How do we find a middle ground?

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How do we find a place where it’s ok to say we believe their are transsexual people (in my lifetime it’s always been around and as far as I am aware not particularly fought against/prevented people accessing services/given equal rights) generally these people (who I totally support and would advocate for) appeared to me to want to go under the radar and just live their lives. I’d have NO issues sharing a bathroom with these people.

What shifted? Why is it now a case that we are bullied into accepting a man (with a beard who in every way looks and acts like a man) as a woman?

I thought in the 90s we accepted that what you wear, your hobbies, who you slept with and career choice did not define you. I was never girlie, wore boys jeans but at no point did I think I was a boy or prevented progressing my life.

We now have men that define themselves as women by going backwards in stereotypes, basically the clothes define the man.

The levels of irony baffle me ‘sex doesn’t exist, but if I wear heels I’m a woman’ ‘don’t assume or judge, but if you don’t assume correctly I’ll punch you’ and my favourite ‘I’m a non-binary lesbian’

The ironic thing is (and sorry if this offends anyone) I never coined myself as a feminist. I genuinely thought the previous amazing women had won the war, I earned equally or out earned my male counterparts, I never felt being a women provided me different opportunities to my brother, if anything maybe a tiny advantage.

But now I feel that all that has been pointless and at 41 I’ve become a feminist because I NEED too. Is this not such a rewind in society. I was genuinely a little nervous today at taking a book to the counter (material girls) a bloody (amazing) book, but a book.

How do we rationalise this?

Sorry for the long post but I am genuinely lost at the next steps to take.

Ah. The fantasy 'butch' (does that just mean short hair, like practically all older women?) lesbian wearing 'traditionally masculine clothing' that mysteriously differs from the usual trousers-and-top-flat-shoe clothes of many many other women.

And who is unusually tall, don't forget that detail. And who works out and is muscular ( that gets complicated because if she took puberty blockers she's probably about 5 foot tall, and if she didn't she has a female skeletal structure, but hey, don't let's start worrying about reality now ) .

The tattoos are a new thing. Lots of women have them. Unshaven? Decades ago I knew a woman with a full beard because of a hormonal condition. No-one could have imagined she was a man for a second. Same with your imaginary lesbian.

It is surely time for the ‘butch lesbian’ line to be put away for good

tl:dr: women (and 10 year old girls) know what cues as male, and short hair, tattoos, trousers, docs, even facial hair, are not on the list.

BINGO!

”Butch lesbians” - took a while to get there but I think that's a full house from Goddess.

Women are women. Men are men. We can all tell the difference, and all women are welcome in women-only spaces and all men are unwelcome.

No, we are saying that if an individual is male they should be barred from using women's toilets, like all other males.

Butch lesbians are, and look, female.

But seeing as “uncomfortable” has been defined upthread as whatever a particular 10 year old deems to be so, then in principle if the “male cues” displayed by the butch made said 10 year old feel uncomfortable, then the butch should be banned from the bogs, no?

There are no other toilets for a butch lesbian to use.

There are other toilets for a male person to use: the men's toilets.

FYI a ten year old can tell the difference between a male person in a dress and a butch lesbian the same way everyone else can tell the difference.

What 'male' cues? Women do not 'cue' as male.

Women do not have male cues irregardless of sexual preference

They are still women

It's actually quite homophobic to suggest that same sex attracted women give off male cues.

I genuinely don't know what 'butch' means when describing a woman. When I was young (well into my 20s) 'butch' was a descriptor for the sorts of boys and men who would now be referred to as 'macho'.

A can't imagine a macho woman.

When referring to lesbians, I understand "butch" to mean masculine presenting, i.e. short hair, no makeup, trousers rather than skirts.

Well yes, indeed, underlining yet again that the trans movement is just old-fashioned homophobia in new clothes.

It's why the Nazis were all in favour of facilitating it, and why Iran is so keen today.

Butch lesbians don't present male cues. They present butch, female cues. That's why they're v attractive to a lot of lesbians who aren't attracted to a single man on the planet.

Crikey, it must take you bloody ages to get a date if you cant tell what sex you're chatting up.

Suddenly I'm seeing the reasons for the, er, lesser spotted polycule 😁

Must be a big time saver, no?

short hair, no makeup, trousers rather than skirts

So like almost all women over about 50 in my world. Nothing masculine about us, and it's been the usual female workaday look for decades.

I'd just like to point out that in the 80's we had a hell of a lot more gender non conformity than now. Butch Lesbians, Goths and half the women and girls had short hair. We never had a moments difficulty telling women from men.
The trans movement is pathologically dishonest. If this is your argument for getting men into women's spaces it is beyond pathetic.

Well yes, it's difficult to come up with anything else which actually applies to all the women you are describing.

In most lesbian couples I know, there is one who presents as more feminine and one who presents as more masculine, or "butch". I can't really describe it any better than that.

But it's not a terribly useful descriptor given that, as you say, plenty of straight women also present in a similar way.

Some "butch" women might be particularly tall, broad and muscular, have sleeve tattoos, shave their heads or whatever. But they still look like women. The only people arguing that they don't look like women are trans activists constructing a straw man argument that if we insist on banning all male people from women's toilets these poor butch women will also be excluded. This is arrant nonsense, since butch women do not look like men.

How are you going to police things though if it’s purely based on aesthetics? “Excuse me: you have a somewhat square jaw, can you drop your pants so I can poke about at your genitals to see whether your vagina hasn’t been constructed from your scrotum”

Women who dress like that are still undeniably female. Lesbian or not

It wasn’t my word - I guess they meant physical characteristics traditionally regarded as male - square jaw etc. but as these are also attributes of many females it’s nonsense isn’t it?

I agree with this

It's not based on aesthetics.

Is there a 6,500 genetic differences between men and women.

Hairstyle isn't one of them. Nor are trousers.

And how will you utilise that to police toilet entry? A DNA test for someone who is touching cloth?

I’d like to apologise to all the women I must have frightened in women-only spaces with my short hair, jeans and size 5 bovver boots.

Because male people look aesthetically very different to female people, regardless of what cosmetic alterations they may have made to their bodies, and in the real world as opposed to TRA-la land, everyone can tell the difference without needing to inspect anybody's genitals.