Why do people believe TWAW?

[hurdigurdi]

I’ve been making a list (because I like lists) but also have been trying my hardest to see the other side of the argument, as I think that’s the best way to see if an argument stands up. I have to admit it’s extremely hard to do because after you have peaked, it is very difficult to imagine being unpeaked.

Anyhow, here is my list of reasons people MAY believe TWAW (or indeed TMAM) and feel free to correct or add to it:

Why do people think TWAW?
“Be kind” and “live and let live” mentality
Group think & lack of critical thinking
Brainwashing
Fear of being cancelled/shamed/confronted/assaulted/losing job or career
Lack of knowledge of basic biology, sexual reproduction and DSDs
Ignorance of the physical differences between men and women (height, strength, lung capacity, heart size, arm span, foot and hand size, pelvis shape and function, sex organs, gait, Adam’s apple etc)
Have never met a detrans person or heard their story
Have never seen the harm gender ‘affirming’ surgery has done (botched neovagina, phalloplasty, mastectomy)
Does not know the risks and effects of taking opposite sex hormones on the body long term
Have never been assaulted by a male or a TIM
Have never competed against a male or a TIM in sports
Have never been in prison with a TIM
Internalised homophobia
Feelings of inadequacy as a man
Autism
Over consumption of porn
Inability to admit being wrong
Have facilitated the transing of a child (and therefore almost impossible to admit any harm has been caused)
Trauma or loss (especially of a mother or intimate partner)

My DS quoted the 40%+ suicide rate when he told me TWAW. I think he has towed back from that.
And a friend told me about genital inspections of athletes.
Seriously ... If you have peaked you cannot unsee. If it's a peripheral part of your life or you get your stats from biased sources you are being conned.

I don't think very many people actually believe it. They started to repeat it to 'be kind' and continue until they see the unforeseen harm it causes.

Some get so deep in that they can't row back, so they have to keep parroting it, even though they know it's beyond all sense and reason.

To be seen as a left-wing progressive. TWAW is part of the omnicause that LWPs must support to be in that in-group. The peer pressure to conform in all ways is very strong in this group.

This links to simplistic 'left-wing = good and right-wing = bad' thinking and no-one wants to be a fascist. So, in this weird world understanding that mammals cannot change sex is a fascist belief. Violence towards fascists is always justified. Of course, this means that people like Stalin, Lenin, Chairman Mao, Pol Pot etc. are now good people which is certainly an interesting historical revision.

Anyway, all this means is that to be a good person you must believe the matra (or thought terminating cliche) that TWAW.

Thank you @FlowchartRequired, I'm
adding virtue signalling & peer pressure to my list

Still reeling from a, discussion with my sister re trans people. I said "A Trans woman (even post surgery) is still biologically a man". Her answer? "I disagree"... 🤯

TWAW is part of the omnicause that LWPs must support to be in that in-group

Its definitely this now.

I dont think it started this way. I think people either were liberals and thought of it as adults doing what they wanted with their bodies, or so committed to gay rights they blindly followed LGBT demands. Maybe thinking it was niche or a fad that would disappear if ignored.

But along with a range of issue, its an easy way to signpost that you are on the right side of history.

She has no experience of trans people ans refers to herself as, "woke".

Anyway, all this means is that to be a good person you must believe the matra (or thought terminating cliche) that TWAW.

For a lot of people I know, I can't imagine that they really believe that Eddie Izzard literally is a woman, they just think it's what decent people should say.

There are some who seem to believe that gender identity is a neurological thing that objectively exists in the brain, and science is always on the cusp of discovering it. Which just confirms my view that gender science is very like the race science of 100 years ago, but probably with less objective basis.

Fear of being cancelled/shamed/confronted/assaulted/losing job or career

Death and rape threats have been used against women since the beginning of time to keep them in line. These are very common among trans activists and people just cannot be arsed with going through it, publicly, in front of their friends and family.

Ostracisation from the group - just look at the threads on here how people are broken from being cast out of their friendship groups for some slight or other - this can destroy people so they don't rock the boat.

When you press these people they always end up with a no. They don't actually believe they change chromosomes and physically lose parts of their anatomy and gain new ones.

OP

Many people believe it because they believe the academics who have said that sex is a spectrum.

I think they genuinely believed that because of some items on your list. But it is still being said. They still believe Fausto’s more than two sexes too.

But it is gender identity theory, queer theory and some postmodernism, in my opinion. The deliberate destabilisation of established science to use it to allow male people to be female and vice versa.

