Have things gone too far?

[Okbussitout]

I saw a tiktok comment thread saying that if you wouldn't have sex with a trans person you're transphobic. My thinking on this is sexuality is quite complex. But for example I've had gay friends say to me they feel really grossed out by the opposite sex genitals) both gay men and women) so if someone has a penis but presents as a woman (this isn't an argument about passing) then it's transphobic not to be attracted to them because they have genitals of the opposite sex that you are attracted to. Primarily I'd say I'm straight and a big part of that is my enjoyment of my partner's penis. (sorry that statement is tmi and redic to type)

This got me thinking about gc argument on here. For the first time I was thinking this doesn't make logical sense. You can dress how you want, call yourself what you want, use the spaces you want, as actually I don't think most trans people are a threat. I'm happy for trans women to be women. But I feel trying to dictate who people have sex is too much.

I'm sort of musing, but also wonder if actually on both sides there is such adversity that there's no going back? With increasingly wild arguments on both sides. So how would there be a way forward from here?

I'm wondering if trans people are angry because they feel their bodies don't match their gender in their head. I've had on and of mental health issues so can imagine this feels awful. I'm also fat so know what it's like to be discriminated against. Maybe gc women are angry because they already feel ver discriminated against and are now told the rights we have are not needed. So yeah I just wonder if this debate is at a point with no way forward reasonable way forward. I'd like to know people's views on this.

i think the trouble for me arises from the idea that there is a 'just be kind' soloution to everything.
The 'people just want to pee' is a great sentiment but once that idea becomes problematic you have to talk about it and define what that entails and who is affected.
Im sure ive shared the ladies at some stage with a transexual or transgender person and neither cared nor minded because the person did just want to pee and pass unnoticed.
But that does not mean that i have no objection to someone who has self ID'd being given a legal right to walk into sex protected spaces.

For me the conflating of the idea that most people just want to pee with sex based protections is highly disingenuous and designed entirely to bully and shame women into speaking up about their concerns.
If trans activists were concerned about the people who just wanted to pee the discussion would be framed as a collaborative attempt to ensure that women using ladies loos felt safe and their dignity and privacy was adequately protected. Its not.
The women most vulnerable and in need of sex protected spaces often have a history that includes bullying and abusive men therefore see the name calling and guilt tripping for the gaslighting it is.
That will obviously inform the tone of their reaction

With regard third spaces, there is a video of a girl in tears because she can no longer get changed in privacy after her school board voted to allow students to pick which change rooms they preferred.
In that case, the trans student had been offered a third space but refused it as they wanted to get changed with girls.
www.westernjournal.com/teen-swimmer-fights-tears-school-board-votes-allow-trans-students-locker-room/
And in trying to find the link, I see now that the trans student in question won a $150k settlement despite being offered a safe space to change and despite winning their school board vote and being permitted to change with girls. In no part of this story was the student unsafe, they won settlement because they felt 'uncomfortable', even as the girl in tears' discomfort and statement that her privacy was being invaded was completely ignored and overridden.
www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-palatine-transgender-lawsuit-settlement-20200214-ldgh6vw7znfsfibwcury3bnn4a-story.html

There are multiple cases of third spaces being offered and refused. Its not about safety. It's about validation.

Thanks for all the replies. I need to do some work! So will look back at this later. Not starting a thread then bailing!

I think that if one accepts that TWAW, then genital preferences actually are 'transphobic'. That's the logical conclusion. It's the first premise that I have a problem with.

Yes it's gone too far - it's gone from trans rights and the desire for a simplified process for legal recognition, to a socially mandated homophobic, lesbophobic and misogynistic dogma.

OP I too would like to see some examples of what you consider 'wild' arguments from feminists.

Would you mind clarifying what actions you see as 'wild' please?

@Winesalot

OP I too would like to see some examples of what you consider 'wild' arguments from feminists.

Would you mind clarifying what actions you see as 'wild' please?

Actually, yes, when you come back later, OP, this is a good question for you to be able to unpack exactly what you are feeling and why. I think it's a good self examination question for anyone who is dealing with some disquiet about all this.

I say this a lot on FWR, but most of the time, the position presented as 'moderate' is the one that requires you to put women and girls as a lower priority than someone or something else. Now, some people may think that's appropriate. But it's not feminism.

