Common courtesy, a non-malicious question from a transgender person

[WhiteFlagHeldAloft]

Hello,

I wanted to ask a question that perhaps some of you may have an answer for. This is not intended to be malicious in any way, or to incite a flame war.

I am another person among many who identifies as transgender. My chromosomes are XY, I lived out my childhood and adolescence as a boy and began taking estrogen and testosterone suppressors at age 18. I identify as a woman and ask that others respect me in that identity. I am in a relationship with a woman who identifies as a lesbian, she was born and has lived her entire life as a woman.

I feel the need to clarify who I am before asking my question as the answer to this question is very relevant to me. I rarely leave me and my partners home, and without fail avoid any kind of sex-segregated environment as much as I can. I work from home, so don't have to do much there. I am not a part of any activism. I am not a vocal member of any kind of community, and avoid social media like a plague ridden rat. I have only ever engaged in sexual contact with my present partner, and for fear that I would not be accepted by her I was never the one to initiate such contact. I understand and uphold consent as a universal necessity, particularly as I have experienced sexual violence myself as an adult.

Alright, that's me. There's a lot more to me than that, but for the purposes of the topic at hand I feel its relevant to state the above.

Why is it okay to not be respectful of my wishes with regards to my identity and how am I spoken to? Why is a simple request regarding language when talking to me such an unreasonable demand? Is it not a common courtesy to be respectful towards someone who is being respectful of you? Whenever I mention that I am transgender and was not born a woman, a lot of gender critical people i encounter immediately start referring to me as a man even when they had been referring to me as a woman before. Over the years and pre pandemic I used to occasionally frequent LGBT spaces and still frequent some private LGBT groups online.

I'm not claiming anything about my biology or genetics or trying to argue that ive somehow changed my genetic makeup. I'm upfront about who I am. I have no recourse in situations where someone just decides to remind me in every sentence of how I was born. It might seem stupid, trivial, ludicrous even that it hurts me but it does. I am very aware of how I was born. I am very aware that I am different. I hate everything about how I was born. To be reminded of that constantly, sometimes even aggressively is mentally and emotionally exhausting. I don't understand why, its not as though its so hard to refer to me respectfully. You don't even have to agree with me, you can think I'm crazy or insane or delusional or whatever else. But at the end of the day its still a slight change in how you speak to me. Benign, and inconsequential to you maybe but to me it isn't.

Theres so much hatred in this discussion I feel like its become so polarized to that point that the lives of unrelated individual people are being dragged through the mud for no reason. I don't want to change your opinions on my identity or convince you of anything. I dont want to hurt anyone or make anyone uncomfortable. I just want to be allowed to exist and engage with other people who will respect me. That's all.

So, to reiterate, why is it okay to just outright not afford me common courtesy? Why is it encouraged, even endorsed, by many gender critical people to not give me that respect? I havent done anything to gender critical people. Im not even involved in any kind of activism or social media. I've been dragged into this unwillingly. I just want to live my life and feel free to frequent LGBT spaces where I won't be harassed by virtue of my very existence and nothing at all to do with the content of my character.

The Lia Thomas scandal is a good example. Thomas gets out of the pool after beating second place by 38 seconds and brags how easy it was, they were cruising, not really trying. 38 seconds.

And then confidently declares that their trans status has no impact on their competitiveness.

At the same time tells the world they have the full support of their team.

And then the females in the team start stating that they have all complained and been told they should shut up. So they admit they have been coerced to support this person’s supposed reality.

What is worse? Knowing that you are different, accepting it and accepting that you have chosen that path (in the belief it is your ‘authentic’ path). Or knowing that you are surrounded by people who are just being nice and not really believing your version of reality at all. Because you demand that you are a woman, not a transwoman but a woman. Of course, you don’t know which people are just going along to be nice vs those who fully believe you.

Remember that even the word authentic has been redefined lately.

WhiteFlag

For me the issue is mutual respect. Many transsexuals are happy to accept their natal sex, respect single sex spaces for women and do not call women insulting things like ‘cisgender’ ‘menstruators’ etc. On this basis, socially, then respecting preferred pronouns is fine for me.

But the trouble is the trans activists have ruined all of this. Demanding that women call their rapists ‘she’ that any man capable of saying ‘I identify as a woman’ actually is one, saying they feel ‘unsafe’ when a woman disagrees with them, demanding that everyone uses their pronouns yet calling women ‘cis’ despite being told repeatedly not to. Gate crashing womens sports and depriving female athletes of medals and records doesn’t go down too well either.

TRAs do not seem like males with a problem who just want to be quietly integrated as a woman where possible but smash and grab invaders intent on taking rights women have won for themselves over decades. They are the real enemy.

Good lord, you women have endless patience and consideration. On the other hand, this bloke is your typical goady arsehole.

Merry christmas to all you women x

You are talking to the wrong people op - you need to ask Stonewall and other TR organisations why they pushed too far- why they created slogans like TWAW and ‘acceptance without exceptions’. If they’d said TWATW and allowed women’s groups to join discussions I don’t believe we’d be where we are.

I’m sorry about your mental health problems but plenty of people have difficult lives and they don’t insist that whole groups of the population are impacted by their personal difficulties.

FWIW I would call you by your name. You would be unlikely to be aware of what pronouns I used to refer you by because you wouldn’t be there. I have a right to use my language the way I see fit when you’re not there. I would be polite and courteous to your face if you were to me too. That’s the way it generally works in polite society. If you called me a cis woman or a TERF or said JKR deserved to die in a grease fire then no, I would not use the language you request.

