A gay man’s journey from TRA to GC

[noblegiraffe]

A gay friend of mine has written about how he went from TRA to GC from a gay perspective. He’s planning on writing some more essays about how the ‘gender cult’ is intrinsically homophobic.

I thought it might be useful to share as a counter to Owen Jones, who he previously believed was a reasonable person to listen to on this. He is also pretty gutted about what has happened to Stonewall, whose authority he trusted.

twitter.com/duncrail78/status/1291373475886768128?s=21

I keep getting an error with the Medium link. Is it working for anyone else? I'll try again in a bit.

It worked for me. Really refreshing to see someone who believed TWAW and was prepared to debate logically and then change his opinion when he realised he'd lost the argument. You're not 'Marie', are you, OP...?

It worked for me. Great article. It shows that Gender ideology doesn't stand up to scrutiny. I wonder if he has looked into why the ideology is being pushed by the likes of Stonewall. I think his anger will increase if he does.

I’ve been following him on Twitter for a while now, as he is quite vocal in his opposition to much of the TRA ideology.

He was already my friend 😁

@OvaHere

I keep getting an error with the Medium link. Is it working for anyone else? I'll try again in a bit.

It's not working for me either. I'd be interested to read it.

I came across Duncan earlier whilst having a snoop on Baroness Nicholson's twitter. Seemed he was taking a bit of heat for saying gay men aren't entitled to biological children? I didn't have to time to look into it, but I think he was saying he's uncomfortable with surrogacy because it's renting a woman's body.

I'd love to get the link working and hear his story.

I got them working. Perhaps a temporary blip.

medium.com/@duncanrailton78/how-i-became-a-trans-rights-activist-then-turned-gender-critical-part-1-cc09c4027b12

medium.com/@duncanrailton78/how-i-became-a-trans-rights-activist-then-turned-gender-critical-part-2-47b61965175

I realised that it was a confused mess of terms which as a Data Architect by profession realised needed a lot of work, but that is a story for another day. I realised though, that the definition of the protected characteristic of Gender Reassignment is very poor.

This comment is very interesting.

We are in this position because of poorly drafted law, and incoherent thinking and assessment on the part of our elected legislators.

Government is simply not doing its job properly. The question is whether it is able to do its job these days, and if not, why not.

And just to add .... I am not sure it is a story for another day. I suspect it is the story.

I really enjoyed reading your friend’s articles. He’s a good writer.

That is a fantastic article, and really sums it up from the philosophical and logical perspective. The personal journey is also very important - his sense of betrayal and loss must run very deep.

It's a very interesting, honest account.

I remember someone on these boards a while back posting they'd had facebook posts reported her employer ( or was it threatened to be reported?) by the LGBT monitor at work.

I do wonder if Duncan's since apologised to the GC woman he got into trouble at work.

An excellent read. More and more men are finally speaking out about this - particularly gay men - it's a relief to see the numbers growing day by day.

This is an interesting read. What it shows is that a lot of people don’t know what the eff they’re talking about when they spout TWAW. To actually understand for and against arguments, you have to have the ability to listen and question. Something, which has been profoundly discouraged by stonewall for some time now.

The damage that Stonewall and the TRAs are doing to trans people is genuinely heartbreaking.

He has apologised indirectly via a mutual friend, but hasn't (or hadn't when I last checked) withdrawn his report to HR.

If he's not attempted to undo the damage he's done, which might be embarrassing for him, then his big public mea culpa is worth jack shit.

@WildishBambino

He has apologised indirectly via a mutual friend, but hasn't (or hadn't when I last checked) withdrawn his report to HR.

If he's not attempted to undo the damage he's done, which might be embarrassing for him, then his big public mea culpa is worth jack shit.

To be fair I'm on holiday at the moment and haven't checked work emails for a couple of weeks. But I'm now tempted to charge up my work phone to check!

Do you think he's genuine @FuriousAndFrustrated?

Maybe I'm overly suspicious but it's quite the Damascene conversion. He makes some good points but I'm going to hesitate a bit on the accolades.

I hope you get a proper apology.

Fascinating piece.
Similar to my own journey. I used to be a big supporter of trans rights, but the increasingly nonsensical rhetoric, the ‘it’s backed up by science!!’ stance that always seemed to be followed by a repost of THAT Scientific American article which cobbled together various small, disparate studies from mainly the mid ‘90s (it became increasingly obvious that the ‘science’ behind transgernderism is scant, often based on incredibly small study groups, and too often suffered from an obvious bias. Add to that that the current trans rights movement has an obvious dislike, bordering on fear, of any serious, neutral, research), and the fact that one look at enthusiastic TRAs on social media showed a shocking amount of glaring misogyny, homophobia and threats of violence, made me realise that actually these are some of the LAST people I would want to share my protected spaces with.
I actually feel sorry for people who genuinely suffer from dysphoria. Their desire for the right to a quiet, happy life has been hijacked by gobby incels with winged eyeliner and pink and blue baseball bats who think their dicks are great. A lot of this is because the net has been cast so wide that it’s become impossible to separate them out, and therefore call them out for the toxicity they’ve brought to the movement and the long-term damage they’re actually doing to the cause of people who suffer from actual dysphoria. There must be many ‘oldskool’ transsexuals out there who are deeply saddened by what’s happened to the trans rights movement, as it’s basically been hijacked by obnoxious weirdos and people on the make.
It’s pitiful to watch, and I think there’ll be a lot of casualties. A backlash is building up, and many more underserving people will get badly hurt.

As to non-binary people, I was at art college for five years so I know preening pretentious self-absorption when I see it. They can do one, to be quite frank.

I hear echos of what many of us on these boards have described as we moved along the continuum from a liberal "of course we should embrace trans rights" to "no, actually only adult females can be women".

It's powerful when the layers are removed one by one and only the truth remains.

@OvaHere

Do you think he's genuine *@FuriousAndFrustrated*?

Maybe I'm overly suspicious but it's quite the Damascene conversion. He makes some good points but I'm going to hesitate a bit on the accolades.

I hope you get a proper apology.

Odd, those were exactly my thoughts on reading that. Something didn’t quite ring true. It’s only the fact that he’s a friend of noblegiraffe that is quashing my suspicions.

Well, that journey is mine. I'm not a gay man, clearly, but I have supported trans rights for 15 odd years. Saw it as akin to supporting gay rights. I knew a transman at college and so to me, it was all about ensuring, as Stonewall put it, 'acceptance without exception'.

My conversion was equally rapid. Lots of ignored cognitively dissonent moments, then researching to prove all of you wrong, which included Pink News (and if that doesn't get any sane women scaling mountains in short order, nothing will).

The thing is, as he says, what used to be about ensuring freedom from and freedom to for a small group of badly marginalised people has managed to slide into full blown Men's Rights Activism.

I still support legitimate trans rights. I just don't accept that women have none, and nor do I accept that what the penis-possessor wants, the penis-possessor must have. Which, when you cut through the bullshit, is pretty much what modern TRAs demand.

I also hope that the friend has made it clear to HR that he withdraws his complaint, and accepts the PP's right, as a woman, to hold views on issues affecting women's rights.

‘Their desire for the right to a quiet, happy life has been hijacked by gobby incels with winged eyeliner and pink and blue baseball bats who think their dicks are great.’

I think this one sentence is the best summation of the problem with trans-activism I’ve seen to date. 👍

Oh I follow him on Twitter too! He's great.