I think I'm becoming transphobic

[MyGhastIsFlabbered]

I feel unpleasant writing this but I need to put it down somewhere. I know trans people, I have no problem with them and I've always said TWAW. But recently, especially in light of the Sandie Pegge, Beth Upton case my views are changing. I don't have a problem with people wearing what they want, I'm even fine with pronouns.

But I'm starting to believe that you cannot change sex. All the surgery and hormones in the world will not make you a woman. Saying 'I'm a woman' doesn't make it so.

What's worse is that my 15 year old stepdaughter is identifying as male and I just find myself getting so frustrated whenever they refer to themselves as 'a dude'.

Am I transphobic or just realistic? How can I come to terms with my feelings as they are evolving?

I agree, that's dehumanising.

I think you're being deliberately disingenuous. The ideology itself, not an individual trans person, is parasitical in nature. Many feminists and gender critical sociologists have said this. Because its a fact. They (as an ideology), hijacked the LGB after they won their rights and attached themselves to LGB, unasked, to give themselves - their movement, their ideology - validity. And now they are destroying the standing of LGB when LGB worked so hard to get where they are now. What else would you call it, but parasitical in nature? When a movement invades another movement, without permission, and then hijacks the movement and starts destroying it and its standing? I'd love to hear how else you would describe it.

I read it as a criticism of the behaviour, not of individuals, but of course its open to interpretation. Report the post if you feel strongly about it. And mine too actually, as its kind of saying the same thing.

"Trans ideology is parasitic on other liberation movements" would have been worded more felicitously. Trans people themselves are not parasites. I also read it as a criticism of the ideology not the people.

I've been in exactly your position. It was a nightmare, because I felt like an Evil Stepmother.

Over the years DSD went from male-identifying and asking for hormonal treatments to non-binary and not wanting treatments, and now just uses she/her pronouns and presents as female: however she has changed her name to a male name.

DH and I struggle with it hugely and try to avoid using any name or pronouns at all - but she now keeps her distance from us because it is clear we were not supportive. I had conversations with her over the years but at the end of the day she thinks we are transphobic for not accepting her non-binary identity, and I think she is sexist for needing a non-binary identity to validate non-feminine behaviour. (This is particularly hard as I am a fairly butch looking female!)

Anyway, I don't have much advice. You are stuck in an impossible place. You may well end up pushing her away which is really sad, but these are incompatible (pseudo-religious) world views and I don't see how they can easily co-exist.

No one can change sex, it's literally impossible. Being labeled as transphobic for stating that fact, just proves the movement relies on unquestioning compliance. I've never been one for that kind of shit, personally.

My daughter says I’m transphobic. The only thing I’ve ever mentioned (to her) is men in women’s sport. It breaks my fucking heart to think of women training their whole lives to compete in their sport, and then not standing a chance of winning because men have decided they’re women. All the hours they put in, the expense, their parents probably went without. If that makes me phobic, I don’t care

@TheoTurkey it doesn't make you transphobic of course, It just threatens your DD's faith-based position that transwomen are women.

In fact if you replace every time someone says "that's transphobic" with "that's blasphemy" it makes it clearer what's going on.

Yes, any deviation from absolute compliance will be deemed 'transphobic'. Eventually one realises that the term is used not as a descriptor but as a chastisement, a way to stop discussion and questions. Yes, same as 'blasphemer' or 'apostate' or 'unbeliever'.

@MyGhastIsFlabbered if you feel able to talk more about this, I'd be interested to hear it and how you have started to see things differently

I'm having an issue with a family member who used to be someone I could talk to about issues with misogyny.

I read this thread with interest especially in reference to "soul" stuff. The irony is this person is very much an atheist. I've seen you on MN before and I don't think you're posting for drama.

TW aren't women. There's nothing transphobic about scientific fact.

I was in Zara earlier. There was a TW at the women's changing room showing women to fitting rooms. (And believe me, they were very obviously male and the longer hair, make-up and painted nails just highlighted this fact). It made me uncomfortable because guess what? It was a man. Men do not belong in women's changing rooms. Again, nothing transphobic about that. Why? Because you cannot change sex. A man will always be a man no matter how he is dressed.

Yeah it was poorly phrased but I took it to mean TRAs (often not trans themselves) and trans ideology (a very fundamentalist form of the belief in gender id).

It's easy for me not to jump to offence on behalf of trans people however because I've been aware of their existence since my teens and the first transexual I knew was long before the current iteration of trans rights ideology. It's perhaps easier for me to step back and see the preposterous, misogynist demands we see at the moment as separate from, and not representing, all trans people.

