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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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3 questions for GC women

1000 replies

ChirpyFinch · 28/08/2024 00:27

As the title says, three questions for the women in this chat.

  1. Do you think the majority of people are gender critical, and why/why not?

  2. Globally, the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. They are also far more likely to be regressive on a range of women’s issues like abortion and anti-gay. Why do you think they agree with GCs on this one issue but disagree on so much else (if you think they do?)

  3. How many trans people do you estimate there are globally?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
37
BernardBlacksMolluscs · 28/08/2024 14:26

@CautiousLurker I’m afraid gin pollutes everything it touches (much like gender-SEE, on topic!)

AmaryllisNightAndDay · 28/08/2024 14:31

Nice cartoons @Waitwhat23 Those should clarify things well for the OP.

And oh yes, I forgot to add - "gender critical" is an adjectival phrase but not a noun phrase because "critical" is not a noun. So you can say "gender critical people" or "gender critical feminists" or "gender critical conservatives / communists/ etc" (you do know the Morning Star takes a GC position?) but not "gender criticals". That's bad grammar as well as rude.

"Sex realist" on the other hand works as both noun and adjective. We can be "sex realist feminists" or "feminist sex realists".

CocoapuffPuff · 28/08/2024 14:38

It's a funny old world where telling the TRUTH is the thing that gets you punished, innit?

Trans as a descriptive term means so much now that it covers almost everyone and therefore is utterly meaningless. Like a single sardine trying to stand out in a shoal of a million.

cariadlet · 28/08/2024 14:38

CautiousLurker · 28/08/2024 14:22

Well, on the basis that everyone who offered a recipe here also took time to answer the OP’s question (including mine which provided a very clear exposition of what I understand GC to mean), I dont feel there is a real derail. Plus, my own definition of GC idoes, in fact, involve the recent discovery of Gin Cocktails, so am still in the market for any suggestions on those.

Edited

Exactly!

I advocated for rock cakes and be-ro recipe books, appreciated the photo of vegan condensed milk (although a closer look showed that it was from Coles and I think that's an Australian supermarket chain) but also wrote a few posts answering the OP's question.

I wanted to follow up the use of vegan v plant based terminology but there's no point if it would be deleted for derailing the thread.

Hairyesterdaygonetoday · 28/08/2024 14:44

ChirpyFinch · 28/08/2024 00:27

As the title says, three questions for the women in this chat.

  1. Do you think the majority of people are gender critical, and why/why not?

  2. Globally, the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. They are also far more likely to be regressive on a range of women’s issues like abortion and anti-gay. Why do you think they agree with GCs on this one issue but disagree on so much else (if you think they do?)

  3. How many trans people do you estimate there are globally?

  1. I’m pretty sure most sane adults in the world know that humans can’t change sex. I suspect that most of those who go along with ‘gender identity’ don’t believe TWAW etc, but don’t dare say so.
  2. As you must know, people can agree on one issue and disagree on others. One issue that unites conservatives and feminists is that people can’t change sex. Conservatives support single-sex spaces etc out of common decency. Most normal people do.
  3. Numbers of people with gender dysphoria is increasing because of huge internet publicity. The numbers will drop when a new fad takes over.
Omlettes · 28/08/2024 14:47

MrsTerryPratchett · 28/08/2024 07:32

I'd like to ask a wide-eyed question about how many feminists are vegan and/or gluten-free. Because from this thread, it's a LOT. <narrows eyes>

We are grovelling American wannabees.

DrBlackbird · 28/08/2024 14:47

@BeckyAMumsnet it would be reassuring if you could tell us if @ChirpyFinch had a track record with MN ie a genuine poster. It looked to me that it was the first time they posted on MN.

It was the nature of the OPs replies in the first two pages that suggested deliberate misrepresentation of the good faith replies including the specious forced teaming, again, of the GC position with the far right. Eg

Do you think that the right wing believes in the same things gender criticals do, regardless of what that says about you - because I don’t really care one way or the other, I’m not here to cast judgement, just to ask. (italics added)

If we had your reassurance, there’d be even more genuine engagement (though I think that there is plenty?). Anyhow, I enjoyed and found the recipe suggestions helpful and the OP could just ignore them.

Finally, in my experience, no one wants or expects FWR to be an echo chamber but usually robust debate is helpful in setting out one’s premises, justifying claims, and the conclusions based on those premises. Especially when it comes to Feminism: Sex and Gender discussions.

