The liminality of sex perception, sex-based spaces and bodily autonomy.

[polypostwonder]

This thread continues a discussion between BonfireLady (sorry, I wanted to tag you but the system says your username doesn't currently exist) and I on biological sex vs perceived/observed sex in https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/5530455-us-to-open-worlds-first-childrens-detransition-clinic-texas-hospital-to-offer-free-services-reversing-the-effects-of-gender-affirming-treatments?page=10&reply=152406258

She has requested I answer the following two questions:

1. would you consider that a viable way forward is for you to self-exclude from women's spaces and instead either advocate for third spaces for anyone to use (e.g. unisex facilities in addition to single-sex) or (probably your least preferred) use the men's?
2. would you support a restriction on anyone under 18 (or 25?) making permanent changes to their body, to match it with their perception of their "gender"? Similar to other restrictions on permanent body changes.

I believe I have previously answered them both. My answers today are superficially the same, but I have better thought out my answers (maybe?). To do this though, I need to share some assumptions.

In the previous thread, I believe there was somewhat of an agreement on the following statements:

1. People can identify a man when dressed in clothes 'traditionally associated' with women. Clothes are superficial to sex.
2. People look at other people and perceive their sex. People are not identifying the gametes/sry/chromosomes/other unobservable immutable biologic factor inside another person.
3. Assumptions about sex are made based on a person’s sex characteristics amongst other observable cues.
4. Pretty much every person in the whole world "exists within the expectations of sex categories". Very rarely it's unclear.
5. If a person exists within the expectations of sex categories, then socially they are treated as that sex whether they wish to be or not.

Building on those statements and previous discussion, some additional thoughts:

1. ‘Biological sex’ is defined by a person’s gametes/chromosomes/sry/other unobservable immutable biologic factor. This cannot be changed.
2. ’Observable sex’ is based upon the perception of sex characteristics rather than known biological sex and influences the placement and treatment of people in social sex categories. Perception is not under control of the observed, nor is it a demand of others.
3. Observable sex can be heavily influenced by biological sex and sex-based function. But sex-based function is not a requirement for the perception of sex.
4. Women’s rights are a cultural accommodation to rebalance access to society and ensure health, fair treatment, safety and/or dignity. Not all women require or access every right, but these rights are a vital benefit to women as a class.
5. Users of a culturally defined space for members of one sex may feel comfort, privacy or protection through separation from non-users. But all users share an equal right to feel comfort, privacy or protection.
6. Misogyny is not biologically based. It is a prejudice directed at women’s observable sex. Sexism can be biologically directed, but it can also be directed at members of an observable sex.
7. Sex realists believe every person should live and be treated by society according to their biological sex, no exceptions.
8. Trans people have a wide range of beliefs and goals. They do not share a single motivation.
9. Better quality research should be done with trans people of all ages.

I think BonfireLady is correct in saying each of us sees the other's "belief" as non-sensical and our own as position as factual. I'm hoping we can discuss this from a somewhat sensical space.

The answer is for men to behave properly. The answer is not for women to accommodate entitled men.

THIS!

I am not aware of a rule or law that is complied with by 100% of people. In fact, some people get a thrill from flouting them (eg excessive speeding in high powered vehicles) and others just don't believe that laws should apply to them (eg tax evasion).

That doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to persuade people to obey laws and rules by explaining the reasons for them, nor does it mean that there shouldn't be penalties for flouting them, even if they are sometimes very difficult to enforce.

If you believe in what Sex Matters are doing then you should give them your money anyway.

The OP's post which seems to propose that who penetrates and who is penetrated partially goes towards determining a persons sex is so completely ridiculous on top of the misogyny and homophobia.

People conduct their sexual relationships in all kinds of ways, so if you go by OP's "rule" it just becomes a farce of comical proportions.

