Darling sister and pronouns

[CheeseFromTheNorth]

I know this has cropped up many times, the sense of sadness when a close family member or friend seems to have joined the #bekind brigade.
Had a forwarded email from my sister who lives in another country, from her work address and she used pronouns in her email signature.
I don't understand it. She is all for social justice (Aboriginal rights) across the board and proclaims to be a feminist.
I won't have a conversation about this with her until I see her in person. But when I do my line will be something along the lines of "I used to respect pronouns, as I saw no harm in it. But as I read more and more about male rapists wanting to be referred to as she/her and all institutions complying with it, I realised that something is very wrong.
Who do I decide "deserves" those pronouns? The trans identifying male that's kind but doesn't pass? The male rapist because he speaks of gender dysphoria, but forces his victim to use language such as "her penis" when testifying in court?
So I've drawn and line and will refer to a man who identifies as a woman by their name".

That's all I would say, it does share my opinion and shows the time line of thinking over the years. I have been overweight for many years (not anymore) so I don't think that me raising the sports issue rings true as a reason for me to be of the anti-pronoun brigade (of course no man should be in women's sports but sports is never something I've been interested in, so it rings false for me to be passionate about it), but I HAVE been sexually assaulted many times, so this is my hill.

Keeping discussions like this light and giving food for thought is the way to go imho.

But what has been troubling me is the "why"? Why has she not looked in to this? She too is a SA survivor and it was a particularly horrendous event that has very badly scarred her.

Sorry for the long post.

I missed this yesterday.

That you consider it an acceptable compromise that on the stand recounting an horrific experience, a victim has to not only deal with speaking about it for everyone to hear but has to show respect their attacker says a great deal. That until recently the Benchbook had this after deeply ideological activists successfully got it added, was a testimony to how upside down some people’s priorities are.

But to see this on a feminist board is a bit of a shock.

I cannot understand how a person thinks that a rape victim, overwhelming female people, should have to be forced into a situation where they have to show respect for their attacker by complying with their belief. Particularly that someone thinks “acceptable compromise to use they/ them or avoid pronouns altogether so the accused pushed the accused penis into me”.

I think that takes some compartmentalisation within the mind of any person, and there are far too many that support victims using attackers preferred pronouns, it is not just a few people. It actively dismisses the needs of the victim and centres the rapist. It emotionally supports the rapist while adding to the emotional burden of the victim.

Rape is about power. Forced compliance to language demands is about power. And some people believe that the rapist should be able to continue to have some last remaining power over their victim.

This post sums it up.

Whether it is intentional or not, expecting any victim of rape, assault or abuse to prioritise the attacker/abuser in their speech is allowing further harm to happen to that victim.

I think it might show the degree of significant personal investment somone has of supporting a group’s philosophical belief when they believe this is in anyway acceptable. And if that someone is acting in this way because they are under some coercive force themselves, maybe they cannot recognise it or acknowledge it. Or maybe they fully believe that the groups’s philosophical belief in themselves must be complied with.

It shows the success though of the narrative of ‘most marginalised, most vulnerable’. Because in the mind of those who find this language demand acceptable, even in a rape trial, the victim is not the most vulnerable, the attacker is. The emotional manipulation of those sound bites has been very powerful.

Either way, it shines a light on the disregard some people have for the well being of others that they think it is in any way appropriate for a victim of rape to have to centre their rapist when giving testimony in court.

What field are you in? Do you know what field my friend is in? Did I say anywhere that every job application in Australia demands this, or that every job she’d applied for demands it?

Exactly. If men think they are unsafe in men's spaces because of other men, why should that ever be made a women's problem?

It has been interesting that Sarah McBride is being introduced in committee hearing now as Mr McBride. Because on knowing the background of that member of congress and knowing what McBride has successfully supported and how harmful those changes have been to female people and children, seeing McBride introduced as Mister does change the tone for any speech that has been framed as being to support female people.