Omlettes · 28/08/2024 14:48

Hairyesterdaygonetoday · 28/08/2024 14:44

  1. I’m pretty sure most sane adults in the world know that humans can’t change sex. I suspect that most of those who go along with ‘gender identity’ don’t believe TWAW etc, but don’t dare say so.
  2. As you must know, people can agree on one issue and disagree on others. One issue that unites conservatives and feminists is that people can’t change sex. Conservatives support single-sex spaces etc out of common decency. Most normal people do.
  3. Numbers of people with gender dysphoria is increasing because of huge internet publicity. The numbers will drop when a new fad takes over.
Edited

None

Omlettes · 28/08/2024 14:49

This reply has been deleted

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FlirtsWithRhinos · 28/08/2024 14:51

@ChirpyFinch

I have some questions for you also, woudl really appreciate your thoughts here:

  1. Do you think the majority of people are gender critical, and why/why not?
  1. Globally, the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. They are also far more likely to be regressive on a range of women’s issues like abortion and anti-gay. Why do you think they agree with GCs on this one issue but disagree on so much else (if you think they do?)
  1. How many trans people do you estimate there are globally?

Really looking forward to your perpective here, it's great to have people engaging in good faith.

ElleWoods15 · 28/08/2024 14:53

@Hairyesterdaygonetoday it’s an easy response to say that gender dysphoria is increasing because of internet publicity, but it fails to take account of the existence of trans people and ‘third gender’ in cultures dating back to ancient times.

I’d suggest instead that numbers of those recognising their gender dysphoria may be increasing, as it becomes more widely understood and (generally) more accepted in our culture. I’d suggest labelling it a ‘fad’ is pretty reductive.

Helleofabore · 28/08/2024 14:55

How many of those cultures that get mentioned here a lot were homophobic so that the homosexual people of these societies had no option but to declare a they were a special gender?

Dumbo12 · 28/08/2024 14:55

This reply has been deleted

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ChaChaChooey · 28/08/2024 15:05
  1. pretty much everyone (even people-with-gender-identities) know that humans cannot change sex.
  2. I don’t really care about left wing/right wing anymore (apart from in economics terms in which case I am left wing). I believe in Darwinism though, as do plenty of people in all political parties, especially in the U.K. where we don’t have many creationists and the ones we do have don’t influence public policy.
  3. ’Transgenderism’ as a concept is specific to the Anglosphere + Europe, so global numbers are irrelevant (bit like when transactivists wang on about ‘intersex being as common as redheads’ without stopping to think about how uncommon redheads are in African and Asian countries. Seems a bit racist really).

CBA with the other questions - perhaps putting them all in one post to make replying easy might result in fuller answers?

DeanElderberry · 28/08/2024 15:05

Clicking to see all the OPs posts is quite educational. All posts were between just after midnight and 5.40ish. So either they are in a different time zone or they were suffering some kind of essay-crisis panic.

I particularly cherish this sentence from their second post I don’t think anyone cares what I think - because I know how forums on the internet work - but I am interested to know what others think.

They are special interested caring people we are not.

Did I mention I've just finished reading Hillbilly Elegy? The author of that is special and caring too. A bit like Adrian Mole but scary.

GrumpyPanda · 28/08/2024 15:05

TempestTost · 28/08/2024 11:01

Do you think conservatives really think men shouldn't be involved in things like washing up?

I sometimes wonder where MN women live that they think things like that. Have they just never met a conservative, or is a kind of thing where they see women conservatives but somehow block out the information they should be getting from that?

MN isn't just FWR.Spend some time on the Relationships board, then get back to us with that question.

Also, I'm increasingly hesitant to apply the "conservative" label to today's right-wingers. "Reactionary", in the literal sense of the word, seems much more appropriate, given that so much of it is a backlash, anti-modernism movement. They're giving genuine, old-school conservatives a bad name.

Snowypeaks · 28/08/2024 15:06

ElleWoods15 · 28/08/2024 14:53

@Hairyesterdaygonetoday it’s an easy response to say that gender dysphoria is increasing because of internet publicity, but it fails to take account of the existence of trans people and ‘third gender’ in cultures dating back to ancient times.

I’d suggest instead that numbers of those recognising their gender dysphoria may be increasing, as it becomes more widely understood and (generally) more accepted in our culture. I’d suggest labelling it a ‘fad’ is pretty reductive.

but it fails to take account of the existence of trans people and ‘third gender’ in cultures dating back to ancient times.

Third gender. ie men who fail to live up to or fit into masculine gender stereotypes or were just homosexual in cultures where that was totally unacceptable. Men who carve out a niche or are forced into a niche in society.
Not men who become, or think of themselves as, women. Not members of the female sex. They are not "transgender".

Also, having gender dysphoria doesn't mean you actually are the opposite sex.

Where are all the middle-aged women coming out in comparable numbers as young women and girls, if it's just a case of gender dysphoria becoming more accepted or recognised?

NoBinturongsHereMate · 28/08/2024 15:17

Helleofabore · 28/08/2024 14:55

How many of those cultures that get mentioned here a lot were homophobic so that the homosexual people of these societies had no option but to declare a they were a special gender?

Most, I suspect. Certainly I haven't found a single one that doesn’t have incredibly rigid divisions between the sexes (almost all with women firmly inferior). And in all of them these people are considered to be a third sex or gender - not the opposite one.

