Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Britain needs more trans people in public life, including the Commons

247 replies

Igneococcus · 03/07/2021 05:52

Says Lord Herbert, Boris Johnson's first special envoy on LGBT rights:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0e8d186e-db6a-11eb-8f14-0bb645f59db0?shareToken=8cf210f54c9d71aa462bb34a9c3e2aa7

OP posts:
mrsborisjohnson · 04/07/2021 18:15

Actually, it would be less than 1% transwomen and 1% transmen, as according to the estimates above, trans people only make up around .03% of the UK population (20,000/68,000,000), so 0.015% transwomen and 0.015% transmen would be representative. Strange this insistence on more representation for trans people when they're such a small percentage of the population, when women are over 50% percent of the population and we only have 34% of parliamentary seats (the highest level of representation we've ever achieved, currently). It's almost as if no-one gives a shit about women, isn't it?

toffeebutterpopcorn · 04/07/2021 18:26

Aren’t there more females IDing as trans these days? So there should be more trans males then?

mrsborisjohnson · 04/07/2021 18:51

This reply has been deleted

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

mrsborisjohnson · 04/07/2021 18:54

...If two transwomen were elected, then they'd have 200% representation, the same as if men were to take up 99% of seats in parliament. As having 99% men in government would clearly be unfair, I wonder how they would handle having transwomen so overrepresented in parliament if 2 were elected.

mrsborisjohnson · 04/07/2021 18:57

No idea why my post was just deleted! I was talking about numbers and over-representation.

mrsborisjohnson · 04/07/2021 19:04

To repeat: women need 105 more parliamentary seats in order to give representation that is proportional to our numbers. I quite like being deleted, it means I'm saying something to upset the misogynists, bring it on.

NiceGerbil · 04/07/2021 19:07

Upthread good point.

For transwomen the they represent women and also trans people.

Female people don't have any categories to represent just for females and also no words or stats (in many situations) collected for us.

Interesting...

NiceGerbil · 04/07/2021 19:08

As someone said, a politician.

If parliament was 50/50 men and transwomen then the female population would have equality of representation.

dyslek · 04/07/2021 19:18

Indeed. Id vote for Miranda Yardly or Jenn Smith every day of the week.

NiceGerbil · 04/07/2021 19:22

I don't think they are the right sort of trans people Hmm

Congressdingo · 04/07/2021 22:00

The goalposts move because both my safety and the likely discomfort of others move during transition

But this isnt solely about you.
Question, did anyone ask any/many women before just walking Into our spaces? It appears it was a done deal when the GRA came into being but no one bothered to ask women. Well we say no now, and that's the end of the matter. No discussing if this trans person or that one can enter our prisons, spa or gym changing rooms or our toilets.
Once a man has entered that space( and it's well enough known about) a whole lot of women will not be allowed. And that is unfair to women.

TinyRebel · 04/07/2021 22:49

@Malteser71

I know a trans women who is desperate to get into politics and shouts very loudly.

This person is a lying, self absorbed self publicist. Also not very clever, can’t string a written sentence together and has no idea about the real world.

I can see them going down well in Westminster.

Are we in the same CLP?Wink
Malteser71 · 04/07/2021 23:54

Depends what a CLP is???

NiceGerbil · 05/07/2021 00:17

This whole thing is a really good example of class approach Vs individual approach.

On this thread.

Women saying. What about these girls and this religion and general privacy etc. It's always about the impact on women/ girls as a group.

Response was. I want to do this. I don't see s problem. I've had this and that interventions. I don't want to go with the men. I have earnt it. Etc.

This also comes up with. Women often. Saying things like.

I have a transwoman friend and she's lovely.
I'm happy to get undressed in front of her.
She wouldn't hurt s fly.
I'm never going to be in prison so why would i worry about prisoners.

Etc etc.

A poster once said. Something like. You said you don't play sport. So why do you care?

This I think is also the reason that, as with talking about male violence.

General on average type comments are taken as personal attacks.

Things like. 97% of sex offenders in prison are male.
You can't say that! I'm not a sex offender. Why are you tarring us all with the same brush?

I'm not sure whether it's s genuine reaction. A tactic to derail. Or a combination or something else.

Articus · 06/07/2021 22:18

Further contradictions TWAW so why special rights or representation. That is because they don’t consider themselves truly TWAW but is a mantra to make others accept that as reality only when is convenient.

These truly female people that are not born women but know all about them are so bloody entitled that pretend their interpretation and perception of women is the one that counts.

