First time....

[ZeldaFighter]

So I live in a fairly rural, socially conservative place. I've followed this issue for my concerns about sport, feminism and the nature of being. But it's all been hypothetical as I don't know any trans people in real life. All this talk about "passing", being able to tell transwomen straightaway etc.

Until the other day. I got out of the car, looked around and about two rows down, someone else got out. And immediately my brain said "That's a man in a skirt". Didn't need to ponder, it was immediate. The bare legs were wrong, they weren't women's legs. And I was outside, metres away and I could tell in seconds. I always thought you might be exaggerating and I am rubbish with humans but I could tell straightaway.

It must be terrifying in prison and extremely disturbing in a refuge or rape crisis centre.

Our brains are hardwired. We know a man when we see one, even if they don't.

My teen boys say they can tell. DS1 referred to the “uncanny valley” aspect. Perhaps men find it harder to spot it once they are fully grown and more evenly matched strength-wise. For kids and adolescents there is a similar evolutionary need to assess threat as for women.

I can always tell as way. It’s often in the way the body moves.

You were traumatised at the sight of a person minding their own business two whole rows away in a car park?

You are putting words into the OPs mouth. She never said she was traumatised.

She says she could tell it was a man.

But you know that!

Uncanny valley is exactly it @BettyFilous

My first thought is that I am being unwillingly used as a prop in their ‘fetish theatre’ (as another mumsnetter coined recently and to my shame I can’t remember who).

It puts me on edge.

The Karolinska Institute in Stockholm did some research about 20 years ago (good job they did, probably wouldn't get ethics approval now) which did indeed prove that women are quicker to spot someone's sex than men are.

Was the Swedish thing the 'point of light' demonstration where they had a few lights on people's shoulders, head, hips, knees perhaps, then showed just the little lights moving. It was clear that it was a man or a woman walking just from half a dozen points.

I'm rubbish at explaining myself today. Lost my words 😡

DH can't tell. We were watching Question Time, and he could not recognise Willoughby as male. Admittedly, sitting down you don't see the unchangeable male physique and movements, so, visually, IW 'passes' better seated. Even the voice was not clearly major to dh. Dh only recognises the more overt signs like a bulge under pink leggings, or a voice like the taxi driver in League of Gentlemen.

Children, on the other hand... Some years ago I was out with my dc (then aged 9 - 16) and we met a transwoman I know. All my dc were puzzled and unsure what they were seeing. This TW, mid-20s, socially and physically transitioned, a perfectly sweet, nice person, no different to how they were before transitioning, ticked all the stereotype boxes for 'feminine', but something really jarred for the dc. The younger ones asked me in private "Is [name] a man or a woman?". Ds1, the eldest, understood that [Name] was a male presenting themselves as a woman, and just accepted it courteously. Afterwards he asked me why [Name] would do that, what was wrong with being a man and wearing makeup, for example. All this, while wearing the makeup that [Name] had put on him!

Where did the OP state this had traumatised HER?

She quite rightly pointed out how it just be disturbing in a women's prison or refuge, where women are meant to be separated from men. Especially when women in prisons and refuges are not strangers to male violence, particularly sexual violence. But she never said seeing a man imitating a woman traumatised her. She merely pointed out how glaringly obvious it is when men try to imitate being female.

*must

DS1 referred to the “uncanny valley” aspect.

What does this mean?

That's interesting to know. We've recently watched two series with trans actors in (the watcher and the peripheral) and my husband couldn't spot either actor whereas I couldn't not notice because it felt so jarring. Not because they were bad actors- they weren't.

Try hard.

Try harder

This ^^

I wasn't traumatised and both of us simply went about our business. I was just surprised that I found it so easy to tell. I wear varifocals, I have no gaydar, I often mistake people for someone else...but at distance, I had no trouble determining the biological sex of the person.

I had thought people maybe exaggerated about how easy it is to tell as many photos make people seem a very realistic member of their acquired gender. But I could tell instantly.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_valley

"you can never tell" is gender ideology myth number 6.

Biggest giveaway is high heels. They don't have the hip movement (iyswim) to carry it off 😁

And a lot of women have ditched high heels and go for comfy flat shoes these days. Fisherman sandals, boat shoes, loafers, you name it. So yeah the heels are a dead giveaway, as well as all the rest.

Yes, I get it now and I agree.

Op didn't say a single word of that. You did.
Why?

Uncanny Valley, interesting. Off topic but that must be why so many people find those life like baby dolls so creepy.