EmpressaurusDeiGatti · 28/08/2024 15:20

If anything is reactionary and reductive, it's gender ideology.

A truly progressive society would recognise that the only thing that makes someone female (woman / girl) or male (man / boy) is their biology.

The idea that being a woman or a man depends on how closely someone's personality, appearance, tastes, sexual preferences etc match the relevant social stereotypes should have faded away a long time ago.

MixieMatchie · 28/08/2024 15:22
  1. the whole world apart from your modern day cult
  2. we also agree that the sky is blue
  3. as there is no sensible reality-based definition, it's not possible to count
Mmmnotsure · 28/08/2024 15:23

cariadlet · 28/08/2024 14:38

Exactly!

I advocated for rock cakes and be-ro recipe books, appreciated the photo of vegan condensed milk (although a closer look showed that it was from Coles and I think that's an Australian supermarket chain) but also wrote a few posts answering the OP's question.

I wanted to follow up the use of vegan v plant based terminology but there's no point if it would be deleted for derailing the thread.

@cariadlet Carnation do a vegan condensed milk, available in UK supermarkets.

MerryMarys · 28/08/2024 15:27

A truly progressive society would recognise that the only thing that makes someone female (woman / girl) or male (man / boy) is their biology.

ANY person with some intelligence would surely recognise that Confused?!

FlirtsWithRhinos · 28/08/2024 15:27

My thoughts on your questions:

Do you think the majority of people are gender critical, and why/why not?
No. Sadly many cultures are still deeply repressive especially of women's freedoms and right to self-determination and equality with men in practice if not in law. But globally, all cultures, even the most sexually equal ones, still have some degree of socially expected and enforced gender roles, and usually more to the detriment of women than men. Why? Because we learn what's "normal" within our culture from the day we are born. It takes an effort of will, and usually someone asking us hard questions, to actually see the everyday social structures around us and realise they are contructed rather than just "the way things are". And even if you do see that, it's still a huge effort to stand against your culture, likely your friends and family, to change them. It's like opening a box with a crowbar when you and the crowbar are both locked inside the box. So most people to some degree do accept and live within the gender roles of their society.

Globally, the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. They are also far more likely to be regressive on a range of women’s issues like abortion and anti-gay. Why do you think they agree with GCs on this one issue but disagree on so much else (if you think they do?)

I'm not sure what you mean by "right wing" given that this phrase encompasses everything from Facism to liberal economies favouring private ownership to conservative religions. Indeed people who are right wing by one definition are often a perceived enemy of the right wing by another definition. It's almost like the label itself is ridiculously simplistic and used to turn complex realities into shallow soundbites.

Assuming from the rest of your post your concept of "right wing" is the current populist meaning of socially-conservative-to-the-point-of-repression, I disagree that this group is at all gender critical. In fact they are highly supportive of gendered roles although unlike genderists they do not support cross-sex adoption of these gender roles. This is in contrast to gender critical people who do not support gendered roles at all regardless of whether the role is being performed by its traditional sex or the opposite sex. The only time its acceptable to perform gender in a gender critical sense is when it is done knowingly, to show up the construct. This is why gender critical people celebrate men enjoiying dresses and makeup yet are critical of trans women in sterotypically female presentation - it's because the first undermines steroetypes of womanhood while the second embraces them. So, given your framing statement the right wing is more vocally gender critical than the left. is wrong, the rest of the question is meaningless.

How many trans people do you estimate there are globally?
This depends too much on how you define "trans people" to answer - you'll need to be more clear. Is it simply anyone who currently claims a transgender identity for any period of time regardless of how long that has been for? Do you include people from non-Western cultures who have different gender constructs who may not consider themselves transgender in the Western sense? Do you mean people who have taken significant surgical and/or legal steps to permanently adopt a cross-sex persona? Would you include gender nonconforming people who woudl not define themselves as transgender? This one really does need you to put some skin in the game first.

Looking forward to your thoughts on my replies @ChirpyFinch

EmpressaurusDeiGatti · 28/08/2024 15:40

MerryMarys · 28/08/2024 15:27

A truly progressive society would recognise that the only thing that makes someone female (woman / girl) or male (man / boy) is their biology.

ANY person with some intelligence would surely recognise that Confused?!

Well, you’d think, but a lot of brains seem to be going backwards…

Waitwhat23 · 28/08/2024 15:40

I do wonder what the next fad will be (and anyone who claims that there's not at least an element of social contagion about all this is deluding themselves).

I think it'll go one of two ways -

  1. The whole authoritarian GI movement will collapse under it's own weight as people finally tire of being told what they must think. I think this will take the form of increasing number of people saying 'no. piss off. I'm not your mum - I don't have any obligation to indulge your navel gazing' to the cult of look at meeeeee's!
  1. Something even more ludicrous will take hold. I suspect some sort of religion, along the same lines as scientology. Again, there will be a backlash along the line, probably when a push for absolute science kicks in as a reaction.
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