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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

My teen daughter has burst out crying and gone upstairs because we were discussing Maya Forstater

337 replies

Bryonyshcmyony · 11/06/2021 12:24

It came up on the news and I said something like surely its obvious that biological sex is real. Gender identity isn't the same as biological sex. She said people on tiktok say that there is a chromosomal spectrum. I said if someone has a chromosomal abnormality that's not proof that biological sex doesn't exist. Then she cried, said how frustrated I make her and just wants to live in a world where transpeople are accepted for who they are and its not her job to educate me as - and I quote - an ignorant old person.

I'm actually quite hurt. I don't want her to hate me! Obviously it's just a subject that is completely out of bounds. Anyone else faced similar?

OP posts:
Stopsnowing · 12/06/2021 04:29

My teen daughter thinks I am a transphobe and I know nothing. The intensity of her delusion will wear off eventually. Although I do get tired of her teensplaining feminism to me.

sessell · 12/06/2021 05:48

OP as your DD will be studying philosophy, buy them a copy of material girls by Kathleen stock, who is after all a philosophy professor. It provides a clear deconstruction of gender identity theory in a philosophical way.
I also have 2 teen / early 20s DDs. And this is a banned subject. The youngest has admitted she agrees with me, but still doesn't want to talk about it. The oldest will literally do the 'not listing, hand over ears' thing! I actually have some sympathy with them. Expressing GC views in their peer groups would make them social parriahs. Women and students have been harassed and 'investigated' for expressing GC views. It is dangerous. I hope and believe that now that GC views are protected more people will be comfortable discussing them, there will be a ripple effect and the curtain will fall. We'll look back on this as a kind of madness.

GCandautistic · 12/06/2021 06:11

If it makes you feel any better, my sister was totally in thrall to the gender cult a few years back. She’s not a teen but we had a heated argument where she screamed at me that trans people are the most oppressed demographic on earth and that my views were vile. It just took a couple of months and a bit of referring to the brave beautiful Danielle Muscato who was at the time living in a women’s refuge and she peaked. Now she’s GC and takes the piss out of it all. I have another sister who is also GC. It’s a relief that I have people to talk to about this and that my family have not lost all critical thinking skills.

Eledamorena · 12/06/2021 06:21

It's very frustrating. I'm a teacher and I have to tread carefully about what I say at school.

We had a male student who presented in a very feminine way (I was one of many teachers who assumed he was a girl at first). There was a situation when some younger boys reported him for using the boys' bathroom, assuming he was a girl. Several teachers immediately suggested we talk to him about his gender identity, ask what he would like to be known as etc. I said no way! If he raises any of these issues, then we can address them. But there is no way we can approach a teenage boy and suggest he might like to be known as 'she', just because he's grown his hair, speaks very softly, and hangs around exclusively with girls. It was like people were keen to have the discussion with him. That really worries me.

I was once teaching a lesson about heroes and I deliberately included a picture of JKR on a slide of various women we might look up to (others were Malala, Michelle Obama, Greta Thunberg, Serena Williams etc). I was trying to keep it to women they would all have heard of. I included JKR to see if they would react to the press about her being a transphobe, and sure enough a couple of girls recoiled and said, 'she's not a hero, she's transphobic'. I know they are (were?) both big Harry Potter fans.

I asked them what they meant. They said she'd written terrible transphobic things. I asked them to give me an example. They couldn't. I asked if they'd read her letter. They admitted they hadn't.

We ended up having a discussion about the media and how we need to check our sources, not accept everything at face value etc. I gave them some examples of things JKRhad written in her letter.

No idea if it had any impact but I can't not try!!

My own children are small but I do not look forward to the possibility of them becoming too heavily influenced by this sort of thinking as they get older. We'll have to wait and see...

HPFA · 12/06/2021 07:15

@Beamur

I think the shell of reality around some of these ideas is very thin. Fine when you only discuss it with people who agree with you. Deeply uncomfortable when challenged. I think this is one of the reason it's so upsetting.
This is it exactly. Deep down people on the "other side" know their case cannot be argued rationally so have no other recourse than anger when challenged.

I remember when there were debates on gay rights back in the 00s and don't remember anyone screaming "no debate" or "bigot" or "your words are LITERAL VIOLENCE". You don't have to do that when you have confidence in your argument.

MsTSwift · 12/06/2021 07:27

There is something about this movement that seems to appeal to young girls. The aggressive protectiveness and strong emotions stirred in them on behalf of gender non conforming boys is bizarre. When the reality is it’s the girls themselves that are the ones actually being harassed and treated badly (see recent ofsted / Everyone’s Invited as evidence). It’s most odd.

toffeebutterpopcorn · 12/06/2021 07:33

K-pop? Pretty girls and boys dancing around and being all cutesy?

