# J K Rowling and the trans furore
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [June 16, 2020, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795 "2020-06-16T18:05:08Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 44
### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/863 "2020-07-01T18:39:26Z")
No, they really shouldn’t. Because they have power.
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### Author:  [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/864 "2020-07-01T18:42:01Z")
How about what **monstro** suggested - “cis women and others who menstruate”?
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### Author:  [@raspberry\_hunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raspberry_hunter)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/865 "2020-07-01T18:55:38Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#):
>
> He will get a pass by society if he doesn’t learn. She won’t. Which is why it concerns you with her.
YES. This is exactly it, thank you for articulating this for me.
It’s such a fine line – I want her to learn all the little social skills society expects women (but not necessarily men!) to know, but I also do want her to be able to speak up. Speaking up by itself isn’t so much of a problem for her, I think, but she also doesn’t know how to make herself be heard. Usually this isn’t a problem in a school context, as she’s had good teachers who facilitated her being heard, but she was in a robotics club last year where all the boys seem to have talked all over her despite the fact that she often had better ideas than they did. (I didn’t learn about this until afterwards – when we saw the team robots run (poorly) and I asked her why they hadn’t used some of her good ideas.)
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### Author:  [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/866 "2020-07-01T18:59:45Z")
> [@Miller](#):
>
> There’s really a double standard at play with Rowling’s defenders. Rowling insists that she should be allowed to disagree with “trans ideology” without being mocked and insulted. Fine, but if you’re going to insist on that standard, you need to extend it as well. The headline that used the phrase “people who menstruate” didn’t have anything to with access to women’s spaces, or representation in politics or media, or prison housing, or any of the red herrings that have been raised in this thread. What Rowlings was objecting to wasn’t the implementation of any particular trans-friendly policy, but to the public recognition of the existence of trans people at all.
I didn’t see it as much of a double standard, but just as such wanton and gleeful cruelty. Why erase trans men? How does that help cis women? I get objecting to “people who menstruate” as being about body parts, but there are so many ways to address that that don’t deliberately and purposefully erase trans men. And based on the trans men I’ve read and heard from, this is just the kind of cruelty they face routinely for no apparent reason aside from hatred.
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### Author:  [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/867 "2020-07-01T19:01:20Z")
> [@YWTF](#):
>
> That’s how you interpret it, but I promise that is not how it being taken by everyone.
>
> When a trans women is allowed to compete for opportunities set aside for females (like the kind of contracts @Dangerous mentioned) then we’re essentially saying these two populations are sufficiently alike that it doesn’t matter if either group gets the opportunity. When we race a 15 year old girl against a 15 year old trans girl, in a political sense we’re saying it doesn’t matter which wins or loses because they are both “the same”. But in truth, they aren’t the same. The girl is likely fighting against sexism and gender norms that stigmatize her for being an athletic tomboy and the trans girl has the benefit of male socialization which prizes athleticism. It’s actually a cruel joke to have them competing with one another.
I think that’s totally reasonable to be concerned about, and I don’t have a problem with challenging this. This is not what I had a problem with with JKR’s writing. It’s the seemingly purposeful cruelty, erasure, and hateful language that I have a problem with.
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### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/868 "2020-07-01T19:03:26Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> Meanwhile, I am getting pretty tired of self-described “gender critical” perspectives trying to explain what they “expect” women like me to think about transgender issues owing to our shared experience of sexist discrimination, while disregarding or devaluing what I actually DO think. I don’t claim to be able to speak for “women” as a group on this issue, and I’m not buying any such claims from the “gender critics” either. I don’t think my opinions are automatically any more valid as some kind of archetypal “woman’s viewpoint” than JK Rowling’s, and likewise I sure as hell don’t think that hers are automatically any more valid than mine.
I’m tired of progressives telling me that I’m not really down for trans rights unless I endorse everything being pushed by gender activitists, even when it is self-contradictory.
“Gender isn’t a big deal! But if you feel uncomfortable with a person with a penis using a women’s restroom, you’re practically murdering them! And setting up a third space for them is akin to racial segregation!”
“Gender isn’t a big deal! However, if someone tells you they belong to your gender class, you should never ever share your opinion about that! You simply aren’t allowed to take each person’s narrative on a case-by-case basis and decide for yourself how to classify them, for your own personal purposes! You must treat all narratives equally! You aren’t allowed to question–even privately–anyone’s motivations for claiming an identity! Because gender is somehow not a big deal while simultaneously being super sacred. People will literally die if you don’t perceive them the way they perceive themselves! Why do you want people to die?”
