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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

JK Rowling article

496 replies

DrDreReturns · 16/03/2022 08:56

Interesting read. I know it's from a Conservative site but it seems only the right are gender critical at the moment.

www.conservativehome.com/highlights/2022/03/profile-j-k-rowling-striving-to-stop-starmer-nailing-his-colours-to-the-fence-on-trans.html

OP posts:
Thread gallery
18
VestofAbsurdity · 17/03/2022 14:32

@Ereshkigalangcleg

There will then be no name for those groups which are oppressed on the basis of their sex.

These people don't remotely care.

Or the basis of their sexuality or their disability, wonder when we'll get onto race and religion and you are quite right Eresh these people don't remotely care which says all you need to know about them.
Thumpsquids · 17/03/2022 14:33

refusing to date a trans woman solely because she's trans is transphobic.

I'm a straight male. I wouldn't not date a trans woman because they're trans. I wouldn't date them because they're male.

MrsOvertonsWindow · 17/03/2022 14:38

Anyone can say no to sex at any time, for any or no reason (except you must date someone you're not attracted to if they're trans cos otherwise it's transphobic).

Imagine saying that on a feminist board full of women Sad Mind you, imagine saying that anywhere ...... Confused
It's coercive control writ large.

nepeta · 17/03/2022 14:42

@MrsOvertonsWindow

Anyone can say no to sex at any time, for any or no reason (except you must date someone you're not attracted to if they're trans cos otherwise it's transphobic).

Imagine saying that on a feminist board full of women Sad Mind you, imagine saying that anywhere ...... Confused
It's coercive control writ large.

This, too, is an area where erasing the body gets us into a real conceptual mess. If we are supposed to be sexually attracted to, say, gender presentation, then no Lesbian would be attracted to masculine women, and the idea that people are somehow sexually attracted to gender identification is a no-starter.

Sometimes when I can't sleep I try to figure out the new sexual orientation categories and find them impossible in that I end up going round in circles.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 17/03/2022 14:44

I'm a straight male. I wouldn't not date a trans woman because they're trans. I wouldn't date them because they're male.

Exactly. It's just gaslighting, suggesting you are singling out a woman due to her gender identity, when that is not what is happening at all.

ElaineFuchs · 17/03/2022 14:45

@MrsOvertonsWindow

Anyone can say no to sex at any time, for any or no reason (except you must date someone you're not attracted to if they're trans cos otherwise it's transphobic).

Imagine saying that on a feminist board full of women Sad Mind you, imagine saying that anywhere ...... Confused
It's coercive control writ large.

My goodness, no. Why do you people keep making this reach. There is no exception to "Anyone can say no to sex at any time, for any or no reason".

It seems like most of the arguments you make are pretending I said something else horrible and knocking that down. I don't think I could have been clearer about my thoughts on consent.

SamphiretheStickerist · 17/03/2022 14:47

I hardly know where to start with that reverse double think.

@ElaineFuchs it was well covered here and elsewhere at the time. I'll have a Search and find a thread or so for you. But really, you could just take my word for it, look, this came out of it!

lilymaynard.com/lesbians-on-chairs-the-event/

Please show me a credible survey of LGB communities showing any significant support for transphobia...

Erm, you seem to have reverse ferreted that. Nobody here would, LGB or straight, would support transphobia. We aren't. We just want wmen's rights not to be devalued.

JanetPluchinsky · 17/03/2022 14:48

Cant you see that you are completely erasing sexuality as a reality?

Sexualities CANNOT exist if you are insisting peoples actual sex doesn’t matter.

It’s not just homophobic, it’s insulting to everybody.

‘Lesbians’ who date TW are bisexual. So you’re neatly erasing all three sexualities, tied up in a nice little bow of ‘progression’. It’s grotesque.

SamphiretheStickerist · 17/03/2022 14:53

I don't think I could have been clearer about my thoughts on consent.

Well, you have made some self contradictory statements.

A "trans exclusionary event" might include any GC march/protest for example, they're all very poorly attended! If there is such widespread support for the movement, then there's no reason for public engagement to be so frail.

So a march for breast feeding mothers wouldalso be trans exlcuionary?
A kid's march for more sprinkles on a a McFlurry?
A men's march for more prostate screening?

Or is it just anything women might want to march?

And poorly attended? Frail? You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about! Try reading round some of the 2019 threads, just before Covid hit. There were any number of women's meetings being threatened, cancelled because of threats, women being harrassed on their way in and out. Masked men, banging on doors and windows, shouting threats whilst the police just looked on, We were not fucking frail, we were being deliberately terrified.

PurgatoryOfPotholes · 17/03/2022 15:05

In the same way that refusing to date someone because they're black is racist, refusing to date a trans woman solely because she's trans is transphobic.

You're lumping some ideas together there. I wonder if there are many black women who are upset at the idea that members of, for example, the BNP won't "date" them.

