Diva magazine exclusively for TRAs now

[SapphosRock]

I’m pretty hacked off about it truth be told, especially since I’ve supported Diva and bought pretty much every issue since I came out as a lesbian in the late 90s.

I’m a member of Diva’s online community and someone recently posted about Nicola Adams (Olympic world champion boxer, used to identify as bisexual, recently came out as a lesbian).

Nicola has made the suggestion of having a separate category in boxing for trans women to compete with one another as she doesn’t believe it is fair for them to compete in the female category. Thread on it here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3834912-Olympic-Boxing-champ-Nicola-Adams-calls-for-transgender-athlete-categories-for-fairness#94290477

This seems completely fair enough, and there is an exception in the Equality Act for exactly this reason, to make women’s sport fair.

As Diva is (was?) mainly a place for lesbian women, quite a few in the online community spoke up in support of Nicola Adams.

A trans woman who is a prominent poster in the group wrote a long and detailed post to ‘educate’ everybody why it is completely fair for trans women to compete in female sport. Point 5 of her post states biological sex isn’t binary. Anyone who didn’t agree is a transphobe.

This was backed up by Linda Riley (Diva publisher) who compared debating the right of trans women to compete in female sport to debating ‘all lives matter’, not so subtly suggesting that questioning the fairness of trans women in sport is as bad as racism.

DIVA MAGAZINE IS OPENLY CLAIMING WOMEN ARE BIGOTED FOR QUESTIONING THE FAIRNESS OF A MALE BODIED PERSON HITTING AND PUNCHING A FEMALE BODIED PERSON IN SPORT.

I have absolutely no problem with Diva welcoming trans women into the community but centering trans activism like this is madness. I know I’ve posted here in defense of Diva before when other lesbians expressed concerns about the TRA / MRA ethos. Apologies I didn’t listen and feel free to tell me ‘I told you so’.

As a side note, the prominent TRA in Diva’s online community made Diva’s Pride Power list. Olympic world champion lesbian role model Nicola Adams did not.

www.pridepowerlist.com/the-list-2020.html

Why do some TRAs constantly say ‘trans women are women’ when they clearly hate women? Why do you want to be something you hate?

^^
This is always puzzling me.

Dianas it's probably because I'm gay so I had many people try and tell me my sexuality was a trend. I find the word 'trend' triggering, for wavy of a better word. It's patronising and dismissive of a persons very real experience.

I thought transgender trend was only about ‘trans’ children through? I didn’t think they commented at all about LGB children. I didn’t think they were denying lesbians were a thing. Have I missed something?

Sorry should have read more closely - it’s the trend bit

Kit no they don't, I just empathise with young people who have their experiences dismissed by adults.

Yes I get that & can understand how that would piss you off

I still find the enormous increase in trans identifying teenage girls extremely worrying though :/

I think the lack of social contagion around lesbians contrasts hugely with the social contagion among girls of trans identities.

One is clearly not subject to social contagion. One is.

I can see why the word "trend" would irritate you if people have suggested your sexuality may be nothing but a fad.

But there is a massive social contagion effect among young girls and particularly Lesbians, causing them to take on a trans identity. The fact that your sexuality is not a trend doesn't mean that thousands of young girls aren't very vulnerable to this ideology.

We've all had to let go of a lot of favoured words in this whole shitshow. I no longer want to be an ally, for example. Likewise some words that were previously unappealing have become useful. This is one such example. I don't think Transgender Trend is the greatest name - but they are doing really important work.

I will admit that I used to have sympathy for those who didn’t feel comfortable in their stereotypical gender, but read and listened to the wise women on FWR and recognised how that belief impacted on females, I started to recognise what women were going to lose, even those women that I’m hopefully never going to join, such as those in jail.

Sorry for being a party pooper and I know I’ll probably get a virtual bollocking for this, but I need to say it. While I’m delighted that you’re starting to recognise the danger in accepting TWAW, I can’t help being a bit disappointed that you only came to recognise that, when it directly affected you. Women have been warning about the risks to females and female spaces for years, but only when your voice was threatened with being silenced, did you see it. Hopefully you’ll also support those women you feel that you have nothing in common with and I look forward to having those discussions with you.

@RuffleCrow

Dear Misogyny, what a beautiful dress you're wearing these days. I barely recognised you.

I've just found thread & love this comment so much. I will be using this.

@SapphosRock that's a really interesting list, and thanks for sharing it. Like @DianasLasso it's the inclusion of Transgender Trend that stood out - their resources are useful and very much along the 'wait and see' line, but the use of 'trend' is definitely an uncomfortable one.

The standard line for kids and teens thinking they might be gay was for a good while, 'Oh don't worry, you're not, it's a trend, it's a phase!' (Code for: 'it's OK, you're not One Of Them!')

The standard line for kids and teens who think they're trans is now, 'Yes I affirm this, tell me your preferred pronouns'. It's a massive overreaction/overcompensation and leaves no space for 'maybe'.

I think the lack of space for 'maybe's and nuance and 'but what if...' in TRA arguments is what does it for so many well-meaning leftie women.

I've never thought TT was a particularly great name actually but it does what it says on the tin - there has been a huge upward trend in young people having some sort of trans identity especially young girls.

There absolutely needed to be some counterbalance to the total affirmation and medicalisation route pushed everywhere else. Let's not forget that 'watchful waiting and talking therapy' was the primary approach of Mermaids prior to Susie Green getting involved.

I've met Stephanie who runs TT and she is an incredibly thoughtful and measured woman who really knows her stuff.

Thanks Sappho I can see that.

(As an aside, I also think some of Transgender Trend's material could do with being run past someone neutral without a dog in the fight to tone down some of the language. There's something slightly off about some of their phrasing, that - imagining myself as, for e.g., a male headteacher who hadn't come across this stuff before - might make me think "fringe oddballs." They need to think harder about talking to the lurkers rather than preaching to the choir.)

