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.

I'm sure Tandora has read it, expert that she is, what with being so keen on reading widely. I'd love to hear her thoughts....... just kidding we've heard them 'that's not what trans is'.

And that is before we get onto the question of whether the words that the man identifying as a woman says are words that he believe himself.

'that's not what trans is'

I can't imagine her saying that face-to-face if she ever had the misfortune to be incarcerated with a trans-identifying male

I think it would be fair to say that there are no clear genetic, hormonal, neurological or any other biological causes of TIM and it remains a behavioural problem until further research is done.

There is no test that can be run on this population to determine if any individual is trans. There are no tests that can be run to split TIM into different groups. We can't split a traumatised child from a man who gets sexual pleasure from dressing as a woman.

All we have at the moment are the self reported feelings and some early research which is controversial and equivocal. Trans people deserve better.

So telling a young person that they have a proven Neurological or physical disorder is misleading and could be potentially harmful if it is used to convince them that their feelings have a basis in proven biology rather than a feeling (however strong and uncomfortable).

If research does improve and subgrouping can be done that maybe results in a mixed group of different men with difference influences that are affecting their behaviour they will still be men regardless of how they feel or how they get sexual pleasure.

They may have a slight biological variation of something (hormonal, genetic, neurological) that can possible influence how they feel. They are still feelings.

The solution is not to label them as woman. The solution is to help them understand how biology has contributed to their feelings and behaviour. Then to help them live with this as the biological men that they are.

Yes, society should be understanding. It should be safe for these men to dress as woman if they want to and use the facilities dedicated for their male sex. Work may need to be done so they can be more accepted in male spaces. Maybe in the same way as disabled loos have the notices of not all disabilities are visible.

What does feeling like a woman feel like?

Tandora has resolutely refused to answer this question, even though I've asked it umpteen times.

Because Tandora absolutely knows that as soon as they attempt to answer it, the airy fairy explanations fall apart.

There is no possible way a man can feel like a woman. None.

The more honest ones will attempt to tell you that they like the stereotypes. We had one man on here who said he could only be 'vibrant' if he identified as a woman.

Still, makes a change from being 'a shifting constellation of ethereal essences', I s'pose.

@Plastictreees @Tandora

What do you consider to be transphobic about what survivors of violence have said in this thread? Please be specific and, if possible, quote from posts.

I want to understand if I'm being accused of being transphobic and, if so, exactly what I said that you deem transphobic. I'd guess others who you are suggesting are transphobic (without saying any names or giving any reasons that you deem them so) would also like to know.

I can’t understand why my trauma is worth so much less than a transpersons trauma.

Neither can I @Taztoy It's an abhorrent thought, that someone could be so dismissive of you and your trauma.

And I add my own trauma to that. As a survivor of extreme male violence, why am I less worthy of compassion?

I would like to know the same please

I have seen it said on social media (NOT by anyone on here) that women who bring up their sexual trauma are weaponising or fetishing their sexual trauma as an attack on trans people (they mean trans identifying males, lets face it).

I was shocked when I saw that and I am no less shocked now. It's a sickening thing to say.

Edited to add: on both Reddit and X
Edited again (sorry): my post is in response to what @GenderlessVoid asked upthread "What do you consider to be transphobic about what survivors of violence have said in this thread?" - i.e. simply mentioning one's lived trauma is deemed "transphobic" by some

I was accused of weaponising my friends rape on here by simply pointing out that her experience makes it traumatising for to encounter men in intimate spaces.

I think the thread was on AIBU, not here.

Absolutely disgusting response.

That's basically what Tandora accused several posters of doing. And I was scolded when I called it disgusting.

It's abhorrent

How many hours, days, years are we going to have to argue basic facts of reality?

It's utterly exhausting.

It's as if some guys with sexual fetishes sat around dreaming up this idea of convincing everyone that they were 'just like the gays' and everyone fell for it hook line and sinker.

Oh wait...

Also "it's just like Feminism - women don't want to be held back by their sex? Well neither do trans people!"

Which sounds so reasonable on the surface doesn't it?

Explaining why it's flawed means facing the reality that regardless of what women may wish to be true, at least today our sex does have consequences and does put us at risk and does affect how people treat us and relate to us and we can't always avoid or control these things, and the fact that we are more than sexist stereotypes is nevertheless not always enough to escape those stereotypes in the eyes of others.

And that knowledge is hard. And many women who would call themselves feminist don't want to accept it. Far easier to embrace "Women aren't defined by sex so TWAW yay!"

A good point in your last sentence. And as we know it falls down immediately you think of, to name one example, Afghani women right now not being able to have windows where they are visible, or go to school etc. They can't identify out of their biology so it is massively presumptuous to think any woman can.

It takes privilege to say women aren't defined by biological sex.

What does feeling like a woman feel like?
"Tandora has resolutely refused to answer this question, even though I've asked it umpteen times."

True. It seems like by using the word cognition instead of feeling tandora is hoping to circumvent the requirement to describe what that feeling feels like. Cognition just means something you know though, and knowledge that doesn't come through external sources is just that, a feeling.