“Gender isn’t a big deal! And neither is biology! Neither is socialization! Neither is history nor politics! Gender is whatever you want it to be, totally independent of these things! But don’t you dare dismiss the importance of the trans experience! That experience is super important! It involves a bunch of biology and socialization and history and politics!”
The rhetoric steps on its own feet. I’m getting tired of people telling me that pointing it out is offensive and harmful.
I’m not posting in this thread because I’ve got a long sordid history with misogyny and sexism. I’m posting because I hate irrationality and logical inconsistences. I hate reflexive denials of reality and lived experience. I hate that for a discourse centered around feelings, only some feelings are treated as valid and worth considering.
I get that you don’t agree with the older feminists like JK Rowling. You don’t have their feelings. Big whoop. But that doesn’t mean that other women are wrong for feeling those feelings or talking about those feelings.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/869 "2020-07-01T19:09:38Z")
If it helps, the line is less fine than you think it is and she will find her place. And gender expectations are changing fast - as are the expectations that everyone behaves in a neurotypical fashion. But, having been there, I get it…I really do.
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### Author:  [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/870 "2020-07-01T19:21:00Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> And that doesn’t mean, necessarily, treat them EXACTLY THE SAME IN EVERY SITUATION (i.e. athletics, shelters/safe spaces for cis women, etc.), but in 99% of daily life, there is no trade-off or threat to consider in treating them as they ask to be treated.
The ACLU fought to keep allowing transgender girls to compete in girls sporting events without taking any kind of hormone therapy or treatment.
Stonewall in the UK is fighting to remove the legal clause that allows shelters and safe spaces for cis women to exclude trans women.
Do you support what they are doing? These are mainstream groups with considerable funding and power, way more than the underfunded rape crisis centres and traumatised women who will be affected by a change in the law.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/871 "2020-07-01T19:25:58Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#):
>
> I wonder who is in the position to call this out. Ciswomen can’t - they risk being called a TERF. It has to be other trans folk. And I’m not sure how many transwomen are going to notice it.
Speaking as a habitually loud, bossy and conversation-hogging cisgender woman, I have no problem with either being called out on my own conventionally “masculine” entitled behaviors when they slop over into disrespecting others, or with (politely) calling out such behaviors in somebody else, whether male, female, cis or trans. And I’ve never been called a TERF for it.
I’m noticing what STM to be a somewhat contradictory stance on the issue of gender-essentialist stereotyping on the “gender critical” side of these discussions (not necessarily fully manifested in this thread per se, but in some similar arguments). Namely, many “gender critical” advocates object, and I think quite rightly, to the use of transgender identity to impose or reinforce gender stereotypes. Yes, it is wrong to assume that a non-“girly” girl must be “really” a boy, or vice versa: people should be able to present as gender-nonconforming without having it assumed that they must be transgender. Trans-rights advocates wouldn’t be doing anybody any favors in the long run if they simply insisted that everybody who’s in any way gender-nonconforming needs to go transition posthaste so they can be gender-typical men or women “properly”.
But at the same time there seems to be this strong insistence on the “gender critical” side of the debate that male biology or male socialization is just going to make you ultimately hopeless at womaning, or vice versa. Or that it’s perfectly fine for, say, a cisgender woman to be super gender-nonconforming and “look like a man” if she wants to, but it’s appalling and intolerable and totally disqualifying for a transgender woman to “look like a man”.
Why the big gender-essentializing fuss about this? I don’t in any way deny, as I’ve been saying all along, that transgender people and cisgender people have significant differences in biology and socialized experience, which are not automatically erased or nullified just by opening up the social categories “man” and “woman” to include both cisgender and transgender people. But why should the rules about gender conformity be considered so much stricter for transgender people?
For instance, I’ve met cisgender lesbians with short hair and big muscles and even the occasional mustache who were often assumed by strangers to be men, and I have no problem whatsoever with their gender-nonconformity and would never dream of asserting that they ought not to be considered “real women”. But if I meet a masculine-presenting transgender woman who looks indistinguishable from one of those “butch” lesbians, what basis do I have for complaining that she’s not being “womanly” enough in her presentation?
If “looking like a man” is something that it’s okay for a woman to do, or vice versa—which I wholeheartedly agree that it is—then why is it not okay for someone who identifies as a transgender woman? If I can’t tell the difference between a “masculine-looking” cisgender woman and a “masculine-looking” transgender woman without investigating their chromosomes or their genitals, neither of which I have any right to do in any routine social situation, then what’s the point of my declaring that I accept the former as a “legitimate” woman but not the latter?
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### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/872 "2020-07-01T19:32:01Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#):
>
> And gender expectations are changing fast - as are the expectations that everyone behaves in a neurotypical fashion. But, having been there, I get it…I really do.
