How has the media conditioned people to 'be kind' re transgender debate?

[FriendofJoanne]

It definitely has; when I saw a friend a few months ago and shared the Sex Matters petition and said "but there are only 2 biological sexes" she said "but you can't say that any more".

I feel that we have absorbed the message that speaking against the trans rights movement is to be a bigot or transphobic but I'm looking for evidence of how this happened if anyone can help?

I've read the Shonagh Dillon paper (here if anyone hasn't read it) but that focuses on social media rather than mainstream. Does anyone know of anything which looks at mainstream media? Thanks

I think the point is supposed to be because someone felt sorry for another person 24 years ago in one specific situation,

women shouldn't want equality or rights. Because it isn't 'kind'. It's not 'kind' to those women though, is it?

Have to say no, it doesn't help much but thanks all the same.

You would do better to start your own thread asking your original question. This thread is specifically about the news media and it is getting derailed.

You're a ray of sunshine aren't you

Eh?

I expect it's a good idea to pay no attention to anyone who is trying to derail the thread.

That was not my intention. I asked a related question and was met with many passively agressive replies which overwhelmed this thread, even though I have made it clear numerous time that I am willing to hear anyone and everyone's opinion.

But what if, sometimes, the "ray of sunshine", can be the unthinking and irresponsible one?

A small example I heard today on Womans hour was in an item on period poverty and providing pads etc in schools. Towards the end someone slipped in the phrase “gender neutral toilets” in a school, just after an interviewee described how boys have peed on sanitary bins. Surely this would not have happened if mixed sex toilets had not been introduced? One of the ways in way access to women and girls spaces have been changed to include males.

The "born in the wrong body" and "female brain in a male body" narratives of what is now known as transmedicalism had an immense impact. After all, who wants to pick on someone with a medical condition? Especially if you've been socially conditioned to be kind.

That’s the thing - gender is pretty meaningless, it’s just as sensible to have loos segregated on the basis of diet, star sign or eye colour. Why not call them Unisex?

Yes. Pricey!
Ah, but there's no limit to what I'll spend on a book about the importance of limits😂

Boundaries represent limitations and defintions, but without them there is no true integrity, no real achievement, and a break-down social cohesion.

Yes. Finding our boundaries- from infancy, are how we develop the sense of an embodied, defined self. I see it as extending out from there in ever-expanding circles.
Healthy, clear boundaries are what actually allow healthy relationship and true connection.
And limits allow freedom to create.
It's paradoxical, but most realities are, I think.

Just how sunshiney do you want us to be about, for example, men competing as women in the Olympics?

Being kind means we're supposed to celebrate that rather than call it out for what it is: cheating.

Not very kind to female athletes though, is it?

Yes, without limits, how can you transcend them?

If you didn't have lines, limits and boundaries you'd just be a big blob floating around in a chaotic and meaningless universe with no-one to talk to. 😎

Toxic positivity is a thing. And yes, definitely, re: boundaries. I am off to look up that book, thank you for the rec!

I've responed quite fulsomely in quite clear and concise ways. Might you respond to any of my points? Pick me up on any of them, or perhaps challenge them?

The main practical issues are:

1. The eradication of female-only spaces, services and other provisions, to accommodate males who call themselves women, and the harmful consequences of this towards women.
2. The medicalising of gender non-conforming behaviour in children, leading to irreversible interventions in an attempt to physically mimic the opposite sex, including blocking puberty, being given cross-sex hormones, and surgeries.
3. The punishment meted out to those who object to any of this, including social retribution, harassment via the legal system, and, at events where women gather to speak about this, physical assault and intimidation.

Agree with Jane. I actually think the media is going the opposite way stirring up anti trans sentiment. Find the Mumsnet classification of these threads a bit odd, strange how in these threads feminism has been co-opted by the anti-trans movement. Maybe in every society there will always be a group of people with a problem with minorities. Depressing really.

Men are not women and biological women are not bloody support humans

No one can change sex and it is absolutely fucking bonkers that we’ve got to the stage where sports bodies are having to spend time & money investigating something everyone knew until 5 mins ago ie biological men have an advantage over women in sport. The proof that TW are men is how much progress they made in persuading ppl they’re a vulnerable minority whose needs overide that of women

Reality is not anti trans, it’s just reality.

Oh and yes Denton’s plus transmedia watch is how

Well if being pro-women is "anti-trans", then it follows logically that being pro-trans is anti-women.

Being pro-women is not being anti-trans?

Posters are talking about women not men

It’s not ‘anti trans’ it’s just acknowledging women are their own sex

Find the Mumsnet classification of these threads a bit odd,
The Sex and Gender board was created by Mumsnet HQ a few years ago, apparently in response to demand from people who did not want to see the topic discussed on other boards. Threads on the issue on other boards are still regularly reported and moved here. So yes, it has become a single issue board because this is pretty much the only place where we are able to talk about it.

The Feminist Chat board was created at the same time to discuss other topics - again the explanation was that this was in response to demand although last time I looked it was attracting less than one post an hour.

What the media are doing is reporting on the inherent conflict that is at the heart of this issue; but also presenting it from a perspective of women's rights; rather than just the trans rights angle that the trans lobby demands.

It has taken years of dedication and determination by a resurgent grassroots movement for the media to pick up on this, and for it to be reported on. For years it simply wasn't - and the mantra was " No debate".

Stonewall and the other lobby groups have had it totally their way for a long time and so, naturally have now got a bit of a hair shirt on about the fact that the issue has become a topic for public debate, and that women are seen as being important too.

You don't build a liberation movemnt by colonising the spaces and the very integrity of another historically marginalised group.