It immediately strips the sub-conscious bias of pre-emptively associating that speech with a female who is campaigning on behalf of other female people. Now it sets up the listener to understand that this is a male person. So if that person is about to campaign that some male people should be allowed access to female single sex provisions, the position comes across with that perspective now.

https://x.com/acyn/status/1888132211217727571?s=46

And when important sub-committee hearings are derailed because the chair used the correct sex title for the person involved but others then acted in a way that caused an adjournment for the hearing in support of this demanded use of preferred language, it becomes clear that there is coerciveness at play here. No one should expect that their belief in themselves should have to be supported by another person. But this group of people with beliefs about their identities that is not supported by evidence and their supporters believe they have the right to expect that their beliefs are complied with.

Using preferred language has now become more important than discussing important business in government.

Y

Just like the NHS Fife case, when you strip away that preferred language, people begin to understand what has been happening and how it has happened.

Meanwhile children and young people are mutilating themselves because they've been sold the magic bullet that will 'solve' their insecurities and trauma.

Meanwhile women are self excluding from hospital and essential services like rape crisis services because they can't cope with being around men.

Meanwhile women are losing their jobs for saying they don't want to undress in front of men. They aren't allowed their dignity and are not afforded protections against vouyeristic behaviour that supposedly exist in law.

Meanwhile women are losing life changing scholarships due to men in women's sport.

Meanwhile women are abused in marriages by men who decide they are women and they struggle to recognise what is happening to them because they've been brainwashed and had their boundaries removed by this pushing of 'being kind' that erodes their own self esteem and worth.

Yeah they don't matter and count. We get it. It's all about the hurty feelings of men in dresses and women with short hair.

Yes, definitely. Great post.

The discordance about this forced pronouns use, and yes, social pressure of ‘it is respectful’ is a powerful force too, has already played out on this thread. Society needs accurate language to protect female single sex needs.

It should be said that society has to have accurate language when needed whatever the cause.

Sentences such as :

”Her naturally high testosterone means she is being banned from female sports events”

vs

“His naturally high testosterone means he is being banned from female sports events.”

Highlight the degree of misinformation out there. Semenya, for instance, has normal male testosterone. And Semenya’s body processes that testosterone.

Semenya had readings of around 22 nmol of testosterone as in the witness statements for the court case. A female athlete with that reading would likely be gravely ill and certainly not competing in Olympic events.

Even the initial level of 10 nmols that the IOC declared at one time is massively high and again, if a female athlete had even that level, there would be grave concerns for their health.

This is from a PCOS advocate on twitter.

PCOS raises female testosterone to up to 5.5 nmol/L (and above 4 can cause serious issues).
5-ARD raised Caster's testosterone to 21 nmol/L.

twitter.com/NathanielHart72/status/1550916276490477568?s=20&t=E8muLvV5kUEpbPeemz8zwQ

Plus there is this:

twitter.com/seaningle/status/1537480540068225031?s=20&t=E8muLvV5kUEpbPeemz8zwQ

Sean Ingle (Guardian sports journalist) mentioned this

The latest scientific publications clearly demonstrate that the return of markers of endurance capacity to "female level" occurs within six to eight months under low blood testosterone, while the awaited adaptations in muscle mass and muscle strength/power take much longer (two years minimum according to a recent study). Given the important role played by muscle strength and power in cycling performance, the UCI has decided to increase the transition period on low testosterone from 12 to 24 months. In addition, the UCI has decided to lower the maximum permitted plasma testosterone level (currently 5 mol/L) to 2.5 mol/L. This value corresponds to the maximum testosterone level found in 99.99% of the female population.

Plus this discusses the ranges

^https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/sms.14581^

The International Olympic Committee framework on fairness, inclusion and nondiscrimination on the basis of gender identity and sex variations does not protect fairness for female athletes
“In adulthood, circulating testosterone concentrations do not come close to overlapping between females (0.1–1.7 nmol/L) and males (7.7–29.4 nmol/L).”

plus that Hoovlet post with handy charts in the tweet

https://x.com/hoovlet/status/1819017510005407984

“Confirmed. No overlap in T levels between healthy men and women, and rarely in people with atypical levels”.
“Below I'll include some info from my book on T and sex diffs. First is an illustration of the combined data from a meta-analysis of studies on a healthy population (by David Handelsman), and another on T levels in ppl with medical conditions/DSDs (by Richard Clark). I've also included my text description of the data. The original illustration is from Doriane Coleman's excellent Sex in Sport article (link is in the graphic). She let me adapt it for my book but hers is clearer!”

