What is "trans" and why does it justify undoing sex in law, society, culture and history?

[FlirtsWithRhinos]

In the Trolls thread @Tandora and I discovered that in a recent thread she had thought she was very clear about what "trans" is while I thought she was simply describing symptoms that could have many causes and did not justify why these symptoms should be treated as actual material facts by others.

• Trolls thread with our interaction on this page: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/5420701-a-little-piece-of-insight?page=15&reply=147554941

• my question on the earlier thread: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5420701-a-little-piece-of-insight?page=15&reply=147554941

Clearly I missed something in that earlier thread but I can't go back because it has reached its post limit, so rather than derail the trolls thread, I am restating my question here.

Looking forward to @Tandora engaging with my questions to help me understand what I missed about her position in the original thread.

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Tandora · 02/10/2025 21:28
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.
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FlirtsWithRhinos · 02/10/2025 23:13
But Tandora you haven't explained what being trans is. All you've done is played the old TRA game of "Not that" when anyone else tries suggest an definition, any definition at all, that appears to fit the random claims you are making that feeling very wrong in the sex you actually are is somehow interchangeable with being the sex you are not, or that a characteristic of the mind somehow overrides the reality and consequences of differences of the body for both the trans person and for others.

You have made all sort of hand wringing emotional claims on behalf of trans people, and roundly insulted everyone who doesn't accept your argument of "they just are, alright" as closed minded and uneducated (which frankly would be hilarious to anyone who'd ever met me), and yet never once explained exactly why this thing makes the differences of sex and the social consequences of those differences, facts that are entirely and unproblematically accepted as real in all other circumstances, suddenly inconsequential and irrelevant in the face of a trans person's mental self image.

So I'll ask you again.

What is "being trans" Tandora?
Is it being one sex but with a deep and aching wish you were the other sex, maybe like a blind person has a deep and aching wish to see, or a lonely little girl has a deep and aching wish that she had been born as one of the popular kids instead?

Or is it actually being, in an innate mental way, in ways we don't yet understand, the other sex, implying that sex is not in fact a descriptor of the body but of the mind?

Because take away the emotional manipulation and neither definition actually justifies the demands being made of women in its name.

Neither definition changes the fact that people with female bodies do exist and do face social and physical consequences because of those bodies, and neither a man's deep feeling that he should have had a female body, nor a man's deep feeling that women don't need to have a female body, changes the embodied experiences and needs and self knowledge of the people who actually have a female body one iota.

Because these are things that are entirely to do with the experiences of women, and so no experience or feeling, no matter how genuine, of a man is relevant to them.

And regardless of which definition you go for, in fact regardless of any definition you go for that places more weight on a man's idea of himself as a woman than the embodied fact of female existence, outside his own mind he is simply not relevant to who women in the original female sense are and what women in the original female sense need at all.

No definition of woman that is stretched to include male people is more relevant to the needs and experiences and reality of female people than the simple old fashioned sex based definition and there is sinply no way round that.
face of a trans person's mental self image.

So I'll ask you again.

What is "being trans" Tandora?

Is it being one sex but with a deep and aching wish you were the other sex, maybe like a blind person has a deep and aching wish to see, or a lonely little girl has a deep and aching wish that she had been born as one of the popular kids instead?

Or is it actually being, in an innate mental way, in ways we don't yet understand, the other sex, implying that sex is not in fact a descriptor of the body but of the mind?

Because take away the emotional manipulation and neither definition actually justifies the demands being made of women in its name.

Neither definition changes the fact that people with female bodies do exist and do face social and physical consequences because of those bodies, and neither a man's deep feeling that he should have had a female body, nor a man's deep feeling that women don't need to have a female body, changes the embodied experiences and needs and self knowledge of the people who actually have a female body one iota.

Because these are things that are entirely to do with the experiences of women, and so no experience or feeling, no matter how genuine, of a man is relevant to them.

And regardless of which definition you go for, in fact regardless of any definition you go for that places more weight on a man's idea of himself as a woman than the embodied fact of female existence, outside his own mind he is simply not relevant to who women in the original female sense are and what women in the original female sense need at all.

No definition of woman that is stretched to include male people is more relevant to the needs and experiences and reality of female people than the simple old fashioned sex based definition and there is sinply no way round that.

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@Tandora I don't have much free time this afternoon. Please don't take slow replies as bad faith and be assured I will be coming back to this thread when I have to engage properly as I really appreciate you wanting to explain this to me.

If we assume that -

Gender is a meaningful and observable thing. (It isn't, the clue is that trans people have gender identities not observable genders).
and
People can have a gender identity that is different from their sex. (They don't, whether people have a gender identity in any meaningful sense is highly debateable, IMHO, at best).
then
TRAs still need to argue why, in a world where men and women have forever been split by sex, sex suddenly needs to be ignored and gender identity prioritized, even though a wrong sex gender identity is very rare.