Zeev · 12/06/2021 07:43

@MsTSwift

There is something about this movement that seems to appeal to young girls. The aggressive protectiveness and strong emotions stirred in them on behalf of gender non conforming boys is bizarre. When the reality is it’s the girls themselves that are the ones actually being harassed and treated badly (see recent ofsted / Everyone’s Invited as evidence). It’s most odd.
It's pretty ironic when you think of it. It's the epitome of female socialisation, to work against your own interests so that you can take care of some males' emotional wants and needs. To do that and at the same time claim freedom from gendered expectations is indeed bizarre.
rabbitwoman · 12/06/2021 07:52

K-pop is the absolute worst. Not least because it seems so funky and fun and frothy.

Now, in the days of Eurotrash there was a lot of debate about the way Japanese and Korean culture deals with sex. How these countries never had a repressive Victorian period in their history. It was so long ago that I have no links or references and am not sure I even remember the main thrust, but something along the lines of, they can be very open and honest about what turns them on so they don't need to produce material masquerading as innocent and harmless which is actually.... Erm.... Not.

Therefore, videos of very cute young women dancing in skoolgirl outfits and singing about innocent crushes are very much taken at face value there - just frothy fun because there is less embarrassment about what DOES turn them on....

It does not translate too well here

I dunno, I might have got that all wrong, but if anyone remembers might make a fascinating thread....

NecessaryScene · 12/06/2021 07:55

There is something about this movement that seems to appeal to young girls.

I was going to post something similar. The vast majority of men won't entertain this bullshit. They may keep quiet at work but they're not afraid of being ostracised by their mates down the pub. I wonder if this is partly because us blokes seem to bond by challenging each other - possibly an evolutionary trait.

This was a question asked of Heather Heying yesterday in the Triggernometry interview - someone (I think male) asking why this stuff seems to appeal more to women, and if there's something evolutionary in it, and is there anything we can do about it?

I forget what her answer was though - I was tuning in and out.

Found it - here's the link. Going to post it before I replay it, so don't know if it's helpful...

NecessaryScene · 12/06/2021 07:58

Okay, yes, do watch that. Heather's on fire.

ChattyLion · 12/06/2021 08:11

On the one hand it’s lovely she’s young and been sheltered enough and lives among sheltered enough peers who can take these very privileged views seriously (and they haven’t yet been forced by bitter experience to develop the radar to identify male sexual entitlement in all its forms). On the other hand, we have to recognise that our kids are growing up in a hostile environment towards females that is new to us if we’re old enough to be their mothers.

Yes, misogyny was everywhere way back when when we were girls and still is but when we were that age, it was in different forms. There wasn’t social media, schools, businesses etc all pushing pornified expectations on us from such a young age and ‘calling out’ on social media - a permanent and highly shareable medium- of girls and women who transgress in any way. These are all at the same time normifying this fake-progressive, anti safeguarding, misogynistic and homophobic, gender identity crap. The tears and panic is the cognitive dissonance our kids feel.
We can all have hope that they’re growing up as sensitive thoughtful young people but the sad side of this specific argument is that there is a strong awareness around this issue (rather than around another social group they could spend their energies on supporting) because there is real fear of what could happen personally to our kids, if they are know to dissent.

I also doubt I could have personally put together a very good argument at that age against an informed adult. I just feel very lucky that people I trusted around me weren’t telling me that night was day in quite the same way. I feel lucky I didn’t have the arena for my public witch trial and my little ducking stool at the ready, carried constantly in my own pocket.

Bryonyshcmyony · 12/06/2021 08:17

I feel lucky I didn’t have the arena for my public witch trial and my little ducking stool at the ready, carried constantly in my own pocket

Wow that's a great analogy. My older daughter hates social media and at 22 has only just reinstalled Instagram and Snapchat because her university uses them so much it's impossible to avoid it. She's annoyed about this. Interestingly she's also very happy, confident and social, loves RL people. 18 year old is always saying she has "social anxiety" like a badge of honour (she doesn't have social anxiety)

OP posts:
ChattyLion · 12/06/2021 08:48

So OP she just needs a few basic tools now and she’ll join more of the dots up herself later. You are not ‘transphobic’ you are happy to see ALL gender non conforming women doing what they like. if some of the women think they are actually male or NB then that’s fine and up to them.

Your daughter needs to know that ‘Gender identity’ is an optional personal belief system separate from, but informed by ‘gender’ ie changing cultural stereotypes of ‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ imposed on both sexes for the purpose of male advantage.

All women gender non-conform in some ways because gender ie‘femininity’ is a virtually impossible standard for any woman to fulfil. This is because its so subjective, culturally shifting and internally radically inconsistent - the whole POINT of gender is it’s a hierarchical trap for women always running to keep up, in order to keep men on top, provided the men fulfil some basic obligations of ‘masculinity’.

So that’s why you agree strongly with your daughter with what she says about the bad old gender norms, that’s why absolutely loads of people of all ages and life experiences think gender is shit. In particular she needs to see that this includes you, one of the ‘old and ignorant’ women who have struggled against misogyny, in your life because of the restrictions and attacks misogyny it makes on you, will do on her, constantly does to all women.

Tell her it’s great that she cares about equality. It’s a great thing that we all need to care about! But the key thing is, equality is for EVERYONE or it’s not equality. That includes for her, you, all women, and every group however they are defined by others or wish to self describe around themselves in relation to any characteristic or belief they hold- not just around biological sex obviously. We are all entitled to have equality together.

