If the majority of women voted in favour of self ID?

[MaIeficent]

What would you do?

Completely hypothetical question. I'm not so interested in hearing about the stats/reality or that 'it would never happen'. Just hypothetically what people's stance would be if it did.

I'm conflicted as I don't think I could ever be in favour but I simultaneously support the right of women to make their own choices even if I disagree with them.

Would you defer to them in recognition that this is the decision that makes women as a whole happiest or would you soldier on and try and impose the wishes of a minority group onto a majority of dissenting women?

The women who genuinely support self id really need to own the real life consequences of their support of self id. After a damning ET, an independent review found that the Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre had harmed rape survivors, due to the Centre's adherence to self id. That's not cherry picking the 'worst examples', that's the real world outcome of an institution so captured that it actually allowed it's service users to come to harm. In a similar vein, the Scottish Prison Service followed a policy which actively put violent male sex offenders into the female prison estate on the basis of self id, putting female prisons at harm. Again, not a cherry picking of such cases as Karen White, but the deliberate policy of a Scottish Government Executive Agency.

Essentially for the true believers, knowing all the above, they are actively fighting to dismantle safeguarding measures for vulnerable women. And I don't particularly care if a majority of women supported self id hypothetically, I would still fight against such harms to be inflicted on women.

I'll have to come back to some of these as it's almost 1:30am and I still need to get out my gym stuff and jump in the shower/make some food etc.

What exactly is this apparently objectional behaviour/attitudes of the women that call themselves feminists that makes other women reject the "feminist" label?

Tbh, I don't agree with a lot of the stuff I read from people that call themselves feminists. When it descends into 'it's not all men but it's most of them" etc it usually turns me away tbh. I see a lot of stuff I feel you'd never see said about any demographic. Like, the view that innocent men need to stand up against the bad men if they don't want to be tarred with the same brush. People never say that about innocent members of demographics overly represented in terrorism attacks or overrepresented in crime stats etc. I mostly believe in individual accountability over group culpabiiity.

I also think some feminists are too myopic and only focus on sex. They'll dismiss male victims of violence by saying "oh, but what sex was the attacker?" This doesn't sit right with me because a victim of a racist or homophobic attack isn't any less a victim because his attacker was male. Sometimes there are factors more dividing than sex. It isn't women's fault of course but it doesn't negate the impact or victimhood.

I don't really see most men as being particularly privileged. Certainly the working class guys I work with lead much less privileged lives than most of women in my majority female team of middle class women when I had a corporate job. I feel that it's a small number of elite men holding most of the wealth and everybody else below them. I also don't understand the fixation with male CEOs. I don't know many CEOs full stop.

I also see a lot of disingenuous claims. Like the claim that 'most men would rape if they could get away with it'. I read the study and it was something like 50 high school students from one college who were apparently given course credits for participating (so likely had a vested interest and may have given silly answers). But either way a tiny sample size of men from one country of a narrow age group can't be used to make broad claims about men in general.

Then I read a discussion about the world's biggest metastudy of DV which found that despite men causing more death/serious injury, women actually commit more domestic abuse. It was conducted by over 100 academics from 20 universities in US/UK/Canada alongside DV associations and they read over 10,000 studies and closely analysed the data from 1200 peer reviewed studies. It was called the 'Partner Abuse State of Knowledge' project.

Some of the same posters who'd referenced that study of 50 college students were loudly proclaiming that the data was 'dodgy' etc but it just seemed disingenuous given the study they'd been using in the other thread. That's just one example. And if you question it you'll usually called a man or a pick me/dick panderer/handmaiden etc. Honestly, I'll usually steer clear of posters who use those phrases as it tells you exactly what type of person they are.

And I'd probs never have chosen to work in the construction sector had I read half the stuff I've since read on here, but I love it. I agree with a lot of feminism but some of it seems determined to make women afraid of their own shadow. Some women get really narky if you say you're not afraid of men (although of course I exercise common sense in terms of safety). I would ultimately rather work alongside the good men than spend all my energy focusing on the bad ones. But granted I'm lucky enough to not live somewhere where women are particularly oppressed.

I have lots of things I could say about male culture too but that wasn't the question. Could say I lot more but need to be up in six hours.

I look forward to reading your reply later, but thank you for your in the mean time thoughts.

I have a lot I could say in return to this post, but for sake of speed at this time of day/night (don't know where you are), it basically boils down to one question.

"I would ultimately rather work alongside the good men than spend all my energy focusing on the bad ones."

You say this about men, but why don't you apply that principle of thought to feminists?

Like if you hear/read a feminist say something you think is extreme or whatever, why would that "turns you away" from women's rights? Or even the label of feminism?
Edited to add here there are various schools of thought on feminism and different types of feminist under the whole wide umbrella of feminist belief, you know like lib fem, rad fem, 2nd wave feminism etc.

