Is it offensive to say "straight" or "neurotypical"?

[MerlinsLostMarbles]

I've been trying to understand why the gender critical movement are saying "cis" is offensive and still not quite getting it since it just means "not trans" (cis and trans are prefixes with opposite meanings).

From what I can gather the argument given by the gender critical movement is that the "default" is not-trans, therefore there shouldn't need to be a word for the "default", just as we don't have a specific word for someone who doesn't collect stamps (an example I've seen given).

But we have "straight" and "heterosexual" to refer to people who aren't homo/bi-sexual, we also have "neurotypical" to refer to people with typical neurological development or functioning. You could say these are also "defaults".

So why is "cisgender" an apparent "offensive slur" when straight and neurotypical aren't?

Yes, I thought that too - was a bit 😕 at someone trying to argue why straight can be an offensive term in some contexts!
I mean, straight is not used as an insult, a slur, a way to discriminate.
Bent is.
They're not the same at all, and to argue straight is offensive and homophobic here is absurd.

Merlin- are you quite young? "Straight" was absolutely originally used as a contrast to "bent"

It's why I have never been comfortable using the word straight in this context.

"They're not the same at all, and to argue straight is offensive and homophobic here is absurd."

Straight isn't offensive or homophobic at all, that's the point. And neither is cisgender, or atheist, or neurotypical.

"Merlin- are you quite young? "Straight" was absolutely originally used as a contrast to "bent"

I haven't personally heard it used in an offensive context, apologies if I'm missing something.

Exactly, I'm completely agreeing with you 🙂
I'm also not offended by cis by the way as I realise it just means that I'm not trans.

I've not heard it used in as an offensive term either

There are two possible groupings of man and woman, the gender based version and the sex based one. Most posters on this forum believe that the sex based grouping is the correct one and that the gender based grouping makes no sense and has no credible criteria by which the people in the group woman are placed there.

In order for the grouping to make sense, there has to be something that a woman has in common with a transwoman that she does not have in common with a transman. No-one has ever been able to define this, other than with respect to the sex based grouping.

It can't be based on identity, because the women on this board think of themselves as a member of the sex based grouping woman, not the gender based grouping woman.

It takes huge amounts of mental aerobics to defend the gender based definition and none at all to support the sex based definition.

In fact, the only definition that makes sense of the gender based grouping is, "Do you feel that you belong in the sex based grouping of women?"

But even this doesn't work. If you make admission to the gender based woman determined by whether or not you WANT to be in the sex based grouping women, then you exclude a huge amount of actual women, who have no particular desire to be one.

If you make admission to the gender based woman, do you believe you are in the sex based group woman, then you excude many transwomen, as we are constantly told they understand the difference between sex and gender.

So the only answer that holds up is that entry into the gender based definition of woman is different depending on which sex you are. Men are allowed to have the gender woman simply by wanting to have the sex of a woman. Women, on the other hand, are there by default just by being in the sex group woman. It can't depend on whether they want to be there or not, because those damned gender criticals won't agree to that.

So, the gender based definition of woman, from a transwoman's perspective is, "I'm in this group because I want to be, and you HAVE to be in this group because I only want to be here if you are too."

Calling yourself cis is capitulating to this nonsense, self-serving thinking.

The sex based definition is the only one that is needed, the only one that makes any kind of sense at all.

It doesn't work because a "trans woman" is a type of man, not a type of woman. Making it an inherently contradictory construction. Therefore because "trans woman" is nonsensical, it follows that its proposed opposite "cis woman" is too.

Perhaps we could compromise on "transwo man", if you have any suggestions for the opposite of "transwo"?

Why insist on using a term someone has stated they don't want attached to them? There's uproar if we do that.

How come every other group gets to decide what they want they want to be called, what pronouns they want to use, what gender they are (and if we don't want to cooperate or even just get it wrong we're horrible transphobic terms), but we are supposed to accept being called cis because that's what someone else has decided we are?

How is that possibly fair?

No you haven’t. It’s just 🐝 zzzzzz

I'm old. I was involved in the Gay rights movement in the 1970s. I must have missed "straight" ever being considered offensive.

This has been explained on multiple threads time and time again, including to you personally. I know, because I've done it. Perhaps rather than ask for the same conversation over again, try doing a search, reading what people have said, and engaging with it in actual points?

You don't lack the information. You do know why. You don't agree; it's not the same thing.

Dead simple.

The genderists perform a nasty little sleight of hand with the word "cis".

They say "but some people do identify as trans and some do not, and it's just a way of specifically referring to the latter".