And as your daughter has partially begun to see, we don’t have equality yet for very very many groups in society, including women, people of colour, people with disabilities, people who are same-sex attracted and many many more.

Sorting that mess out for the benefit of women, doesn’t include letting in men to women’s spaces and giving them women’s opportunities and doesn’t include not safeguarding girls and women. Because the really problem here has nothing to do with gender identity, it is with some MEN who are well documented to take advantage of any access to girls and women they can get.

However those men identify their gender identity (if they know or care about that stuff at all) is beside the point. Male pattern offending persists after gender identity transition but the key thing to know is in the first place that there IS such a thing as male-pattern offending.

You have sex-based solidarity with transmen and female ‘NB’ people as with any female person who in whatever way doesn’t perform gender to the shifting standards of the day, because we know society does in many ways punish them. Therefore safe zones of whatever kind just for women are essential.

If your daughter can grasp that then she’ll see for herself in time that ‘gender identity’ as it is currently being pushed at her, is a men’s sexual entitlement campaign built on some vacuous man-pleasing shifting sand. Importantly hopefully she will start to feel reassured and inspired that lifelong she herself can have the pleasure, inspiration (and if necessary refuge) of the company of other women.

She’ll come to see its OK to say it’s up to men to put their own fucking broken house in order, it’s not women’s job to do it for them. Men need to do the heavy lifting work for themselves around freeing themselves and their male peers from ‘masculinity’ gender norms. And crucially, that male violence isn’t women’s problem to solve. Making all women less safe doesn’t make some men more safe. That’s not how male violence works. The problem needs to be named and dealt with at source.

Bryonyshcmyony · 12/06/2021 08:56

That is amazing ChattyLion and I have screenshotted it. Thank you so much.

OP posts:
TwistedEyeOfHorus · 12/06/2021 08:58

Old and ignorant? You mean experienced and streetwise, not book-learned or indoctrinated?

My adult children know what I believe: they don't think the same, but they are at least open minded enough to see different opinions can be held at the same.t8me, and a lot depends on the situation of the person holding those views.

I hope this gets sorted between you and your daughter: age and wisdom helps, but getting a working ceasefire will do a lot.

ChattyLion · 12/06/2021 09:53

Sorry Bryony I didn’t mean to put down such a lot of words, I just feel like our kids are so so close to getting it and soon they will. And it will so positive for change for the future when they do. Flowers

TriteMale · 13/06/2021 03:27

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TriteMale · 13/06/2021 03:48

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ALittleBitofVitriol · 13/06/2021 06:38

One thing that helped with my dd was to tell her that I was hurt by her willingness to assume the worst of me (phobic/mean etc) - with no evidence (I asked her to give me an example of when I had been nasty/discriminatory, yeah, she couldn't). Yet she was willing to assume the best of perfect strangers. I asked her why that was, what led her to have that view of me?

I also asked her if accusing her own mum was part of 'being kind.' I asked her if ~certain examples~ were being kind to women.

There was more to the conversation, but these points helped her realise that she had let a certain narrative take the place of her own thinking.

Siblingquandary · 13/06/2021 08:09

I have the reverse of this. My parents are TWAW and be kind and don't see women's concerns as valid. Thankfully my mother doesn't agree with no debate so we've had a civil conversation about it and my father and I have tacitly agreed not to discuss.

When I did talk about my endometriosis, the street harassment I've faced and threatening behaviour from men who refuse to take no for an answer in a nightclub I could see the cogs start to creak a little. Funnily enough I'm not as sympathetic to his feeling that sport doesn't matter and we should just have the best 'people' win etc etc.

I just don't understand why people who claim to be progressive, inclusive and compassionate don't seem to consider women as casualties in all this.

MouseyTheVampireSlayer · 13/06/2021 09:23

Trite male The reason that less dad's are the sahp has nothing to do with turn ons and everything to do with finance. Most men are bigger earners than their partners and so when it comes to maternity leave or career breaks the women takes the hit because it makes financial sense (and also biological sense if you breastfeed) I'd love DH to split the maternity but he earns double what I do despite us training at the same time in the same field. He got up the ladder quicker.
Believe me, the fact he can change a nappy and will take Ds for a morning when baby has been up all night isn't just a 'turn on' it's a godsend.

And women fancy lots of different types of men. Benedict Cumberbatch, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Killian Murphy. Furthermore, if there's over representation of beefy guys it's because directors, who are overwhelmingly male, seek them out.

There's also nothing wrong with fancying beefy guys anyway, apparently Jason Momoa is lovely in real life.

TriteMale · 13/06/2021 14:49

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MouseyTheVampireSlayer · 13/06/2021 14:53

I don't know any women like that. But men who marry women who do that are equally as culpable.

aloris · 13/06/2021 15:59

My teenage son believes TWAW and that I am a hater. His perspective is from the transwomen he talks to online when he is gaming (he began this when the pandemic began; before that he only talked to his school friends online).