Are We Really 'Women' On The Inside?

[HazelLemur]

Dear friends,

As anyone paying attention to current trans affairs knows, the anti-trans brigade like to throw around what they think is the “killer question”.

"What is a woman, then?"

These people will often engage in triumphal sneering as they further insist "Your chromosomes are what you are; XX are women and XY are men. It's science, innit?"

And as a confident trans-woman I say to these people "Absolutely! What is a woman? Great question! Let's examine that".

To begin, let's consult three definitive sources:

First, the Cambridge Dictionary of the English Language.
Then, modern genetics and neurophysiology.
And finally, up to date research on brain structure in cisgender and transgender women.

First, the dictionary.
For this, let's go with the Cambridge Dictionary of the English Language:

Woman (noun)

1. an adult female human being
2. an adult who lives and identifies as female though they may have been said to have a different sex at birth

As we can see from #2, despite the recent social backlash and disproportionately loud screeching from certain murky corners of the internet, Western culture as a whole is moving toward accepting the validity of trans peoples' inner gender identity. No person with a working moral compass would consider this a bad thing.

Next, let’s summarize genetics and neurophysiology.

Modern society routinely treats all the following “XY” humans as WOMEN, however...
-You can be a woman because you have X & Y chromosomes but your body is insensitive to androgens and you have female anatomy & gender identity.
Ah, so much for the childishly simplistic “But women = XX and men = XY".
-You can be a woman with X & Y chromosomes but your Y is missing the SRY gene, so you have a female body and gender identity (yes, this is a real thing despite your denials).

People who have X & Y chromosomes, but their Y is missing the SRY gene, develop a female body.
Should we treat such people as men, in society, when they have the body of a woman, simply because simpletons insist that XY = Male?
Only an inveterate bigot with some weird religious and/or psychosexual axe to grind would say yes.

You can be a woman with XXY or XXXY chromosomes, giving you a male body but female brain/body map and gender identity.
-You can be a woman with XY chromosomes but a mutation called CBX2 that blocks the influence of the SRY gene.
-You can be a woman because you have 46,XY in some cells but 46,XX in other cells, or 47, XXY.

These are all valid, scientifically obervable genetic variations that highlight the "But XX = women and XY = men" mantra for the simplistic, unscientific nonsense that it is.

And lastly, there are studies of brain structure.
These show that in the section of the brain that determines one’s sense of gender identity.

The brains of transgender women are almost identical to those of cisgender women.
The brains of trans men also align more with cisgender men than they do with women.

And so, to summarize

Modern science, which is how rational people resolve differences of opinion.
It is not about referring to holy books, written in pre-scientific ages past.
It is not about regurgitating simplistic, binary statements that you learnt in the 4th grade.

This shows us that, genetically and biologically speaking, there are many types of women; including transgender women like me.

P.S. In this essay we have a summary of the cutting edge science which validates transgender womens' biologically determined, inner sense of gender identity.

As I’ve said, a rational society follows rational explanations, and doesn’t define its people via outdated religious or cultural ideas.
But beyond that, there is simply human courtesy and kindness.

It’s cruel, hateful and rude for the transphobic bigots to demand that people be forced to conform to their anti-scientific notions.

No one's life is affected negatively by honoring a transwoman as a woman, as the historical record of many trans accepting societies have shown.

Good people will see the very challenging dilemma that transwomen are in, and their natural empathy, coupled with scientific insight, will make them want to support their fellow human beings in being who they know they are.

And so, I ask all of you:

Should we as a society treat trans-women as the women their brain and neurobiology tells us they are? And, if not, why on earth wouldn’t we?

P.P.S. The image in this post is of women who have XY chromosomes, but an androgen insensitivity syndrome which causes their bodies to develop as female.
Would anyone in their right mind insist we treat them as males, simply because of their chromosomal makeup?
The bigots might, but you know you're better than that, right?

Makes sense.

🎸🤘

I think this works for this thread. It sums up some of the dynamics that we regularly point out on FWR

https://x.com/hothingsgirlsay/status/2049144814344474760?s=46

This comment is a masterclass in linguistic persuasion tactics disguised as common sense.

