My Name Is Anna. I've been called a terf - is the BBC starting to permit open discussion?

[nauticant]

On at 11 this morning (Monday) on Radio 4:

My Name Is Anna. I've been called a terf

My Name Is...Anna is branded a terf – a byword for transphobia. She rejects the label and goes in search of solutions to some of the thorny issues around trans inclusion.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000s1rr

[SpiderGwen]

It was a start, at least.

[Ereshkigalangcleg]

I really wish someone in the media would just explore it from the female perspective, considering our feelings. It's always about "trans rights".

[scentedgeranium]

It struck me how thoughtful Anna was and how open to other opinions she made herself. And how utterly hardline and unbendable Jamie and his missus where.

[Jaxhog]

@WorryBadger

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Exactly. That I can't even discuss how I feel about it with transwomen friends says it all. They feel free to tell me how they feel, but never ask me how I feel.

We need to be more mutually honest without females being accused of being terfs if we disagree with their point of view.

[Jaxhog]

@worryBadger Wow. Even MN won't allow a debate!

[FreiasBathtub]

I thought this was a good listen. I must say it was good to hear more moderate voices from the trans perspective. It gave me one of those 'oh, what if I'm wrong moments?' thinking about healthcare and using language that makes people feel comfortable and accepted. And then I realised the language is balkanizing what it is to be a woman. People who menstruate but can't get pregnant. People who get pregnant but can't chestfeed. People who used to have a cervix but don't any more. People who carry a baby but don't parent it. We lose the word that encompasses all those people, and that makes it so, so much harder to join the dots and see the systemic mechanisms that underpin their shared experience.

None of this matters very much if you take the view, as many young people seem to, and as I know I did before the full weight of the patriarchy came crashing down on me after I carried and birthed my babies, that individual self-expression and acceptance is paramount. But once you realise that we need class-based analysis and mechanisms to address the systemic disadvantage that women - whatever their biological cans and can'ts - experience in society because of their sexed bodies and all the expectations that they absorb and embody around those bodies - then we must keep a word that describes them as a class.

[MaudTheInvincible]

if you say trans women are not women you are transphobic

And if you say trans women are women you are gynophobic. There's not squaring that particular circle.

[doublehalo]

Off topic but can I just say that BoreofWhabylon is one of the best user names I've seen on Mumsnet.

Made me laugh out loud today so thanks BoreofWhabylon

[2021vision]

Christine Evans Urology surgeon in Wales was my hero decades ago she was renowned for her surgeries, turning a penis into a vagina

Even with my CSE biology I know that you cannot turn one body organ into another. It's very important that we continue to use language that is precise and correct as everyone will be able to better understand:

A female's internal reproductive organs are the vagina, uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries. The vagina is a muscular, hollow tube that extends from the vaginal opening to the uterus. Because it has muscular walls, the vagina can expand and contract.

Women do not pee from their vagina.

[merrymouse]

I think we need to be able to talk about how incredibly offensive and harmful it is to force people, particularly women, to agree to the concept of gender.

[BraveBananaBadge]

Interesting Twitter link @nauticant, I see the first reply is a young she/her who complained to the BBC because views like Anna's lead to 'very real violence'. These people really, really can't see the wood for the trees, can they?

[merrymouse]

We lose the word that encompasses all those people, and that makes it so, so much harder to join the dots and see the systemic mechanisms that underpin their shared experience.

Very much agree.

However it also makes day to day communication difficult. I keep hearing ads asking men to donate blood, because men's blood and women's blood is not the same.

www.blood.co.uk/who-can-give-blood/why-men-should-donate-blood/

Only language that relates to women's bodies is somehow distressing - why?

[JoodyBlue]

@doublehalo

Off topic but can I just say that BoreofWhabylon is one of the best user names I've seen on Mumsnet.

Made me laugh out loud today so thanks BoreofWhabylon

haha - yes excellent name

[HighlightedTrees]

If Descartes said 'I think, therefore I am' today, he would probably be gaslighted and social media shamed that he saw himself as a 'being' because it is marginalizing or dismissing other beings that do not think or don't identify as thinking beings ffs

If we are no longer are allowed to state 'I have physiologically and psychologically and socially reacted to having xx chromosones since I was born, therefore I have an understanding and claim to what a woman is' then we are absolutely fucked quite frankly.