@PatrickBaitman had a great post on another thread. I'm going to copy part of it here if that's okay. Perhaps it'll help @Tandora set out a stall?

Trying to follow trans ideology feels like being trapped in an old Star Trek episode where Captain Kirk defeats a hostile supercomputer by hammering it with logical contradictions until it bursts into flames.

Only difference is, instead of Kirk saying, “Everything I say is a lie,” it’s activists saying: Gender is innate, but also a social construct. Trans women are identical to women, but also uniquely different. Biology doesn’t matter, except when it must be changed surgically. The binary is oppressive, but “non-binary” requires the binary to exist. Self identity is absolute, except when we don’t approve of it. Stereotypes mean nothing, but I knew my gender because I liked pink dresses and barbies. Trans athletes should compete in the category that matches their gender identity, for fairness and validation…except for trans men.

Can I just add it's not about what trans is, if that can be contextualised at all, it is 'how does one know which person that says they are the opposite sex is 'genuine' and which is not'. And what does 'genuine' mean?

The closest TQ+ ideology gets to logic is when it practices DARVO. As an intellectual exercise it gets literally 0/100.

Anyone who has a degree of intelligence, and a willingness to engage in a small bit of critical thinking will rapidly ponder things like "if men can be women and lesbians are bigoted for not dating male women, then homosexuality is bigotry, and so is heterosexuality". One might rapidly conclude "As someone who does not believe it is bigoted to have a sexual orietation I can't accept TQ+ ideology at all, not one microscopic amount".

I’d like to discuss with @Tandora how we square the circle of competing rights.

I do not want men (which includes trans women who are a subset of men, legally) in women’s single sex spaces. The law agrees with this.

But I’m told that makes me a transphobe. So what is the solution?

Surely the people you refer to claim to be the opposite gender, and then go on to claim that having an opposite gender entitles one to the rights of the opposite sex (whilst making zero effort to even begin to justify why, other than sad man-in-a-dress hurty feelz in the gents) are making an outrageous and incoherent demand, and it is of nop relevance at all whether the man in question is 100% genuine or on the wind up.

To help find a definition it can be helpful to also define what it is not...

So Trans = transition = movement from one state to another...

We know this is not physically possible (trans-sex) as no-one has ever managed to change sex - and mutilating the body / taking hormones does not equal sex change.

So is it something to do with feels and beliefs / intent / how you live - which is the area of gender where society defines its stereotypes of the moment (i.e. trans-gender). If society has:

• a stereotypical man - and therefore defines that as male gender
• a stereotypical woman - and therefore defines that as female gender

could a man (biological sex) choose to adopt the symptoms described in society's stereotype of a woman (female gender) and therefore become trans-gender?

The simple answer is no - because a man taking on those 'symptoms' (wearing a dress / high-heels / lipstick and nail polish etc.) doesn't become anything other than a man wearing a dress / high-heels / etc. - i.e. they start to change the pool of data used by society to define the male gender and in fact shift / expand the definition of the male gender - they don't 'trans' to female...

So the basic logic demonstrates that it is not possible to be 'trans' or 'transgender'. So, if you can't be it - what does that mean for those who make the claim?

• Mental health issues
• Mental confusion
• A deliberate attempt to deceive
• Some other deliberate intent - such as sexually based...

So we can narrow down hugely the possibilities, and every person I have read about or met has fallen into one of the above categories...

Tandora · 02/10/2025 21:28
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.

One of the issues I have with people like Tandora coming out with "you don't understand", is that they always claim that very young children can "know that they're trans".

So another question from me is: If large numbers of adults can't understand this, how is it that children can, and are all these children experiencing the same thing? And how can we know what they're experiencing is actual "transness" if it's impossible to express in words?

Yes, that is where I am. I am happy to accept there could be something significant and real in trans people's experiences. I just don't see why it has anything to do with actual body sex.

What I am missing is the leap into "... so sex and all the physical and social consequences of that for female bodied people in particular can be ignored".

To justify the leap TRAs need to give a stronger reason than just accomodtaing symptoms.

Anyone making the statement Trans Women are Women, or even just a lesser "Trans Women are closer to women than other men so we should pretend they are women" is, whether they own it or not, fundamentally changing how all women are understood by, relate to and operate within society.

Accepting that something in a man's mind makes him more "a woman" than other men cannot be done without implicitly accepting that it is something in women's minds and not our bodies that makes us women.

As someone who is (currently, as far as I know) a woman, I think I have a right to understand what that is and to decide for myself whether it applies to me or not.

Someone on the 'insight' thread (apologies, i forget who) described their childhood experience of gender dysphoria. She wasn't affirmed and grew out of it. @Tandora was able dismiss this first hand experience as different from other children with gender dysphoria. I'd like to know how she was able to do this. They couldn't at the Tavistock. I'm sure Dr Cass, for one, would love to know how @Tandora achieves this remarkable feat.

It doesn't even matter how you define 'trans'.

