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)

Inclusion is another word that trips people up like this. They assume that 'inclusion' means having to include all comers at all times. But inclusion often requires exclusion to work. To be inclusive to women in certain circumstances we need to be exclusive to men.

Exactly. I think you have to have a wide experience of living life as an actual woman to understand the multiple ways women get screwed. I wouldn't have understood that at 20 either.

Definitely. I called myself a feminist at 20, but I thought that meant that women should be treated the same as men, and we should act the same as men.

It's been a much longer process to understand we're NOT the same as men and that while we shouldn't be penalised for being women, we don't have to change how we think, behave and act to still want to demand that we are worthy of the same rights and opportunities.

For me when all this madness started I definitely had a “be kind” and “live and let live” mentality and just didn’t think about it that much. But then as more and more scandals happened and I started taking an interest and read into it more that’s when I changed my mind! I also never actually believed TWAW and didn’t really realise that some people actually believe this.
I still do have that mentality tbh but enough is enough with the TWAW nonsense. I believe trans people should have rights to not be discriminated against the same as any other person but that can’t come at the expense of women’s rights.

I think that it’s partly indoctrination. There’s a reason why every defensive response (for example the younger actors from HP responding to JRK) starts with the mantra, “Trans women are women!”

Beyond that, I suspect there are a lot of young people who believe there is new science to prove it’s true.

A lot of this is not based on knowing and showing the “new discoveries”. Instead it’s based on deliberate undermining of established science, which we know, but don’t tend to prove on an individual or day to day basis.

For example, sex is binary. We all instinctively know that, but as soon as someone claims it’s a spectrum, many would not be able to argue that point. Enough science journals that should know better have bought into this, thus giving it legs.

Ditto the medical profession, which has been so infiltrated that it’s now run politically and not on the evidence.

And recently, there’s been the “challenge” that as we haven’t had our DNA tested, we can’t be sure what it is. The fact that I know mine because I’ve had babies and I know my daughter’s because she went through female puberty and has periods is only convincing if you believe in science and understand that the probabilities are strong enough that testing isn’t essential. My intelligent daughter remains unconvinced as I didn’t respond with sufficient confidence as I wasn’t expecting the question.

I’ve heard over and over that it’s not up for discussion as the science of “trans” is now settled and confirmed.

Many of us believe science we cannot see or prove. Can I prove the Earth isn’t flat? No, I take it on faith that there are scientists who can.

So when the science is deeply undermined, as it has been here, then setting out to prove that first principles about sex and how it works still applies, becomes depressingly difficult. Especially when many people instinctively believe men over women.

We’re not really set up for science. We’ve evolved to have faith. It means that we’re very susceptible when someone with enough standing sets out to deliberately deceive.

Yes. It is like the incorrect usage of the term ‘discrimination’. Where someone takes the view that any ‘discrimination ‘ is ‘bad’.

No. Discrimination is not ‘bad’ in itself. Illegitimate negative discrimination is what is ‘bad’. And excluding male people from female single sex provisions is not illegitimate or ‘bad’. It is negative for the male person involved but then it is also not discriminating specifically against one group of male people. It discriminates all male people.

But those arguing about equally, inclusion and discrimination don’t seem to understand the finer points. They just seem to repeat a weak argument and think that because it convinced them it must be a good argument.

Goodness knows, in terms of science. It is just wrong - they aren’t and they can’t be.
In terms of “belief” well I suspect it’s because they’re following a particular herd.

Because the quality of science teaching is patchy and many people don't understand basic biology.

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 thinking of a particular person I know, highly intelligent but also highly ideological (so the perfect combination for rationalising the irrational) whose two big issues are trans rights and Palestine.

Well, ok, I say. I'm not going to convince you on the substance of your positions. But if you concede that the left has an antisemitism problem and a misogyny problem - and that's common ground between us - surely you see that your most important causes provide an opportunity for some pretty nasty stuff to hide in plain sight.

And that's when the descent into tribalist bluster happens.

I've spent my life working in the arts, and the general mind-set is very pro-diversity and inclusive. So, when trans rights became a thing, it was just seen as part of that. I don't think anyone really believes people can change sex, but if you've been working in an environment where being alternative is normalised, no-one is going to be that bothered when Fred decides he's really called Tracey and wants to be referred as she/her. When the implications of that decision start filtering through, it's often too late to row back without being described as "transphobic" or even worse "right wing". I'm very glad not to be working in a management position any more as it would be very difficult.

@FiveBarGate
Yes I think age has a lot to do with it too and I've definitely become more 'radical' and angry about women's rights as I've aged. I now find myself watching the news and seeing all the damage men are doing in the world, and enjoying imagining an alien coming to earth and deciding they all need quarantining as they're such a dangerous species 😅.
At University, 40 years ago, I'd have really struggled to hold and voice GR beliefs while being an active supporter of gay rights, pro-abortion, etc. Today, I'm confident enough in my position, on this at least, to just say 'fuck 'em'.
This is why I think it's really important that the link between 'anti-trans' and the far right is broken - GC young women and men need our support so that they feel able to speak up without fear of being oastricised by the left.

She’ll justify it to herself by saying that they’re only being violent because they’re not getting what they want/need/deserve and that those of us who object are being very unkind to them, and they are kind, gentle, souls, who only want to pee. She may well have them down as freedom fighters, one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter so they say. They’re hardly Nelson Mandela though are they?

Libertarianism

People should be free to do what they like with their bodies, and not be discriminated against because of it.

