Is it even possible to debate the trans-narrative outside MN?

[HagoftheNorth]

I’m regularly astonished (tho I guess not any longer surprised) by the number of organisations trumpeting gender identity as if it were an accepted fact. Most recently in response to Sunak’s statement on the matter; Women’s aid federations declaring their belief that TWAW; Andrew Boff (GLA) on R5 last night declaring that of course people can change gender (not corrected, as Sunak specifically said people can’t change SEX); I’ve heard some people saying that it was illegal for Sunak to make such a statement - again, no pushback.

It makes absolutely no sense to me. Does anyone know of a forum where people are actually prepared to debate this and defend their GI viewpoint?

I would say it’s actually impossible to debate it on mumsnet. It’s become a horrible echo chamber of fear mongering and misinformation.

Surely the definition of an echo chamber is that people are only hearing the views that align with their own. Unless you think that gc MNers are not regularly exposed to genderist and TRA views in the whole wider media and in real life (and also from some posters on MN), then I don't see how that can apply.

I saw people debating the issue yet again on Jeremy Vine the other day and realised that we are in a strange cultural stalemate where TRAs always appear to be winning any debate, because the person on the other side can never openly say that they don't believe in gender ideology and so do not believe TWAW etc. We all know that loads would actually agree with that, but they're not able to say it so obviously they appear to be losing any debate because their argument does not make sense without that underpinned logic.

But it's pretty much taken for granted that whatever your views, you MUST at least agree with the ideology.

This is going to be my only post on this thread.

I just want to say that this is to some extent an echo chamber; there will be lots of Mumsnet posters who disagree with elements of the consensus on this board (myself included) who have no desire to insert themselves into a debate where they know that 99% of the posters on the thread will be ready to argue against them. Perhaps this makes me weak (or just busy and stressed by life) but please don't assume that you're reading a full spectrum of views on this board.

“Trans people and supporters don't deny that there are some people who cause issues but most trans people do not act in this way and there is usually no way to even tell they are trans. Realistically, you are no more likely to get assaulted by a trans woman than by anyone else and we should be using these cases of assault to deal with the abusers themselves and not an entire group of people on a whole. For example, if someone gets assaulted by a cisgender man, this is not an excuse to start being discriminatory towards all men in general.”

By this statement, it seems you don’t seem to understand how safeguarding and risk assessment works.

“if someone gets assaulted by a cisgender man, this is not an excuse to start being discriminatory towards all men in general.”

Er, safeguarding does discriminate against all male people.

So, while you are here, can you link us up to the evidence that a male person at any stage of transition becomes less of a risk of committing sexual offences as any other male person in the UK?

Well, no. This is the feminist board. Generally attracts feminists, as you'd expect.

If anyone is looking for broad spectrum of views maybe look out for polling on the issues. Yougov has a bit, WingsoverScotland has done a few.

Edit: response to Sir Walter's post.

The problem is that you can’t deny reality 🤷🏻‍♀️ men whatever they wear, whatever surgery they’ve had, are not women. Most of the time, it doesn’t matter but sometimes like the right fir women requiring intimate care to have a same sex carer, like the right of female rape victims to have a female only support group it really does

decent men would recognise this and not force themselves into women’s spaces. The men that do this are not decent, they are only thinking of themselves

what I’ve learned over the years is that for example 99% of the public agree that men should not be in a female rape survivors group - that makes 99% of the public transphobic

I think that says quite a lot.

No. Hatespeech is frowned upon in most communities.

And yes exactly on the safeguarding @Helleofabore my DH is lovely & wouldn’t hurt a fly @speenmum Shall we just give him a free pass into all women’s and children’s spaces then? I mean I’ve told you he’s lovely what more do you need?

Not quite.

The way you are using this term in dehumanising. We are not allowed on this board, and quite rightly, to call trans people ‘the transes’ or just ‘transes’ or something similar. Because it is dehumanising.

That is how you have used the term here. It is offensive and rightfully trans people would complain if people referred to them in that way.

My partner's the same,too soft for his own good really.I don't think any woman would want to see his hairy arse in their changing room though.

The aim of most GC feminists is not to be mean to a person clearly in distress, most of us don't actually give a shit what people want to call themselves, how they wish to dress etc.

My aim is to keep single sex spaces for women genuinely single sex.
My aim is protect vulnerable children from making life altering decisions about going on hormones and surgery before they are mature enough to understand the consequences.*
My aim is to stop schools , hospitals, universities and other public institutions peddling lies about biological reality.

The problem is that these two things have been conflated. Which is why I roll my eyes when people try and be balanced by saying things like 'well I don't agree with men in women's prisons, but well, you know....TWAW, what's the harm?'.

The harm is that these two things are not unconnected. The first thing would not be happening without the second thing. The idea that men could be in women's spaces unchallenged would not have been accepted 30 years ago, so the groundwork of lies had to be laid to enable this.

The foundational lie of TWAW is what is supporting men in women's prisons, spaces, sports teams etc. There is a direct connection between these two things.

So it's not really about being mean to trans people, it's about maintaining reality based policies, laws and decisions around public healthcare, spaces and services for women and girls.

Thanks for expressing this so clearly, Farmageddon

Sorry to be repetitive! Phone refused to quote, then did quote.
but worth repeating.

Separated 'bathrooms' are indeed a form of discrimination. We are separating people on the basis of their sex class.

Why do you think we have sex segregated spaces?

This . Like a PP I speak to lots of people about it - trades people, retail workers, estate agents, builders, pensioners and they are all GC.

They don’t have any problem telling the difference between men and women or understanding the risks to women and children of having men in their safe spaces.

So I think it’s a social class divide - it’s only the so called educated or professional classes who are willing to lie until they are blue in the face, because they are understandably scared to tell the truth.

