BBC responds to backlash to article about lesbians being pressured into sex by some trans women

[FindTheTruth]

BBC spokesperson said: “The article looks at a complex subject from different perspectives and acknowledges it is difficult to assess the extent of the issue.

“It includes testimony from a range of different sources and provides appropriate context. It went through our rigorous editorial processes.

“It is important that journalism looks at issues - even where there are strongly held positions. The BBC is here to ensure debate and to make sure a wide a range of voices are heard.”

attitude.co.uk/article/bbc-responds-to-backlash-to-article-about-lesbians-being-pressured-into-sex-by-some-trans-women-1/26090/

[ClaudiusTheGod]

@aliasundercover

In which case they are not straight men.

I agree. This seemed blindingly obvious to me.

[Linguini]

Looks like a fluff piece of PR for an American/Canadian dating site. Guess they're trying to attract the UK market via the BBC.
Good luck to them, I hope it's a great success, but I did think the BBC weren't supposed to do ads.

But I wonder whether this article was done as an act of balance to the original article
Not sure, before the cotton ceiling article the BBC were running loads of pro-TRA "most marginalized and vulnerable" trans stories. This is basically normal for them. The cotton ceiling article was an exception.

[BootsAndRoots]

Yes, not strictly the opposite, although whereas the original article was about lesbians who refused to date TW (or men who self-identified as women and pretended to be trans), this is about transwomen who want to date heterosexual men.

It's a nice story and as people say it shows how a third space can work. I know the Super Straight meme came from heterosexual men being called transphobic for not wanting to date transwomen, and the third space helps deal with that.

But I wonder whether this article was done as an act of balance to the original article, and because how we know that organisations have produced a rulebook on how journalists should report on trans issues, the article focuses on what people see as the stereotypical transwoman (ie a gay man who transitioned to being a woman attracted to men), and not on the men (like the bearded men who claimed to be trans) from the original article.

[Rainbowshit]

That's the way it should be. Transwomen on dating apps should be upfront and honest. Anything else is leaving themselves open to heartache and possibly assault, and also not fair on prospective partners.

[Igmum]

Agree. This isn't the opposite, it's a nice story about a couple plus a plug for a couple of apps. And absolutely yes to third spaces. It is so good to see this handled in a positive way, no threats against others and no condemnation of lesbians. Let's have more third spaces please

[nauticant]

Maki Gingoyon, based in the Philippines, runs the dating website, My Transgender Date, with her partner, Cyril Mazur. Maki says that when the site started in 2013, 1.5 million profiles were set up immediately, but only a few hundred people were active. Eight years later, the number of active members has risen to 120,000, and a growing number of straight, young cisgender (non-transgender) men seeking trans partners now feel confident posting their photographs.

It turns out that third spaces can be created and they can work. Part of the success seems to involve engaging with material reality. Let's have more of this kind of thing.

[TurquoiseBaubles]

It seems that they want to start a dating app for transpeople and those who want to date them. I think that's a fantastic idea.

Now can lesbians have their dating apps/groups/spaces back please?

[Plasmodesmata]

I don't think that article was an opposing view. No lesbians involved, for a start.

[Livelifeinthebuslane]

Isn't this why it would be better for transwomen to be transwomen (and same for transmen) so people can opt in or out of wanting to date transpeople? It probably wouldn't get rid of all the abuse (which I note is coming from men) but it should reduce it from those men who are looking for a woman not a transwoman.

[allmywhat]

In which case they are not straight men.

Hesitating to say this, but the photos of the couple together in the article unintentionally make that point. They just look like pictures of a gay couple. I doubt this propaganda will persuade anyone but I guess the target audience is TRASs.

[aliasundercover]

she says straight men may slowly be becoming more receptive to the idea of dating trans women

In which case they are not straight men.

[allmywhat]

Seems like the BBC have had to do a story with an opposing view

I was worried when I saw “opposing view!” I was expecting an attack on lesbians. But this story is harmless.

It’s propaganda for the idea that straight men want to date TW, but I think that’s ok. It’s not like TW outnumber straight men and can take over all their groups and meeting places, I think it’s unlikely that pieces like this are going to contribute to a culture of sexual coercion.

[BootsAndRoots]

Seems like the BBC have had to do a story with an opposing view, probably as a direct result of the backlash and need for impartiality:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-60086567

[LobsterNapkin]

@TheMarzipanDildo

The ‘old people=bad’ and ‘young people=good’ is such a Whiggish interpretation of history, which is very
ahistorical in my view. History hasn’t been a constant march of progress. Think about the European witch hunts. The generation before the witch hunters saw ‘witches’ as a bit odd/eccentric/people to keep on the right side of. Even earlier than that the Church was trying to convince ‘witches’ and those who believed they were witches that their superstitions were false. I’d say these were more reasonable views then “burn the witch!”