I don't know if you actually know any black women, but no woman I know is so lacking in self-respect that she wants a white racist, who doesn't see her as a fully equal human being, sticking his penis in her, and then saying "I'm not racist- I have a black girlfriend". Nor do they want to have mixed race children with a man who will never be on his kids' side when those children experience racism growing up. In fact, avoiding that type of man is more of an issue, because some racist men get off on the idea of fetishising and fucking black women. There is an entire sort of porn devoted to it.

There are also racist white women who fetishise about fucking black men. In my own experience though, straight black men are just like straight white men- they don't seem to care nearly as much as women do about whether the person they're having sex with tonight respects them. Nor do they worry that racist sexual partners will pressure them into sexual acts they find too extreme.

So what is it about "trans women" that means they want to be dated by women who don't want to date "trans women"? Why are you raising the subject of racism when they're behaving nothing like black women?!

Actually, let's not be coy here. "Date"? Are these "trans women" really upset that they're not being asked out to the cinema? Or is it that they are truly desperate to go to an Italian restaurant?

No, they're angry that some women have looked at them and thought, "I could never find these people sexually attractive. I would not feel sexual excitement and arousal. My pulse rate would only increase in panic. I would not gasp in excitement as we undressed each other. My vagina would not lubricate, it would not experience tenting (the internal equivalent of a male erection- look it up), and no matter how I closed my eyes and pretended it was someone else doing it, I would never ever approach having an orgasm myself. I do not want to spend an evening getting that person to experience sexual satisfaction, with my hands, mouth or vagina, and I certainly don't want to risk pregnancy".

How many sexual encounters does a lesbian have to have with a "trans woman" before she gets awarded a lifetime Not a Transphobe Badge and can get on with pursuing mutually fulfilling sexual relationships with women who make her mouth go dry?

ElaineFuchs · 17/03/2022 15:27

@SamphiretheStickerist

I hardly know where to start with that reverse double think.

@ElaineFuchs it was well covered here and elsewhere at the time. I'll have a Search and find a thread or so for you. But really, you could just take my word for it, look, this came out of it!

lilymaynard.com/lesbians-on-chairs-the-event/

Please show me a credible survey of LGB communities showing any significant support for transphobia...

Erm, you seem to have reverse ferreted that. Nobody here would, LGB or straight, would support transphobia. We aren't. We just want wmen's rights not to be devalued.

Sorry, I'd still appreciate seeing it for myself. I find it very hard to believe that it wasn't for some transphobic statement or attire.
ElaineFuchs · 17/03/2022 15:29

@PurgatoryOfPotholes

In the same way that refusing to date someone because they're black is racist, refusing to date a trans woman solely because she's trans is transphobic.

You're lumping some ideas together there. I wonder if there are many black women who are upset at the idea that members of, for example, the BNP won't "date" them.

I don't know if you actually know any black women, but no woman I know is so lacking in self-respect that she wants a white racist, who doesn't see her as a fully equal human being, sticking his penis in her, and then saying "I'm not racist- I have a black girlfriend". Nor do they want to have mixed race children with a man who will never be on his kids' side when those children experience racism growing up. In fact, avoiding that type of man is more of an issue, because some racist men get off on the idea of fetishising and fucking black women. There is an entire sort of porn devoted to it.

There are also racist white women who fetishise about fucking black men. In my own experience though, straight black men are just like straight white men- they don't seem to care nearly as much as women do about whether the person they're having sex with tonight respects them. Nor do they worry that racist sexual partners will pressure them into sexual acts they find too extreme.

So what is it about "trans women" that means they want to be dated by women who don't want to date "trans women"? Why are you raising the subject of racism when they're behaving nothing like black women?!

Actually, let's not be coy here. "Date"? Are these "trans women" really upset that they're not being asked out to the cinema? Or is it that they are truly desperate to go to an Italian restaurant?

No, they're angry that some women have looked at them and thought, "I could never find these people sexually attractive. I would not feel sexual excitement and arousal. My pulse rate would only increase in panic. I would not gasp in excitement as we undressed each other. My vagina would not lubricate, it would not experience tenting (the internal equivalent of a male erection- look it up), and no matter how I closed my eyes and pretended it was someone else doing it, I would never ever approach having an orgasm myself. I do not want to spend an evening getting that person to experience sexual satisfaction, with my hands, mouth or vagina, and I certainly don't want to risk pregnancy".

How many sexual encounters does a lesbian have to have with a "trans woman" before she gets awarded a lifetime Not a Transphobe Badge and can get on with pursuing mutually fulfilling sexual relationships with women who make her mouth go dry?

Here's the thing. one can:
  • hold bigoted opinions about trans women and treat them like men
  • not be transphobic

But one can't be both.

nepeta · 17/03/2022 15:32

Elaine Fuchs, could you elaborate on what 'men' are in this context?

Ereshkigalangcleg · 17/03/2022 15:33

Here's the thing. one can:

  • hold bigoted opinions about trans women and treat them like men
- not be transphobic

But one can't be both.

