A little piece of insight

[Tandora]

Into a topic so woefully misunderstood.

Eg the suggestion "oh well they can just use the men's" displays a total lack of understanding and regard for what it is to be trans .

Why can't they use designated unisex toilets?

They could use "gender neutral " spaces. They don't wish to, of course, because they require women to act as "affirmation " of their delusionary belief system, regardless of the women's consent

Right- this is your question. which is why im trying to explain what being trans is. It's entirely relevant, the reason people can't comprehend the issue is that they simply can't comprehend what it is to be trans.

The OP appears to have made the mistake of assuming that all trans identified men reach the position of deciding to be women by the exact same route, this is not the case.

My religion says that I need single sex spaces only to undress, shower etc. Your refusal to allow me these spaces shows a total lack of understanding and appreciation of my religion and what it is to be a member of my religion.

I suggest multiple spaces so each of us has an appropriate space for our religion. Why does your religion get to bulldoze all the others?

And they can. They just need to use the loo and changing spaces for their actual sex.

My DD’s experience of being trans was that she felt self conscious and/or vulnerable wherever she chose to pee, however she chose to dress or shower, and certainly with her GD she had no interest in going to a gym. The ‘where’ was irrelevant. She had issues over her body, over how she thought she wished to be perceived. Wherever she went, the common denominator was her. Not the sign on the door. It was therapy that helped, and time to process. Not putting herself at risk in the men’s changing room or being questioned/embarrassed in the women’s because she looked like a pre-pubescent boy.

Perhaps if you were less trans women/male focused and considered the lived experience of trans men [also ‘trans’] you might understand what we - women - are trying to explain? Or is it only the male - sorry - trans woman’s experience and rights that matter?

I don’t care what it is to be trans.

it is irrelevant.

they are the sex they were born and should use facilities that align with that.

FGS why does this always simply boil down to men insisting they MUST be allowed to use the women's loos?

Transmen never seem too be so insistent about using the men's, do they? They're happy to use the women's.

It's ALWAYS men trying to push in. Always.

Tandora
the reason people can't comprehend the issue is that they simply can't comprehend what it is to be trans.

Being trans is being a human, just as being a woman is being a human and being a man is being a human and being gay is being a human and being lesbian is being a human and come to that being an amputee is being a human and being a pentathlete is being a human. Not a special human with special extra privileges more than any other human; just a human.

And the hoohah at present is because one small subset of human has been told "no, you are not ever so much more important than all women anywhere, and no, you can't just trample over all women for your own convenience" and they don't like that.

Suck it up, guys; women are fed up with pretending to believe a bunch of hokum in order to spare the tender feelz of a bunch of delusional and often aggressive men.

Jesus, I can't believe you said that with (presumably) a straight face.

Do you not know the degree to which women accomodate men who are making them uncomfortable to avoid triggering an aggressive escalation from the man or accusations of over reaction from bystanders?

Some men are a bit clueless and simply don't realise the woman is uncomfortable and trying to manage the situation without offending him.

And some men know bloody well what they are doing and carefully keep the needling and touching just below the level where it's obviously intrusive, just low enough that he can play "Who me? I'm just being friends/having a laugh. You are weird!"

The single most irritating phrase in the language may be "can't you take a joke?" when someone reacts against a bit of sexist "banter".

Why is that women's problem to solve? Why are services and spaces designated (and in many cases fought for and funded by women) seen as a useful resource for men to appropriate?

If it's about using a space in which they feel safe, why are third spaces decrided as transphobic? How can this refusal of third spaces be seen as anything less than a demand for women to be used as non player characters in the validation fantasies of men to be in female single sex spaces, to the detriment of women using those spaces.

How judgmental activists are towards women who want privacy and dignity? Yes, noticed that too. And their inability to think outside of their own desires or see anyone beyond them as mattering.

Is that down to the failures of the education system? I don't know. Possibly. But I think your main concern about the education system was that it left women with the inconvenient idea that they had an existence beyond being mindless therapeutic props in the lives of special men.

What is being trans, then? What about it makes it impossible for transwomen to use men's public toilets? I understand that might make their gender dysphoria worse but I don't understand how it makes it impossible to use the gents.

I do not understand why any transwoman thinks it's ok to use the ladies loo, changing rooms, etc. when that is likely to cause distress to some women. Why is the transwoman's discomfort more important than the women's?

Depending on your definition, I may be trans. I sometimes feel like I am a man, even though I'm physically a women. (I sometimes feel like I am not human, too, even though my body is that of a human female.) So what is it about being trans that is different than my experience of feeling like/perceiving myself as a man or a non-human?

I know that I am physically a woman and that's how others perceive me so I use the ladies bc I don't put myself before everyone else.

Funnily enough, I met a couple of people whom I know to be trans today. Nice people.

I know I'm supposed to perceive them as totally opposite to what they are and somehow different to other men and women but it's almost embarrassing how boringly and obviously the man is a man and the woman is a woman. He looks, talks and acts just like all the other men in makeup in the room and she looks, talks and acts just like all the other short haired, barefaced women in the room. There's literally no frigging difference. I wish them both well but he belongs in the men's and she belongs in the women's.

There is never an answer to this. Jolyon raises loads of money and loves being litigious...why doesnt he spend his time fighting for third spaces for the trans-identified. In third spaces, the vulnerable trans people could also have safety in numbers, which would help their feeling of vulnerability, and they would be the safest spaces ever, away from the horrid females who are mean to them.
But no. That's never the argument is it. In some ways I prefer the openly-misogynist aggressive TRA to this manipulative nonsense about how sad these men allegedly are.

The thing is, if your distress is triggered by how other people perceive you - that’s not something you can control.

Why cant they fight for third spaces for their specialness? Why do males have to have female spaces? They're allegedly special and different. Ok..have different special places. Leave female rights alone.

Why do you think that the feeling (however genuine they may be) of a small group of male people should supersede the privacy and dignity of female people?

Yes, we should just call it what it is: misogyny.

You have a choice of colours.

The reason we can't grasp it is because it doesn't make sense. You seem to hold a quasi-religious belief that trans people are who they say they are, irrespective of biological reality. You didn't reason your way into that position, and therefore you don't have any arguments that could convince us. You're just asking us to accept it on faith. That's not going to happen.

I couldn't possibly comment on how badly I think you have been let down by your education.