Why is Mumsnet so GC?

[ireallycantthinkofaname]

Maybe an odd question but I've never come across another space, online or otherwise, where being GC is the norm. IRL I only ever discuss GC views openly with one family member, whose stance on it is similar to my own, though, so I'm not saying it's unwelcome.... Just curious how/why it's come about. Any thoughts or theories?

Last time was an answer about womanhood being a constellation of data points. So Hatched, have you come up with a new answer or sticking to the constellation?

Someone spends too much time on twitter in a bubble.

There is no movement.

There is spontaneous grass roots understanding and growing awareness of the injustice and flawed logic that transwomen are the most oppressed and women need to be the ones to change to accommodate that.

The damn burst fucking ages ago on that.

Women are talking amongst themselves and men are starting to just get pissed off at it all. And the examples of injustice and problematic scenarios which are causing systematic safeguarding failures and freedom of speech failures just keep growing.

An idea is only as good as it works in practice. Gender replacing sex only creates harms to wider society. Someone with gender identity issues needs to deal with them themselves rather than expecting the whole world to play along. This might sound harsh, but that's the reality.

That means open categories and women only categories in sport. That means single sex provision anywhere there is a state of undress or discussion of intimate issues or bodily functions as an absolute minimum. That could mean provision of third spaces too though, but alongside single sex and not replacing them and not transforming existing womens facilities (this reducing provision) but not mens.

The fact you see arguing on twitter and come to the conclusion that there is a fracture in a movement that doesn't actually exist is utterly fascinating and reflective of a lot of the problem tbh.

The whole ‘movement’ and ‘coalition’ stuff - and the assertions that it’s disintegrating - is just conspiracy theory thinking. A whole range of diverse individuals and groups disagree so they must be plotting together - and victory will come when the evil empire in the shadows is defeated.

But life is not badly written dystopian fiction of this kind. And even if it were, I don’t think the coalition arguing for ever more medical and surgical intervention and thought policing would be presented as the plucky heroes.

I thought it was all about that 'immutable sex essence'.

I think it’s all about digging in the thesaurus for impressive sounding words to assemble a salad with.

I would support the continuation of the GRA if you can explain to me how a man can “live as a woman” without using stereotypes.

And there's the nub of why the fury of colonising males is directed mostly gender critical feminists rather than at genuinely transphobic men who may really endanger them. We're the ones who want to let kids be kids, who are fine with androgynous clothing, who don't believe that 'boys should' or 'girls can't'. Sex matters, but only for the things where our sexed physical differences come into play.

I doubt it will become true if you keep saying 'no it isn't' harder.

😆TRA's have been chanting the false statement 'TWAW' for years, increasingly desperately so you've got a bit of a cheek there. Another bit of DARVO.

The fact you see arguing on twitter and come to the conclusion that there is a fracture in a movement that doesn't actually exist is utterly fascinating and reflective of a lot of the problem tbh.

The fact that he can't see that people can have differences of opinion, yet still respect each other's arguments and not just throw a strop about disagreement and flounce off screaming hate, says a lot, too.

Presumably those surrounded by people who validate untruths and lies will find discussion, debate and nuance unfamiliar?

I think we are forgetting something. If a person can convince themselves that they, as a male person, has any advice to offer young female people and female children because of their ‘experience as a woman’, they are obviously open to being convinced that feminist groups are collapsing!

Just saying….

Holding an opinion that reality doesn't matter, doesn't change reality.

HTH

I'm not surprised you've managed to alienate your sister; you seem to have convinced yourself that observing a simple linguistic politeness is an unforgivable act of betrayal more important than your relationship with her.

Red has a brother. Not a sister. She's always had a brother, why should she call him her sister? Why should Red have to rewrite her history to placate her brother?

I'm not sure who you are referring to with this?

Tens of thousands of individual women who started out wanting to be non confrontational and inclusive gradually realising that that is not what is being demanded of us does not make a 'movement'.

