What does it actually mean to be gender critical??

[LajesticVantrashell]

(Reposting with an amended thread !!)

I’ll admit, I’m still hanging around in the margins regards feminism and everything that entails. I consider myself a feminist, and have been trying to educate myself on key areas more recently.

I took an interest in the Maya case last year, and have often ducked into the FWR threads when they appeared on the active list. Lockdown and JKR, and now the slow emergence of others who are questioning the slavish adherence to TWAW have led me to this place. I’ve signed up. You can’t identify out of your biology.

But what I can’t get my head around is what it actually means to be gender critical. Because to me, it’s simple, but any kind of Googling takes me down a rabbit hole that leaves me scratching my head. So am I right in thinking…

1. Gender critical means we are literally critical of gender, because for women, the social construct of gender is what oppresses us, keeps us a secondary sex, ensures we’re not as well paid and that we don’t have the same level of opportunities as men (amongst many other things, obviously)

1. Trans/Non-binary don’t agree with this because they rely on gender as a means of an identity if they choose not to align themselves with their biological sex. So while we’d rather see the world as the ‘binary’ of male and female sex (but with no assertion of how you should act if you’re either of those sexes) they see their themselves on a spectrum of gender identities which are fluid and interchangeable. They see ‘sex’ as a rigid box of oppression that dictates they must act a certain way, whereas we’re saying it’s actually gender that creates this oppression by asserting (through societal norms) that if you’re a woman you must wear heels and make-up and if you’re a man you must drink beer and not cry.

Now I know they are the extreme examples, but I just don’t understand why trans/non binary people are critical of the gender critical movement? Because if gender didn’t exist, there would be no societal construct to rail against, therefore negating the need for all 51 of the current list of gender identities to exist? Meaning men could wear dresses if they chose and women could shave their heads if they chose without needing to label it as something ‘different’?

Am I missing something?

(like I said, I’m still on a journey of discovery here so go easy on me!)

Can you link the thread you're reading, Eyes? Wouldn't mind a look.

The 'sex is a spectrum' types never have an answer when you ask them to describe the spectrum of gametes. Just because their own understanding has changed doesn't mean the realities of sexual reproduction have changed.

They can only claim to have female bodies while in possession of SRY gene and all that entails, by positing some other metric by which sex is determined - 'something in the brain' generally. It's bollocks, and demonstrates that they don't fully grasp the connection between the label "sex" and the mechanism of sexual reproduction.

Don't know if this has been posted before but research showing no difference in boys and girls brains.

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/11/191108074852.htm

I’ve been trying to get my head around all this for some time now and usually just end up more confused! But this thread has been really clear and helpful. Thanks all!

One of the definitions of 'critical' is ^ expressing adverse or disapproving comments or judgements^. But being gender critical does not mean simply disapproving of 'gender', or being judgemental of those who consider gender important.

Another definition of 'critical' is involving the objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgement. I think this definition is more important. Being critical in this way leads to a better understanding of what gender is and how it influences (and is influenced by) our society.

Urgh. Italics fail. I was trying to put the definitions in italics, not to emphasise my opinions.

@TyroSaysMeow here's the first one www.mumsnet.com/Talk/other_subjects/2120841-MNHQ-are-going-to-decide-what-constitutes-transphobia-on-MN-What-advice-guidelines-would-you-give-them?pg=1
and then it continues here www.mumsnet.com/Talk/other_subjects/2122564-MNHQ-transphobia-guidelines-part-2?pg=1
I think that's full too so there may well be a third waiting for me!
Thanks for the reply, I'm too tired now to understand, I'll try again tomorrow

GC has become a label and so a group to be "targetted" that's overtaking the root idea of feminism. Or rather, feminism lite / third wave feminism/ liberal feminism is forgetting the whole point of feminism.

The true roots of feminism have always been about the fact that gender sex roles are oppressive and harmful.

As is, by extension, everything associated with gender stereotyping.

In a way calling ourselves GC feminists is a tautology, it's just that so many people men have appropriated feminism for their own causes that we either do that or get lost in translation.

Radical feminism (root feminism) is the other best way to describe it, but I feel that term has also been spoiled with stereotypes and many have been made to feel suspicious of it, possibly also because radical gets used to describe so many other groups, often portrayed as bad.

They see ‘sex’ as a rigid box of oppression that dictates they must act a certain way, whereas we’re saying it’s actually gender that creates this oppression by asserting (through societal norms) that if you’re a woman you must wear heels and make-up and if you’re a man you must drink beer and not cry.

Except that for some transsexuals (m2f and f2m) their dysphoria is rooted in severe discomfort with physical sex characteristics and not so much about heels, makeup and beer etc.

surely you can't really believe that this brilliant author and philanthropist is actually a hateful bigot and for some reason has decided to splurge it all over the internet just to be spiteful to trans people?

I don’t think she’s being spiteful. But she writes and publishes fiction. Doesn’t necessarily mean she knows much about the diagnosis and treatment of transsexuals/ gender identity issues.

I would understand "transexual" to be discomfort at physical sex characteristics and therefore a form of body dysmorphia.

Transgender is not the same though, is it? Transgender, we are told, requires no dysphoria of any kind. Hence the erasure of the term "transexual" and it's replacement with the delightful "truscum".

I think a lot of people new to this hear "transgender" and think "Hayley from Corrie" and think we're being awfully mean.

Thanks Eyes, that's my afternoon sorted.

Even back then, the topsy turvy was in full force. Someone on that thread mentions a definition of transphobia that includes asserting that "trans women" aren't "real" women - if they were talking about gnc females I'd agree entirely because telling such women that they're not real women because they don't perform femininity contributes to and exacerbates dysphoria.

But they're not talking about females, they're talking about males. Who have dysphoria in part because everyone around them is telling them they're not real men.

It seems so simple to me. Females who transgress the rigid confines of gender are just as real women as females who happily buy into the stereotypes of feminine presentation. It's transphobic - showing hatred of gender-transgressions - to tell a female she's a man because she doesn't do femininity.