I fit in the “neuroatypical” category so I totally get why girls like me seek to escape their pain by going with male or non-woman identity. It seems like when I’m in a room full of women, I am always the lone freak. I’m physically awkward. My speech is disjointed and cluttered. I stutter. I twitch. I have poor eye contact. I lack the cardinal interpersonal experiences that most women seem to have. Other women always seem so proficient with verbal communication and super “put together”. Men can be these things as as well, of course, and often are. But it seems like there are more male “weirdos” than female weirdos. I can understand the temptation to think, if you are a female weirdo, “Hey, maybe I’d feel more comfortable as a guy. Maybe guys are supposed to be my people.”
I honestly think the only reason why I haven’t rejected my womanness is because I was born in the 70s instead of the 90s It took me a while, but I finally got used to my “woman” identity and realized that we contain more diversity than meets the eye. I think if I had been exposed to the nonbinary concept as a 20-something, I probably would have latched onto it _before_ making this realization.
I think a lot of quirky nonbinary women will come to terms with their quirkiness and their biological sex and realize they aren’t opposed to each other. Is it a big deal if that doesn’t happen? No. But I see no reason to think that everyone who sits on the nonbinary bus will stay there forever.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/873 "2020-07-01T19:33:19Z")
> [@monstro](#):
>
> I get that you don’t agree with the older feminists like JK Rowling. You don’t have their feelings. Big whoop. But that doesn’t mean that other women are wrong for feeling those feelings or talking about those feelings.
Like I said, I’m not claiming that I have any more right to speak for “women” as a group than someone like JK Rowling does. You’re the one who was implying that she somehow has a greater right to speak for “women” as a group than I do:
> [@monstro](#):
>
> I would expect a woman that has spent her whole life experiencing sexism to not be eager to hop on the slogan which implies her mental state is what causes her to be stigmatized and othered.
You’re making it clear right there that you “expect a woman that has spent her whole life experiencing sexism” to consider Rowling’s opinon more sensible or valid than mine. Well, I likewise am “a woman that has spent her whole life experiencing sexism”, just as Rowling is, but I disagree with her on this.
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### Author:  [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/874 "2020-07-01T19:40:23Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> Speaking as a habitually loud, bossy and conversation-hogging cisgender woman, I have no problem with either being called out on my own conventionally “masculine” entitled behaviors when they slop over into disrespecting others, or with (politely) calling out such behaviors in somebody else, whether male, female, cis or trans. And I’ve never been called a TERF for it.
Lucky you. I have a whole set of friends of friends on Facebook who do exactly the behavior I’m describing, right down to the accusation of being a TERF. Perhaps your experience is not universal?
In my (granted limited) experience, once a transwoman has spent some time as a woman, she tends to get resocialized as a woman, and the behaviors of male entitlement tend to go down. That has been the case with my friends in their 50s . And its been my experience with Dopers as well - although this is a strange format for gender anyway. But it takes a while - and the 20-ish year old college students that I’ve observed haven’t gotten close yet (neither of them has physically transitioned - one isn’t even out beyond her roommates and a few others.) It isn’t binary - not all transwomen do X. But enough transwomen do X that it creates an issue for some cis-women who are continually on the defensive against X.
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### Author:  [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/875 "2020-07-01T19:44:33Z")
> [@YWTF](#):
>
> Insistence that women stop referring to themselves as women (as opposed to “cis women”) when talking about female reproductive issues is largely coming from males.
I don’t think that’s true. As @Dangerosa said, a lot of younger women are transitioning to escape misogyny. They do not want to be reminded that there is anything female about them, hence the insistence on this ‘inclusive’ language. It is not true of transwomen, most are not ashamed of their male parts and that’s why terminology describing men has largely been left alone.
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### Author:  [@YWTF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YWTF)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/876 "2020-07-01T19:45:26Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> How about what **monstro** suggested - “cis women and others who menstruate”?
This wouldn’t bug me, but a lot of women object to the “cis” prefix because it implies we have a gender identity _and_ biological sex. I don’t believe I have a gender identity. All I know that I have is a female reproductive system. So what does that make me?
Do you think it’s wrong that women just want to be called women?
Here’s another question: are there enough similarities between women and transwomen to create a linguistic need for a word that refers to both groups? If so, what are those similarities?
Answering these questions requires a workable definition for “woman” that includes both groups. I don’t believe there are enough similarities between women and trans women to justify calling both women. As individual groups, adult human females have stuff in common (their reproductive system) and trans women have stuff common (their reproductive system and gender identity). But I’m not seeing what commonalities unite the two groups such that communication is well served by lumping them under “woman” together.