For me that man in the Guardian piece who insisted on telling the shop assistant that he was going to wear the lingerie he was buying, because he enjoyed the fact that she didn't want to hear about his sex life and he could force her to, was one big trigger. Another has been watching the physical disintegration of a once bright young girl who has become a wheelchair bound wreck as a result of treatments to aid transition. A third one has been seeing how closely the manipulation and dishonesty around the transition process for young women tracks that around anorexia in 80s and 90s.

I'm not in a movement. I'm a lifelong feminist who can recognise hostility to women being pushed by commercial interests. It stinks. Gender stinks.

I'm not surprised you've managed to alienate your sister; you seem to have convinced yourself that observing a simple linguistic politeness is an unforgivable act of betrayal more important than your relationship with her.

This is so wrong, you do not get to overwrite a relationship with incorrect terms

I know! If my sister decided she was now my brother there is no way I would be prepared to rewrite my 50+ years history of having a sister in order to collude with her mistaken belief she was now a bloke.

My existence has been contested all my life - I've never been consciously aware of a world where I wasn't subject to attempts to brutalise me into pretending to adopt an identity I didn't experience.

Nearly four decades worth of gender-enforcement behaviour and I still haven't given in.

If you are of the opinion that the reality I have experienced all my life is false and are inclined to 'educate' or debate me on how I should get in my lane and pretend to be a man then I'm afraid there is quite a crowd who came before you.

There certainly hasn't been much validation going on.

how I should get in my lane and pretend to be a man

As a male, how are you “living as a woman”? This would be useful information pertaining to your question to me about whether I think the GRA is still valid.

I don't see why any man should have their assertion they are a woman validated. It's not true so why would I validate it?

I have seen nothing, heard nothing and read nothing in all these years that adequately explains to me why I should believe a man stood in front of me is a woman just because he says so.

I am happy to change my thoughts on this just as soon as someone can give me an explanation as to why I should that actually makes sense.

Didn't BH previously say that they passed as a woman? Or am I thinking of someone else?

He did say that,but then again don't they all?

Amaryllis - Me too but I am not sure if a study could even get ethical approval when after all these years there is so little evidence of benefit from puberty suppression.

Information about the study is now available.

Professor Emily Simonoff has been confirmed as Chief Investigator and will now lead on developing the detailed proposal for the planned research on puberty suppressing hormones in early onset gender dysphoria. Emily is Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London, where she is also currently Head of the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Director of the King’s Maudsley Partnership for Children and Young People. She has extensive research experience and is also academic lead for the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services Clinical Academic Group at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. The research is being developed through the National Research Collaboration Programme, a joint partnership between the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and NHS England.

Good set of sponsors and partners. I'd think they're confident about obtaining approval.

https://www.england.nhs.uk/commissioning/spec-services/npc-crg/gender-dysphoria-clinical-programme/implementing-advice-from-the-cass-review/cyp-gender-dysphoria-research-oversight-board/

And to add...

It's like being forced to agree the Easter Bunny is indeed real because John in Accounts is adamant he saw the real Easter Bunny in spring 1986.

That might have been Alphawoman.

Hells - I am more optimistic in some ways rethinking. I think that the horse has already bolted and the awareness will not be pushed back into a subversive stable. It will unfortunately take time.

I think we wait an inordinately long time for awareness to influence people's health or social behaviour in many sphere. Some examples.

• 5-A-Day that was always intended to be a transition to the actual 7 or 9 a day.
• We know about the recommendations in re: healthy body weights and physical activity.
• Lots of disability awareness, relatively negligible accommodations in workplaces, public spaces, public services like transport or healthcare, far less businesses. (Jay Rayner recently had a piece about identifying a restaurant that could accommodate someone in a wheelchair.) https://www.theguardian.com/food/2024/feb/15/yes-it-can-be-hard-to-get-a-restaurant-table-but-it-can-be-impossible-if-youre-a-wheelchair-user-jay-rayner

So, as ever, I remain agape at the behavioural modification and scale of changes introduced in what seems record time by this phenomenon. And the number of spheres, healthcare, the legal system, policy making, employment law, prison service, education…

I shall go and look at the blossom at a tree until I have an uplift :)