If someone said I'm gay, because I just know I'm gay. It's a deeply seated cognition. And then you saw they were always in heterosexual relationships. You'd ask them, wouldn't you, what do they understand by gay, and what makes them feel that word applies to them? You wouldn't just say sure, you have a cognition that you're gay, so you are, even if you don't match the definition.

Can I just confirm where we are at now please?

We have these statements from a previous thread that Tandora started with the view to 'educate' us where Tandora said:

"I don't accept that recognising and accepting the realty/ validity of a trans woman's experience causes women at large 'profound distress'. If you were DU's mother I might cut you a bit of slack there. Otherwise - nope."

And then made it even clearer when asked with this statement:

“I don't accept women are harmed or compromised in anyway by accepting the reality of trans experience.”

Which I don't believe can be interpreted as anything but that this poster rejects that female people really feel distress when they find a male person accessing a single sex provision that they, as a female person, expects to exclude all male people. With the proviso that if it is a publicly accessible space, all male people over the age of about 8 years old.

Then we have this post on this thread at 11.11

" Someone else being trans does not negatively impact you. You just think it does because you're very transphobic.

Sorry to be blunt but this is the bottom line. "

Which when combined with the context of the other statements I mention, really leaves little doubt that female people who feel distress when they find a male person accessing a single sex provision that they, as a female person, expects to exclude all male people, are completely dismissed as feeling distress. Plus they are now considered 'transphobic' and 'anti-trans'.

I would appreciate clarification on this, because to me there really seems to be an attempt at some obfuscation on threads where there then is some kind of declaration that 'female people need to make some accommodations' while still trying to appear reasonable with 'sure, female people should have some single sex provisions ... but I don't want to be dragged into discussions about single sex provisions, I only want you to all understand the theory as to why these male people have the right to be in those single sex sex spaces.'.

I would like confirmation as to whether I am making a fair interpretation of the past week's posts or not. And by all means Tandora if you want to clear up any misinterpretation, please do so. I have asked for clarification several times and nothing really has been said to clarify this.

There are two purposes to a thread like this.

Operation let them speak.

The sheer fun of the intellectual challenge of debate (but not in the usual sense, rather in the sense of the intellectual challenge of arguing against incoherent contradictory things. It's a bit like the horseshoe theory where extreme left and right in poltics meet - the hardest things to argue against are incredible robust and evidenced arguments on the one hand, and things so incoherent that one can't pin them down to challenge them on the other.)

Remember after weeks of me asking Tandora admitted that her position is that no woman have the right to female only toilets or changing rooms (not preteens negotiating their first periods, not elderly maiden aunts) and that she started a thread to state that neither men with DSDs or transwomen should be excluded from womens sports (and definitely no sex testing).

However she also repeatedly states 'its not a case of either or' but refusing to explain how we can have both female only spaces and never exclude trans women from anywhere. I can't make it add up.

She really is only concerned with the men/TW, isn’t she? Trans men - ie vulnerable young women - are not considered for a second are they?

I have watched with interest over the past months actually. I remember when the 'what about ND people' argument was being first floated by this poster. Do you remember this? It was a 'what about ' argument rather than this very strong and what seems to be fully fledged theory.

It feels like we were the test bed for that initial theory to see if some people accepted it. Now it is not a 'whatabout', it has become a solid element. Yet, has there been any newly released evidence? No. So why is it now moved from a 'whatabout' thought experiment type suggestion to something so strongly stated?

There seems to be something going on here where there is something disconnected about it all. Like there is a most definite avoidance in being very clear about anything except this newly strong theory that cannot be diagnosed but apparently is absolutely the answer to what 'being transgender ' is... yet, then doesn't fit all people with transgender identities. But it most certainly is the answer....

And yet, people wonder why the questions keep getting asked over and over. It is because it is all theoretical with nothing proven but has to be made out to be stronger than it is. While not wanting to admit that actually there is no solution that will allow female people to have single sex spaces while fully accommodating the male people that the poster centres. There is nothing at all solid about these arguments at all, yet we are being told that if we don't agree with are full of hate.

“I don't accept women are harmed or compromised in anyway by accepting the reality of trans experience.”

I suppose you could understand this to mean accepting that trans people believe what they believe, without feeling any obligation to believe the same thing.

But I have to say that Tandora understanding of trans experience seems quite narrow.

In any case, you can't force people to believe that trans women are women, even if, as Tandora suggests, disagreement might induce psychosis. I'm not sure that Tandora's arguments are entirely helpful to trans people. They do tend to paint trans people in a rather negative light and overstep general expectations of behaviour.

I agree.

But I am trying to work through these fundamental statements so that at least there is some kind of direction. I find the posting history to be almost deliberately confounding and dissociative because there is this adherence to this theory that lacks any honest discussion about how it is all applied.

It is a version of someone saying 'there must be a way of being fully inclusive' as a wish without ever acknowledging any part of reality.

Not just 'it could be neuro diversity' but Tandoori was very, very certain Transness was a DSD a few scant weeks ago and went to great lengths to persuade us of this. Now any mention of this isn't engaged with at all, not even one of Tan's trade mark 'I never said that'. It's almost like when she can't make one half baked theory stick she just abandons it and moves on to the next one, which is strange behaviour from an expert with decades of research behind her.