How do you speak up without being called transphobic

[Enterusername111333]

I just feel so lost... I don't know how to voice my opinion without accusations so I just take the easy option. Where does it end?

It's all very 'are you or or have you ever been a member of the communist party?', isn't it.

'Renounce your views', ffs. Does he want you to wear a hair shirt and be ducked as a witch too?

Spot on, Datun.

The paradox of “trans”.

It’s male privilege that allows them to demand that others see them as women.

If there were no biologically male trans people, and this movement hadn’t been started to cater primarily for them, does anyone really think that biologically female trans people on their own would have been able to part the Red Sea, culturally speaking, and have their path made clear, obstacles just melting away before them?

I don’t.

Funny you should say that. He is a full-on SNP activist. I'm trying to imagine what it's like in the #transally bubble where "we are progressive and you are a bigot".

ArtfullyCrumpled That's really sad, I'm sorry.

OP, this thread has been derailed so many times I’d be surprised if you’re still even here.

I have two suggestions.

One is to read up on the subject so that you have general themes/facts at your fingertips.

the other is to just drop occasional questions/dilemmas into the conversation, like “I know what you mean, but live as a woman/dress as a woman/feel like a woman, what does that even mean?”. Everyone will be too embarrassed to tell you what it means (horrendous stereotypes). Also, no govt has been able to define it (most notably this month, the Scottish govt). Or “I see what you mean, but how do we tell the real trans people from the bad faith actors?”. Answer: you can’t. Or “Yes, but if children aren’t considered sufficiently mature to drive/buy alcohol/smoke/vote/get a tattoo, how come they’re mature enough to decide to be sterile?”. Mild unease at the idiotic implications works far better than outright confrontation in my experience, on a casual, friendship basis, but I don’t know if you’re talking about personal or professional circles.

It won’t end until we stop it. And that means speaking up.

I do feel sad about it. I think he is convinced that myself and other GC people are only motivated to speak up against self ID through some sort of hatred, ignorance, resistance to change and bigoted view.

Yeah, I don't think it's a fun belief system to maintain, tbh. Having observed how these circles operate, it will become harder and harder for him to countenance friendships with anyone who doesn't conform to his (somewhat niche) beliefs.

Yea, it is very sad, and I’m sorry too ArtfullyCrumpled.

You’d think he would know you a bit better after so long.

It’s extraordinary what those who believe in this ideology are capable of projecting onto those who don’t believe.

Very sorry to hear this too, Metabigot - must be very hard when it’s your own brother.

Dionysiana I’m increasingly thinking that as you and others have suggested, simply asking questions is one of the most effective ways forward. Goes completely against my natural tendency to want to Explain It All but - for those who are just going along with it blindly out of “be kind” and “inclusion” motives - it’s got a very good chance of making them actually stop and think.

And as this whole thing blows up (as it inevitably will), it's hard to know what the denouncers will do, having separated themselves from their friends and family who hold perfectly rational, reality based views. I suspect there will be widespread backpedalling and 'of course I didn't mean it like that!'.

Shite for you though - solidarity.

This!

This this this!

Another one here who am no longer upset at being called a transphobe. I know I am not.

It was bewildering at first though. Why am I being yelled at and shunned for asking sane and legitimate questions.

In the 3-4-5 (?) years since it has run the full gamut:
transphobe, homophobe, bigot, fascist, racist (not sure how or why, but was called that too) and also uneducated and that I, personally, was killing lesbians
Which was very, very bizarre - it was in a discussion were I said no, there is no innate sex inside you that is different to the biological sex you are born as, that you magically morph into just by thinking/wishing/feeling it in your head. Even if you link to dodgy YouTube videos to prove «the Science».
The poster was a marine biologist if I remember correctly, who somehow got humans (primates) mixed up with shrimps. If they can change sex so can we, was the reasoning.

I am not a shrimp though, even if I were to identify as one 🤦🏽‍♀️

Very hard to accept that your brother is profoundly misogynistic. My sister is the same, has even used the 'renounce your opinions' line on me. We've barely spoken for a couple of years because she prefers to stick to the Labour line that TWAW and she can't believe that I, a feminist and a lesbian, don't. She's accused me of being transphobic and a Tory bigot. It's as if the rational part of her brain has been closed down. She'd be denouncing me to the Nazis and having me shot if she could.

@ArtfullyCrumpled That's a great pity, but it still leaves me curious about him and about the other gay men who share his views. You probably can't get any answers from him now, but would he consider having sex with a transman? (Maybe he doesn't see himself as vulnerable to either physical or social pressure to have sex, so that's not an issue for him.)

And is he happy to include transmen at all events for gay men?

Very sorry @Metabigot and @ArtfullyCrumpled that sounds very upsetting. 💐.

