I have a question about same sex attraction and trans rights in the context of gay men and transmen

[Diagnosticdigressions]

Like lots of parents, I'm having plenty of lively discussions with teen daughter at the moment about the question of whether transwomen are women etc and the complexities of that. Have also had conversations with lesbian friends about the impact of this debate on them. Was somewhat alarmed at the statement from the head of Stonewall recently that seemed to infer that lesbian women who don't date (trans)women are transphobic (I think he also likened it to racism and excluding people from your dating pool on the grounds of ethnicity).

Anyway, it got me thinking about how gay men feel about dating transmen (or just other 'men' if that is your take on it) - specifically those who have not undergone gender reassignment surgery? I've not heard anything about that and, based on past conversations with gay friends, I just can't imagine them being up for dating a (trans)man with breasts and female genitalia.

But, I admit I haven't had a conversation like that in many years and maybe times are changing and I'm out of touch. So, where are gay men in all this? This is genuinely not meant as a goady post - I actually don't know and am interested to know why this doesn't seem to get anywhere near the same level of coverage.

That night not make much sense as the tweet in question has been deleted. You can see the awful Pink News' take on it here www.pinknews.co.uk/2021/01/29/boyz-magazine-david-bridle-editor-spiked-trans-lgb-alliance-terrence-higgins-trust/

Don't take it too seriously, it's a 4chan rabbit hole.

Not that I buy that, but regardless of where it originated, it gained rapid traction for a reason.

Enough people had seen the compulsory bisexuality arising from the redefinition of "gay" and "lesbian" to as "same-gender attracted" to see the fun in poking back with their new hecking super-valid orientation identities.

I got the gist but yes the Pink News take 'clarifies' things.

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to post. It was really frustrating discussing this stuff with DD yesterday and I'm trying to find ways to talk about it with her that will help her understand that it's so much more complicated than just 'being kind'

I did a quick google - couldn't find anything that coherent but it looks as if SGC is a middle aged man identifying as a girl, right? Publicly so? If so, I imagine DD's take would be that this person is an anomaly overly emphasised by transphobes to present the worst case scenario

Actually there are many, many more that are worse. But Secret Gamer Girl didn't stumble upon his nickname by chance. He is only public about it...because he was doxxed. He didn't publicise that he was a middle aged man when he was secretly trying to talk to girls online.

Plenty of examples on here and if you google 'this never happens mumsnet' there are many links to individual threads...here's 2 of them...

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3348290-It-will-never-happen-resource-thread

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4557531-this-never-happens

I mean what is it you want to know? Men feel they are entitled to sex. They will work things including legistlation to get it. Some are gay and some are straight. P Tatchell is the 'go to' on matters of sex but he is quite open about thinking that children should be able to make their own minds up about sex [having it if they want it] with middle aged men. Nobody seems to ask someone with actual safeguarding experience and women who object are labelled Bigots, TERFs and Pearl Clutchers. Many gay men object to P Tatchell on many matters especially of age related access but still the BBC will go straight to Tatchell on these matters. If you say their names too many times [esp on here], their internet scrapers pick it up and the post and potentially thread will disappear after being reported as 'hate speech'. If too many people say it, MN gets subjected to DDOS attacks in an attempt to try and get it shut down.

@AlisonDonut
thanks for those links. What do I want to know? Well, I was interested in people's views on this in a place that it's being discussed because, as I said before, I had seen almost nothing in mainstream media covering the gay men / TM angle. Lots of people here have given me examples of where it is being discussed and that is helpful, as are the 'it will never happen' resources.

I do though get the distinct impression from some posters that it is considered very stupid to ask anything about this - despite the fact that I have read and taken on board every single answer - and that this isn't the place to do that (which is the exact opposite of what I thought). Of course I can just google everything but the internet is bloody massive and hard to navigate at times and clearly the people on this board have already done a lot of thinking on this hence coming here.

I am still working out how to talk about this with DD. I thought I'd made some headway until last night when she came up with some really crazy stuff so I'm looking for ways to highlight clearly and unequivocally the problems with her argument. It's as simple as that. Thanks again to everyone who has taken the time to post. I'll probably leave this thread now.

I do though get the distinct impression from some posters that it is considered very stupid to ask anything about this

It's not that- as you may or may not know, hundreds of troll threads start with similar OPs, and then descend into bunfights, sock puppetting for screenshots etc. Different posters have different levels of willingness to take such posts at face value, depending on how cynical they are I'm cynical (generally) but willing to engage in good faith unless I'm given a reason not to!

So are journalists covering this stuff just avoiding the elephant in the room because they are scared of repercussions?

That's basically it. If you're a female trying to point this out, you will get the full force of the TRAs, and if you're male, what's the point in stirring the pot where you're nice and comfortable and left to do what you like? (With some notable exceptions)

Right, well, I'm a regular poster just not on this board. And I didn't think I'd given anyone reason to believe I wasn't genuine. Anyway, thanks again - it's appreciated and I feel armed with some useful stuff with which to re-enter the teen fray...

yes, I see that. Depressing.

4chan were responsible for making it go viral

www.snopes.com/fact-check/super-straight-nazis-4chan/

What's True
The "Super Straight" trend originated on TikTok through a user named Kyleroyce, and then went viral on 4chan, a forum popular with members of the neo-Nazi movement.
^^
What's False
It is false to claim that "Super Straight" originated on 4chan, but the phrase and hashtag did go viral there.
^^

Snopes is owned by Facebook. Please don't use it to 'fact check'.

Snopes is owned by Facebook. Please don't use it to 'fact check'.

It's a very slippery "fact check".