I feel trying to dictate who people have sex with is too much

You've picked up on one aspect of this, the right to be able to pick a partner based on their sex, but this is only part of a much bigger picture of the removal of women's rights. Have you heard of the cotton ceiling, the erasure of Lesbian right to choose a partner based on genitals, the erasure of Lesbian only spaces, the erasure of Lesbian only dating sites. this is part of a bigger picture of the erasure of women's rights, erasure of any women's independant enterprise, example today the defunding of the Lanarkshire Women's refuge.

In public loos (when we used them in old times!) I often would end up washing blood from my hands because I'm bleeding a lot and in the changing process that happens. Its awful its embarrassing even though I know I shouldn't be embarrassed. It reminds me that I'm not getting the medical care I need for my periods. So yeah I do want a space for that grim reality of being a woman.

I, too, suffer from very heavy periods and have had to wash clothing as well as hands. You talk about being embarrassed about it. I am very embarrassed about it when it happens and the only thing that helps is knowing that I am in a women's toilet with others who may have also had that experience.

I would be much more embarrassed looking up to find a male who presents as a women their while I am washing my hands or drying a bit of clothing.

When my child was a baby, I was always out and about with them in the stroller or pram. When I needed to use the toilets, including heavy period time, I would have the pram or stroller in the door way because I couldn't leave my child unattended outside the door (sometimes, it would take a while before the flooding stopped enough just to get off the toilet). I would have been mortified to have to do this with males walking past.

Similarly, when my mum in a wheelchair needed a toilet and there was no accessible toilets available (and yes, this does happen!).

There are many reasons for single sex spaces that also relate to dignity. As well as safety. I keep getting the feeling that those people who are wanting to be kind and who calm their thoughts by thinking 'they just want to pee' are happy to ignore the needs of women in the situations above.

The solutions have been proposed. In fact, a group of transwomen are petitioning for them now as well - additional spaces where people who simply do not care about who is in the next cubicle to them can go and for those that do, maintain single sex spaces.

And for those who declare 'who is going to police the single sex spaces', surely you are not implying that males who have been told of the laws (if the laws are actually clarified and the language strengthened) and asked to respect others needs would simply just ignore everyone else's needs for their own need to 'just pee'? That they would actually need policing?

@McCanne

Yes it's gone too far - it's gone from trans rights and the desire for a simplified process for legal recognition, to a socially mandated homophobic, lesbophobic and misogynistic dogma.

This is it exactly.

I just don't know how both can be supported? But anyway my op was about feeling like there is no room for common ground

I and an increasing number of women would suggest that if men (however they identify) claim they feel unsafe in men’s spaces, then it is up to them to campaign for, or fund/run alternative spaces.

That to me seems like a suitable and sustainable middle ground. The arguments against it seem to be spurious comparisons with racial segregation and claims that any recognition that men who claim they are women are not literally women is bigotry. The arguments are made with surprising vehemence for people who say they merely want a safe space to pee.

Millions have been spent by billionaire activists and lobby groups campaigning for men to have women’s rights and full access to all women’s spaces. Had they spent the money and effort on campaigning for third spaces, they probably would have been well on the way by now. So wanting to pee in safety does not appear to be a priority.

@Okbussitout

Thanks for all the replies. I need to do some work! So will look back at this later. Not starting a thread then bailing!

Good luck with your research. It took me months to get my head around the enormity of this situation.

Re your previous statement
Then the need for a trans person to go to a toilet where they feel safe

I have not managed to dig up any actual evidence of tw bring any less safe in the men’s toilets than any other vulnerable male group. This statement seems to be something that many people have accepted as fact without actually seeing any proof.

I have even asked the trans people who post on here for their evidence and haven’t really got anywhere.

As a starting point for numbers, an average of 150 women are murdered every year in the UK. The last trans person to be murdered in the UK was thankfully in 2018.

Newspapers tend to be quite keen to follow the reporting standards set by the activists so they will use female pronouns for any person who wishes to be identified as female at any point in a criminal process and often not mention trans status at all.

It is treated differently when trans people are the victims of crime where the reporting often highlights that the crime was due to their trans status. This should mean that it is easier to identify the number of trans people who are victims of crime. Obviously the newspapers could also report the victims anonymously if they don’t want to be ‘outed’.