If you are using the term 'woman with high testosterone', plus check your sources and don't spread misinformation. Female people with PCOS, women, DO NOT HAVE male levels of testosterone!

Oh come on. You answered that in a way that specifically suggested you felt the person you were responding to was lying or exaggerating.Your mild caveat (which is clear because of the punctuation you chose to use with it) of "- at least not every one of them - " could be taken out or changed to "mostly", which renders the main point you were making as follows: "I live in Australia. Job applications (mostly) don't ask for pronouns." That is what you were saying, no?

Words and sentences and how we write them mean things. Which brings us back to the point of the OP and the issue with pronouns.

Pronouns aren't "just" words we can choose to use outside of their usual meaning to be 'kind'.

Changing how words are used and what we mean by them can have huge and detrimental effects on material reality and have long been a known propaganda tool. Using "she" pronouns for males if they demand it has led to misinformation being reported, rape victims being forced to call their male rapists or attackers "she" in court (some have been punished for not doing so) which is distressing and coercive to many and also serves to distort public understanding of who commits which crimes when reported in the press. It has also led to the distortion of important public statistical information and facts.

Similarly, using words like "gender" instead of "sex", which you might think is mild and innocuous, has in fact led to significant detriments to the legal rights of women, and the near-successful dismantling of many sex-specific rights in legislation and on the ground. Because although some do, not everyone sees the words "gender" and "sex" as synonymous. I see "gender" as "sex stereotypes". Genderists see "gender identity" as an inner sense of self that is far more important than actual sex.

If you replace "sex" with "gender" in written legislation, you open the door to the wholesale replacement of significant and hard fought for women's legal rights - which were sex based, because discrimination against us was based entirely on our sex - with the supposed "rights" (demands, actually) of a subset of men who believe, wish or fantasise that they are somehow women. "Gender", according to trans advocates, being essentially their idea of "femininity", which they say can include males but renders them female. Women's actual rights can and have been dismantled as a result of this simple word change. Words REALLY matter.

And yet you accused me of lying for giving my friend’s experience in Australia, both by implying I’d made up my friend, and then by implying that I was speaking for every job application in Australia.

What I find incredible is to be told that language doesn't matter by the same people who INSIST that we use 'the right pronouns'.

Language twisting is the bread and butter of Authoritarianism.

This is why Orwell and Arendt wrote whole books - to highlight the power of language and how language is used to subdigate and control less powerful groups.

The fact that language here is being used AGAINST women tells you much.

Historically women suffer harder in authoritarianism for a various of reasons - all of which comes back to a loss of power and control.

The examples above about how the narrative looks very different when you start to look at rape trials and how men are pushing for access to single sex spaces really are eye opening.

The really obvious one in news headlines is when you get anything advocated for women's single sex right as automatically 'anti-trans' rather than pro-woman. That says who has the power. The BBC are incredibly guilty on this score and don't seem to be able to wrap their heads around it - even given rulings about not believing in gender being a view worthy of respect in a democratic society because frankly it's still what the majority ultimately believe even if they want to be nice to trans people.

The whole be kind thing is a form of coercion and social control whereby you can't express concerns as they have automatically been de-legitimised in this climate. You automatically face an uphill struggle to argue a case - and that's the point of saying be kind and pronouns - to disempower women. To destroy the ability to ask questions and to say this is not ok. Even in situations where is glaringly obvious that it's problematic. Like rape crisis centres or in the witness box for a sex crime.

Anyone who fails to acknowledge this and actively rallies against this saying 'what difference does it make to say pronouns, what harm does it do?' is trying to discredit and disempower you. They don't want to listen. They are acting in a way that isn't kind. It's abusive because it says your view isn't important and your opinions are not worthy of respect because they are not kind.