Excuse the silliness, I am of course being facetious. It took way longer to write than it did to run through my mind in a slightly amusing, short few seconds 😅

Do heterosexual couples both change sex if pegging is involved? Do homosexual couples suddenly become either heterosexual or opposite sex homosexuals? What happens with nonbinary people? Don't even get me started on what happens to people's sex if they are involved in a polycule? I would imagine that in some cases a person might undergo multiple changes of sex in one sexual encounter. Does this happen to everyone, or is it only some people and if so why? If "sex" is essentially partially transferrable by the act of penetrative sex, does using a condom help? Has "sex" in fact been hiding away as an unknown STD up till now? How has this marvel of biological science not been discovered before now? Should trans activists not get some kind of award for this discovery now it's been made?

The mind boggles at the possibilities! 😂

What if you're bisexual? Is consent involved? Do people need to declare out loud that they don't wish to become whichever sex before they engage in a sexual relationship? Do they need to do it before every time they have sex? Is there some kind of wavier form to sign if you do consent?... Is it... a spreadsheet?😂

And again, a reminder that this is not just a squabble about toilets, much as TRAs like to paint it as such.

It is about whether the female half of the species deserves legal, social and political recognition in our own right, or whether it's reasonable to subsume us into some ill defined group of "people who look like we culturally expect women to look or feel what they believe to be wommanny feelings inside".

The single sex spaces issue in this context is actually two issues.

The first is nothing to do with Gender Absolutist demands. It is simply "are woman only spaces justified and practical?"

The second, which is where Gender Absolutism comes in, accepts that woman only spaces are justified and practical, but then quibbles about what type of person is "really" a woman or it is "reasonable" to exclude.

Since I consider the idea that womanhood is mental rather than physical reprehensible, to me the second question is like asking what types of racism we should just agree to live with.

I was about to joke "does this mean the various inanimate objects men have been found to penetrate like car exhausts, wide bottles and so on are actually female?"

And then I realised - oh god, I bet to them it does 😫

I also want an end to rape. As men seem to ignore the law and rape anyway, should we just give up and stop fighting to eliminate rape? I mean, that’s another example of men riding roughshod over women’s consent? What about VWAG? Should we just stop fighting that as “men are gonna do it anyway”?

Yes, with a pivot table and vlookups

Many seem to want a slight 5ft 4 person who's been living for decades with a modified physiology as woman with a long term male partner to be excluded from the ladies loos. It's a completely unreasonable ask.

What I want is the recurring sexist idea that some men are more like women than other men because of how they feel or think to be put thoroughly to bed for good.

Once that is off the table, we can talk fairly and honestly about whether some men are not well served by a single provision that has to cater for all types of men, and what an alternative might look like, without having to pretend/believe such men are somehow a bit wommanny really.

It is the 'What is a woman?' question, when anything is possible except a female person who is old enough to be an adult.

Sex is off the table because dsd exist and not all women are fertile.

So its about height. Small men are women because they are the size of the average women, also tall men are women because some women are over 6 foot tall.

Its about breasts and hips, not because of pregnancy, childbirth and feeding, but because men are attracted to breasts and hips.

Its about performing femininity consistently over years. So a man wearing heels and being ladylike is more of a woman than women who doesn't.

The idea that a man has the power to define what women are based on what he wants and what he can achieve, is gender.

Many seem to want a slight 5ft 4 person who's been living for decades with a modified physiology as woman with a long term male partner to be excluded from the ladies loos. It's a completely unreasonable ask.

It really is not an unreasonable ask.

That some people think that asking for this makes women seem a bit ridiculous at times is not surprising as we know that there are plenty of people who believe that some male people really can become female people if they past that person's selected criteria. When you then drill into that criteria, that is when you find how completely unworkable that person's expectations are. Arbitrating a person's sex category based on their subjective reality is the concept that is never going to be a reasonable one.

We know there are always going to be some men who refuse to do the right thing & stay out of our spaces, & that most of them will be the ones who identify as trans.

But the point is that if most men, regardless of what they identify as, use their own spaces, the ones who keep going into the women’s are more likely to stand out & it will be easier to challenge them.

All the same old useless arguments being rolled out again, including “laws don’t stop people doing X,Y,Z, so get rid of the laws”.

