Lost friends because I am not a believer

[WhatIsGenderQueerAnyway]

Regular poster but NC.

Please tell me how refusing to go along with the delusion that a person can change sex and that everyone has a gender has affected your relationships and friendships.

It’s proving to be a bumpy road for me as I peaked several years ago and since then have lost a few friends. It’s been an eye opener actually.

That is indeed interesting. The secondary our kids go to is overwhelmingly working class and trans/ non-binary doesn’t seem to be a thing at all.

I don't have masses of friends but I told them my views (I felt they should know who they're hanging out with). If we ever broach the subject again, it'll probably be one of them who raises it. I got the feeling they were kind of ignorant about the subject, although at least one knew a few tw. My sister is firmly GC. My youngest probably thinks I'm a bigot. I don't want to upset her so I don't raise the subject. The couple of times it has been raised, she brought it up reading MN over my shoulder.

As an aside if anyone on this thread hasn't already could you please follow the link below and sign the petition to try to strengthen the Equality Act and keep single sex spaces as single sex. It's a Government petition so it is totally confidential.

Please also share with your gc friends and family. We're running out of time to get to 100k.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/petitions_noticeboard/4722618-petition-to-update-the-equality-act-thread-2?page=28

About poshness.

There was a Stonewall survey a while back on which those who identified as trans were twice as likely to have a degree and four times as likely to have a PhD as the general population.

Is being educated posh? Well, in this country anyway, a bit. It certainly argues some resources. Though some would argue it's much harder for trans people to get or keep jobs due to discrimination, so some stay in academia.

Every trans and nonbinary person I know either attended Oxbridge or is the child of someone who did. Though that could well say more about me than trans people in general. I'd be interested to find out more socio-economic stats though.

FlytingMachar can’t believe you got deleted - it was excellent. Wish I’d screen grabbed it!

Interesting - the deletions
Cant really ever remember being deleted before under any user names, though i suppose it wasnt entirely relevant to the OPs question.
Is there direct communication from MN explaining reasons for the deletion or any right of appeal - I havent had any notification? I guess satire is verboten🤔

Yes, this. If someone I might have thought of as a friend declares themselves disappointed or angry with me for my GC views, I clearly misjudged them and it's just as well that I've found out, though I won't burn bridges. As it happens, I haven't lost any actual friends and I've found a few new ones and strengthened a few bonds. I've remained on good terms with a relative who transitioned FtM socially in middle age.

My DH did lose a longstanding friend who has socially transitioned one of her children and gone full Mermaids/Stonewall/TWAW. I suspect she is a classical "groomed parent". She suddenly cut all contact with everyone in her old support network who agreed with the view that all transwomen are, by definition, male. I thought DH might be hurt because he'd invested so much time and energy in supporting her through various traumas, but he assured me that he only felt relief.

The song was so funny! Why did it get deleted?

Woke stasi sounds familiar! I’ve had the same with a family member. She flounced out of a big family WhatsApp group two years ago calling me a TERF when I said that I supported JKR and then blocked me. She looked like a toddler having a massive tantrum.

A couple of old friends went quiet on me and reluctant to meet up once I started speaking out on the subject. Another person has asked me to stop mentioning it. I heard through the grapevine that they think that I have become very right wing! I’m a lifelong feminist!

As a PP mentioned though I have made some new friends during the last three years. We realised once we hesitatingly got talking that we all thought the ideology behind trans etc was completely nuts. It’s a big relief to discuss this openly. So yes there has been a positive outcome in many ways to opening up on this issue. We all agree that the tide is turning especially after the Scottish rapist in his pink leggings showed his true colours by declaring himself a woman after his arrest. That story must have peaked many more people.

@KohlaParasaurus I wouldn’t be able to remain friends with someone who allowed that to happen to their child.

I've had the same, I kept quiet for five years then just though, fuck it, it's too important to keep quiet

I have had a relative and close friend tell me it's the same as gay people, historically, fighting for their rights. When I asked for their take on how it's the same, they both told me it's just change we will have to accept eventually. These were 2 separate conversations.
I made a vow with myself not to bring up the conversation with either again; but if they do I will certainly be prepared to lose contact if they can't actually contribute a valid argument.

I hear you. It’s very liberating to speak your thoughts freely with people who aren’t scared of not thinking “the right thing.”