When you think about it, there are only a few subjects where it makes sense to specify a certain sex/gender. One of those subjects is reproductive health. If it’s wrong to say “woman” (without qualifying it) when talking about _wombs_ of all things, just when should we be using it?
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### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/877 "2020-07-01T19:56:31Z")
> [@YWTF](#):
>
> This wouldn’t bug me, but a lot of women object to the “cis” prefix because it implies we have a gender identity _and_ biological sex. I don’t believe I have a gender identity. All I know that I have is a female reproductive system. So what does that make me?
It seems like hurt feelings are unavoidable
“Girls and women who menstruate” = you’re excluding transmen
“Girls, ciswomen, and others who menstruate” = “ciswoman” is a gender and we’re talking about a biological function
“Females who menstruate” =\> some transmen don’t consider their bodies “female” (even though if they are menstruating, it sure seems like their female parts would have to be there)
But it seems to me that if “women” is off the table, “females” would be the next best thing followed by “Girls, ciswomen, and others.” I really don’t like either, but I do find them less cringey than “menstruators”.
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### Author:  [@YWTF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YWTF)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/878 "2020-07-01T19:59:50Z")
> [@DemonTree](#):
>
> I don’t think that’s true. As @Dangerosa said, a lot of younger women are transitioning to escape misogyny. They do not want to be reminded that there is anything female about them, hence the insistence on this ‘inclusive’ language. It is not true of transwomen, most are not ashamed of their male parts and that’s why terminology describing men has largely been left alone.
I know that there are trans men that object to being lumped with women.
But that doesn’t mean they are leading the hate JKR train. When Daniel Radcliffe spoke out against JKR right after her menstruator tweet, the first thing out of his mouth was “transwomen are women”. Everyone should have considered this a gigantic non sequitur, but few people did because they were thinking the same thing he was. That this had something to do with the word “woman” in reference to trans women, not trans men.
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### Author:  [@YWTF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YWTF)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/879 "2020-07-01T20:03:50Z")
> [@monstro](#):
>
> But it seems to me that if “women” is off the table, “females” would be the next best thing followed by “Girls, ciswomen, and others.” I really don’t like either, but I do find them less cringey than “menstruators”.
There are too many trans women that believe they are female for this to work.
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### Author:  [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/880 "2020-07-01T20:07:21Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> > [@monstro](#):
> >
> > You seem to be implying that _everyone_ believes that the “have made a serious and long-term effort to live their lives as women” stipulation is an important criterion for “woman”.
>
> I think what I said goes for the vast majority of trans activists (and the cis women feminists whose writing I’ve found convincing on this).
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > > > **We are calling for the removal of a requirement for lived experience.** The current criteria relies on outdated gender stereotypes and pushes trans people into absurd situations where their documents and clothes are deemed more important than their actual lives.
> >
> > > > There should be no medical requirements, **nor an evidential requirement of lived experience** , for gender recognition. The current GRA depends on a diagnosis of Gender Dysphoria and the provision of evidence that the person has been living “in role” for at least two years. These requirements are degrading and unnecessary barriers.
>
> All of those explicitly say or imply “serious” (or a synonym), and some explicitly say or imply “long-term” (or a synonym). The preference for no “lived experience” stuff would seem to conflict with “long-term”, but not if they’re talking about “lived experience” _post transition_ .
Are you joking? The last two explicitly say there should be NO requirement for lived experience to legally change gender. So no, the trans activists don’t think having lived as a woman is an important criteria for being one. You would be able to turn up tomorrow, sign a piece of paper, and you would now be eligible for those business programs aimed at women that Dangerosa mentioned. You could apply for scholarships for women if you wanted to study. Your company’s diversity would magically be increased. You could use the women’s restroom in those states that restrict it by birth certificate, because that is what this law allows you to change. You really see no problems with this?
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### Author:  [@YWTF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YWTF)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/881 "2020-07-01T20:09:06Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> You’re making it clear right there that you “expect a woman that has spent her whole life experiencing sexism” to consider Rowling’s opinon more sensible or valid than mine. Well, I likewise am “a woman that has spent her whole life experiencing sexism”, just as Rowling is, but I disagree with her on this.
There is disagreeing and then there’s accusing someone of lying and being ignorant, stupid, and hateful.
The latter is what has happened to JKR.
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### Author:  [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)
#### Post date: [July 1, 2020, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/j-k-rowling-and-the-trans-furore/855795/882 "2020-07-01T20:12:59Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#):
>
> And based on the trans men I’ve read and heard from, this is just the kind of cruelty they face routinely for no apparent reason aside from hatred.
You don’t really think that when people use the term “women” to describe people who menstruate, they do that out of hatred, do you?
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