Legalism

The law says that people can change their legal sex, and conceal their birth sex. We should respect the law.

Cartesianism

It sounds plausible that gender identity and physiological sex are two separate things.

Wanting to look clever/bamboozlement One

You read too much Judith Butler.

Wanting to look clever/bamboozlement Two

You read too many articles about how sex is a spectrum, DSDs, blah blah blah.

Human propensity to believe in ghosts

And Tarot, Astrology, Religion, etc etc

Genuine kindness

You know TWAM, but why hurt their feelings?

I also think we underestimate the strength of herd mentality. The last few years have really shown us how unscrupulous politicians can use that to their advantage. Give people an enemy and fill them full of righteous indignation, and you can make them believe anything, especially when you’re telling them that they’re on the right side of history, people really respond to that.

Have no idea! I’m left wing but GC and I struggle with understanding how so many people think that men can claim to be women - the dominant taking over the subservient and think that that’s fair!

Back in the good old days when transsexuals were incredibly rare and the word non binary hadn't been invented, I used to try to believe TWAW. I didn't really believe it in hindsight as I had such cognitive dissonance that I avoided thinking too much about it, but my thinking was that there was some way in which men could have a female brain and that it was some kind of medical condition. I would struggle to maintain that belief now that gender identity is so widely discussed and with the benefit of my adult critical thinking brain. But that was my reason.

See also Asch conformity line experiment - but in addition to that, somewhere I’ve read that some of those conforming to an experiment of this nature do actually come to ‘see’ the lines as genuinely equal via some cognitive function trickery. As opposed to just saying the lines are equal for social reasons.

I'm probably going to explain these theories badly, but here goes...

1.Faulty logic, misogyny and ideas around masculinity.
Some see a man in a dress and think "a real man wouldn't behave like that" ergo, must he a woman.
Some see it and don't want men to act like that, and some men won't want those men in their gang, they want them othered and distanced from their maleness. 'Not a man' equals 'must be a woman.'
Let the women deal with them, the 'real men' don't want to know.

2.And there will be men who just see women as some reductive alien other, not real people worthy of much consideration, so when these "not real men" tick the same boxes they can join the women category.

3.Dr Upton said in his evidence for Sandie Peggie's case that he is a biological woman, because he's biological and a woman,and he's a woman just because he says he is. So faulty schemas and magical thinking play a part too. If that is what he actually believes.

4.I hear the "they wouldn't go through all that if..." argument, with people thinking of old school transsexuals. I think there's an element of not wanting to challenge something they feel unqualified to know about, in the same way as if something horrific or inconceivable happens to someone you might think 'i can't begin to imagine how that feels'. So rather than use logic - I can't imagine how x must feel, but I do know what a woman is and isn't - they assume it is all some complex state beyond their comprehension.

For my uni aged child it's a mix of
Years of being told so at secondary school
Peer pressure
Importance of disagreeing with Trump
Loyalty to a trans friend

My question is do people actually believe it?

as in really, honestly believe a man putting on a dress and saying they’re a woman means they are a woman. Indistinguishable on every level from a biological woman.

do these people also believe in the catholic transubstantiation where the wafer is literally turned into the body of Christ?

I had a heterosexual male friend who found the Thai "ladyboys" who worked in the area he lived very attractive. Beautiful. Not at all manly. No one would ever know 🙄 etc (of course he missed the obvious point that clearly he did know!!)

It was inconceivable to him, as a hetero man, that the ladyboys were men, and he was attracted to these men, albeit men who looked like women.
He could not cope with the mental gymnastics, nor did he want do, and as it impacted him in no way whatsoever, nor did he have to.

"I am heterosexual, exclusively attracted to women therefore ladyboys are women" was all he could cope with.

I think many "bloke" type men are like this.

"Dr Upton said in his evidence for Sandie Peggie's case that he is a biological woman, because he's biological and a woman,and he's a woman just because he says he is. So faulty schemas and magical thinking play a part too. If that is what he actually believes."

This breakdown of a phrase to try to support faulty logic is something I first witnessed Ivy/McKinnon doing in about 2019. And Ivy/McKinnon was a philosophy lecturer at the time.

Right then, I am a billionaire and Jeff Bezos needs to lend me couple of million…

Dr Upton sounds delusional

Just watching a Law and Order SVU from 2009. In that, they say that something happens in utero, and they develop with the brain of one gender and the body of the other. There are studies that prove this.

I met my first trans woman in 1979 in London on a bus. Her life was a living hell. But it was her life, authentically.

Stephanie Hirst is a person that explains a lot, so that non trans people may understand a little better.

But as to the main premise, at the start of my post? I don’t understand why that’s so hard for people to get.

Let's face it, most of the arguments used to support the prioritisation of gender identity over sex when sex matters are based in emotional manipulation. There is absolutely no scientific evidence to support the claims.

There is no commonality between the groups of people claiming to have transgender identities other than a philosophical belief in their identity.

We now even have enough examples of people with transgender identities declaring that they have declared they are trans because they wanted to be different to everyone else. For them it was a lifestyle choice.

And yet, there is this constant pressure from others to support this philosophical belief. And to use the language that goes with it. The demand that others use someone's chosen pronouns is often discussed on MN. So many people insist that it is 'respectful' to use those pronouns and that language that is demanded.

No. It just isn't. It is not respectful either to shame someone who won't contort their language, who wants to use established language conventions. But it seems to make some people very good about themselves to attempt to do so.