I hope you will be proud of me..

[namechange62]

I'm not very educated, married to a good man, live a quiet life in a small village in the south west, have good relationships with males in my family who are good men. (Grand/Father, uncles, sons, son in law) and have strong women in my life (mother, daughter daughter's in law, nieces etc).
Just setting the scene really..

Well it all kicked off this afternoon at my house. (When I say kicked off I mean a quick argument lasting about half an hour! Not EastEnders worthy..)

I have to say I had a few. Not many because I don't really drink but ..

Somehow it was bought up about Gen Z being offended about something that my kids/and partners grew up with (ages 29-36…). A sketch in Little Britain. Somehow the conversation turned to trans stuff and eventually turned to transwomen.

Anyway I bought up the case of transwomen playing in the (WNBA? ) basketball and how some men are pretending to be women to join. Showing solidarity with the woman having to play with 6ft 10in transwomen? I've probably got details wrong but hopefully you can understand?

Well it got heated.
SIL Sort of agreed but said it's rare. I said even one transwomen taking a female space is one too many. I talked about transwomen in female toilets. How do we know who the 'safe' ones are. It got on to male violence v female violence.

My Dil who works with victims of DV agreed and was quoting statistics about calls to DV helplines rising during the world cup.

My son got very heated and did the usual whataboutery. But what about women who do the same?! Trans men in male sports? Transmen who use mens toilets/changing rooms.

I said it's very rare but he continued to get riled when I started spouting some stuff I'd read on MN.
Mediocre men who fail in mens teams taking places from women, men invading women's spaces for fetish reasons. I said do you ever enter the toilets thinking whether you are safe? (Surprise that he didn't even know what I meant? And surprised when I told him I did!). His GF then agreed with me. I said you have no skin in this game (males taking female places in sport, jobs and prizes) and never will!
He got heated and continued with the whataboutery but I held my ground.

Told him about the transwomen who invade female changing rooms (I encountered one myself) and how would he feel if his grandma had to deal with a semi naked man who was getting kicks by humiliatingly women.

SiL got it and eventually DS got it too. These are normal hardworking men.
Anyway we left it at that but both of them said they didn't know half of what I'd said.

I read a lot on this thread on MN and want to say thank you for educating me. I can't help many people to understand but I think I got 2 men today to think a bit more about it.

@namechange62 I don’t use the word ‘transwoman’ anymore as the word "woman" refers specifically to an adult female human and does not apply to men. I use trans-identified male.

I learnt this from some of the women on here.

@akkakk Brilliant!! Thank you!

Yes. I've seen TIM used and wondered if it universally recognised?

I don’t think it is. ‘Transwoman’ or ‘transgender woman” are the universally recognised terms.

Hopefully someone more experienced will let us know.

I think TIM and TIF work well on here. IRL I use 'men who say they are women' and 'women who say they are men', to avoid any ambiguity.

Except that lots of people not up on this topic don’t understand them and think that TW means a woman who identifies as a man.

It can be so confusing! Some people think using the word ‘trans’ before woman means they were born female and have ‘transitioned’ to male.

The word woman should NEVER be used in the context of men!!

💯

Just use 'men'.

DH has never yet got his head around it, he needs an explanation every time.

I usually use "men who identify as women" which seems clear.

Then this brings up, What does ‘identify’ mean?

The truth is so simple!

Pretend to be based on cartoonish steroeotypes

Just this...

increasingly I use quotes if referring to 'trans women'
but refer directly to men pretending to be women as I feel that clarifies the situation the best...

says what it does on the tin...

The word ‘pretending’ is accurate, whereas ‘identified’ is not.

My post above should say ‘identify’ not ‘identified’!

I have. Probably about half a dozen times now. TPA getting more and more A the pesky women on here won't fall into line?

Are TPA and Northernlightsss one and the same?

Well, I think it would depend who I am talking to. I wouldn't say about DD's trans friend "so, R is a girl pretending to be a boy" because it sounds insensitive. I wouldn't say "men who pretend to be women" if talking about trans issues at work, because some people would find that offensive and possibly complain about me.

To me, "identify as" is descriptive, as that is what they consider themselves to be, it doesn't mean I agree. I don't particularly like the "identity" terminology but I think it is clear and as neutral as I can make it. I appreciate others disagree though!

You might not say it, but do you think it, it reads yes to me.

And I can see why you wouldn't directly to their face.

I would probably think it, yes.

Fair enough. I wouldn't say it to their face either, to save my child's feelings, but I'd certainly have my guard up. And if they mentioned using the wrong sex spaces, that's a different scenario. I'd struggle not to then.

https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2023/08/07/clarity-matters-how-placating-lobbyists-obscures-public-understanding-of-sex-and-gender/

'We did not expect to find quite how poorly understood these terms are.
Both terms were correctly understood by fewer than two-thirds of those asked. The remaining responses split roughly evenly between those who misunderstood, and those who were not sure.'

Yes, just look at the census stats for Brent. Highly unlikely if they'd understood the question, for which I don't blame them.

By doing this, you are prioritising and protecting men’s feelings.