What's really interesting about this is that the height of this sort of thing was not during the middle ages, it was the early modern period, the return to classical learning, the reformation of the church, the Enlightenment. In a lot of ways the modern period wasn't great for women.

It really does go to show that history is complex and that kind of Whig approach is just immature. But then I suspect many of the people who embrace it wouldn't know a whig if they fell over one.

[allmywhat]

A different individual added that the BBC could provide balance by writing a story that spotlights the “fetishisation of trans women”.^

what an interesting suggestion from the Times article. I totally agree that the BBC could write an interesting article on gynandromorphophilia - I hope that they'd make a point of indicating the extent to which it frequently co-occurs with autogynephilia. I really think the BBC needs to write an article or two about AGP.

[Whatiswrongwithmyknee]

Make it

[Whatiswrongwithmyknee]

That does maritime particularly galling that things are now moving backwards at such a pace.

[334bu]

Apologies if this got posted earlier in the thread, but Youtuber Shaun has posted a video about that BBC article.

Another man desperately trying to deflect from rape of lesbians by some males who identify as women. The point of this article is that lesbian women are being coerced into non consensual sex acts by males who threaten to shame them within their community. Males pressurising lesbians to accept penis is both rape and a firm of " conversion therapy"

[DucksInRowShitHotLawyerLTB]

Apologies if this got posted earlier in the thread, but Youtuber Shaun has posted a video about that BBC article.

[Enough4me]

Unfortunately I think an awful lot of women and children are going to be hurt, and will have to bravely speak up, before legislation protecting women is used to stop selfID men from easy access.

Students love to 'be kind' and don't understand the truth. It's only when it's blatant that they will start to take it in.

[toofer]

Well said. The idea that moving towards a society in which the vulnerable group here - women - are raped with impunity, cancelled, bullied and have our rights removed = 'attitudes towards vulnerable groups improving' really takes the biscuit.

When all the research shows that actually trans people are the safest demographic, while women are murdered at the rate of around 2 per week; while conviction rates for the most serious crimes against women, including rape and domestic violence, have been shrinking in recent years to the point that there is almost no legal recourse for victims, even as the numbers of these crimes are at all-time highs, to be able to write with a straight face that you think attitudes towards vulnerable groups have 'improved' is unbelievable!

And after a week in which the young generation as you pointed out campaigned to get a lesbian feminist professor sacked for daring to discuss women's rights, to claim that this young generation is 'more accepting'?!? Come on now, that is just taking the piss.

You could only write that if you didn't think women were actually people, or that violence against women mattered, at all.

[AlwaysTawnyOwl]

@MargaritaPie

There is still a very long way to go, but my point was that attitudes towards vulnerable and minority groups have improved in the past 50 years. Generally speaking, each generation is a bit more accepting than the one before it.

Pushing an agenda which says that being a woman is a matter of ‘identifying’ with something called ‘female gender identity’ - never defined even by those who say they believe in it - but which is a set of regressive stereotypes of how women should be/behave is not progressive or tolerant towards women. When brave and exceptional women like Joan of Arc are assumed to be transmen because of course being a brave military leader is not apparently part of a female stereotype it takes us all backwards. When female athletes who have trained for years find themselves ousted from a medal by a biological male, or unnecessarily injured in a contact sport, it tells us that male feelings are put, once again, above equality for females. When girls are told that the male indecently exposing himself in the women’s changing room is there legally because he’s a woman, we say women and girls don’t deserve privacy and dignity. Trans ideology isn’t tolerant, it isn’t progressive, it’s a backlash against women’s rights.

[Ereshkigalangcleg]

Yes, exactly.

[Whatiswrongwithmyknee]

@Ereshkigalangcleg

From the Times article:

“The headline of the piece implies that a significant enough number of trans people are sexually harassing women that it deserves to be reported on,” said a young employee. A different individual added that the BBC could provide balance by writing a story that spotlights the “fetishisation of trans women”.

I wouldn't have any objection to such a piece, I imagine reading about male "chasers" would be quite interesting. Nothing to do with women though.

Any such crime deserves to be reported upon. What an awful thing to say. How many policeman pretend to arrest someone in order to take them somewhere and murder them? The scarcity of that does not render it un-newswothy.

[AliceThorpe]

The BBC has a long way to go to redress the harm they have caused by following Stonewalls agenda against women.

I do not understand how medically castrating children and young people, lesbians and autsitic children was ever allowed, let alone is still allowed.