Just bear in mind that we don’t invite teenage boys (at a very high risk of violence) or small thin men to join us in the ladies facilities for their safety. There is no reason to treat any other group with special privileges.

Oh, and then there were the times during milk explosions trying to dry up clothes due to that, standing in line waiting for toilets to come free while milk patches are quickly growing and then finally get to a cubicle to try to hand relieve the milk and clean up afterwards.

I find it incredible that there are still those who deny there is a difference between how males and females use toilets.

I wonder how many transpeople there are in the UK? I guess we will never find out now because of what has happened with the census. I don't see how that helps anyone, particularly anyone who is transgender. The whole idea of the census is to find out what is actually going on in society so that needs can be provided.

Have no problem personally with anyone being legally recognised as having a different sex from their both sex and certainly not with anyone who is non-traditional, fluid or whatever. I do think things like women only facilities and sport need a great deal of careful thought, and not dogma, as whatever you think, people who start off as male biologically are vastly more likely to be criminals, violent, rapists and abusers and this impacts on all women and men themselves, trans or otherwise. A source of a lot of the problems transgender people face is male violence, not TERFS.

Aren't most people a bit fluid? Who the heck is stereotypically female all the time? I don't think anyone would mistake me for a male though it did happen a couple of times from the back when I had a pixie cut in my early 20s. I fancy men and am married to one, I would never rule out fancying a woman but it has never happened. I am very much into football and used to play, and work in a (vastly) male dominated industry. I'm glad I don't feel I have to change into a man to do this, but perhaps sometimes it would help.

I feel like feminists and transpeople don't have to be poles apart in their views and indeed can be one and the same.

I think people forget that there’s a difference between finding someone good looking and being sexually attracted to someone. For example, I can appreciate how beautiful a woman looks, but I wouldn’t want to have sex with a woman. Just doesn’t interest me. I wouldn’t want to have sex with a woman, whether they are biologically a woman or just identify as one.

Are straight people prejudiced if they don’t want a gay relationship? Are gay people prejudiced if they only want to have sex with people of the same sex as them? Of course now. So that means people aren’t being prejudiced or “transphobic” if they don’t want to have sex with trans people.

‘Now’ should be ‘not.’

Ok, I was going to start my own thread about my views, but it does seem appropriate to put them here. I'm not sure if this sounds like a conspiracy theory, I've name changed and I'm happy to be told I'm way off mark and as I've never put it anywhere but in my head before it might come out all wrong but here goes.

The argument about genitals only seems to come up when discussing dating, but I think it's much wider than that and should be included in all the discussions about toilets, refuges, prisons, changing rooms and all sex segregated spaces as for me, genitals is a massive part of why I don't want trans women in my space. Now the answer you usually get from most TRA's is 'what's between my legs has nothing to do with you', and for the most part, I'd agree with them. I truly couldn't care less.

Until they're in my space.

The uncomfortable truth for most penis owners is that a penis can be used as a weapon. The extreme of this is rape, but there is also a whole load of offences, before then, including exposure, wanking in public, voyerism, all of which would involve a penis somehow. If a man decided to use his penis against a woman, most would be able to over power her, shock her, scare her into submission, and no matter the outcome, even if she fights back, it's likely to leave emotional scars. Women do not have the same arsenal.

As women, we have to trust that every male we meet doesn't want to use their penis as a weapon against us. It doesn't matter how big, small, skinny or strong they are, it's the man's choice whether or not to offend against us, if they want to we have absolutley no choice about it and it's horrible.

Now we know the majority of penis owners (including TW) absolutely would not do anything like that, but the problem is, some would and this is the reason we have sex segregated spaces which include toilets, changing facilities, dating sites etc. because we just can't tell who will and who won't.

It's nearly always possible to tell a penis owner, even though there may be a few ambiguous folk, usually within one or two interactions it becomes obvious. We have to treat all penis owners, no matter how they are dressed, with caution. All women will do it instinctively, and I think, that many women are overriding their instinct in order to be kind.

Comments about being unfairly discriminatory if you don't fancy anyone are being made by basically incel MRAs however they identify, chippy at no-one or not the right people fancying them or being able to have has much sex as they like (or they think they'd like, in reality a lot would rather wank and look at porn), and that people owe them their attention.

