heavily I have to wear 2 of the thickest pads I can buy at a time and still change them hourly at most...

I could go on.

Yes.

@LokiOdinson

I havent painted all trans people as anything. If you read the rest of my comment I've actually said I'm happy to share spaces with those who arent like that.

Which is easily achieved through psychiatrist involvement and psychotherapy.

If I'm painting all these trans people like this why have have I been the first person most of my trans friends come out to?

I don’t feel the same about everyone who claims to be trans, no.
I see the Karen White story as another horrific story about a male rapist rather than a story about a trans woman
I don’t know enough about Yaniv to hold any strong opinions.
I try not to engage in stories about mentally ill individuals who have entered to debate to enable a wider angle on things.

But what is a transwoman then? Because up till now the TRA's want us to believe tgat anyond claiming to be a transwoman is a woman. We need a clear definition.

Personally, for me that would mean someone who has transitioned both legally after years of tgerapy plus having had bottom surgery. Even then I see them as transwomen, not women. I feel that part of being a woman is growing up as one your whole life. What is your definition?,

Cheers Bishop

I was called a transphobe when he kicked me into a wall and I came out with "what the fuck look at the size of me how could you lash out like that".

Yeah. I was transphobic for that too.

Water off a ducks back these days.

Every time I go to my trans friends with stories where people accuse me of this crap they get a good old laugh too.

Ok...
But how do I teach them about all of that. I could tell them. I could cry and break down because of the trauma.
But they wouldn't actually understand how it feels. Men and TW will never actually understand how it feels to be a woman.

I know right! I was obviously treating this thread insufficiently seriously. I am suitably chastened

Still not angry in the slightest, finding it a bit WTF that people are still trying to make me out to be

Not quite gone to bed yet:-

TheFormerPorpentinaScamander
Which part of my 'lived female experience' do TW want to learn about?
The bit where I was wolf whistled at by men in a van whilst walking with my mum. When we passed them again at traffic lights they shouted 'phwoar. Mother and daughter. I'd destroy that"
Or the bit where I was sexually abused, and repeatedly raped from the age of 12ish.
Or the bit where I had 2 abortions after my rapist got me pregnant.
Or the bit where I have to take medication to stop me turning into a suicidal monster when my period is due.
Or the bit where I bleed so heavily I have to wear 2 of the thickest pads I can buy at a time and still change them hourly at most...

I think men should learn about all of the above. Not restricted to any certain sub-category of males who'd like to identify as femaies.

I don’t feel the same about everyone who claims to be trans, no.
I see the Karen White story as another horrific story about a male rapist rather than a story about a trans woman

Well that’s very transphobic. Acceptance, no exceptions. That’s the mantra I believe. So if you think TWAW you have to accept all of them, inc the rapist with a penis who put on a dress for the first time yesterday and is hoping to serve their sentence in a female prison.