Lib Dem women say what?

[vivariumvivariumsvivaria]

Thanks, @Xanthangum for posting this on the holy 50:50 thread.

www.libdemwomen.org.uk/pro_trans_rights_open_letter

The first point says:

1. Variations in sex and gender, however they manifest, are a simple fact of human physiology and psychology, and neither the state nor society should pass judgement on people who deviate from what is considered the norm

Can anyone help me understand what that means? Because medicine has long since considered the "norm" to be the male body.

Do I deviate from the norm with my awkward Y chromosome? State and society certainly judges me for that.

I have voted Lib Dem in the past. I have met some of the people who have signed this open letter.

They didn't appear to be idiots at the time. Can anyone help me translate what this actually means - there is a vote coming up in Scotland, so I have until May to find somewhere to put mine.

@Ereshkigalangcleg –I disagree with that characterisation, not least because the 'genuine and hard won struggle for [gay] rights' was my own as well, and I don't think trans people are co-opting that unwarrantedly. I know we disagree on this, but can you at least see that trans people asking for better access to trans healthcare and easier routes to transition etc are doing so genuinely, rather than to spite people or be difficult?

We have got a situation where this concept of 'liberal identity' which is a certain group of beliefs is being deliberately for the purposes of being misleading to carry moral weight being confused and conflated with liberal democracy.

In the same way that there are abuses of language and meaning between sex and gender.

YY. Sleight of hand.

@RedToothBrush – As a thought experiment, do you think that, for example, out-and-out racists and ex-members of the National Front should be allowed to be members of the Liberal Democrats?

As I said before, political liberalism is about making society as a whole more liberal. A person being removed from the Lib Dems because they fall foul of their membership rules does not constitute the state running roughshod over their individual liberties. You are still entitled to vote for who you want, associate with people who want to associate with you, say what you want, express any opinions that you want – you just can't force an organisation to agree with you or listen to you. The Liberal Democrats are not the only means to engage in democracy in this country.

I know we disagree on this, but can you at least see that trans people asking for better access to trans healthcare and easier routes to transition etc are doing so genuinely, rather than to spite people or be difficult?

I believe there are some people who genuinely have gender dysphoria. Which I believe to be a distressing and difficult psychological condition.

But I don't accept the ideology whatever motives they have. There is a clear rights conflict and I don't see why women should come second.

And I don't see any basis for allowing self ID. It should be medicalised, because it is a medical condition.

@Apollo440 –Religious organisations complained of infringement of their religious liberty when same-sex marriage was introduced, for example. Similarly when hate crime legislation was brought in to allow for homophobia to be an aggravating factor in the commission of crimes. More generally, concerns about gay teachers, gay people in changing rooms, gay people serving in the military – all of these considerations were weighed against the individual freedoms of gay people. And it was determined (rightly in my view) that those individual freedoms ought to win out.

Why can you only argue your case with analogies? Maybe ask yourself why it doesn't stand on its own merits.

And that's the inherent lie!

Transpeople politicking for trans rights, healthcare etc is an objective no reasonable person would stand in the way of.

But that isn't what is being fought for. Transwomen are demanding women's rights that's why transwomen are women.

And much more commonly now transmen are demanding men's rights as transmen are men!

That's the disputed area, where male bodies demand entry to female arenas. Women say no.

People like yourself berate us for doing so!

@Ereshkigalangcleg – Of the broad group of trans people, do you accept that it is the vast, vast majority who have gender dysphoria, and that these people genuinely, in good faith, just want to be able to access services to be able to deal with that in the way they prefer?

And do you see why there are so many people who don't see why trans people should come second either? And with the exception of some at the extremes on both sides, I'm not sure I'd agree that there's any 'ideology' at play really – it's just competing views as to what people think is the most equitable way forward based on the real needs and hopes and fears of real people, on both sides. That doesn't strike me as massively ideological.

And much more commonly now transmen are demanding men's rights as transmen are men!

Not really getting indulged in the same way by men and male centred organisations, though.

Do you accept that it is the vast, vast majority who have gender dysphoria

No.

No! Not in the slightest! Wonder why 🤔

Lies. If you are going to tell one. Tell a big one.

Then carry on. Until people start to question the very integrity of the truth and the meaning of words until they are rendered meaningless and people feel they have no power.

Failing that just kick em out the party citing they are bigots and have done with it because there is no right of appeal anyway in the Kangaroo Court of the Radical Association.

@Ereshkigalangcleg –Analogies help people view things through different lenses on issues where there is a lot of entrenchment. My view on its 'own merits' is as I put it in my first post here: I don't think the state should prevent people from living life as they choose. If that means they identify as a different gender, then so be it. There are difficulties there, which you point out, but I don't think they're insurmountable, and think this whole political debate would end up far more equitably if there was a lot less heat on both sides of the argument.

@CuriousaboutSamphire–I'm afraid I just don't agree. You're entitled to your view, but it's not one I share. In my view, denying people recognition of something which is core to their identity and conception of themselves is to deny them their dignity, and I just don't think that hard line helps anyone. I'm not here to berate you – I'm only posting really because I disagreed with the characterisation of my 'side' of the debate as "authoritarian" –but I don't think we're going to see eye-to-eye on this.

Anyway, good to discuss this with you all, but I have to return to other things, not least work. I hope despite my disagreement with those who have been interacting with me that I have kept things civil!

I think there are vastly more people claiming to be trans than actually have medical gender dysphoria, which is more like body dysmorphia than just thinking you don't really feel like you think a male should feel, so actually you must be a woman.

You're just continuing the lie. You did so by ignoring the first part of my post.

Not a good tactic as anyone reading later will see my whole post and will see that you had to ignore half of what I did type to make your point.

So which member of the Radical Association are you?

I think you're enormously naive and cavalier with the rights of many people who are more vulnerable than most trans people, but we all have different perspectives, eh?

Time to post this again from Lachlan Stuart. Lachlan for those who don't know is a civil servant who worked on the 2019 Labour Manifesto with a view to securing the best plan for trans health.

It dismayed the pop up people and LGBT Labour because it was the removal of the established legal rights of women that interested them.

Nowhere, ever, have I seen any recognition from any of them of the astonishingly bold, tangible and very expensive commitment that we gave to improve the lives of trans people by ensuring adequate and much improved access to health care services.

It’s not because they didn’t know.

It’s because that’s not what they’re interested in.

medium.com/@lachlanstuart/the-confessions-of-a-transphobe-b4942c06e6e4

@RedToothBrush – I'm afraid I'm not a member of the Radical Association – I disagree with them on an awful lot of other things, as well as their overall approach within the party. Anyway, really must dash now. Thanks all for the discussion.

Username makes me wonder... just passing through my ass.

Monitoring and reporting back to high command what the womins are 'plotting' now.

They must not be allowed to discuss things.

If anyone hasn't seen this thread, I suggest that you do read these thread...

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4169150-Pseudo-realities-Power-and-Language-Games

Its really enlightening.

[quote PassingThrough2]@Ereshkigalangcleg

Sure, everything is a balancing act. But for much the same reasons that the legalisation of homosexuality, civil partnerships and same-sex marriage were the right thing to do despite competing considerations, I think that steps to make the lives of trans people easier are on balance the right thing to do as well. For example, improving access to trans healthcare and enabling trans people to transition more easily doesn't strike me as harming anybody, but does help people live their lives more freely.[/quote]
Read this short essay. Then come back and say affirmative healthcare offered without any attempt at a proper mental health evaluation first isn't harming anyone.

hormonehangover.substack.com/p/top-surgery-regret-part-1

So very dismissive!

Ta ra! Important shit to do!