Yes, It did go viral on 4chan, I'm sure. It went viral everywhere, including Reddit and Mumsnet.

Then you have the claim it's "popular with members of the neo-Nazi movement". Probably not as popular as Reddit is, or Twitter...

And then that gets stretched to "responsible" by the poster, something Snopes couldn't bring themselves to say.

Anyway, back to the subject - you'll see how any sort of resistance is met with spurious claims of "Nazi". Unsurprising some feel unable to push back against that while "being kind".

4chan were responsible for making it go viral

4 chan was one of the places it went viral. It certainly took off on twitter.

I don't be really see why on the fact that some bad people use social media is an argument that s particular idea is invalid.

Think about your own sexual orientation. I assume you are straight? If so would you be sexually attracted to someone who was your own sex but presented as the opposite sex? Sexual attraction is visceral, not cerebral. I am a woman who is sexually attracted to women. You know, actual biological women with female sex organs who move smell and feel like women. Anyone expecting me to defend justify or overcome my feelings is homophobic. Stonewall is homophobic.

I am a lesbian. I love using that word. I've even lived on Lesvos from where we get our name. I am a woman who loves women. That's still an actual living breathing reality. I'm proud to be who and what I am. Transactivists can fuck off to fucking hell if they will not respect my reality.

Didn't the 'superstraight' guy's mum get death threats too?

And they had to go on an all out social media hideout?

I'm sure a lot of people on here would like to deny that men are not being pressurised into relationships with trans people, but I'm seeing a trend of it happening (some of the links people have posted here point to such).

But the one thing I think we can guarantee is that no one practices what they preach. I'm sure the head of SW would refuse to go out with a man self identifying as a woman, and the gay men that say other men should sleep with trans men wouldn't themselves.

I read an article by a gay man that said that there should be shows about gay men dating trans men, when I asked whether he would consider it himself the comments were deleted.

you'll see how any sort of resistance is met with spurious claims of "Nazi".

Yes this. I am so so so tired of the prostituting of that word, which just lazily and childishly uses the murder of millions to score personal points whilst clearly not having the faintest idea of what it means.

Until there are eagle badges, goose stepping armies and an invasion of Poland, ghettos, people on cattle trucks with bloody extermination centres being built, and whole towns of people being burned alive and shot into ditches by a government owned troops, no , it is not 'like the Nazis' ffs.

I think it's becoming more of a question with gay men. IMO it's been a later thing because of the demographics. Most of the male "lesbians" are older, whereas the "gay" transmen are fairly young. I also suspect, though I don't know, that among transmen many of the older ones were attracted to women, but that in the younger group that is significantly less likely to be the case. So these younger people are now just getting seriously into the dating scene.

The other element of that is most retain female patterns of sexual activity which are not the same as male patterns, and especially not the same as gay male patterns. So they are just not likely in large numbers to be going in for things like bathhouse culture.

All that being said, I don't think it's nearly as simple as a gay man would never be attracted to a transman unless he was actually bi-sexual, I think those axes aren't always the elements that end up dominating. If anyone watched that video with Buck Angel on the other thread, the people who watch that transman porn are not straight men or women - they are gay men. It's interesting to see what he reports gay men saying to him about being attracted to transmen. That's not surprising to me, I think sexuality is more complicated than people are often willing to admit, and also the way the brain "reads" a person's sex is pretty primitive and doesn't really take account of the possibility of medical interventions. Also, young males and young females can often look quite similar and some gay men like that androgenous quality. Then too of course sometimes the weirdness itself is actually what is attractive to people totally apart from anything else.

I think that's all somewhat less likely to be the case with transwomen, because women's sexuality is different, and because transwomen don't typically read as women. As for the attraction to androgynous younger adults, I think that's also less common among women compared to men, except maybe for teen women.

Basically I think it's somewhat more likely gay men might be attracted to transmen than lesbians would be attracted to transwomen. So you might not get quite the same overwhelmingly negative response from the male part of the gay community.

Like lots of parents, I'm having plenty of lively discussions with teen daughter at the moment about the question of whether transwomen are women etc and the complexities of that.
Not complicated at all.
Transwomen are not women.

The Snopes article says that 4chan is popular with members of the neo-nazi movement, It doesn't say all 4chan members are Nazis.

‘What do you mean 'gay'.’

I mean gay men, not bi, in a relationship with another ( trans) man. And a lesbian, not bi, in a relationship with another ( trans) woman.but I think you probably already knew that.

I also know a lesbian couple where one wife transitioned to male and they stayed together although the woman does say she finds it difficult sometimes from the POV of outsiders thinking that they are a straight couple when she herself still identifies as a lesbian.and feels no mess gay for her partners transition.
She still loves her DH regardless of the transition from woman to trans man and they have kids together.

It won't be addressed because it affects men.

Gay men are still men and hence their rights trump those of women.

They won't have to stand aside and allow their sports to be decimated, they won't be expected to hold their tongues about concerns re safe spaces, the word man will not be replaced or demonised & nobody will question them re who they will date.

It's just another step towards Gillead.

I mean gay men, not bi, in a relationship with another ( trans) man. And a lesbian, not bi, in a relationship with another ( trans) woman.but I think you probably already knew that

Well no, as in your world 'gay' is two straight couples. This is what we mean. If gay now means straight...then what...the...fuck?

Homosexual = same SEX attracted.
Heterosexual = opposite sex attracted

So a man (male sex) and a transman (female sex) are heterosexual.
A transwoman (male sex) and a woman (female sex) are heterosexual.

It seems very very very very clear to me! (And to most adults with half a brain).