Once I read a TW detransitioner saying the more s/he wanted to be like a woman the more s/he realised it wasn’t woman like to speak over without listening, without considering impact, with the feeling of entitlement and chasing success s/he was socialised into. This TW was suffering ill health because of choices about transition. And that’s where I still do sympathised with TW and TM. Their path is so different to a biological fact of life, that I cannot understand why those unique issues are not pursued instead of eroding women’s rights and spaces.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 07/07/2021 10:07

and provide gender netural facilities. However, there are currently people and groups who try and remove or prevent the spread of gender neutral facilities, which is just craziness in my opinion.

Only 4% of the people in a recent poll were in favour of having exclusively mixed sex facilities, so there is that.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 07/07/2021 10:14

There is no argument I can see as to why I shouldnt.

There are plenty, whether or not you personally "see" them.

andthedogtoo · 07/07/2021 12:37

@Lonel

Why? We've already had women's officers who are trans and we've been told that there's no difference or conflict of interest. Surely women can represent tw then?
doesn't seem to work that way round for some reason Hmm
Aparallaxia · 08/07/2021 02:09

@NiceGerbil

I don't think you wrote that did you, it was someone else.

Anyway.

You're conflating sex and gender id I think?

Female is sex. Even most (not all!) trans activists agree on that. The ones who are born without a penis. The vulva people.

Sex role/ stereotype is societal. Changes over time. And is different all over the world. They are enforced to varying degrees but are enforced. Those who don't conform are usually seen to be unusual/ different.

I'm not sure what you mean by complicated. Sounds like you might have an internal sense of gender? Dunno.

Our biology is the reason for our oppression around the world and through history. Female is the ones born with a vulva who the vast majority of the time get periods boobs and can get pregnant. No more, no less.

No, I am not conflating sex and gender. Nor am I denying that there are two sexes. Nor do I have an internal sense of gender. I obviously expressed myself very poorly because I wanted to say that I precisely do not have such a sense.

My point was this: Trans women claim to know what it is to be a woman. They have an internal sense of their gender/sex. Now, I have been female, man and boy, for 62 years, a woman for a large chunk of that.. and I haven't the foggiest idea what they are talking about. I can self-identify as female because of my genetic make-up (and, in my case, because I have all the right junk in all the right places). This has not, however, allowed me to build up an inner sense of womanhood. Where does theirs come from? Clearly—or clearly to us—from gender roles in the society in which they have grown up, the gender roles assigned to the sex they don't belong to.

At the same time, I think I believe that the interplay of sex and gender is more complex than you do (i.e. between standing and occurrent individual physiological and psychological states, and societal groups of various sizes, purposes, prestige, interrelations with other groups). It can't be an accident that 97% of violent criminals in the US and UK are male, say. Testosterone! we cry. And yet in hunter-societies, while sneaking-fucking certainly goes on (men who "buy" sex with a woman not their partner in return for a larger share of game the man has brought home; hence there's competition for larger prey, which doesn't benefit the group as a whole), rape is rare, as are brawling, fighting, and murder. Why? We get one gender role (sneaky fucking) and not another (mayhem) in the same group (young healthy males).

Take another example: woman's bodies are changed long-term by motherhood. What does that wash of hormones do to the brain, then? Women abandon their kids far less often than men do. Is that just the internalized touchy-feely nurturing gender role at work on the women who stick around? Or society's external rewards and punishments? Does biology play no part? All all? I think these are genuine questions.

That's all I mean. Nothing sinister, I assure you.

SpindleWhorl · 08/07/2021 02:49

Aparallaxia, that's an astonishingly reductionist view of complex hunter-gatherer-forager societies.

Lonel · 08/07/2021 05:36

Now, I have been female, man and boy, for 62 years
And that's a confusing choice of phrase for this debate! Grin

Is that just the internalized touchy-feely nurturing gender role at work on the women who stick around?
I don't think anyone is denying that nurturing is affected by hormones AND gender expectations. There was a thread on here recently with women saying how less kindly they felt towards children after the menopause.

andyoldlabour · 08/07/2021 08:44

How many transmen are getting involved in politics?

Asterly · 08/07/2021 09:02

“Actually, it would be less than 1% transwomen and 1% transmen, as according to the estimates above, trans people only make up around .03% of the UK population (20,000/68,000,000), so 0.015% transwomen and 0.015% transmen would be representative.”

Hold on. Let me get this straight. This forum is dominated by discussions on the dangers of trans, and there are only 0.015% trans women in the UK. Interesting! Does that make any of you stop and think for a moment?

Helleofabore · 08/07/2021 09:09

Interesting! Does that make any of you stop and think for a moment?

Why yes. Thanks for mentioning it.

It is exactly WHY we are having the discussion. Because such a small group of people has been allowed to have so much impact on the rights of women and children, the language women use to describe themselves, our sports, our employment and education opportunities, our health needs.

Again. Great point! Should be repeated and often.