Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Who is the most vulnerable to domestic abuse and violence? Women or trans women?

103 replies

rabbitwoman · 06/03/2022 10:42

In the wake of SMP Robison's statements in Holyrod this week, I have seen so many people up and down twitter (and once in a real life conversation) that trans women are more vulnerable to domestic violence and abuse than women.

I am wondering exactly where this comes from and why it is said so confidently.

Does no one ever question it when they hear it? Just a very quick bit of mental maths shows me this is nonsense, knowing as I do dozens of women who have been victims of abuse and domestic violence, but I only know three trans women altogether.

How does this maths stack up, is it just an outright lie with no evidence or is there actual evidence and statistics to back it up? Because next time someone trots it out I would like to be able to rebuke it....

(although if it is true, surely that's a very concerning trend that we should be a lot more aware of?)

OP posts:
Helleofabore · 06/03/2022 10:46

I would like to hear the answer to this too rabbitwoman

rabbitwoman · 06/03/2022 10:52

Someone has zipped me this which is impenetrable to me:

ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2020.305774

However, saying a trans person is 2x more likely to suffer intimate partner violence than a woman does not mean MORE trans woman need support than women?

Also, we know that many trans people call dead naming, misgendering and generally refusing to believe that they are of the sex they claim to be actual violence, so is this included in the definition of intimate partner violence in this study?

OP posts:
AlisonDonut · 06/03/2022 10:54

This is why they started with the 'report hate crime' thing where every thing is 'transphobic' and anyone who questions anything is committing a 'hate crime' so that the recorded stats would add up and it would look as if 'transphobic hate crime' is through the roof.

Whereas it is 'misgendering' or sticking they are mainly reporting, it will just show as a hate crime not as simple linguistics. And thus trans women become victims as much as women are.

Whereas women are actually being raped, assaulted and murdered, most of which isn't ever recorded or even reported as the police do nothing when it is a woman who is a victim. They have to die to even get on the stats.

PrawnofthePatriarchy · 06/03/2022 10:56

Women are weaker than men, which is why most DV is committed by men against women. Being male, TW are therefore far less likely to be the victims of DV than women. It's a no brainer.

wingscrow · 06/03/2022 10:57

I wasn't aware this was a competition...

Domestic violence is unacceptable whether it affects women, trans women or men.

That's what we should focus on.

AlisonDonut · 06/03/2022 10:59

@wingscrow

I wasn't aware this was a competition...

Domestic violence is unacceptable whether it affects women, trans women or men.

That's what we should focus on.

And how do we do that exactly?
Worrysaboutalot · 06/03/2022 11:07

Well there are an estimated 30 million women and 300,000 transwomen in the UK.

(1% of the population 600,000 transpeople divide in half to get transwomen ignoring enby etc for this sum)

845, 734 cases of domestic violence reported yearly in the UK. According to <a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/domesticabuseinenglandandwalesoverview/november2021&ved=2ahUKEwiI6pXGqLH2AhWIYMAKHYMWASMQFnoECCEQBQ&usg=AOvVaw10IFnb1u7h4Kl74ug1ZOpl" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">ONS

Even if EVERY case of domestic violence was against women and transwomen (hence ignoring male victims) AND every transwomen was a victim of domestic violence.

Then 545,734 women victims and 300,000 transwomen victims is the maximum options.

So at the most trans friendly approach there is double female victims than transwomen and we all know the real figures will be a higher percentage of women by a massive margin.

Lookimg at deaths, for example yearly around 120 to 140 women are killed by a male usually domestic violence in the UK. Yet not a single UK transwomen has been murdered in years.

Plus Fair Play for Women did that stats analysis showing transwomen were safer than woman and other men.

HouseOfGoldandBones · 06/03/2022 11:09

All violence is unacceptable.

Asking women to act as human shields to some men, to protect them from other men is unacceptable.

Asking women to open up their spaces to some men who feel entitled to not respect women's boundaries is unacceptable.

Bullying women who say no to sharing women's spaces with men is unacceptable.

The issue is male violence. Removing the safeguards we have won't remove male violence, it just makes it easier. That is unacceptable.

EmbarrassingHadrosaurus · 06/03/2022 11:19

To use a well known example, Grace and Daniel Lavery have published photographs and descriptions of actions that would read as IPV (albeit volitional in the public depiction, presumably).

That is a paper that is desperately in need of a plain language summary. The abstract doesn't report some information about the relationship dyads/whatever and the comparators so it's difficult to interpret the information without those and other variables/confounders.