First comes the decoy analogy: “A man can’t be a frog.” That sounds clever, but it distracts from the real issue. Nobody claims humans can become another species. The comparison is there to make the listener feel the speaker has already won before the real discussion even starts.

Then comes frame control. They shift the conversation away from sex and into gender, because sex is concrete, measurable, and biologically relevant, while gender is often defined in vague, flexible, self-referential ways. When you can move the debate onto softer ground, you gain rhetorical advantage.

Next is semantic drift. They use the word woman after redefining it. Historically, woman referred to the female sex class. Now the term is quietly swapped to mean identity, while still borrowing the emotional, political, and legal significance attached to the original meaning.

That leads to borrowed moral capital. Women have faced oppression, exclusion, reproductive control, violence, legal inequality, and systemic barriers across cultures for thousands of years because they were female. That history belongs to the female sex class. If you redefine woman while keeping all that historical weight attached, you are inheriting a struggle built on sex while denying sex matters.

Then we get presupposition. “Sex is different than gender” is presented as settled fact rather than a contested framework. Saying something confidently does not make it universally agreed upon.

Then comes category collapse. Gender roles, stereotypes, clothing norms, and personality traits are mixed together with the category woman itself. But rejecting stereotypes does not change your sex. A woman who hates dresses is still a woman. A man who loves makeup is still a man.

Then there is false consensus language. Statements like “No trans person is saying…” attempt to speak for an entire population and close off examples that contradict the claim.

Then social proof through vagueness. “Gender has changed throughout history” sounds deep, but usually refers to changing expectations and norms, not literal changes in who is male or female.

The clean distinction is simple:

Gender roles can change.
Fashion norms can change.
Personality expression can change.
Stereotypes can change.

But women were historically oppressed on the basis of sex, not identity.

Words matter because categories matter. If language becomes infinitely flexible, protections, data, fairness, and reality become infinitely negotiable.

I remember my German penfriend's family taking me on a trip to see the border between West Germany and the DDR in 1964.They lived in Hamburg and the nearest point on the border was only about 50km away. To see a high fence running right across my whole field of vision out in the countryside was an eerily unforgettable sight for an 18 year-old.

Interestingly, on another thread on mumsnet, many mothers seem to believe that boys have a special "boy brain" which means they behave differently from girls, and need bringing up differently. This is unfortunate because they would then presumably have to believe that a boy inadvertently born with a "girl brain" would not be a proper boy and might even be a girl.

So such a totally unevidenced idea seems to be quite prevalent among otherwise rational people.

I do! And I hope in return that you bow down to me as the actual Queen of Mars! You can be my right-hand beetle 🪲

Do I get paid in Mars bars? If yes I'll take the job.

Not chromosomes, bodies - and the reproductive systems which differentiate them. Chromosomes are just the starting point from which all else follows.

Because that "cellular configuration" is not just significant for a moment "at conception". It is an immutable fact determines the body that we will experience the world though and that people will experience us as for our whole lives.

And as female people that has significant meaningful consequences for us that we face everyday and that you will never face and mostly never even think about.

You in your ignorance solipsisticly assume that we care about and want to police trans women's identities.

But we don't really. It's just that the things you are aren't really anything to do with being a woman, not in the original sense that is the reason the concept of "woman" even exists in the first place and is a simple unavoidable reality for the female half of humanity.

We just want to continue to be allowed to recognise and speak about the things we are that you are not, because while you have no idea whatsoever why these things should matter, we, who will live with them not just at a "moment at conception", but from that moment of conception to the moment of our deaths, do.

And so it matters to those of us that are woman, in that original sense, that the definition of us is not subsumed by the definition of you who is not, because in that subsumation so much will be lost. Not to you, but from us.

By imposing your limited and self serving identity onto us you reduce us from everything we can be to only what you can also achieve. And sir, that is not much.

So what you seem to experience as some grand "anti trans" drama with you of course in the middle as the wounded and wronged grande dame is simply the reassertion of our truth to the lies you impose upon us.

Rational, intelligent, educated people lose their minds when it comes to babies/ children.

