Thread derailment

[Temporaryusernamefortoday]

Wondering if I am the only one that’s noticed more and more thread derailments. I’m not talking about TRA taking a TWAW stance but an individual being deliberately obtuse or missing the point of an individuals posts to create an argument about a tangential element. It just seems rather insidious and designed to prevent proper conversation.

This is not a TAT but a thread about a phenomenon.

I dont think you read the post or you wouldn't have rehashed what I just said. Maybe go back and read it again. This time, think about why it would be poor care for a midwife to emphasise womanhood when someone feels their sex is about as important as their ring size. Think about why we might be more inclined to orient her care about the identities she feels are more central to her being.

As a HCP, you have to ensure that you don't allow the things that you find important to obstruct you from providing safe, holistic care to the service user.

There is a difference between "does not care about" and "actively denies".

I suggest you reread my post as you have clearly not understood that.

So why would we allow the needs of women to dictate the literature that we provide to the range of service users that we have? You dont make sense.

Youre saying that a leaflet aimed at everyone who might have a anamoly scan should omit some of the service users who might need an anomaly scan because including them somehow erases other groups who are also included (women). It's totally illogical.

The type of society we want is one where anyone who is pregnant receives safe, holistic care.

Or indeed remove the woman entirely from services which are specifically for one sex such as when NHS Scotland/Scottish Government ran a national radio campaign for cervical screening which used only the phrase 'those with a cervix'.

This started over me saying that several types of human give birth and as a midwife who cares about providing excellent care to their service users, I recognise that "woman" isn't central to the identity of everyone who is pregnant. Therefore, i'd be a better midwife focusing on the aspects of their identity that they do feel are core to who they are. This is completely separate to sex and gender.

Nice words, but we all know you would draw a line at, for example, racism. You would not - or at least I hope you would not - produce a leaflet that pandered to racists to ensure racist women felt properly addressed by language that differentiated their race from those they consider inferior? Then consider why it is you think it's ok to do that to women.

Yes it's best to say women and anyone with a cervix.

This is such a ridiculous analogy. What has racism got to do with including TM in maternity services? Are you saying TM are like racists? What is your point here?

So (flipping my original question) why didn't your own language shift back here? You know that "pregnant women" is the accepted language here and yet you didn't automatically change. Either you do think "pregnant people" is a more correct term, or else you have been affected in some way - perhaps by habit? - so now you automatically reach for those words even though you don't believe in them yourself?

They didn't though.

They said only 'those with a cervix'.

Because of ideological capture in the name of 'inclusivity'.

I flipped my language because I was specifically talking about a rhetorical trans maternity service user. Pregnant person is the more correct term for them and so I automatically use it even when I am speaking about them. Just like I still call the partner of a lesbian woman "mum" if she is the other parent. She isn't factually the mother/other parent of the baby until the baby is officially registered. Really and truly, until that happens, it's just mum and her wife/GF. Unlike with the majority of heterosexual couples where the partner is also the biological parent of the baby so calling him "dad" is factual. Even if he never makes it onto the BC.

Yes that's wrong and that's why I said it's best to say women and people with a cervix.

And there is is again.

"including them somehow erases other groups who are also included (women)"

So despite claiming that you don't really see trans men as not women, you just use this language to make them comfortable, your subconscious is telling us that actually you do see them as separate groups.

As a female person, I can tell you I find the language "women and ..." whichever groups of female people are apparenty not women extremely excluding, and it makes me feel very unseen.

Because while weaselly orgs may feel they can sit on the fence by telling women like me "oh we don't really mean it, we just need to make women who do not like to be seen as women feel included", I can only make sense of it in the way it actually written, which is that "women" are some sort of personality group, one to whch I have no idea if I belong or not.

Can you not see, by trying to sit on the "women and..." fence, you are actually disempowering and demeaning everyone? Female people who are supposed to just carry on understanding "women" means women in the original sex-based meaning, and trans identifying female people who are being pandered to with language no one except them is actually suppposed to take seriously?

I have stated many times on this board that it is impossible to believe that trans identities are valid without either holding sexist ideas about mental differences between men and women, or holding sexist ideas about the low importance of female-specific needs, voices and experiences.