Why would any female person give a male person any sense of justification for them to access female single sex provisions of any kind when that male person is not and will never be female?

This is what makes no sense.

No male person should be accessing any female single sex provision.

Not the kind ones.
Not the lovely friends and family ones.
Not the ones someone judges as 'passing' enough.
Not the ones with enough of a trauma history.
Not the one with a piece of paper that allows them to tell other people the impossible - that they are female.
Not the ones who have lived as they believe women live for any amount of time.

Letting any male person believe that they just have to work hard enough, invest enough or whatever to be rewarded with access to female single sex provisions is not an act of kindness or empathy.

• every person with a Y chromosome to voluntary give up using women's facilities no longer how long they have been doing so and no matter how unlikely they are to cause fear in any woman.

Yes absolutely. They should NEVER have been using them in the first place, they had NO right to do so, they sure as shit never asked women if they could, they just marched on in there.

It just isn't possible, and fighting to try to make the impossible happen just makes the cause seem a bit ridiculous at times.

Why is it not possible? Are TIM uniquely incapable of obeying the Law, respecting women, women's boundaries, privacy and dignity?

While we are here, can we please knock on the head the idea that being a 5ft 4in man is somehow a fate so awful that it would be better to be a woman. I have short men in my immediate family, and I am seriously insulted on their behalf. It is also a view that borders on racism given the range in average heights across ethnicities.

If single sex spaces are impossible to achieve, why do we have them? Why have we been trying for decades?

I would say that the idea of spaces for women and trans identifying men are more difficult to justify, design and police.

For a start, are trans identifying women included? If so, why is their transition not as significant as male transition?

Then we have to justify why women, either including or excluding TM, and TW need space away from the majority of men.

It can't be for reasons leading from female sex, it can't be about VAWG because TW are just as likely as any other men to be perpetrators. Opportunities? Is there any evidence that all women and TW have the exact same barriers to the same opportunities?

Even if reasons are found, sex difference are still there. Safeguarding still exists and its just not safe to encourage adult TW (who are male) to be alone with girls and vulnerable women. So the design of these spaces will have to allow for that. Single sex with 'gendered' spaces.

Then it comes down to policing.

As a species we are good at identifying someone's sex. We are not good at identifying someone's gender.

No one, not a girl, women or TW could question any man.

So why are TW so keen to create these spaces? Its not about a shared need to avoid men, because the set up couldn't exclude men. Are we to have clinicians diagnosis people at the door?

TW inclusion is only for validation, isnt it? And if they cant use the women's spaces, they want to destroy them.

Pablo Picasso was 5 foot 4. Given his predilections, everyone would be safer with him in the gents.

Height is a totally red herring.

But have you not understood murasaki? Men want something and would be upset if they didn't have it!

It's a bit warm for my ditzy female brain, clearly!!

It is an absurdity to think that a slimly built short man is a female person, but we keep seeing this as some kind of justification that some male person might 'pass' on the basis of this appearance.

It is really just constant philosophising and constant justification.

As a man, I am totally unimpressed by other men needing to be stopped. We are all capable of behaving well. Why do women have to stop us? Why don't we accept that some spaces are not for us? Actually, most of us manage that just fine, particularly when we have matured beyond our teenage years, when admittedly some of us hadn't learned much self control. But all or us, teenage or older, trans-identified or not, are perfectly able to respect women's right to spaces for women.

...how about expanding upon this? It would be a different angle to explore...

I can eventually, but it may take a while to process everything into something that represents my thoughts and is discussable.

*I'm afraid I don't believe you that there is no record of you being born male in the UK. Unless of course you weren't born in the UK and your birth country allowed self-ID from birth (like Germany does now)...

I was not born in the UK. My birth certificate was altered in a process that I'm not sure exists anymore due to trans acceptance policies. A birth certificate change was required before any other identification/documents could be modified, not that I had any at the time. This is also no longer the case, I believe. In the UK, my birth seems to be treated in much the same way as my marriage and our children.

I'd not even thought about it. That is true then.