Rights Conflict - simple explanation?

[BreatheAndFocus]

I need a bit of help, please. I was texting with an old friend from school and they mentioned something about trans people (sorry for vagueness, trying not to identify them if they’re a MNer) and “how ridiculous some people are, saying there’s a conflict between trans’ rights and women’s rights”.

I started pointing out a few things, but it soon became clear, they had no real idea about the issue and genuinely saw it as a few bigots just being hateful for no reason.

So….how do I explain the rights conflict simply in a few sentences? I know that if I go in all guns blazing, they’ll get the hump and switch off. They also don’t like not knowing things so any specific references will be rejected if they don’t know about them and the conversation will be closed down. I want to keep the tone light and casual, but sum up the rights conflict simply, briefly and clearly.

Any help welcome! TIA

Does your friend believe that rights can conflict? Some people seem to think that the only reason they ever conflict is that someone is wrong but won't admit it. Use an example from a different topic area such as my right to extend my property and your right to sunlight/ view and so on. Establish the principle that it is possible for rights to conflict first and then draw a parallel with something like sports or youth hostels. Or changing rooms.

I don’t bother arguing whether “trans women are women”. It’s an issue of faith, pointless to disagree, like arguing over whether there’s a god or not.

I go straight to the fact that with gender self-identification (which isn’t the law but is being allowed anyway), every man is allowed into women’s single-sex spaces. And the men who want this most, other than trans women, will be sexual predators. Obviously.

How can the right of females to a single sex space exist at the same time as the right of a male to enter which ever sex space they wish?

How can the right of a female to a same sex examiner having been raped co exist at the same time as the right of a male to be treated in every situation as if they were in fact female?

And the one up thread: to believe this lunacy you have to believe that it is justified and righteous that some females lose access to any spaces, groups, resources, facilities, services, care, (that they pay equal taxes for), so that males can have their preferred choice in the moment from the entire menu of available choices.

And if you believe that you're a male supremacist.

Perhaps in this situation it is enough to say: many women don't want to accept males into their spaces, so even if I don't mind there are others who don't want that, many for good reasons. The reason might be religous, or having experienced assault previously, or just feeling that you are being gaslit and being forced to pretend something that you don't believe. So it isn't ridiculous to feel any of those things. If you have a daughter, how do you explain that she is a girl and what does being a girl mean? How will she learn to move in the world in a safe way if you can't be clear about what being a girl means?

Tell your friend that transwomen already have exactly the same rights as every other male in this country so what other rights does she think these males need, and why does she think that the removal of all female protections should be an acceptable price just to pander to these males demands.

Female spaces are for the safety, privacy and dignity of women, not to provide validation for males who claim to be women. They already have spaces for their sex. How they 'identify' is absolutely meaningless to anyone but them.

@Rodedooda

20% of male offenders in prison are there for sex crimes. For TW it's 50%. And many of them insist it's their right to be in female prisons.

I tried typing out what I said about this stat to a young male relative that got through but typing it out I realised although accurate would likely be deleted for causing menz hurty feelings.

So suffice to say if 50% are in for sex crimes and we all know the abysmally low conviction rate for sex crimes, that means 50% is shockingly horrifyingly high and statistically a proportion of the 50% may also have committed a sex crime and got away with it.

Frankly if you want to know the state of women's rights in the UK there it is.

Women may not mention the sex crimes male people commit against them and risk deletion if they try.

Not because it's not true.

But because it's a truth male people find too hurtful and offensive to be expected to cope with.

Up the bloody revolution. Sick to the back teeth of this.

I'd keep it very simple and low-key. So TW mustn't be discrimated/harassed but name one thing you're uncomfortable with - e.g. sports or being called 'menstruator/cervix haver'.

Sometimes it IS like pie! This is one of those situations. If women give away their slice to anyone who says they are a woman, women have given up their slice to anyone who says they are a woman. Perhaps they didn't want their slice, however the women who gave it up, gave not just their slice, but the slices that belonged to every other woman. Is that their choice to make?

@JoodyBlue

Sometimes it IS like pie! This is one of those situations. If women give away their slice to anyone who says they are a woman, women have given up their slice to anyone who says they are a woman. Perhaps they didn't want their slice, however the women who gave it up, gave not just their slice, but the slices that belonged to every other woman. Is that their choice to make?