OP, you still haven't answered the Staniland Question.

Here's a link to it:

en.everybodywiki.com/The_Staniland_Question

I'm really interested to see how you'll answer it.

I have even asked the trans people who post on here for their evidence and haven’t really got anywhere.

Well, yes, you can bet that if there were any incidents they would be waving them as examples repeatedly. At some point an ongoing absence of evidence begins to look like evidence of absence.

The only incident that I've ever seen gain any media traction was one transwoman being "assaulted" by two women in a women's toilet. (IIRC, the case was dismissed and the "victim" in that case was convicted of some sexual(?) assault some months later, possibly suggesting the report may not have been entirely truthful).

Oh, and there was something more recently about a man going into the women's to assault a transwoman who was in there after women complained. Both those were outside the UK though.

And you do hear complaints from transwomen about being thrown out of women's toilets or getting funny looks or whatever.

What you never seem to hear is stories of what happened to them in men's toilets. Not even anecdotal ones, let alone real reports.

Again, only example I can think of is from the other side - Fionne Orlander

Was out in Manc, used the gents, one cubicle, no toilet seat but floor to ceiling door ty God. Came out and washed my hands guy using urinal looks over his shoulder and asks if this is the guys. I say "I am a guy" and he smiles & says "you're a pretty guy" I thank him and leave.

(The implication being that Fionne getting that much attention was unusual.)

It seems unlikely to me that transwomen are at higher risk in men's toilets than women's. They would likely be safer in third spaces themselves than if they were clocked in the women's.

Sounds perfectly rational to me, IAmAWoman.

many women are overriding their instinct in order to be kind

I agree. This is what I was trying to formulate and express yesterday - women have spent their lives being careful about males. Males on the whole don't seem to understand this - I imagine it's perhaps impossible to understand if you aren't of the sex that is (in general) smaller, and physically weaker, and able to be impregnated, willingly or otherwise.

When 'metoo' happened, what surprised me was how the men reacted - so many of them really honestly had apparently no idea of what life was like for women, how that fear is kind of background noise for so many of us, how we learn to live with it and around it. Almost all the women that I know have experienced sexual assault, harassment, rape - at the hands of men. It had never occurred to me that men wouldn't know this!

I'm not saying women cower - far from it - I am saying women carry rape alarms, keep a baseball bat/knife by the bed, avoid dark streets, tell a friend where they're going, check their drink, look behind them, cross the street, don't run at night - there is a very, very long list, but I'm sure you get the idea. Risk and risk-mitigation and risk-avoidance is drummed into us from girlhood, from when you first get whistled at/propositioned (usually maybe from around, what, 11? 12?).

We grow up learning how to identify and avoid the dangerous ones - the dangerous ones are virtually all male.

We know males. We know who they are and what they are capable of. It's not paranoia, it's a simple statement of fact to say that women are at risk from males as a class, and the only rational response is caution around males.

This popped up today - two high profile tw discussing women’s toilet habits on social media.

When I go to the toilets I don’t really want some sniggering person who doesn’t share the same sex as me (I can’t say it more clearly as I’m on two strikes) in the next cubicle listening, judging, and then posting it on social media.

It may be claimed that girls could do that too and that may be true but they are far less likely as they share the same body type so are hardly likely to find the idea of hovering above the seat because of germs quite so hilarious.

The majority of TW obviously have the advantage of being able to pee standing up.

gardenbird, that makes me so angry

Hovering is a fact of life for women. Too many toilets only have the bowl and no seat. When I saw this, it really brought home why we still need single sex spaces.

These are two very prominent and outspoken people discussing and mocking women's toilet habits. And to be clear, highlighting 'bum meet seat' in this way and context is undeniably mocking.

@gardenbird48 that reminds me of teenage boys attitudes to periods at secondary school.
I never got on with towels and used tampons. Obviously I didn't shout this around but word got around. Cue awful sneering comments and Buffster is a dirty slut etc.
If you'd have added them actually being able to go in there I most certainly would have stopped attending school.
Until period shaming stops men have no business in women's facilities.
I realise it's gone back to toilets like a boomerang. What's up with that?