One of my oldest FB friends has gone 'grey rock'. We met on a language learning page in 2014. Did video study calls every weekend, confided in each other etc.

But what can you do? I just help with crowd funders in a modest way. Don't get stuck in the weeds to quote Mr Cummings ( of all ppl!) I try to avoid arguing with zealots on Twitter.

Still have to be a bit cautious too - a close relative works in media and I don't want them to pay a price.

I quickly discovered that when I (lifelong feminist, socialist, bi, marched for gay liberation in the 70s, Greenham woman, GNC) stated what appeared to me to be uncontroversial facts (sex is binary & bodily, & nobody in human history has ever changed sex, for instance) I was monstered as a transphobe, “radicalised by a hate group”, accused of being in the pay of extreme right wing American White Supremacist religious groups & of wanting women back in the kitchen, & had attacks made on my livelihood. By people who knew me, & who alternated these attacks with cries of “how could you do this to your friends?” and “why can’t you just be kind?”

A quick glimpse into how exceedingly authoritarian, dishonest & manipulative the GII movement is.

So I decided “transphobe” is much less of a descriptive term & much more of a silencing mechanism, and that I am not going to be silent about things that matter.

A great liberation right there.

That said, there are 1 or 2 groups on FB which seem mainly dedicated to posting pics of idiotic men looking stupid in fetish gear.

I’m not interested. I don’t care how badly people dress provided they’re reasonably covered, and I don’t at all care how they dress or undress in private with consenting adults. I was a teen in 1973, after all. That seems borderline “transphobic”, in a trivial kind of way, though mainly if that’s all they do.

I’m pro women, pro reality, pro safeguarding, pro decent mental health care & pro evidence-based medicine. That’s what I’m for.

AmaryllisNightAndDay · Today 10:37
@ArtfullyCrumpled That's a great pity, but it still leaves me curious about him and about the other gay men who share his views. You probably can't get any answers from him now, but would he consider having sex with a transman? (Maybe he doesn't see himself as vulnerable to either physical or social pressure to have sex, so that's not an issue for him.)

And is he happy to include transmen at all events for gay men?

This from The Gay Men’s Network related to a CPS consultation about rape by deception shows that some gay men are concerned about transmen, issues related to trans ideology.

www.cps.gov.uk/consultation/consultation-deception-gender-section-rape-and-serious-sexual-offences-rasso-legal

I'm sorry for derailing. I do think it's relevant to the OP's question though. Thank you so much for sharing your experiences. The truth is it hurts and it's painful to be cast out for your beliefs.

I am in tears here for the loss of a long friendship of someone I absolutely respected snd loved his soul with all my heart. Being told I can't be friends with him anymore.

I need to process the things he's just said to me in a message.

Ok so calming myself down and having the courage of my convictions now.

This was basically the message I was given publicly on SM.

Give dignity to a marginalised group of people.

Rhetoric by GC campaigners is same as used against gays.

Same as Trump Rombinson Farage

Passing that one bit of legislation doesn’t take away others rights

Access to single sex spaces has been allowed for years.

In having beef with the Equality Act you cannot claim to believe in equal rights for all

You cannot claim to be an ally when openly supporting those who hate

We are harassed, verbally abused, beaten and murdered more thanks to the rhetoric of those you follow:,

LGB Alliance
Helen Staniland
Graham Linehan
JKR
Maya Forstater
Johann Lamont
James Dreyfus

There is also the issue that he said on SM that anyone with these beliefs is a bigot and a c*nt.

I hope he reads this or someone gets the message to him that I am here to protect womens rights and all human rights but one group should not take the rights away from other.

I am in tears here for the loss of a long friendship of someone I absolutely respected and loved his soul with all my heart.
I'm so sorry for you Artfully. It hurts to lose friends.
In time you will come to realise that he is not who you thought he was; you are mourning somebody who either no longer exists or who never existed in the first place. I had a friend (a good friend, I thought) who fell out with me. It hurt like hell for a few years until I realised that she had a pattern of falling out with people. It was just a matter of time until it was my turn to be in the firing line.

Ach, ArtfullyCrumpled, I'm really sorry. That is awful.

TBH the insults flung at women when it comes to this issue (and it is largely women who get the brunt of it) are just so wide of the mark they barely make any sense.

Some people seem to need to monster and dehumanise those who disagree with them - I think that's quite telling.

Thank you @ArabellaScott and @senua. Put my head about the parapet a tiny bit. Just by following and retweeting and got this.

I did explain why I followed and that I am someone who has used rape crisis. I didn't need to but I did. But that was ignored completely.

God I really appreciate what you have all done for YEARS.

I spoke up this year openly for the first time (with mixed results) and kept coming back to the Maya Forstater ruling and how enormously important ruling it is and the absolutely hell Maya went though to put that in place to help protect all of us.