Except 'being kind' needs to address the issues raised by the Cass report, figures about sex offending and clashes with the the law which demonstrate a real issue. Being kind needs to acknowledge that rape victims and female prisoners sit at the bottom of the social hierarchy and have appalling life experiences which are all too often the antithesis of privilege. When they are erased or deliberately silenced because they are an inconvenience again we have power politics at play.

Authoritarianism is anti grass roots. It seems to silence those without power in order to maintain and strengthen its own. MN has enabled questions which get to the heart of 'holding power to account' on this. That has been the purpose of the press historically and as technology changes and traditional media has struggled to adapt, it's been a social media site that's essentially 'held the line'. We have a lot of battles over power and control and the role of social media within our democratic society to go, but on this subject, it's reassuring that actually there is more of an equilibrium than perhaps we have considered possible.

As I say I think that the thing about lived experience is we do see and feel the truth, even if it becomes undermined by authoritarianism. It is the power to speak that truth that's affected.

And ultimately on this subject we all know that transwomen are not women because women can't be transwomen and the identity of transwomen rests on a special quality that women can't have. The circular argument always highlights women are female and have a different sex to men and males who claim to be women.

Trans rights are not something that benefits women - including when it comes to trans identifying females. Even transmen don't get the rights to hereditary titles, they don't get the breaks in sport, they don't get more respect from men and live in less fear because they still remain vulnerable in the same way as any other female, they don't get social credit for being the most vulnerable in the same way, the medical shite has been based on studies mainly done on men with completely different drugs and completely different surgeries but claimed as worth accepting as good quality.

It says so much.

This is an extremely important point. It is entirely one way.

My eyes were truly opened when I realised the hereditary titles were unaffected. Or how men being called up for the draft is unaffected in the US.

All these politicians who cannot define a woman. They know exactly who are men and who are women when it suits them to know. The dishonesty of this movement is off the scale.

The bizarre reality is it's perfectly possible that when we scratch the medical stuff and look out outcomes, transition for males may have a slight benefit but for females it's extremely harmful and therefore should not be pursued as a medical pathway. This is a can of worms that no one wants to address.

And even if it's medically better for a minority this doesn't address the level of benefit and whether it might be catastrophic for other individuals. And therefore should be discouraged.

Never mind the impact on women in terms of various risks and social impact. Impacts that aren't even being looked at objectively because they are politically difficult to acknowledge where there are problems.

When it suits them, the TRAs/MRAs will be honest.
It's all fundamentally about control, "I'm right and you're wrong, my desires trump your safety, privacy and dignity".
There's definitely no listening to why women don't want men in their spaces, no compromise...no now we've taken your thoughts into consideration we'll fight for our own third spaces.

Wow. All of this for a post that wasn’t intended for you, wasn’t and was only a few sentences. Most of this isn’t even relevant.

Erm.

Ok.

😂

Oops, rogue “wasn’t”

@RedToothBrush

Erm.
Ok.
😂

If you need clarification, Red, most of Helen’s post wasn’t relevant to my own post. Obviously it is relevant to the general thread theme.

So? Being relevant to the whole thread theme WAS the point.

It doesn't all have to be about your personal post, for goodness sake.

I wasn't asking for it.

I'm amused that you think I was addressing anyone personally.

It's the internet. On forums you may quote someone to make a point directly to them or to make a wider point to anyone else reading. Because it has relevant and adds context/understanding to a subject.

Thinking it's all about you just amused me.

Forums are a collective stream of thoughts and ideas for multiple users. You don't get to control that. I learnt this 25 years ago. You have some catching up to do.

Yes language matters. Language control and politics has a huge history and there are some superb writers on this. I recommend reading them to expand your knowledge and understanding of why it's so critical to gender identity beliefs because they fundamentally underpin it and hold together the belief system. Which is precisely why you know it's a load of old cobblers.

Also I'm EXTREMELY amused at someone trying to control the conversation when my post is all about how people try to control the conversation.

@RedToothBrush

I'm amused that you think I was addressing anyone personally.

Then why would you comment “Erm.Ok.😂” with my quoted post if it isn’t personal? Seems odd.

Hey @MarsScarlet I’m still awaiting your apology for accusing me of lying twice.

Erm ok.

😆