Feeling really conflicted

[Tittie]

I've been lurking on the GC threads for quite some time, but don't feel articulate enough to contribute, compared to some of the brilliant posters here!

I peaked about 2 years ago. I remember confidently describing Mumsnet as transphobic to my friend not long before that I can't even remember what it was that changed my mind.

Anyway, there seems to be more and more coverage of trans/sex/gender issues in the media at the moment. It's making me incredibly uncomfortable that I find myself agreeing with newspapers, celebrities and politicians that I would ordinarily distance myself from (eg the Daily Mail). I am 100% gender critical, but I have this nagging doubt about who I am both agreeing and disagreeing with. Is anyone else feeling conflicted in this way?

There’s a lot of casual conflation going on in this thread. Most gc feminists, certainly the ones I choose to associate with, know all too well that genuine trans people, the people formerly known as and indeed still insisting on being referred to as transsexuals to differentiate and distance themselves from the current version of transactivism and its gender ideologically driven proponents, aren’t the voices being heard, and certainly do just want to quietly get on with life. The problem isn’t with these trans people, which is why the problem is occurring now and not 30 years ago. Things have changed. To try to frame this argument as though nothing has changed, or as if there isn’t a powerful lobby group who have been successful in a process of institutional capture in order to strengthen their position to lobby for actual change in law detrimental to women, is disingenuous.

I’m more concerned about why outlets like the bbc, independent and the guardian aren’t covering it in an unbiased manner. Doesn’t that worry you?
It's about the business models. No one buys physical papers now so they have all diversified. The guardian is not behind a paywall, they have settled on a free at the point of use model (like in the Social Dilema) where they are not selling news to you, they are selling their users attention to other people, mining for data and either advertising or selling influence in some other way. In particular in the case of the guardian, they have picked a demographic and are going for sensational headlines that reinforce an existing view and aiming for rage clicks and conversion rate shares. There is a whole science behind it. You are the product they are selling.

The BBC has a guaranteed an income so is a bit complacent, tries to be unbiased but has young hip staff who are probably caught up in the pseudo-reality themselves.

@BarbaraofKent

If it were 'on both sides' then TRAs wouldn't have to endlessly recycle that one single Magdalen Berns tweet that is always doing the rounds!

I haven't looked at Aidan Comerford's twitter for a while now, but at one point he was posting it several times a week!

There have been plenty of trans people and trans supportive people who've had their employer contacted, trans people's families harassed on the site that must not be named, people reported to social services etc. The difference is none of this ever gets published by the right wing press. A prominent trans youtuber just received a string of death threats and chose to do nothing about it and removed the posts referencing it from her feed out of concern for the person's mental health.

I've been quite clear what I think of death and rape threats. I do not however considering someone anonymous kid posting a stupid meme of an anime character holding a gun to be a credible death threat - I dont like it, I have challenged it and wish it didn't happen but I don't really see that it's worse then accusing people of being groomers or child abusers simply for having a different opinion on how best to support trans kids. I think Posie's recent comments calling for armed men to start using womens toilets to protect them from the trans is as damaging and frightening to trans people as some of the worst shit I've seen from the trans side not least because it could have had real violent consequences given the political mood amongst many of those who follow her.

And I recognise and appreciate many gender critical people have spoken out about some of this stuff, but a lot more seem very keen to minimise it.

If parents were potentially at risk of violence if they changed their kids in toilets for non-disabled people then it would be closer to the same thing.

Can you post some links to back up your claim that male trans people are at risk from using men's toilets jj?

Can you also show that they are more at risk than other vulnerable groups such as boys, gay men, ethnic minorities, disabled people etc?

It really isn't a "both sides" thing. A handful of unwise tweets/posts on one side against a tsunami of violent and sexually violent ideation directed at women and girls by male people on the other. Plus the successful attempts to demonise and dismiss any possible concerns women have about the trans political agenda and rhetoric, no matter how mild.

I'm not going to entertain any gaslighting that there is any parity because it's a patently ridiculous claim.

I realised something today thanks to this thread. And now I am really, really, really angry.

Since I was 15, I have been told that whenever I said anything about feminism, I had to be as polite as possible. That if I wanted women's rights to progress, it was imperative that I be incredibly civil. That it was imperative that any group fighting for improved treatment took care not to alienate anyone by being too abrasive.

I have tried my very best to do that, and never to risk being, perish the thought, strident. Even last week, a man turned up on the Omid thread and told posters that if they spoke too robustly, he would be forced to dismiss feminists.