Sonia Sodha has a good piece about MVAW today:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4497942-Sonia-Sodha-MVAW-is-about-more-than-toxic-masculinity

MarshmallowSwede · 06/03/2022 11:22

This reply has been deleted

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

FunnyTalks · 06/03/2022 11:24

@wingscrow

I wasn't aware this was a competition...

Domestic violence is unacceptable whether it affects women, trans women or men.

That's what we should focus on.

Well yes. In the short term violent males should be prevented from being violent. In the long term we need to look at why some males are this violent and how to prevent boys growing up to be those males.

In the short term women (who commit very little of the violent and sexual crime) need safeguarding from those violent males. A part of that safeguarding is sex segregation. And yes that means excluding males from some spaces - even your lovely gentle brother /gay best friend who came to your hen do/ transwomen.

Statistics show that males suffer more violent crime in general than females. Transwomen are male so perhaps this is the source of the idea they are more vulnerable to DV? Given transwomen have male bodies so cannot become pregnant from rape and stand a greater chance of fighting back I do question this idea.

It goes without saying that males need protecting from male violence too. But it is blindingly obvious this shouldn't mean including them in female single sex spaces and thus undoing one of the few protections women have.

Females are more likely to be attacked at home, by someone they know. This is simply because these are the women least safeguarded and therefore most accessible to the violent men who know them. Stripping one of the few protections women have against violent males in the name of faux equality would just mean violent males have more access to other women too. That's not progress.

OldCrone · 06/03/2022 11:32

@Worrysaboutalot

Well there are an estimated 30 million women and 300,000 transwomen in the UK.

(1% of the population 600,000 transpeople divide in half to get transwomen ignoring enby etc for this sum)

845, 734 cases of domestic violence reported yearly in the UK. According to <a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/domesticabuseinenglandandwalesoverview/november2021&ved=2ahUKEwiI6pXGqLH2AhWIYMAKHYMWASMQFnoECCEQBQ&usg=AOvVaw10IFnb1u7h4Kl74ug1ZOpl" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">ONS

Even if EVERY case of domestic violence was against women and transwomen (hence ignoring male victims) AND every transwomen was a victim of domestic violence.

Then 545,734 women victims and 300,000 transwomen victims is the maximum options.

So at the most trans friendly approach there is double female victims than transwomen and we all know the real figures will be a higher percentage of women by a massive margin.

Lookimg at deaths, for example yearly around 120 to 140 women are killed by a male usually domestic violence in the UK. Yet not a single UK transwomen has been murdered in years.

Plus Fair Play for Women did that stats analysis showing transwomen were safer than woman and other men.

If you're going to use statistics, you should look at the percentage of women who suffer abuse vs the percentage of transwomen. Using your figures of 30 million women and 300,000 transwomen, if transwomen are suffering abuse at the same rate as women, around 1% of the total should be transwomen, so there would be around 8,000 cases of domestic violence against transwomen and 1 or 2 murders by partners every year.
CatSpeakForDummies · 06/03/2022 11:34

Even if it's true, it's not a justification for putting TW in woman's shelters, it's justification for setting up LGBT shelters.

Women abused by men have v specific needs, they are often financially isolated by having children and have these children in tow. They need to be away from men and protected from these men finding them.

TW will have more in common with domestic abuse in same sex, male relationships. They need help recovering and splitting up, but are unlikely to be in the situation women are with caring responsibilities and no access to money. I can't imagine that being around men is triggering in the same way.

Different needs need different solutions, not to ruin the solution women have found.

OldCrone · 06/03/2022 11:43

This survey is a few years old now, but it has an interesting description of what constitutes domestic abuse of trans people. If the partner of a trans person threatens or attempts suicide or if they self-harm, this is considered to be an act of abuse.

www.scottishtrans.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/trans_domestic_abuse.pdf

80% of respondents stated that they had experienced emotionally, sexually, or physically abusive behaviour by a partner or ex-partner.

A quarter of respondents stated that their partner or ex-partner had threatened or attempted suicide or self-harm as a way to make them do, or stop them doing something. Receiving such threats from a partner or ex-partner can generate intense feelings of guilt and concern for the wellbeing of the partner or ex-partner particularly since suicidal thoughts, threats and actions are strongly associated with mental illness, severe emotional distress, and vulnerability.

sacredfeminina · 06/03/2022 12:15

Imagine of someone identified as a pirate. And he was the only person to identify as a pirate in the UK. Then he was killed. That would mean 100% of pirates face abuse and murder. That is a high percentage!!! Would we then do all we could as a society to stop 'pirates' being killed.