Beautiful and such a good response to the stupid rights-are-not--slice argument. It is often wrong in any case as is clear from debates between neighbours on trees and light etc. and also when ultra-Orthodox men refuses to sit next to women on planes and trains.

What does that 50% mean in real world numbers? 10? 20? 6000? 100,000? 250,000? Like 50% of what number? The entire population?

@quack22

What does that 50% mean in real world numbers? 10? 20? 6000? 100,000? 250,000? Like 50% of what number? The entire population?

It's the prison population.

It means the general prison population.

Sex crime convictions overall are committed by 98% male people compared to 2% female people.

In the male prison population 20% of men are in prison for sex crimes.

When you look at men who identify as women who are in prison, 50% are inside for sex crimes.

In the UK.

That translates to what numbers?

83,618 in jail (0.0088% of the general population), 79,749 being men. So 50% of that is 39,874.5 identify as women? Not sure about that .5 half a person but these are my estimates using your stats.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_prison_population

No idea why you think 50% of all male prisoners identify as women, but nevermind.

I think you can find exact numbers here if you have a hunt around.

fairplayforwomen.com/campaigns/prisons/

they had no real idea about the issue
It's always worth repeating the statistics on surgery (or, rather, lack of) because so many people are unaware.

[quote Linguini]No idea why you think 50% of all male prisoners identify as women, but nevermind.

I think you can find exact numbers here if you have a hunt around.

fairplayforwomen.com/campaigns/prisons/[/quote]
Because the only stat given says 50%, doesn't say 50% of what number or anything. When i go shopping and see something with a 50% off sticker on it, i look at the original price, it gives an idea of what the price is (numbers).
What is the numbers used to get the 50%?

I believe the actual Equality Act 2010 specifically addresses the fact that rights can conflict? But IANAL.

@quack22
MOJ figures show that 60 of the 125 transgender prisoners known to be in prison in England and Wales are convicted sex offenders or dangerous category A inmates.
fairplayforwomen.com/transgender-prisoners/

Figures released by the MOJ in 2018 show that half of all known transgender prisoners counted in April 2017 had at least one previous conviction for sex offences.
fairplayforwomen.com/campaigns/prisons/

Given the low conviction rate for sex offences this is a serious safeguarding concern.

It's also helpful to ask what rights trans people don't have - much of this is an American import, where trans identified people were in a different situation. But in the UK trans people have the same rights as everyone else.

Once it's established they already have human rights, and that women indeed have human rights too - it becomes clear that what is being demanded are additional privileges, which is a point at which to suggest that perhaps a better way to consider this conflict is in terms of needs as opposed to rights

Whenever a trans woman is selected for a women’s Olympic team, a natal woman who would otherwise have qualified will lose out. That’s the clearest example I can think of. No one is arguing that trans people should be excluded from sport, the only point of controversy is which categories they should be eligible to compete in and whether new categories are needed.

Also, we know that the protected characteristics do occasionally come into conflict with each other, because those conflicts have ended up in court. I can think of two high profile court battles in which “religion” clashed with “sexual orientation”. One such case was concluded recently after years of legal wrangling.

The simplest explanation is:

How can you uphold women's hard-won sex-based rights if you expand the meaning of WOMAN to include MEN?

It's a total no-brainer.

This is an example a male friend came up with.

"90% of them have penises. So if a transwoman works at an airport doing security checks, and wants to be treated as a woman, won't that conflict with the right of a female passenger to request that she is only patted down at customs by a female member of staff?

"Why does the transwoman have more of a right to search female passengers than the female passengers have a right to refuse?"

@AlisonDonut

There are 3 swimming ponds.

One for males.

One for females.

One mixed sex.

The male one and the mixed sex one were not enough for the males who identify as women, so they got the rules changed and decided the female one was for them.

When women on the other hand decided they identified as men and went into the male pond, they called the police. Even though women are not actually a threat to men

Males want it all but absolutely have to keep women out of their spaces, supported by the law.

Cannot be repeated enough

There can also be conflicts within one and the same person: like the UK lord who decided he was trans and therefore "a woman." Until he realized the title would pass to some other relative, at which point he insisted he was a woman in all respects except for male primogeniture. ... And the judge who heard the case agreed with him! Any conflicts are to be resolved by the male getting whatever he wants right then.

Just need to ask your friend one thing.
“ Is a transwoman female.”?