And that seems fair enough. Clearly, some people do identify as trans and some do not.

But they then use this reasonable point to leverage in the assumption that males with a trans identity and females without a trans identity belong together as "trans and cis women", while females with a trans identity and males without a trans identity belong together as "trans and cis men".

That jump simply isn't justified by anything except an unevidenced and ideological belief that a trans identity in one sex IS the same as cis identity in the other sex, when it's clearly more rational to use trans and cis women to mean a (natal) female people with and without the difference in identity.

So, the first reason I reject "cis" as the genderists use it is because while they may claim wide eyed it's just to differentiate cis and trans, in reality they use it to force their belief that gender identity is a significant difference and sex is not into common language.

And of course the other side of the same coin, to impose onto the people they believe to be "cis" the gendered state of mind which they name "womanhood" and believe to the common factor between "trans women" and "cis women". Again, this is an unevidenced ideological belief that many women (original female meaning) experience as a direct descendent of the sexist and reductive beliefs about female people that have been used to marginalise, exploit and disempower us since forever.

So no Merl, it'nothing to do with who is "normal" or not, It's because genderists are using the term to normalise restrictive sexist and homophobic beliefs. And that seems to me a very good thing to resist.

In that case you have:

Woman

and

transwoman

Sorted!

The language already exists.

That's how languages work. We have words for things.

Yes, but if you're going to coin new ones then it helps if they make sense and don't have an agenda many don't concur with attached.

'Cis woman' as a pairing with transwoman would only make any sense if you actually believed transwomen are a category of woman. Gender critical women don't see being a woman as being a matter of subjective belief, merely one of objective biological fact.

Do you feel the need to apply words used by faiths you don't believe in to yourself?

"Straight" was not in it self used as a slur but it was used to indicate that one was not "bent" which was a slur.

I'm happy to concede that maybe this was a variation in regional vernacular where the word "bent" was originally used to indicate corruption/deviance eg a "bent copper" and an honest one could be described as "straight as an arrow"

I always found it odd that "queer" became acceptable while "bent" remained a slur.

Straight as a descriptor for sexuality ONLY came about because of the slur "bent" for homosexuality.

Therefore in its origins is the direct relationship with a slur.

I can understand how that has the potential to have been offensive.

Come to think of it, the reason cis and trans as two categories of a group of people doesn't work is the following:
The group of people have nothing in common to begin with so you cannot use an adjective to split them, first you need to group them and you can't use woman as transwomen are never women to begin with. Your starting point blocks your usage of an adjective to then split the group.

Cis and trans also indicate a binary that falls apart the minute you accept non binary is also a valid option.

Does it matter whether or not you understand why it’s offensive? If a sizeable number of a group are telling you it is offensive to them, perhaps just believe them.

Why do we need a word for “not trans”- it’s utterly insane.

Most of us do not subscribe to the trans/gender cult and refuse to be bullied into using this nonsense language.

"Cis" doesn't just mean 'not trans'. It means your gender identity aligns with your sex. So to accept being 'cis', you have to accept you have a gender identity. I reject cis because I don't believe that gender identities exist. It has the same impact on me as being called a heretic, or an infidel: your belief system, not mine.

This annoys me. I am sick of people trying add extra labels to who I am
I'm a woman. I was born female. End of. All this rubbish on I identify as this or that! It's crazy. If someone wants to transition and be a woman, that's fine but pronouns and all these additional descriptions is crazy. We are born either as male or female. Simples. If you want to change that then you do you. But stop with the crazy list of names to identify as.

My daughter has a friend who wants to identify as a rabbit. FFS give me strength.

Hmmm, it's a valid question.

Would you prefer GT, GD and GC instead;
Gender typical (where presentation is obvious)
Gender divergent (where presentation does not necessarily align with how the individual prefers to be considered)
Gender critical ( where the individual doesn't give a crap about how a person presents and wants to treat everyone the same regardless of their sex, while being mindful of the physical and psychological differences between the sexes. )

Calling me a cis woman instead of a woman puts my 'lack of trans ness ' as my defining characteristic which isn't relevant to me and makes me uncomfortable.

One of my (now adult) DC is trans. We have agreed to disagree on many things. I am considered a Terf even though I am not trans exclusionary particularly but am also allowed to insist that I am not described as cis. One of my other DC suggested 'womb woman', (after the Ricky Gervais controversy) and it has stuck, at least within the family, as a bit of an inside joke, but it could work on a wider basis.

Should this be adopted instead of cis ?

If cis and trans are opposites, then a transwoman should be a female who identifies as male.