I think you make a good point delicious

I am actually barely affected by this ideology. I own my own business so I can make sure our equality policies are legal. I'm settled in middle age and don't have to worry about keeping woke young men happy by spouting wokitudes. I have enough money to avoid places that impose penises in places where they shouldn't be - I can afford a private room in a hospital if I need one and I can afford to take my children out of their schools if they get Stonewalled. I am unlikely to end up in prison (although just got out of a week in MNHQ prison for saying pretty much what Janice Turner said in the Times this week ). I no longer need access to abortions, contraception. I'm single and well off so won't need a women's refuge. I don't play any sport so can't be bumped off a podium.

But I am boiling with rage about the impact on women and girls who are not me. The young girls having to silence themselves and tolerate boys in their school toilets. The women losing places on sports teams and shortlists. The women having to submit to males providing intimate healthcare. The women in prison and refuges and locked mental health wards having to keep themselves safe alongside men ....oh and lesbians (I'm not one) having to explain again why they don't want sex with men.

Once you've seen one piece of the truth, surely you see the whole thing?

And I think it is quite important to ask what we actually mean by transgender.

Most people think it means "suffers from gender dysphoria" - ie, a deep psychological need to reject the sexed body they have. That certainly exists. I'm sure its roots are deep and complex. But anyone with a critical faculty would note that gender dysphoria appears much much more common in adult men than in women. Until very recently when it's become an epidemic in teenage girls. We need to understand why that is and I have my views (which MNHQ discourages us from expressing).

However "suffers from gender dysphoria" is no longer what transgender means, according to the TRAs. No dysphoria is required. Some women are simply born in the bodies of men, according to this ideology. Some women are born with penises. We are not calling them women simply as a social nicety to ease their dysphoria. They are actually, literally women. With penises.

Most people do not know that this is what is now being forced upon us. You are free to believe that some women are born with penises. But I don't. And I don't want this ideology promoted in schools.

So when you say that you think people need to listen and accept the experience of trans children I'm not quite sure what that means. If it means listening to their dysphoria and empathising then yes. If it means confirming that they are actually "born in the wrong body" then no.

I think the name rather than the content turns people off.

Whatever you see it as- a genuinely internally felt image of what you are /a MH issue / an opportunity for misogynists/ a gateway for weakening safeguarding / any or all of the above... Describing it as a 'trend' has a dismissive, trivialising tone, which is also not in step with what that org are doing. For me, anyway.

Apologies to any of the women involved in very grateful to you for all the hard work you do, that's a genuine view from me.

Welcome to the Wrong Crowd

Now that needs a tshirt.

work from Transgender Trend (ie dismissing young people being trans as a trend)

I agree about this. I love some of the work TT have done, really informative and useful, but the name is not good, sorry.

• it's also the focus on 'transgender'. It's a bit like the shift in the pinned post at the top of the page, here. Much better now the focus is on women's rights or gender/sex.

Trend applies sadly. 20 years ago (back in the day!) the phrase was ‘exploring your sexuality’. I remember that being bandied about everywhere and that’s what teenagers/YA did. Some to be supportive, some to try stuff, others knew already. Everyone seems to be ‘bravely’ coming out as pansexual currently which is vague news.

Exploring a transgender identity would fit. I guess it wouldn’t be welcomed.

I had a similar change of heart, upon seeing what it meant in reality.
I was a fully signed up member of be kind and TWAW, to my shame I also remember shaking my head reading Dittanys posts.

Not to give too much away, but my role involves running services for women which includes DV, which of course we had to open up.
Let’s just say whatever you capitulate, it will never be enough, even if you centre the TRA’s, the next thing will be hunting down dissenting voices.
I did a bit of research and what firmly catapulted me over to the other side was the Authoritarian tone, the wrong think and compelled speech. And the heavy insistence on me saying something I knew and the whole world knows to be untrue.
I had a lightbulb go off and thought I’m being fucking gaslighted. Once I saw the parallel with abusive DA tactics, that was it.

Sooo...

I had various issues over the years. My big thing is life is fairness. I think things should be fair. I think I should be fair and I think you all should be, too. So obviously I think we should all be fair to transmen and transwomen. Besides, I know some and they're lovely, blahblahblah...

But what about being fair to women, too?

I think the big things were how TRAs reacted on mumsnet to women having concerns about women's safety, like women's sports and prisons. Welfare of men and women in prisons is a personal priority to me, and I object to men in women's prisons. Shouting people down for having material concerns and trying to disrupt discussion around fairness in sport, and safeguarding? Well, that's... not fair.

I was able to put it down to individual TRAs being arseholes for such a long time, but it got harder and harder.

At the same time, because of lockdown, I'd started using twitter more. My twitter sphere was strictly cats, Brexit, musicians, cats, Brexit, nerdy stuff and cats. No trans stuff. Then I ran into all this in the wild. I knew I hadn't sought it out, but here they were: lots of TRAs all together, all being unreasonable together and none of them saying, 'hey, steady on'.

This time, I couldn't put any of it down to carefully curated screenshots and the behaviour was writ large. They weren't asking for recognition and acceptance for trans people; they didn't want a seat at the debating table- they had a seat and they were pushing everyone else off theirs!

The idea that being gay was a phase etc used to be a real problem...

I think that trend is a really ill judged name for the good work they do.

And I know I'm a keyboard warrior but like I say, that's what I think.

PotholeParadise what you say definitely resonates. Do you ever wish you could go back to blissful ignorance?

I've just seen the Diva magazine page on Facebook is getting massively trolled. I hope it's not because of this thread.

Why would it be because of this thread?