Like for me, there are a lot of people that include trans identifying males in their flavour of choice in feminism, I disagree entirely with their stance that men can be women and should be included in female spaces yada yada. I am not "turned away" from feminism just because someone holds an opinion I disagree with also calls themselves a feminist.

You will forgive me for this slightly tongue in cheek comment I hope, but it seems that you and trans identified men have something in common here. Other people's external opinions are given far too much importance, and apparently can shape your internal sense of self 😆

More seriously though, you have essentially said this yourself. In terms of this discussion about self-id and majority vote, you say you might be swayed into supporting it even if you disagreed with it, even if you personally think it's harmful, because a majority voted for it. Now you also say that you don't want to be labelled a "feminist" because you've heard/read some things you disagreed with which were said by some feminists.

I don't really understand this personally. I like to think that I'm a pretty open minded person on the whole, so I'm always open to reasonable, good faith discussion. I am capable of changing my mind on things when presented with compelling evidence which goes against my prior held beliefs. I am open to thinking I could be wrong on a subject if given reason to do so. No matter what though, I still know who I am.

You can't convince me that 2+2 = 5 no matter how many times you berate me - hypothetically speaking, of course, with the royal and generalised "you".

It sounds to me like you can be swayed by what other people think, even if you know it's wrong? I don't understand that, personally.

Edit bolded and underlined end of 5th para.

I also notice that you've given a different reason you/other people find feminists actions/behaviour objectional in your most recent post, compared to when you were saying earlier - that it was because of feminist's dogged insistence on evidence and stats etc.

That wasn't really a serious comment about feminists in general so much as about how people act on forums, which isn't exclusive to here. Sometimes when people are extremely invested in a cause it can be a bit exhausting discussing it with them because they're so focused on pushing their point it almost becomes a duel rather than a discussion.

You will forgive me for this slightly tongue in cheek comment I hope, but it seems that you and trans identified men have something in common here. Other people's external opinions are given far too much importance, and apparently can shape your internal sense of self 😆

I'm not sure I entirely agree! I think the problem with a lot of transwomen is that they don't actually seem to recognise (or don't want to) that most people don't actually think they're women. It's almost as if many have zero self awareness.

I actually live literally next door to a transwoman - I'm really not making this up. I think he's the only one I've ever actually spoken to. He's nice enough but I thought he was just a crossdresser for about two years as he looks a bit like Mystic Meg when he goes out in his wig and heels etc. It's a pretty exaggerated persona for want of a better description. But he's apparently been using a female name for about 15 years and the elderly lady on the other side who's known him for years says that he claims to have always known he was a woman.

The thing is, he works in the same industry as me and he just looks like a rough, grizzled old bloke when he gets back from work with all his tools. He's gotta be about 60yo.

Ok, I'm completely waffling now and I've probs just created 20 screenshots for the transgender subreddit to froth over so I'm going to go back to bed.

Well I think this just comes down to a difference of opinion really. I think this is all totally normal discussion.

You gave your personal opinion on how popular you thought self id policies with women in other countries are, and then you found it "a bit exhausting" and "pushing a point" that posters wanted to discuss how your personally held opinion differed from the reality.

They did this by giving links to polls, and discussing how self id is introduced to the general public in such a way that a lot of people don't realise it means men in rape crisis centres, female prisons, and a loss of female rights.

You are free to hold whatever personal opinions you'd like, people are free to disagree and even post links to show why. Obviously the same holds true in reverse. Aka discussion.

I get it.

However, as to aims’s point, if you do make a claim that is not accurate, people are going to respond because inaccurate claims should not be left to stand unchallenged on a public forum. It is actually irrelevant what your intention was in posting the claims. It is important on any thread of FWR to ensure that generalisation claims being made are as accurately represented as possible because people are reading along or will find the claim through search and it needs to be challenged if it is not accurate or has been misrepresented.

@CohensDiamondTeeth

"To me it seems like you're saying there is a general feeling of objection towards assertive women who know their rights and have evidence to back up what they are saying, who will correct mis/dis-information when encountered, and who refuse to sit down silently in a corner smiling benignly while direct harms are done to children and female people's rights".

Agree

@Malificent

It seems like that to me. You came in with assumptions, and there's been a lot of DARVO here. YOU are the one who got defensive. YOU are the one who said you didn't want to get bogged down with statistics, then introduced statistics, then accused US of derailing. If this is all a philioposphical wondering for you on a Saturday night - that's nice for you. For us it's really important and has had real-life impacts on us in our private lives and our work.

Not worth it for me to discuss with you, anymore. I'm out Hopefully lurkers got something out of it.

*philosophical wondering!