[OhHolyJesus]

Did I hear it right? Jamie was implying that the people making really vile and abusive remarks towards JKR shouldn’t be ‘villainised’?

Jamie is You Tuber Jamie Dodger who has made videos to explain why JKR and LGB Alliance are transphobic so to find the mildly diluted repeat of this position on the BBC isn't surprising. The video about them as a couple planning for a child in the future and the video telling Shaaba's little sister that Jamie is trans is quite eye opening.

I also thought Anna probably diluted her reactions or her position in some of her responses.

When the background to the Camp Trans murder wasn't even mentioned and nor was Jamie's own You Tube content was overlooked it really wasn't that different from the BBC position on trans stories but it was a tiny step forward I suppose. The opening lines were quite shocking and it was good to hear young women speaking about their entry into radical feminism, (I might not align with their particular brand of radical feminism but it's something).

[requiredwriting]

@Jaxhog

I STILL don't think transwomen understand (or want to understand) the fear that many female-bodied people have of male-bodied people in sensitive places. I think a lot of this is because they do not have the same experiences as many female-bodied people. Having a female body for many of us means we are treated differently from small children according to our society and culture.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be something that can be discussed openly. Even in this broadcast, the focus was on the feelings of transwomen - not anyone else.

Yes, this is what needs to be said, over and over again.

And sometimes I am tempted to add, that it's penis-havers that bother us. Call yourself what you like, even though men and women are traditional, but no penis, no admittance.

[CranberriesChoccyAgain]

@HighlightedTrees

If Descartes said 'I think, therefore I am' today, he would probably be gaslighted and social media shamed that he saw himself as a 'being' because it is marginalizing or dismissing other beings that do not think or don't identify as thinking beings ffs

If we are no longer are allowed to state 'I have physiologically and psychologically and socially reacted to having xx chromosones since I was born, therefore I have an understanding and claim to what a woman is' then we are absolutely fucked quite frankly.

We certainly see a fair few beings who don't think, and feel marginalized. 😁

[Defaultname]

[quote BitMuch]OU professor SG Chappell did a great job at NAMALTing . . .

Said "I pass myself if I don't speak". Photographed here
eicsp.org/events/event-details/784-an-evening-with-prof-sophie-grace-chappell-18-june-2020[/quote]
"Don't speak" is the same as 'dumb' in English, isn't it?

[RhapsodyandAshe]

Sexual Reassignment Surgery does not create a vagina, it creates a permanent wound that will need to be forced open on a daily basis for the rest of that person's life.

[scentedgeranium]

@Jaxhog

I STILL don't think transwomen understand (or want to understand) the fear that many female-bodied people have of male-bodied people in sensitive places. I think a lot of this is because they do not have the same experiences as many female-bodied people. Having a female body for many of us means we are treated differently from small children according to our society and culture.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be something that can be discussed openly. Even in this broadcast, the focus was on the feelings of transwomen - not anyone else.

Yes yes yes.

[HubertHerbert]

I was scrolling through BBC sounds and found a familiar face - to my surprise - Selina Todd on R3 - no sign of cancellation over on BBC 3! Was a very pleasant surprise - and fascinating hearing the programme on social mobility.

[IsThePopeCatholic]

Absolutely!

[merrymouse]

@Jaxhog

I STILL don't think transwomen understand (or want to understand) the fear that many female-bodied people have of male-bodied people in sensitive places. I think a lot of this is because they do not have the same experiences as many female-bodied people. Having a female body for many of us means we are treated differently from small children according to our society and culture.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be something that can be discussed openly. Even in this broadcast, the focus was on the feelings of transwomen - not anyone else.

Also some women who don't feel this way minimise the concerns of women who do - so anyone can use the "but my female friend thinks" excuse.

You need a level of maturity to understand that different people have a different experience of life - to go beyond "I feel like this so everyone else must feel the same way"

[IsThePopeCatholic]

If, like me, you lived through the Women’s Liberation Movement in the seventies, there is no way I am going to give up some of our hard-fought rights. A woman is a woman and not a man.