What I have never been clear about is what unites actual women's experience with all of 'transwomen's' experience that excludes all non trans identifying men?

Like what is that supposed to be? There is nothing that makes that sex cohesive.

It's logical for 'transwomen' to be seen as a sub set of men. But they have absolutely nothing to do with actual women.

You can't ask such a leading question.

It would be like saying what is being a mum? Is it suffocating your children with your blind devotion and unconditional love, or is it hating the fact that your children impose themselves on your life?

If you were genuinely interested in the answer, you'd ask and allow the person to use their own words. You'd actively listen and absorb the information.

Listen, I won't pretend I'm interested in the answer so I don't ask these questions. The answer has no bearing on how I live my every day life. Where I do hit upon "trans issues" going about my life, the answer to this question is wholly irrelevant.

Can I ask, seriously, when you think about this question "what is trans?", why does your mind only go to transwomen? Like why isn't your phrasing more about trans people being a subset of their biological sex rather than just about men who think they are women?

I really dont get this.

It’s not irrelevant.

I want to know because trans women - who perceive themselves as biological women - want to access women’s single sex spaces.

I don’t want them there due to my trauma, because they are biological men.

That’s why it matters.

They can’t be excluded from women’s single sex spaces if they are indeed biological women, can they?

Are you the OP?

@LoftyRobin for me, my personal view is that trans women are a subset of men and trans men are a subset of women.

But I never hear of trans men wanting to force their way into male spaces in the same way as tran women want into womens single sex spaces.

my view, fwiw, is that trans men should use the women’s spaces and trans women the men’s.

No of course not. You can’t name change in a mumsnet thread?

It’s a chat forum, I was answering your question?

Also. Did you ever hear of empathy?

There is no definition of 'transwoman' that is workable to organise society around.

Its dependent on totally subjective and woooly ideas about feelings and behaviour.

I'm pretty sure there was at least one story on here about that gay dating show where there was a trans man. Also gay clubs have been termed homophobic for not allowing women of all "subsets" in their clubs and specifically not recognising transmen as men.

I also read something that said the reason transmen do not tend to want to access male spaces is because many aren't attracted to men, nor do they want to form friendships with them. They want to assume a male (and the resulting privilege) in a female space. Now make of that what you will.

Either way, I find it weird to talk about trans women without thinking about transmen.

Hello

I would suggest you take those issues up on the threads in which they were posted. I wasn’t on those threads so I can’t comment.

What I can say is I want a definition of trans because we need that so as to determine who has access to womens’s single sex spaces and what healthcare provider turns up when I ask for a female.

When I say I want a woman to provide my healthcare I mean a biological woman - but that means, to some, that I might get a man. And that’s not respecting my consent.

Neither is it respecting the law when a man enters a woman’s single sex space.

so we need clarity.

What I am saying is that there is absolutely evidence of transmen wanting to be classed as men and gain entry to male spaces. But you don't seem to even consider that when you think about these issues. It's all about men posing as women, and why men can't change sex and men men men.

That's what makes it seem far more about some thing against men than it does about protecting women. I think that of some right wing politicians who make trans issues their main agenda. It's far more about their disgust that a woman could think herself worthy of being a man, or that a man would identify as something as disgusting as a woman, than anything else.

For me, I just think sex and gender are the same thing and you can't change them.

Being trans is a naturally occurring form of neurodevelopmental difference.

To be a transwoman is to be born with observably male physical characteristics (e.g. penis, testes, sometimes chromosomes will be observed in utero through prenatal testing but not always), but to recognise/ understand self as being female.

To be a transman is to be born with observably female physical characteristics (e.g. vulva), but to recognise/ understand self as being male.

If you are trans, attempting to suppress, deny your cognitive experience of sex, including through being forced to live in your natal sex role, (e.g. being treated as per your birth sex wherever men and women, boys and girls are treated differently) can cause profound and debilitating psychological distress. This distress is so pervasive and intense that it can result in clinical depression, anxiety, disruptive mood dysregulation disorder, self-harm, suicidality and even psychosis.

There is no evidence that being trans can be cured through psychological therapies, any more than autism or being gay can be cured through psychological therapies; rather, these types of interventions can cause significant further trauma and harm to the individual.

We absolutely must find ways in society to accommodate this small minority group of people, as we accommodate others with neurodevelopmental and other minority differences.

Accepting trans people and including them society is not incompatible with preserving the dignity, privacy and safety of women and girls. The idea that there is a conflict has been spread through moral panic which has been used to roll back progress towards recognition and inclusion of trans people in society.

There is no logical, nor evidence, base for the idea that banning trans people from using basic facilities, like toilets and changing rooms, in accordance with their gender will have any impact whatsoever on reducing prevalence of violence and women and girls. Indeed, these policies will have quite the reverse effects of increasing gender based harassment in public spaces.

Hope that covers it.

I think you’d do better reading Set Theory than Queer Theory. The former is much more useful than the latter.