@NotHavingIt I’ve never heard of Resisters but will look into this. I appreciate the advice.

My guess is that it was too good.

Something I have observed:

Much of the current younger generation's lefty social justice debate uses the concept of 'privilege' in such a way that if a teenager is white, middle class, heterosexual, 'neuronormal', physically fit, and possibly at least nominally Christian then she/he has zero oppression points and is mostly expected to be silent and self-debasing.

To buy their way out of that lowly position, teenagers can identify as trans or nonbinary or self-diagnose mental disorders etc. This raises their status among the lefty progressives.

Or bisexual or pansexual works as nobody will test those!

I always found this way of using 'privilege' inane as depending on context it assigns over 90% of people into the special category of those who have their private laws. "Cishetero" is more than 90%, after all. It also suggests that nobody is treated correctly, that you are either privileged or under-privileged, and once you see the problem like that the solution is not necessarily to stop treating the underprivileged so poorly and to work to raise their status. Finally, it's all about words and nothing about real resource transfers.

@nepeta I’ve noticed this too. It seems so attention seeking. All these privileged children inventing problems so others feel sorry for them. I’m glad my kids are too old for this shit, but I wouldn’t have tolerated it anyway in their teenage years.

What is pansexual??

Pansexual is attracted to all genders.

Tbh I think it's a thing. I'm bisexual but gender presentation does affect how strongly I am attracted to people. I'm less attracted to transwomen in general than I am to men, and less to transmen than to women.

It's a separate question what being attracted to genders rather than one or the other or both sexes might mean.

From one theory pansexual would be bisexual if we base sexual orientation on sex as it has been defined (as all genders belong to one sex or the other almost entirely).

From the other theory (the gender identity one) it would be something different?

There might be a difference in being attracted to certain aspects of people and sexual orientation. I am very heterosexual, but I tend to be drawn to only certain types of men. To me the former is orientation, the latter is preference.

I think I understand but it gives me brain ache to grasp what you’re saying!

There might be a difference in being attracted to certain aspects of people and sexual orientation. I am very heterosexual, but I tend to be drawn to only certain types of men. To me the former is orientation, the latter is preference.

The difference is that I would not be attracted to women who share the type of men I am drawn to. So for me, at least, sex is a necessary condition for attraction but not a sufficient one.

Yes, almost four years ago I fell out with a friend of several decades after she spouted a load of gender twaddle. And I left WI over the same crap.

Much of this is the implicit assumption many made that trans rights are exactly the same as Lesbian and gay rights in that outside some religious views they won't affect anyone else's lives at all but make the lives of a minority much better.

When you add to this the #nodebate, a very large number of kind people don't even understand what our concerns might be. Much easier to assume that we have suddenly become bigots or not quite sane. Trying to explain those concerns can sound like lunatic ranting because some of the things actually happening are so impossible to believe until we see them happening. That's why sports wakes people up, and to some extent being told that old-fashioned women are now just body parts or body functions because 'women' as a sex are to be erased.

But it's very hard work, and can only be done in small steps, beginning with, say, the prisons or sports.

I've lost a few acquaintances, but lost one very close friend (known her for 20 years, travelled together, did the reading at our wedding etc, very, very close friend).

We live on the other side of the country these days, but last time I saw her in 2018 she fallen into queer culture, and I'd noticed a few things (Karen white) but hadn't taken a deep dive yet and we had a strained but civil conversation - I didn't realise at this point how tetchy the whole thing was. She was staying with us, so parted on good terms.

She was obviously on red alert, and the very first time I mentioned something on Facebook, 3 years later, I found out I'd been unfriended.

I'm heartbroken and angry that she could think so little of me, or not even let me know i was out of her life. She's obviously a true believer and I'm considering her beyond reaching. I'm also angry at her cheering on the loss of women's rights and services, particularly one rape crisis provision local to where we both lived, which had tossed aside women's safely, with such aplomb.

I am pansexual and my partner is a transman. I am attracted to individuals. What is beteeen their legs doesn't matter to me. It's very simple.

I am GC. I have opinions, my partner knows. He respects me. I respect him. I think all things can be done with respect.

@Josette77 Thank you for contributing to the thread. I’m interested in understanding what you say. How does your partner being a TM fit with your GC beliefs? How do you reconcile the two?