Over 140 women died this year at the hands of men. How many were abused?

So do percentgaes matter, or actual numbers?

zanahoria · 06/03/2022 12:16

I know who is more likely to commit violence

Trans women are males and show no deviation from male patterns of violence.

sacredfeminina · 06/03/2022 12:17

And the point about women being weaker is THE point. Theres a great book called 'The Power' which depicts an imaginery future where women all of a sudden have an electrical surge in their hands which makes them more dangerous and powerful than men. It puts into perspective the power balance.

sacredfeminina · 06/03/2022 12:20

This isnt domestic abuse related, but identifying is a choice, where as being born a woman is not.

Therfore a man could walk through a park at night and choose not to wear a dress or a wig.

A woman cannot walk through a park at night and choose not to be weaker, look female, and ultimately have a vagina.

SamphiretheStickerist · 06/03/2022 12:20

@wingscrow

I wasn't aware this was a competition...

Domestic violence is unacceptable whether it affects women, trans women or men.

That's what we should focus on.

The problem comes when a TW needs post abuse support.

Many arrive at refuges, crisis centres and ask to be admitted - to spaces that are set up by, run by and for women. Many of whom say no, or leave because there is now a man in the service they expect to be single sex.

The competition arises due to funding. We, the services, lose funding if we don't accept male bodied individuals.

We lose service users if we do.

So I shan't apologize for wanting the truth, meaningful statistics, real data, to be used.

Nor will I apologise for loudly combatting the lies, obfuscations, emotional blackmail and at out threats made by those who don't care about the effects gender ideology has on women.

JaninaDuszejko · 06/03/2022 12:48

I know I've seen statistics that show gay men are the only group of men to be the victims of sexual violence at anything like the same rate as women. I wouldn't be surprised if the stats for transwomen are similar. Men police male feminine behaviour aggressively. But transwomen shouldn't be allowed in women's refuges any more than gay men should be.

TinselAngel · 06/03/2022 13:00

This idea that trans women are more prone to domestic abuse is a deliberate campaign to isolate trans widows.

Who do you think it is being alleged are the perpetrators of this abuse against trans women? It can only be us.

Look up Scottish Trans Alliances report about domestic abuse, and you will see that we are considered to be abusers if we do things such as "refuse to affirm our partner's gender identity" or "misgender". The language of abuse is co-opted and DARVO'd against us in order to silence and trap us.

From the moment that a trans widow's husband announces he is trans, any resistance whatsoever is now framed as abuse. If you don't immediately agree that the father of your children is a woman then you are an abuser.

Why it is that a man should suddenly become more likely to be abused rather than more likely to be an abuser, because of a feeling in his head, is never explained.

Read trans widow's stories and draw your own conclusions about who is most likely to be abusive in this situation.

It's becoming increasingly likely that the law on the Spousal Exit clause will be changed, partly due to completely unsubstantiated allegations made against us, that we deliberately prevent or prolong divorce so our exes can't get GRC's.

Of course the reality of that situation is it's actually more likely to be the trans widow who will be coerced into staying in the marriage longer.

EmbarrassingHadrosaurus · 06/03/2022 13:04

I strongly recommend the Sonia Sodha article about programmes to disrupt behaviour in violent men rather than unsuccessful attempts to fix them.

The issue that underpins domestic violence is that the the greatest physical threat is tends to be from men and that the greatest physical damage sustained tends to be by women. Power asymmetries influence coercive control as another form of domestic violence.

KittenKong · 06/03/2022 13:06

What other group is just so darned desperate to be portrayed a weak and vulnerable, and suicidal? Especially when the whole visual is around baseball bats with barbed wire, fake blood stained T-shirt’s (womens blood supposedly) and threats with guns, nooses and guillotines?

It’s a very odd subculture. I am sure there is a PhD in there…

TinselAngel · 06/03/2022 13:16

What other group is just so darned desperate to be portrayed a weak and vulnerable

There's a reason for that but I'd get deleted for saying it.

KittenKong · 06/03/2022 13:19

I’m sure I’ve got some old books on subculture and psychology from my old student days.

Must dig them out, I definitely remember writing a little social contagion, and conspiracy theory believers (oh yea there is a identifiable ‘type’) when I did my psychology degree.

Swipe left for the next trending thread