Welcome to the dark side!!

"I believe anyone can identify as whatever they want, it's not harming anyone."
But men dressing up as women is harming women and girls.
For example, the guy who got his new boobs out to play with on the White House lawn when Biden was in power; I wouldn't want my daughter seeing that and thinking it was normal behaviour for a woman.

Calling trans people parasites would indeed be transphobic. But there are certainly aspects of the activism that are parasitic in nature. The co-option of DSDs, adding the I to LGBTQ+, is like a cuckoo in a reed warbler's nest. A much larger, louder interloper using confusion to take attention and resources. And as for 'no LGB without the T' and what's been done to Stonewall - that's full on zombie ant fungus levels of parasitism.

It is not the dressing up that harms women and girls. It is claiming that by wearing "women's clothing" they become a woman that harms women and children.

Back in the heady days of 2nd wave feminism i thought we had debunked the shite about gender stereotypes. Seems not.

We've just heard an actual doctor in a tribunal describe how he is biologically female.

There are only two possibilities, here.

Either he is deluded, and grossly ignorant of very basic reality, or he is lying and using sophistry to try to pretend that he has the right to insist that women in a state of undress in a changing room do not leave the room when he enters.

Not directly related to Upton but about power tripping and people being too scared to say anything, there's a thread in the legal advice subreddit on Reddit today about an employer who is having to deal with a person who has added BDSM based neopronouns to their customer facing emails.

The employer, who sounds a bit of a wet lettuce, isn't sure whether they have to accept them by law. Other staff are also taking the piss, naturally, and there's more handwringing about this and the need to support "trans rights" than the creepy sexually suggestive pronouns. I imagine this person was positively hoping for the attention, these people are so naive.

Most of the comments have been censored, obvs

https://www.reddit.com/r/LegalAdviceUK/s/F5kOvt0sOU

Except this is legally absolute bollocks.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cyve4m79e6lo

As demonstrated in court today:
Castellucci described the experience of trying to obtain legal documents listing them as non-binary as an "ordeal" and the court heard they worried about possible difficulties related to their gender identity when applying for British citizenship.

They also raised concerns about how their gender identity would be reflected on their death certificate, when their US documents state they are non-binary.

Lord Justice Singh, sitting with Dame Victoria Sharp and Sir Andrew McFarlane, said that only 11 countries worldwide, as well as some US states including California, recognise non-binary gender in law.

Non-binary is an umbrella term for those those who do not identify as exclusively male or female.

In a judgment published on Tuesday, external, Lord Justice Singh said: "The concept of 'gender' in the Gender Recognition Act (GRA), when referred to in the context of the domestic law route, is confined to two genders."

There are NOT six billion genders in the UK. And non-binary has no legal status. So anyone saying differently is talking incoherent fiction.

I didn't used to be transphobic but after being exposed to so much awful behaviour from those who have a trans identity, I think I am transphobic now. The word "trans" has all sorts of negative connotations in my mind and when I encounter someone with a trans identity I assume the worst about them. I'm definitely prejudiced against the whole lot of them now. I often have to step back and think and remind myself that they're not all like that because my gut instinct has been cultivated after years of all this to say otherwise. Sorry but this is the truth and I expect it's the same for many others here.

(Name changed as I don't want this confession associated with all my posts on women's rights.)

I identified as a man to annoy someone who thinks TWAW. For some reason he couldn't keep up the pretence. I told him he was transphobic 😬

I identified as a man to annoy someone who thinks TWAW. For some reason he couldn't keep up the pretence. I told him he was transphobic

Well done

A worrying number of the undeleted posts seem to be from people with basic misconceptions about the Equality Act.

The underlying problem has been created by the MCW member of staff, not the employee taking the piss with the BDSM pronouns, IMO.

This is how badly schools and teaching materials have been poisoned. Most young people are still TWAW

Yes, the same as anyone playing with their bits in public (which are generally biological men!) What I should have said is 'IF' it's not harming anyone, my apologies.

My point remains though. If you want to dress like a woman then go right ahead, whatever makes you happy. But I will not say trans women are women, and I don't want willies in female spaces.

A worrying number of the undeleted posts seem to be from people with basic misconceptions about the Equality Act.

The underlying problem has been created by the MCW member of staff, not the employee taking the piss with the BDSM pronouns, IMO.

Yes, exactly. The employer says elsewhere that he/she mandated pronouns for everyone in email signatures because of the other trans person on the team. Because he felt "othered" . So this is partly a problem of their own making.