A new one on me - if we want to call ourselves women we have to provide a definition of the term.....

[rabbitwoman]

Scratching my head over this one, on twitter this evening.....

I think he has given up and gone away now (thank you latriciamcneal)....

...... But the audacity was breath taking.

Is this really where they are at now?

@tabbycatstripy

Sorry: a male and a female they would.

Ok…I was reading your original response 4 times and still confused 🥴🤣 Bit of a fundamental error typo 🤣🤣🤣🤣

It was.

We just have to say adult human female. They understood that when we weren't allowed the vote.

As soon as you mention chromosomes these types will tell you that you have no idea what your chromosomes are or what anyone else's are

True, but then they don’t (generally) know their chromosomes either so how do they claim TWAW?

Obviously roughly half the population have xx chromosomes and are born with a uterus, the question is whether the term ‘woman’ applies to all and only those people, or whether the way people actually use it in practice, and the function it plays in our language, is broader.

If you want to speak more broadly, find new words.

How did we ever survive in the past without memorising a stringent definition of what a woman might be in our everyday lives?

I think this is because most everyone can tell the sex of other people without much effort, and the definitional borderline cases with biological definitions are extremely rare and unlikely to matter much in most cases.

Sexist lawmakers in the past had no trouble writing laws which discriminated against women etc., and employers always knew which job applicants looked like they might get pregnant in the future.

It seems to me that the old definition, i.e., the one we have all been using for a very long time, should not be the one which is to be carefully spelled out. Rather, it is the new definition of 'woman' that needs to be spelled out:

Is it being feminine (passive, submissive etc)? Is it wearing skirts and makeup? Is it having a sexed soul?

Do you mean 'broad' as in it includes more people? Wouldn't a different definition also exclude people as well?

Do you mean you would also include things like ‘a painting of a woman’, ‘a statue of a woman’ etc, Helen?

I can see that a transwoman is in some sense a representation of a woman, without actually being one.

It might be broader, if we meant people with DSDs where they aren’t sure of their sex. It’s not going to be broader because obvious males have female ‘thoughts’ - that doesn’t mean anything, really.

This is a language war

It’s not going to be broader because obvious males have female ‘thoughts’ - that doesn’t mean anything, really.

You either change the definition to 'having female thoughts' or whatever, which would exclude lots of females who don't have those thoughts/feelings/identities, or you add them to the original definition, which means that yes it's broader but the consequence is it's harder to be men than women, because female born people can't be men whereas male people can be women, which wouldn't really make any sense.

Definitions are exclusionary, its time to stop seeing that kind of exclusion as a negative value judgement.

A woman is an adult human female. That is enough.
The problem arises because the mantra transwomen are women has infiltrated the language and muddied people's sensibilities.
A man who says he is a woman could be called a transwoman.
A transwoman is a transwoman.
Transwomen are not women.
Transwomen can have a penis (90%do?).
Women cannot have a penis.

This is why everyone including politicians are scared to answer the question because they have to go against the mantra TWAW or get themselves in a real soon.

Woman: adult human female, female defined as in PP.
Trans woman: adult human with male body and feminine gender.

‘Feminine’ and ‘gender’ being far harder to define with any accuracy, science or objectivity.

@GibbonsGoatsGibbons

As soon as you mention chromosomes these types will tell you that you have no idea what your chromosomes are or what anyone else's are

Had NIPT for DD, so in her case I absolutely new what her chromosomes were at 10 weeks gestation.

knew not new, and surely anyone who has conceived a child together knows what their chromosomes are.

Yeah, okay, you win, I should never have engaged.

It was when they said that if I was a true feminist I would support funding for developing external gestation tanks to relieve EVERYONE from the burden of giving birth that I decided to step back

@rabbitwoman

Yeah, okay, you win, I should never have engaged.

It was when they said that if I was a true feminist I would support funding for developing external gestation tanks to relieve EVERYONE from the burden of giving birth that I decided to step back

Has someone been reading Aldous Huxley as a handbook rather than a dystopian fantasy?

I’m pleased to report that this lunacy hasn’t made its way to my primary school. We teach sex education - men have sperm, women have eggs. End of story.

You either change the definition to 'having female thoughts

But then you would be called upon to explain what a female thought was and why it was different to a male thought

It was when they said that if I was a true feminist I would support funding for developing external gestation tanks to relieve EVERYONE from the burden of giving birth that I decided to step back

I trust you learned an important lesson about many of the people on Twitter

Ereshkigalangcleg

I trust you learned an important lesson about many of the people on Twitter grin

Haaa, nooo.

I know arguing with people on twitter can be frustrating, and sometimes a bit frightening..... But one thing it does is show me, with absolute razor certainty, is that when you start to discuss gender politics their arguments really come apart very quickly.

I have crossed swords on twitter with Grace Lavery, Laurie Penny, Aidan Commerford, Katie Montgomery, and many many more and most are unable to talk about this issue without stooping to the same usual tactics to avoid providing anything concrete to the floor.

And I am always polite, keep my cool, my humour, back everything up with evidence and it's amusing but also very interesting to see how quickly they fall apart and rely on the same tactics.

Their favourite is demanding evidence or citations for everything - of you provide it they will refuse to engage for any spurious reason (ie, that person is just a notorious trans phobe / has internalised trans phobia, that's a right wing rag, I am not clicking on anything from GBNews, The Times, The Mail, the BBC, etc because they are proven to be trans phobic, that's already been debunked, that's not been peer reviewed etc into oblivion)

I know it's frustrating for some.....