In addition to your list, I think that some (many?) people may not actually believe that TWAW but to say otherwise risks being aligned with some pretty awful people on the far right. It's a pretty uncomfortable position to be in, politically, when you find yourself in agreement with people who hold deplorable views on a range of issues.

I think people who believe TWAW are those who believe that gender is a construct (as we gender critical people believe too) and that men can just as easily identify as women as society can call adult females women and adopt all that that denotes culturally.

I think the issue we all share is that we have this construct called gender. Feminists have rightly railed against gender constructs for decades, I think gender is the issue.

One major issue is that society has been constructed around these gender divisions (sport, toilets etc) rather than sex-based divisions and that’s where there has been an enabling of the muddying of what is acceptable.

I think many of us would be on the same side (gender can fucking do one) if it weren’t for the way our society is constructed around gender.

Another major issue is that young kids who have always been introspective, self-absorbed etc due to that stage of life have been latching onto this. Also neurodivergent kids who feel out of step, out of place (some with very black and white thinking) are latching into this. And kids who are attracted to the same sex are sometimes led to believe this makes them the wrong “gender”.

The issue is really complex and needs much more thought and discussion but of course gets completely polarised all the time and our ‘hang on, wait a minute here’ gender critical voices get lost/silenced, so we can’t actually talk about this as a wider culture anymore.

I think the vast majority of people - even people who say it - don't actually believe it. They've just been told it, and filed it in their 'facts' box without any further thought. So they don't really have a reason beyond 'lots of people say so'.

There’s nothing wrong with being kind. It’s an attitude I admire. I’d question how kind it was to support the idea you can change sex though. It’s easy, and a bit lazy, but it’s not kind in any way is it?

I believe the main reason why I DON’T believe it is because I don’t align myself with any political party and I never have. I don’t believe something or go along with it because it’s what’s expected.

And I can see so clearly why my lefty friend in academia is so dreadfully captured, because she thinks she’s being kind and doing the right thing.

Another reason is because (without giving details) I have been a victim of male violence/abuse and the TRAs are so obviously in that category.

I don't think they do actually believe a biological human male magically transforms into a biological human female through the power of feelings.

If they genuinely do think that, then they are very very stupid indeed

It's a pretty uncomfortable position to be in, politically, when you find yourself in agreement with people who hold deplorable views on a range of issues.

This is a reflection of how tribal politics has become however. It used to be not at all unusual to disagree with your 'side' in particular issues - in fact it was (and still is) a sign of intelligent and healthy debate.

But somewhere along the line, presumably because of the decline of religion/national solidarity/class/etc - politics became the place where we centre our identities. And therefore we feel the need to be all in or all out.

I’d be very interested to hear the reasons why from people who believe TWAW.

You can live however you choose but imo you can’t change biological sex. Also, why isn’t there as much focus on trans men are men?

I have yet to meet anyone who actually believes it.

Yeah this gets to the heart of it. We have no robust moral frameworks for making good decisions any more. Kindness has become a be all and end all.

As you say, nothing wrong with being kind, but as a single basis for morality, it's very lacking. There's a tendency to give people what they want in the moment, without thinking of the longer term. It prioritises those who shout the loudest. Culturally, being 'kind' is a virtue more demanded of women than men.

A perfect storm of factors that favours TRAs rather than women.

@Goody2ShoesAndTheFilthyBeast I'm not sure even the trans people genuinely believe it, if they did they wouldn't be so constantly in need of validation by natally born women

It is mainly virtue signalling.

Nobody actually believes it.

Even Tom Daley knew TWAren'tW when he didn't ask one to grow a child for him.

No one believes it because it's patently untrue.

The very fact that it's a topic of conversation, let alone debate, shows that it's untrue and that no one really believes it. No one has ever had a debate over whether your mum or any other woman in your life is a woman.

It's just a lie. People want to say it (I'm guessing) because they want to be 'nice', but it's a fallacious reason. They are just prioritising a vanishingly small number of men's feelings over women's rights.

Do I want trans-identifying men to be attacked, castigated, mocked or made to feel less than anyone else? No.

Do I believe they are women and should have access to women's spaces? No.

Do I care whether their feelings are hurt because I'm not going along with the lie? Also no.

male violence/abuse and the TRAs are so obviously in that category

This I think has to be considered a big part of it - what some people, male and female, see as a 'legitimate' excuse to be aggressive or abusive towards women.

I'm sorry for what you, and far too many others, have been through @hurdigurdi