How to lose friends and alienate people? Be openly GC

[ProfessorFlitwick]

I have recently "come out" as GC to my friends, and I am sad by some of their responses. It turns out that for some of them, me thinking a woman is a biological female is an insurmountable hurdle to our friendship. I'm sad to see women who I know are intelligent just repeating the gender ideology dogma without being open to applying any critical thought to it.

Atheists and theists can respectfully debate the existence of God, and still be friends. They understand they are debating the wider concept of God, and not attacking each other personally or denying the other person's right to hold their view. GI supporters seem incapable of comprehending this way of debating something, any form of discussion is seen as a direct "attack" on the "existence of trans people" and must be immediately shut down. When I think of the types of people in history who try to silence or intimidate people who disagree with them, it doesn't bring up a great bunch of people.

Does anyone else want to vent about their experiences of navigating (or losing) friendships with GI supporters?

Contexts/statements where “woman” is clearly being used to refer only to natal/biological women:
“Women should have regular smear tests to detect early signs of cervical cancer”
“Women in the UK were not able to vote in general elections until the twentieth century”
“Most women are shorter than most men”

Contexts/statements where the speaker could reasonably intend the term “woman” to include trans women:
“Women often find themselves the target of unwanted sexual attention in the town centre on Saturday nights”
“Most women have longer hair than most men”
“Women are subjected to greater scrutiny of their appearance and clothing choices than men”

Contexts/statements where the speaker could reasonably intend the term “woman” to include trans women:

But you haven't explained here why you'd use the word "woman" to include some men.

Mrspenguinsschoolforfreaks yes I do see your point that words can have more than one meaning, in different contexts.

However I think the problem happens when a word's definition is stretched to include something it is mutually exclusive with. Women aren't men, by definition. The point of the definition of women is that it's the type of human that's not a man, and vice versa. It's a descriptor of sex, of which there are two mutually exclusive categories.

Whereas all the meaning of mothers are the various ways in which a woman can be a mother – biologically, adoptively, legally etc. but all still in the realm of parenting the younger generation. None of them encroach on something that a mother literally can't be – such as a son or father, or a baby. It is doing that that makes a category meaningless.

Women often find themselves the target of unwanted sexual attention in the town centre on Saturday nights”
“Most women have longer hair than most men”
“Women are subjected to greater scrutiny of their appearance and clothing choices than men”

All these apply equally to men who try to look like women, so they don't need to be included in the "woman" definition.

Also, these things are all cultural. The idea that TW are women or should be accepted as women arises out of the idea that you can "be" a woman by performing some cultural stereotypes we associate with women, which are specific to place and time. Yet you probably don't agree that a white person can "be" black by adopting some stereotypical cultural attributes and modifying their hair and skin. In fact that's extremely offensive. Likewise someone able-bodied pretending to be disabled by using a wheelchair. Even if some people might treat you as black or disabled if they were suitably deceived. Would that make it OK to change the definition? If not why not?

It's only with sex that appropriating the selfhood and "lived experience" of a category that's mutually exclusive to your own is supposed to be accepted and even celebrated. It still doesn't make any sense though.

They also apply to men who are slightly feminine, e.g. some gay men, especially the unwanted attention and the scrutiny of appearance. And they are not trying at all to look like women.

I’m sorry, I will come back to this, I’ve ended up working very late tonight. I have been mulling these points over on and off throughout the day