Talk about the double standards.

TRAs can do what they like, can't they, without worrying about it reflecting on the wider movement? The wider world doesn't care.

It's just women who have to be perfect.

@OldCrone

If parents were potentially at risk of violence if they changed their kids in toilets for non-disabled people then it would be closer to the same thing.

Can you post some links to back up your claim that male trans people are at risk from using men's toilets jj?

Can you also show that they are more at risk than other vulnerable groups such as boys, gay men, ethnic minorities, disabled people etc?

You have asked me this countless times and I have answered many times. To repeatedly ask someone the same question they have already answered suggests you are not debating in good faith.

third spaces have been suggested repeatedly ad infinitum by gc feminists. It is a suggestion consistently rejected. Because for the shouty tra’s (as opposed to genuine ts) it isn’t about mutually agreeable solutions to achieve maximum safety and comfort for all. It’s about male entitlement.

Sorry, this week, not last week.

And those people who would make such demands and plough through women’s boundaries despite women voicing their concerns, despite female discomfort, and who would consistently reject a more reasonable solution, are exactly the people I don’t want in.

There have been plenty of trans people and trans supportive people who've had their employer contacted, trans people's families harassed on the site that must not be named, people reported to social services etc. The difference is none of this ever gets published by the right wing press. A prominent trans youtuber just received a string of death threats

Are these threats coming from feminists?

I think Posie's recent comments calling for armed men to start using womens toilets to protect them from the trans

She didn't do that, and you know it. There's a thread on here about that if you're still confused.

You have asked me this countless times and I have answered many times. To repeatedly ask someone the same question they have already answered suggests you are not debating in good faith.

Ah, your stock answer yet again. I'll take that as a 'no' then.

You have never answered. This is what you said the first time I asked.

And those people who would make such demands and plough through women’s boundaries despite women voicing their concerns, despite female discomfort, and who would consistently reject a more reasonable solution, are exactly the people I don’t want in.

Same here. Red flags all over the place.

Pothole it's honestly one of the most important things you can grasp. Once you understand that critique of tone in this context is simply a control mechanism to divert from the content of what you say because you are a woman who will not comply, it becomes much easier to simply focus on speaking up and ignoring those who are trying to control you.

The same applies to every irrelevant instance of guilt by association, long pompous male opinions, or appeals to be kind.

No woman is obligated to solve the problems others demand them to. Women do not need special justification to fight for the rights of all women and girls.

When you feel conflicted, ask yourself why you would feel conflicted about being concerned for women and girls. It's a good question to ask, always. It will tell you how much you've internalized the idea that women and girls should come as a lower priority than almost anything else. I encourage you to reject that conditioning.

I think Posie's recent comments calling for armed men to start using womens toilets to protect them from the trans

Except that's not what she said, is it?

There have been plenty of trans people and trans supportive people who've had their employer contacted, trans people's families harassed on the site that must not be named, people reported to social services etc.

Who? And by who?

@AnyOldPrion

I sometimes feel conflicted too. Not because of who agrees with me, but I sometimes wonder whether I am wrong and at some point society will reach a stable position where men are accepted as women and despite the negative effects on some women, it will be accepted as the new societal norm, and those who objected will be seen as having been over the top.

I was listening to Germaine Greer the other day and though she continues to believe men are not women, she said she’s not really interested as it isn’t that important. I wondered whether she meant that there were other more pressing feminist problems (I think that’s what she was implying) or whether she thought the fad would pass, it would more or less sort itself out, and we’d settle into a new pattern like the one I mentioned above.

But deep inside, I continue to think there is something very wrong. I don’t think it can work for men to simply be able to choose whether they should have women’s rights. I think, if the fad does continue, we need to be looking at alternative separate spaces, and I argue for those wherever possible.

I am also very worried about the effect on children. I genuinely don’t think any child has the mental capacity to understand the consequences of puberty blockers. Nor do I believe an 18 year old can understand the consequences of unnecessary mastectomy, or taking drugs that will permanently affect whether they can ever use female spaces without making the women in those spaces uncomfortable. Given their female socialisation, I suspect that will weigh more heavily on them than the men who use our spaces without a second thought.

So painful though it is that we have to pay lawyers to defend our current legal situation and our right to speak out, I think we have to persevere with the court cases and judicial reviews. Every time the judges agree with us, I am reassured that we are ultimately right and something is already far wrong. I hope that with all the appeals, that things will continue to go in what I see as the right direction.