Becuase we all know it’s lies. Your average 5 years old can tell the difference between men and women and most 12 olds could tell you why it’s not safe to have men in women’s prisons or playing women’s rugby.

So it’s just nonsense to pretend that anyone think it’s true. They all know it’s nonsense.

It’s just politically expedient nonsense for the chattering classes.

Even the most full blown TRAs know that men can’t become women. Because they never use transwomen as their surrogates when they buy babies. They don’t even hire transwomen as their cleaners.

Gay men chanting “ TMAM” still don’t date them. Straight men who say TWAW don’t shag them.

Its all luxury opinions. It’s not that they don’t know the risks to women and children , it’s that they don’t care because it doesn’t affect them.

It might be an echo chamber. However it's acknowledging issues which are still legally relevant.

There's a thread at the moment about the equality act and what it does and doesn't say and the impact of language creep.

When the act was written there was no need to clarify the meaning of the words man and woman because it was universally understood.

The deliberate conflation of gender and sex and redefinition of the word woman (but notably not man) undermines the law and the way it was intended.

This hasn't been helped by the advice of Stonewall which has misrepresented the law and given poor advice (we have a legal case that has actually demonstrated this which a company being found to be discriminatory on the basis of the advice they took from Stonewall).

So this isn't about an echo chamber.

This is about the action and effect of the law. Many threads stem from that singular point of the conflict between The Law and 'Stonewall Law'.

This is something transactivists need to engage with whether they like it or not. They can stay in their echo chambers or it will be brought by women bit by bit to the courts and to the press to put political pressure on parties to sort the fucking mess out.

Rules and actual law reflects public sentiment to a certain degree. Laws which do not have public consent and do not seem to serve justice, are problematic for politicians. The public are just waking up to the injustice to women's sport for example. It's not going down well. And it will continue to go down like a cup of cold sick as awareness that transwomen generally keep their penises contrary to public belief.

There was a deliberate acknowledged strategy to try and get laws passed under the radar without public scrutiny. It's now backfiring.

So saying we are all in an echo chamber here, fundamentally missed the point: it doesn't matter if we are. There is a certain percentage of the population who are non-believers. Non belief is legally allowed. And non-believers have equal rights. Because that's how equality works.

Do you think it's ok to be attracted to one sex only, or is this akin to racism?

I can only speak for the people that I know and not for myself.
Do you know what you mean when you use the word "woman"? Or could you try and explain it? You seemed to be getting male/man and female/woman mixed up/ conflated earlier, so I'm trying to understand what you mean when you say it.

Btw i think you're wrong about people's assumptions. There could be no lawbreaking trans people ever and it still would not affect who is and who isn't counted as a woman. That is what people have been objecting to for the past however many years (I've been here about 6).

It is an echo chamber, as in it is a place where you ( mostly) all share the same views and expect praise or reinforcements of beliefs whereas anyone dissenting gets accused of being a man, "welcomed" to MN 🙄 or if that doesn't work try to paint as being angry.

God I spend far too much of my time squabbling with other women on Mumsnet to believe this is an echo chamber. Discussions get really quite heated at times on a whole raft of topics. I’ve been accused of arguing in bad faith and not being a proper feminist but so what? I know those things aren’t true and there are always people that think throwing insults on the internet constitutes debate.

But you are right that there is general consensus on here that men aren’t women. Most of us probably also agree that the grass is green, the earth isn’t flat and that spiders exist but if someone rocked up and expected us to seriously debate whether or not these basic facts are true they would get a similar reaction and nobody would be calling Mumsnet an echo chamber for that.

Mumsnet is about the only open forum on the internet where (mostly) women can gather to talk about actual feminism without being berated for being exclusionary of men or banned from the forum so of course we are going to congregate here en masse.

But women who believe that men can be women are not banned from this forum. So long as it is within Mumsnet rules you can argue whatever you like. Some posters are a bit rude and call you a man but so what? I get told I am arguing in bad faith on here and I get called a Nazi TERF elsewhere on the internet but it doesn’t stop me putting my point of view out there or prevent other people reading it if they wish to.

I’m taking about it more with friends and family. It’s delicate though - you have to dance around the topic and introduce with care (which in itself is ridiculous and shows how far free speech has been eroded).

Happy to report that each time I’ve brought it up in real life they’ve also had GC views and have also been anxious about sharing them. Same story over and over. Still, we’re all talking about it now…as a pp said, every little helps.

I know, I can't understand where this idea of 'nothing should ever be segregated because that's mean' has come from. There are absolutely times when we segregate (by age, by sex, by ability) and with good reason to do so - usually safety or fairness.

In everyday life, going about your day at work it ordinarily doesn't matter what sex a person is - until it absolutely does.
Somehow pointing out that women at times need single sex spaces for a good reason has become a radical viewpoint.

Any you know what, when we remove sex segregation, the people who lose out time and time again are women and girls, because those things were put in place to enable women privacy, dignity or a fair shot at competition.

I think some people see “discrimination” as a necessarily bad thing. It’s drummed into everyone on DEI courses etc that we mustn’t discriminate. But nobody ever educates about lawful discrimination and how it can be put to good or necessary use. It’s a bit of a problem really.

Interesting view, I'd like to hear more about this

It’s Chestertons fence isn’t it @Farmageddon ie don’t take a fence down till you know why it was put up

@popebishop It is obviously not akin to racism. But just because someone is only attracted to one sex doesnt mean they have to hate the other one. It's perfectly fine to have concerns about systems like sports and bathrooms because it is a tricky topic with no good solution that benefits everyone involved. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't treat trans people with respect and understanding even if some problems have arisen in the past

DH is a man so no. But if it was a wife who had transitioned from male at birth then yes. because trans women are women so can go in women's spaces