And I use racism as an analogy to highlight this because I think it is shocking that the sexism of Genderism is openly supported by officialdom in a way that racism (while sadly still very present unofficially in officialdom) is rightly not.

@Squishedpassenger

We do have that person here who identifies as both a TM and a woman but that's the only time Ive ever heard of anyone doing that..

There are more people like me out there, but we are literally not allowed to speak up anywhere. This board is the only place I've found so far which wouldn't shout me down for transphobia for exposing my views. Which in turn means that new TMs only get to hear the one TMAM discourse, and either it doesn't even occur to them to question it because it's The Truth From On High, or even if they do, they don't have anyone to discuss it with anywhere.

Several types of humans give birth but regardless of identity they are all female. I'm not sure how you can separate identoty from sex and gender, at least not while you're giving giving birth. There's a big difference between (a) thinking that "woman" as an aspect of your identity isn't very important to you, and (b) refusing to identify as female or a woman at all while being pregnant and giving birth, to the point where it causes you distress if your HCP reminds you of it.

It's very ideological to assume that a midwife can provide "excellent" care to a mother while focussing on other aspects of the mother's identity over the physical realities. Pregnant women often have all sorts of ideas and theories about how things should be and I thought midwives were usually quite good at bringing them back down to earth.

I see TM as TM. TM can get pregnant and have a cervix and so literature has to include them. It isnt complicated.

If you feel that acknowledging TM exist and need maternity and gynaecology services as erasing you or other women, I think that's something you'll have to deal with yourself. The answer isnt to exclude TM so people who don't want to acknowledge their existence can live in peace.

I think if you keep trying to have TM excluded from safe, individualised maternity care, any other more valid points you have about sex and gender will be dismissed. Especially by professionals who have a duty of care to their service users.

I think you have to consider that for some people, being understood in that way is the most important aspect of their care.

Any attempts to challenge a pregnant sevice user on how their personal identity would be the epitome of terrible care. Only a selfish narcissist would do anything like that. Don't get me wrong, I have met midwives who are so awful that they have done things like that. Thankfully 2 of them are now struck off for not being able to leave their personal views at home and letting them leak into how they care for their service users.

This is a really eye-opening thread. It's somewhat raising my blood pressure, but having so many pages of one person arguing for their beliefs is also interesting. It lends a certain continuity.
So to get back to something akin to the thread subject, I think it shows that there is a place for something that some people may consider a derail.

Bingo - it's respecting the needs of the noisy minority over the quiet majority again.

In your view the quiet majority can suck it up and "deal with it". But surely it's the TMs who have the problem and who need to deal with it? They are no more excluded and deprived of safe individualised maternity care by being included as women (they know what the word means!) than all the other women are excluded by these word-games. Medical safety is compromised when HCP don't use clear language about sex.

I think people might be accustomed to shutting anyone who has a different perspective down through a mix of snark, derailment and relying on the moderators to give greater protection to explicitly GC views. Since on this thread, people have called out thee tactics already, it isn't as easily utilised this time. Since I am willing to respond to any posts aimed at me or about me, the thread continues.

What are they dealing with though? A TM receiving safe and individualised care and being included in services relevant to them? Why would that bother anyone if they are also included? They do feel excluded by being included as "women" because they report as much. How can you speak for TM? That's very presumptive to assume you know better than them about what approach to their healthcare they need from professionals.

I wasn't really talking about challenging an individual user - though goodness knows how you talk to a pregnant woman about testosterone use without challenging her.

It's your assumption that somehow TM aren't women which you revealed here even outside of the individuals you have to deal with. As a HCP you must have to deal with individuals who have all sorts of whacky ideas and carefully avoid challenging them in order to provide that care. But HCP don't usually take it on themselves to validate those whacky ideas.

Why would anyone pregnant still be on testosterone? Do you think a TM is going to go to the trouble of conceiving a planned baby and not find out that they have to stop testosterone? It wouldn't be a challenge just like it isnt when you enquire about other harmful prescribed medication someone might be on.

I think you are imagining all these scenarios that just don't occur. The majority of TM will have ultra planned pregnancies.