So that’s where I’m at. It worries me how many people I previously would have respected believe I’m a bigot, but I don’t believe I am. I can justify my position and given I’ve always considered myself a reasonable person who can see nuance, I don’t think it’s me that’s suddenly changed. I think the situation has changed slowly, but that it has been done under the radar, hence the feeling that something has suddenly shifted a long way and everything feels out of place.

That makes me uncomfortable, but when I see the reach that Stonewall has, that’s another little jerk that tells me that something is wrong. Children as young as twelve having mastectomies. The police recording male crimes as female. Those things have to be wrong. Women in court having to pretend that their male assailants are women can’t be right. Men in women’s prisons: definitively wrong.

When I look at those things, I can tell it isn’t just me having this out of proportion. And if those things are wrong, then the rest is likely wrong too. We’re not imagining this and we’re not wrong to object and that is the conclusion I keep reaching any time I feel that doubt.

Very well put. Totally agree with you.

@BarbaraofKent

There have been plenty of trans people and trans supportive people who've had their employer contacted, trans people's families harassed on the site that must not be named, people reported to social services etc.

Who? And by who?

I expect they go to another school so we wouldn’t know them

TW who are harassed & threatened are harassed and threatened by men and yet strangely it’s always women the TRA go after

I do worry. It is my belief that people should be allowed to live however they choose. If that’s as a same sex couple or not it should be celebrated. If it’s as non binary brilliant. I have met people who are transgender and it doesn’t bother me in the slightest because I decide who I like based on treatment of each other and our mutual likes. Nothing else. At the same time though I feel sad that gender terms, particularly those used by women are suddenly deemed ‘wrong’ and ‘offensive’. I feel like how I identify is gradually being frowned upon and changed. Breastfeeding is one such term, we hear regularly that some women are subjected to poor treatment over public feeding. Now we want to replace the term itself...why? I genuinely don’t understand how fact is suddenly offensive or wrong. I feel wrong for asking.

@OldCrone

You have asked me this countless times and I have answered many times. To repeatedly ask someone the same question they have already answered suggests you are not debating in good faith.

Ah, your stock answer yet again. I'll take that as a 'no' then.

You have never answered. This is what you said the first time I asked.

No I didn't. I pointed out that as trans women have never used men's spaces then there is no data, however in the one place trans women are forced into a male space - prisons - figures show they are roughly 30 times more likely to be sexually assaulted than men.

Please don't ask me again.

@BarbaraofKent

There have been plenty of trans people and trans supportive people who've had their employer contacted, trans people's families harassed on the site that must not be named, people reported to social services etc.

Who? And by who?

I'm not gong to name them and invite further harassment by posting their names on here, but it has happened to pretty much every high profile trans or trans supportive person I follow on twitter in one way or another. And it's been done by people who call themselves gender critical in most cases.

There have been gender critical people themselves who have complained about online abuse from within the movement after infighting has broken out. I acknowledge there is a problem with the way some trans people and allies have used social media in this debate, it's a shame few seem to be able to look at their own side and do the same.

It is disheartening that it would seem that it is only the right wing press who appear to have any interest in maintaining women's rights. However, this should not invalidate the reality of the attack on women's rights. Any society which will open up female safe spaces to a group of people of the opposite sex who are just as likely, according to all evidence, to be as violent towards women as other males, deserves to be called to account. Moreover, any society which acts so unjustly, without ever asking women for their opinions on this removal of their rights to safe spaces, is a deeply misogynistic, sexist one.

Oh! So when TRAs say men’s toilets are unsafe for transwomen they actually mean prisons.

Got it.

And it's been done by people who call themselves gender critical in most cases.

Rubbish.

The debate is toxic because its full of violently misogynistic TRA's trying to silence women with #nodebate, rape-threats, death-threats, harassment, de-platforming, attacking meetings, attacking women, cancelling women, intimidating domestic abuse survivors, taking women to court for 'wrong pronouns' (and repeatedly losing) pile-ons, getting them banned from twitter and constant lies.

women aren't assaulting TW in jail or in bathrooms. We don't go round wearing Kill all Terfs tshirts or telling men to choke on our genitals.

Its disgusting that you do this all the time.

So when TRAs say men’s toilets are unsafe for transwomen they actually mean prisons.

And when TRAs say men's toilets are unsafe for transwomen they somehow mean its because of all the nasty feminists.