I could not comprehend why my very smart, PhD qualified, scientist friend was so astounded that my first born was bald. She had fallen hook line and sinker for the indigestion means a hairy baby old wives tale (and boy did I suffer), even being reminded that for part of the pregnancy the fetus is covered in hair and having the actual reason for indigestion in pregnancy wouldn't shift her.

I assume it's the same flaw that means plenty of clever, well educated people fall for trans ideology.

The border was a very oppressive sight, it's really hard to describe. Also the differences between West and East Berlin at the time. I went on a school trip to Berlin in 1984 and we went to East Berlin for one day, it was such a difference between the two halves of the city. I'm glad I got to see it before the end of the DDR.

Ahh the famous trans culls. It's well documented that any men seen wearing pink or heels or highly decorated clothes or having long hair or wearing make-up were murdered. It's why there is no trace of such behaviour.

We're gonna need a bigger bingo card.

Someone remind me - at the annual thread awards, I'm going to vote this as creepiest thread title of 2026.

All land attracts the land tax. Land with outline planning consent for houses will attract a higher rate of tax than land without planning consent, because just having that planning consent increased its sale value.

Some farmers may get subsidy payments to use their land in a way that assures the nation's food security. Those subsidies might be bigger than the land tax the farm owner paid. The starting position is still that all land is taxed.

@selffellatingouroborosofhate given profit margins in agriculture (extremely low) that's gonna be fun...

Even in 1876, no one was culling people. Medical technology was not great, poverty was rife and caused a lot of child mortality, yet people weren't culling children.

Galton didn't even coin the term "eugenics" until 1883. Whilst disabled and poor people were institutionalised and sterilised, actual "culling", the deliberate murder of people by the State, occurred for a brief period during the Third Reich, long after your "150 years ago" time frame and limited to one country.

This ridiculous, inaccurate, and hyperbolic statement makes me doubt the sincerity of everything else you say.

The Wolffian duct develops into many organs. It is not just one cell. You don't understand basic biology.

I'm uninterested in having a discussion about violence with you or anyone else here.

Male violence and the unique ways in which it affects women are at the heart of sex realist beliefs.

Yeah, I forgot about China. I was thinking of Europe. Nonetheless, British children were not culled 150 years ago.

Hence the subsidies. The State can intervene to protect our food security.

It would also be perfectly reasonable to apply import taxes on imported food so that British farmers aren't being forced to undercut foreign growers.

The core problem is supermarket shareholders getting paid profits when British farmers don't get fair pay. We don't assure food security by letting Tesco et al do this.

There are women alive in the UK today who couldn't get a mortgage without a male guarantor, who couldn't keep their jobs once they became mothers, who couldn't be raped within marriage. But funnily enough when you ask what it means to live as a woman this is never what our visitors have in mind.

It is never a burning desire to do the majority of the housework and childcare while caring for elderly parents and holding down a job for less money with a pension gap and fewer promotion prospects. It's swirly skirts and swooshy hair.

Can anyone summarise the last 8 hours for me? 😇😇

Yes of course

The majority “the poster is a twat” “evidence is bollocks”

total derail

Poster returns “no i am not” “here are my mates” (some pretending to be GC women)

endless too and fro

Poster “there are no men here”

Who votes for whom debate emphasis on mr “hypnotits”

<Enter left stage Monty pythons cast dressed as a beetle>

<enter right stage the urge resisters give in and arrive in possession of logic and facts>

Brief assessment of debate so far, no meeting in the middle found, nor will there ever be.

We didn't get any sources in the end.

I'll take your word.

fairplayforwomen.com/penis/

I would believe a trans woman on HRT would be in the 'incapable of impregnating anyone' camp

I don't know whether the dick wielder in front of me is:

• one of the 20% of TIMs who takes any kind of hormones at all, nor if those hormones have killed his boners;
• one of the 80% of TIMs undergoing no medical treatment at all and therefore still packing sperm;
• a bloke in a dress.

It's statistically most likely that he can still knock me up if he feels so inclined.

And frankly, even if one in a thousand TIMs can knock me up, that's still infinitely more than the zero women who can.

It's about rape and forced pregnancy.
It's about rape and forced pregnancy.
It's about rape and forced pregnancy.
It never stops being about rape and forced pregnancy.