What IS the answer?

[Youdonthavetobegood]

I'm firmly GC with my opinion now, and happy with that. But I have a few questions (hopefully not incendiary but who knows these days) but genuine ones that im not really sure the answer to.

When I've had (heated) debates with friends taking the opposite stance, they often come up with the counter argument to keeping female only spaces, as 'where are raped transwomen supposed to go? Where are transwomen prisoners supposed to go? where are they supposed to go if they are domestically abused?'

And I'm really not sure of the answer. Partly I kind of want to say, well it depends how far on their transitioning they are? Like, do they have a penis still? Can they still rape.women? But that somehow feels a bit crass, particularly in the refuge scenario.

So what is the answer to this kind of pushback? A third space? If so, would there be funding for this? It's not as though I don't have compassion for transwomen who have been raped or beaten, so I'm genuinely interested as to the best solution to this, that doesn't further endanger women, or transwomen (I guess in the case of them being in a male prison and fearing for their safety because they are trans.)

What's the compassionate answer?

A third space. This is what Stonewall should have been campaigning for when they added the T in 2015 (we already have protections for gender reassignment from 2010 and the 2004 GRA in place for 11 years by then.)

Third spaces are something that feminists have suggested for a while. Mind you, that is not for women to have to sort out.

If we're talking about compassion, the victims of Karen White and Katie Dolezal matter more to me than how Karen and Katie deal with male prison.

@ArabellaScott

Third spaces are something that feminists have suggested for a while. Mind you, that is not for women to have to sort out.

If we're talking about compassion, the victims of Karen White and Katie Dolezal matter more to me than how Karen and Katie deal with male prison.

Quite agree

As for the funding issue, Stonewall and Mermaids could do something with their million pound budgets, I expect.

Third space

Yes, third spaces are the answers. These shelters only exist due to the tireless work of countless 2nd wave feminists, now being dismissed as transphobic dinosaurs.

SW could choose to spend its millions lobbying for these spaces, and i have no doubt they would be highly effective, but instead they are demanding that males have access to spaces created by women for women, and that women participate in this with a chorus of validation.

SW has created the fiction that there is only one way to accommodate trans people.

@ArabellaScott

Third spaces are something that feminists have suggested for a while. Mind you, that is not for women to have to sort out.

If we're talking about compassion, the victims of Karen White and Katie Dolezal matter more to me than how Karen and Katie deal with male prison.

Yeah for sure, I guess I was thinking more in the case of those jailed for non violent crimes

When you look at the financial accounts of charities such as Stonewall, it is quite frankly beyond comprehension that they haven't set up these refuges and safe spaces for those they represent who need them. They have out all their might, aggression and energy into campaigning and insisting that women should move over and be "inclusive" rather than doing the much more obvious thing of devising third spaces that are safe and appropriate for tran identifying men.

Whatever the answers to your queries (and there are many potential solutions) they are not the concern of those attempting to keep women and children safe and comfortable. In the same way that the RSPB isn't constantly challenged by their lack of campaigning in behalf of retired race horses.

Yes. Third spaces and definitely not for women to have to organise.

Maybe ask your friends why they support forced teaming when it is female’s who are being harmed having to compromise their well being and safety?

Making provision for transwomen doesn't mean eliminating single sex spaces.

There is plenty of mixed sex provision already. It needs to be in addition to female only. You will find, however, that this third space option is unacceptable to some trans extremists. They require a female only space that only admits them. A third space doesn't validate their gender identity.

Thanks for your comments, a third space does sound reasonable. And the money issue, I hadn't thought about that but of course it makes sense that Stonewall et al could pay for that. I foolishly forget that most rape crisis centres and refuges are charitable rather than govt funded.
This is helpful, thank you, it's good to have solutions for once

Yeah for sure, I guess I was thinking more in the case of those jailed for non violent crimes

What's in that for women?

I guess in the case of them being in a male prison and fearing for their safety because they are trans.

Even a non-violent transitioned male is a male and distinguishable as a male. Why should any female who has suffered trauma from males be put in a position of having to ‘cope’ with a male in a place they are not free to leave?

The solution was NEVER to put them in female prisons. That rests on an agenda that has not been shaped by the needs of females and all about that subset of males.

Your friends are absolutely welcome to fundraise for 3rd spaces as long as they don't take money from underfunded women's services.

@Helleofabore

Yes. Third spaces and definitely not for women to have to organise.