@Malificent

Oh, and you asked 'what we would do' if the majority of people disagreed with us, or at least pretended they did * I don't have to imagine. I left my much loved job because of it - because I don't go along with things that I believe are deeply harmful to children, no matter what others say.

I think I will be proved right, but even if there is never any public declaration, I know I was not complicit.

• or, most apposite, were too scared to speak up.

Edited for detail

The reality of male violence

In reality, would women be wiser to consider the risk of male violence to be greater from your child or from a transwoman?

Well, obviously from a fully grown man. But I wasn't talking about the trans issue. More about the way that a lot of feminists act like they're the principle victims of male violence when in fact men are something like 4-5x more likely to be assaulted by a stranger. I remember a study done by the Australian Institute of Criminology and it found that men were 11.5x more likely to be murdered by a stranger. Usually it's something like 70-80% of homicide victims.

The usual response seems to be "oh, but who is doing the killing" but I don't really see it as the gotcha many seem to believe it is. It only works when you make sweeping generalisations and lump all men together. In reality, a Jewish guy worried about anti semitic violence doesn't have any influence over the type of men that are a risk to him. Same with homophobic or racist violence. I think I'd be equally worried about a son as I would a daughter.

Stating this will often result in you being called an MRA and to me it often veers a bit close to the way TRAs call people 'transphobic' for pointing out facts like humans can't change sex etc.

This wasn't really what I was planning on discussing but it's nevertheless how I feel. I don't think men have it particularly easy. They do the vast majority of shit jobs nobody else wants to do and we only focus on the CEOs etc. I say this as somebody who's driven dustcarts for three years and never seen a single female binman and who works up to 15 hours a day in heavy plant surrounded entirely by men. I'd wager there's more female execs than female refuse collectors.

@Maleficent

That post from @BackToLurk wasn't for you. It was addressed to @TransParentlyAnnoyed - who has a child who is a female who identifies as a man.

Back to Lurk is making the point that males (however they identify) are more a risk to everyone than women are, however they identify.

Oh, well I can't really argue with that. I'm just glad that I'm a women sometimes when I see how men treat each other.

I notice you are talking about (actually introduced) something that you didn't want to talk about, again. I've got sons, I worry about them, but that's not what this thread is about and you've deflected again.

Edited for clarity

It’s pretty obvious that men are going to kill more men than they do women, for many reasons. That’s all part of male violence.

And women do plenty of ‘shit jobs’. Lots of them unpaid.

But if you feel that strongly. Start a thread about it.

I’d assumed they’d forgot to switch profiles. I’m such a cynic.

I mentioned it in relation to one of my last posts about the elements of feminism I often don't agree with. There's plenty I do agree with, however, the trans issue being one of the biggest ones. But libfems seem to be amongst the biggest proponents of trans rights so what the above poster said about the diversity of feminism is probs how I'd see it.

I find myself rolling my eyes when celebs get on their soapboxes and make claims like "if you're not a feminist you're part of the problem". There's quite possibly more feminists supporting men that want to barge into women's spaces than there are opposing it.

95% of workplace deaths is pretty wild though. I probs think about it more than most because I work in the sector where most of these incidents happen and am in a pretty high risk job myself.

I’d assumed they’d forgot to switch profiles. I’m such a cynic.

I only have one other username and it's not that. But again it's what I said above about how anybody that doesn't agree with the feminist consensus is often branded a troll or a man. As if a woman could never have a different opinion.

Interesting how this discussion has shifted to discussing male attitudes. Which underlines a key point.

Even if you can get a lot of women to think men in dresses are women, and amongst young women many do, the whole TA project runs into problems if they can't get most men to agree. I agree with the poster that men are obviously human just like women, they are a mix of good and bad. They are more physically dangerous but they don't always use that power.

Look what is happening with women's basketball - two huge guys are saying they are women now - inspired by Sophie Cunningham - a big chunk of the TA narrative starts imploding.

Decent men have always been sceptical of extreme TA claims. They can't articulate the details well often. They just instinctively know what creepy men might get up to. However the wall of silence which stopped women speaking up also affected them. We have to be honest that a HUGE part of that refusal to talk about the issues is a result of female social pressure.

Look at Parliament and organisations most of the crazy TAs are women.

Most women here have men in their lives who they love.

But feminism is about women and girls. To ask why women doing feminism arent thinking about men's needs is missing the point.

Somehow, it's even worse than that. We're being lambasted with 'but what about the men?!' while being told to ignore the women affected by the real life consequences of self id.

OK, but if a white person complained about experiencing racism they'd probs get a pretty short shrift even if they said they were only advocating for their own demographic. I know it's probs not a like for like comparison but you get my point.

I'm not saying we should advocate for men. I just can't always get behind white middle class women with degrees and good jobs playing the victim (which is a lot of the feminists I've encountered).

I'm actually not trying to offend people on here, although I'm probs doing a good job. 🤣