Just like one can refuse to accept the existence or validity of exclusive same sex attraction
Or not be a homophobe

But not both

Ereshkigalangcleg · 17/03/2022 15:34

I think we are getting to the point where calling someone transphobic is on the same level as calling them "mean" or telling them to "be kind".

334bu · 17/03/2022 15:38

**Just like one can refuse to accept the existence or validity of exclusive same sex attraction
Or not be a homophobe

But not both"

👏👏👏

VestofAbsurdity · 17/03/2022 15:38

ElaineFuchs Transwomen are men, they are of the male sex and man refers to an adult male human. It is impossible for a woman to be a transwoman because they don't meet the defining criteria of being of the male sex.

A lesbian is same sex attracted therefore perfectly entitled and right to treat men, however they present or identify, as being members of the sex to which they are not attracted. Not bigotry or transphobia just plain bog standard reality and protected in law.

DomesticatedZombie · 17/03/2022 15:39

So you're saying that refusing to have sex with a transwoman because said transwoman is male is 'bigoted'? You're actually going there?

Well, at least it's illustrative for all those people who keep telling us that nobody really says these things.

MrsOvertonsWindow · 17/03/2022 15:40

Madam Bunbury really had the right idea. A poster who from the outset presents gc feminists as "aligned with people wishing to roll back abortion rights, promote misogynistic viewpoints and homophobia" while posting views that advocate coercive control is likely not to be posting in good faith.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4267555-Bunburys-Thirteenth-edition-unlucky-for-some

DomesticatedZombie · 17/03/2022 15:40

For anyone who doubted the truth of the BBC article on the matter - here we have someone who is actively supporting exactly the ideology described therein.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-57853385

Ereshkigalangcleg · 17/03/2022 15:40

Well, at least it's illustrative for all those people who keep telling us that nobody really says these things.

Yes, this is here, and it's also being talked about in court in relation to Maya Forstater today.

Artichokeleaves · 17/03/2022 15:41

Ah.

So if I perceive a biological male as a biological male and refuse to have sex with them on the grounds that I exclusively am sexually attracted to biological females, I'm doing something wrong?

Is there some brainwashing course I can go on to train myself into tolerating this unwanted sex with the biological sex I don't find attractive, don't want to have sex with but apparently have to force myself into learning to like or go to hell or something?

And how is this not conversion therapy? You know, actual conversion therapy?

This is trying to train gay women to be straight for the benefit of males, while totally dehumanising those women. You do realise that? It does not matter how often you repeat 'but I'm not saying have sex with people you're not attracted to and don't want to' - this is in fact exactly what you're telling me as a lesbian.

The ability to say no to someone on the basis of not being attracted to any member of their sex cannot exist alongside expecting a homosexual woman to provide sex to male people on the basis of their gender identity.

It's like single sex spaces for females cannot exist at the same time as permitting male people to enter all spaces at will based on their choice and preference.

Just pretending this conflict does not exist does not achieve anything. And it's very very noticable that the conflict is being avoided instead of faced up to because avoiding it favours male people and meets their choices and preferences and needs at the expense and silencing and vanishing of female ones. The inequality and sexism is stark.

DomesticatedZombie · 17/03/2022 15:41

'Is a lesbian transphobic if she does not want to have sex with trans women? Some lesbians say they are increasingly being pressured and coerced into accepting trans women as partners - then shunned and even threatened for speaking out. Several have spoken to the BBC, along with trans women who are concerned about the issue too.'

DomesticatedZombie · 17/03/2022 15:42

I think you will 'learn to cope', Artichoke, wasn't that the phrase?

Helleofabore · 17/03/2022 15:43

A "trans exclusionary event" might include any GC march/protest for example, they're all very poorly attended! If there is such widespread support for the movement, then there's no reason for public engagement to be so frail.

That is hilarious! That is such a bad take.

For a start 'Elaine', you must realise that there is trans people in the UK who agree fully that people cannot change sex, that females need single sex spaces and if they are male they will respect those places, and that same sex definitions are just that.... same sex.

That you think you can write such a statement that any 'GC' (how many people here even accept the label 'GC'?) march or protest is 'trans exclusionary' is demonstrably false. There are in fact, several regular posters on MN FWR who are trans and who agree with many of the issues we discuss. Maybe even as much as some posters you are labelling as 'GC'.

It is really remarkable to see the dissonance in action on this thread.

Then to say 'they are all very poorly attended!' is also hilarious and really ignores several things. Firstly that many people who would like to attend these events have child care issues meaning they don't have the freedom to attend. Secondly, women are being doxxed and also attacked at these events so clearly there is a threat involved with attending. Hence also why women are using anonymous forums and social media to discuss this issue.

And if you require 'proof' of attacks -

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4503517-manchester-mvagw-vigil-and-woman-beaten-up

This is from this weekend.