No surprises that the @WhiteFlagHeldAloft hasn't had the common courtesy to come back to this thread, the point of it, as suspected, was to tell women to listen and do what OP demands. That pesky male socialisation and belief that women are second class service humans for the greater good of males never fails to show itself in posters such as the OP, the efforts to couch it and hide it in long winded poor me posts are so transparent it's laughable.

Asks to be shown "common courtesy ", does not have the courtesy to acknowledge any responses to their post.

@soontobe60 I know. I wrote something about that in my later post which you haven't seen yet.

@Funnylittlefloozie

Asks to be shown "common courtesy ", does not have the courtesy to acknowledge any responses to their post.

Always double standards it would seem.

I think Germaine Bunbury would also tell us to think of the women who have previously received strikes and bans on this sort of thread.

@Calmyourselfdown

I appreciate those who have taken the time and have responded in such a detailed, measured way. And for those of you who have suffered abuse at the hands of men, I am sorry that you have experienced that, being no stranger to it myself, in past times. As we have shared our women only spaces with trans women for a long time, mostly without noticing, and without incident (I’m sure there will be some exceptions - there always are), I guess my feeling is that as GRA reform won’t change that, then I will continue to support it.

‘From the outside looking in’, I wish you all a Merry Christmas.

I'm sure many of us do this and absolutely do notice but we don't want to cause a scene. This should not be mistaken for acceptance.

And as expected, OP has disappeared.

knowing that you are surrounded by people who are just being nice and not really believing your version of reality at all

This, I think, is where some of the rage comes from. An identity built on untruths and politesse is not robust and can't endure without a lot of effort and shoring up.

That dynamic makes me think of the Buddhist idea of the 'hungry ghost ', always unsated and always chasing the illusion of desire.

Happiness comes from self acceptance, and someone who has to chase approval and validation all the time is working hard to fool themselves as much as anyone.

So my response to you, OP:

Accept that not everyone will share your views, nor even like or approve of you. We can't control the world or other people, at least not very much. Life is limited and often doesn't go the way we'd like.

It would be a healthier approach to finding peace and happiness, OP.

Wishing you well.
W

I would use your preferred pronouns, of course I would. I might make yhe odd mistake because it's not that simple just turning your perceptions around, but I would do my best. I have aTW friend whom I have known for many years - pre-transition - and I am used to referring to her as 'she/her' and don't make mistakes about her. The same would become true of you if we were to be friend in RL.

When I say TW are men, I am speaking my truth. It includes my friend, and I feel no guilt over that as Iknow that is what she thinks too. She is a man and courtesy and kindness mean that we, who know he r in RL will maintain the fantasy that she is no longer so.

She doesn't refer to me as cis, or to anyone else for that matter. Sheknows that sex doesn't change, so she doesn't see GC as TERFdom she sees it as truth.

If the TRAs/MRAs behaved as she does, we could have a debate, a conversation, be friends, support each other, help each other. That would not appear to be what they want.

Who is sending the death and rape threats, btw? Would you have a nice laid back chat with someone who threatened to kill you or hoped you would die in a grease fire, or who sent you pictures of a baseball bat wrapped with barbed wire. I think you wouldn't.

@Funnylittlefloozie

Asks to be shown "common courtesy ", does not have the courtesy to acknowledge any responses to their post.

Are you surprised? I'm not.

11 pages OP. Be polite and acknowledge the responses.

Ah, just another 'set the bomb off and run away' thread.

Even though it’s a typical post and run thread it’s still good. This sort of thread with sensible responses shines a light on the issue and will help people realise the issues. Own goal for the OP I should think.

Makes it so clear, doesn't it?

Females think it's a conversation as implied, and that courtesy and respect is involved, and self identified women see female people as sisters with skin in the game.

Where as in fact, to be honest, the answer being looked for is 'yes sir'.

It’s the thin end of the wedge. I’m sure an overwhelming majority of people would be happy to call people by their preferred pronouns if it had no effect on single sex spaces.
Using preferred pronouns often indicates that you believe TWAW which gender critical people don’t. It can feel like collusion.
I respect the fact that you acknowledge your biological difference and I would be happy to refer to you by your preferred pronouns but I can also completely understand why some would feel uncomfortable with it.
If the TWAW stance wasn’t so absolute and all consuming, the TWAM stance wouldn’t have to be equally firm.

Ultimately, it boils down to your feelings being hurt vs. women’s rights and safeguarding being decimated.

Right, from now on we clearly need to ignore these sort of manipulative goady posts.

It's really bloody rude of you OP.

Downright discourteous, I'd say. Wag your finger at the wimmins then sod off back to your pooter game....how tiresome and predictable. Still, maybe somebody will read the answers and learn something beyond "be kind".

@Funnylittlefloozie

Asks to be shown "common courtesy ", does not have the courtesy to acknowledge any responses to their post.

Ironic isn't it, and completely unsurprising as the courtesy always seems to be demanded by everyone else, yet not reciprocated. I don't use preferred pronouns as I don't believe TWAW or TMAM. I want to protect women's rights and keep women safe.

I made the huge mistake of coming back to this thread because I thought the OP meant to seriously initiate.. Oh, how dumb am I..... And Happy Xmas!!!

Let's face It, it wasn't really a 'question', was It, OP?

More an instructional wee tantrum.

@NeedsCharging

Practically every thread on this board, on a daily basis.

Name two.

I've seen threads on here from posters criticising work colleagues who use pronouns in their work email signature.