Maybe ask your friends why they support forced teaming when it is female’s who are being harmed having to compromise their well being and safety?

As you know, many hitherto thoughtful and intelligent women have a blind spot when it comes to this issue.

But I'm glad to be able to have a sensible solution. It definitely isn't for women to sort out, of course, but contrary to the TRAs assumptions, I do come to this debate from a perspective of compassion for anyone who is unfortunate enough to be raped or abused. Glad there's a workable solution. Obvs the TRAs ideology would never allow it, but it's a solution that sits right with me

@ArabellaScott

As for the funding issue, Stonewall and Mermaids could do something with their million pound budgets, I expect.

This

Helen Joyce put it quite succinctly in an interview.
" We have to win"

Interview on Free Speech Nation with Helen Joyce

It's not possible to change sex. So if trans women are uncomfortable being male, then maybe society can find a way of dealing with that. But there is absolutely nothing women gain by allowing men into their single-sex spaces - nothing at all. And quite a lot to lose.

This isn't the gotcha that people think it is, given women - and the women's movement - has been asked the same question about men approximately 895 times daily since 1971.

The answer is, as it has always been, campaign and fundraiser for your own spaces - men's spaces for men, trans-inclusive spaces for trans people. Crack on, we will cheer you on for the sidelines. But our focus and energy is on supporting women. We're not doing the labour for you. You didn't do it for us.

If transwomen are moved to women's prisons because they are vulnerable in men's prisons, then surely gay men should be in women's prisons, as should small men, and possibly unwell men, and young men who are there for non-violent crimes, and possibly men with special needs (autistic, for example) as all these groups are particularly vulnerable in men's prisons.

Do we then need a third prison for particularly vulnerable women? Who decides which women go in there, and which are robust enough to go with the vulnerable men.

It's such a complex issue

Or we could divide on sex lines and ensure that there is space in women's prisons for particularly vulnerable women and space in men's prisons for particularly vulnerable men.

Or we could divide on sex lines and ensure that there is space in women's prisons for particularly vulnerable women and space in men's prisons for particularly vulnerable men.

Strange how simple it really is.

I guess I was thinking more in the case of those jailed for non violent crimes

Prisons are interesting as it is the State who has an obligation to safeguard all the prison population irrespective of their crimes.

They cost money and the general population will never be motivated to improve living conditions for a tiny minority of the minority community (all prisoners).

One of the obligations is to provide inmates with social interactions. Isolation is recognised as a form of torture.
By committing a person to prison the State mandates that the prisoner will provide social companionship to the other inmates.

The State had decided that single sex provision was a good risk mitigation to prevent inmates commit sex based crimes against other inmates.
Most prisons operate at or over capacity.
Many prisons don't provide single occupancy cells.

Ireland has legalised self ID filling in a paper obliges the State to recognise the individual as the opposite sex (GRC).

2 women's prisons 12 mens prisons.
Legislation says males go to a male prison females to a female one.

Take a female, decided to avail of the legal right of State recognition of being male and convicted of failing to pay a fine for a nonviolent offence, where should the inmate be house to serve the prison term.

"When I've had (heated) debates with friends taking the opposite stance, they often come up with the counter argument to keeping female only spaces, as 'where are raped transwomen supposed to go? Where are transwomen prisoners supposed to go? where are they supposed to go if they are domestically abused?' "

Where do your friends think women who've been raped and domestically abused, and are they aware of how those places came into being?

There have never been enough refuges, and we don't have to go too far back to when there were none at all. The first refuges were set up by women for women, with ZERO government (local nor national) funding. IIRC the very first was in 1971 in Chiswick where the council rented out a derelict building for a peppercorn rent to a local women's lib group. All the money, all the beds, all the bedding, food etc. were funded by the women. It was real hand-to-mouth stuff.

I'd be asking your friends why the trans community is not doing this. They'd even get government funding these days! Why are they nor organising and fundraising to make these refuges happen? Why is Stonewall not doing this with all their money and organisation and contacts?

Why are women expected to give up yet another had-fought for and still underfunded emergency facility?

And what do they think it's like for the traumatised women and children in these refuges having a male in there?

where are raped transwomen supposed to go?

Where are raped men supposed to go?
Many men in prison will have been victims of rape by other men but nobody is advocating for them to be placed in female prisons. The solution is simple, make male prisons safe for all male prisoners no matter their gender identity.