J K Rowling and the trans furore

In My Humble Opinion
2644

It’s because these are fundamentally different issues. Allowing Y chromosome athletes to compete with non-Y means the demise of the entire concept of “women’s” athletics. No person who was born with XX chromosomes will win an important athletic event, ever.

If you let someone with a Y chromosome use the Ladies’ Room, those with XX chromosomes will still be able to use the room. I simply do not accept that this allowance puts women at additional risk of assault. That is your assumption, one made with no statistical evidence to back it up. However, I’m a scientist at heart, and if such evidence did exist, actual fact confirming that letting transwomen use the Ladies’ Room increases the number of assaults on women, I’d adjust my thinking.

2645

I can supply some evidence but we need to first agree on something.

A policy that permits transwomen to use women’s spaces mean effectively turning these spaces in a mixed-sex (aka unisex) space. Do you agree?

2646

I agree with you for people who are sincerely trans, but there are creeps who will hang out in restrooms and locker rooms just for the thrill. Even if they don’t physically assault someone, they may act in ways which are inappropriate yet not overtly actionable. If a creep wants to spend the afternoon watching women go into the stalls and listening to them pee, there wouldn’t be much that could be done. Here’s a creep who hid in the only place in an outhouse you can hide so he could watch women going to the bathroom:

If creeps like that could just say “I’m a woman” and then could hang out in women’s bathrooms and locker rooms, how would they be stopped?

2647

Would you like to put some money on it?

I’m being serious. Would you like to take a bet that I can find many more stories about Y-chromosome havers assaulting females in public restrooms than XX-havers?

2648

I think it’s particularly the case in film because of the very high barriers to entry. If it was something like the number of women studying biology vs physics then it’s more likely to be due to personal preference.

2649

I just read that outhouse story that @filmore linked to. While it doesn’t exactly surprise me there are men depraved enough to hunker down in a literal shithole just to see some vulva, stories like this will never cease to amaze me.

2650

Thank you. What first alarmed me about the movement was that they did not seem to be listening to people with reasonable concerns and were dismissing them all as prejudiced/transphobes rather than recognising these issues as real and looking for compromises.

In terms of risk to ciswomen, I think prisons are the biggest issue, followed by women’s shelters and similar, then locker rooms, and bathrooms are not a huge concern to me. My main reservation wrt the latter is that in the UK we have seen a push towards unisex bathrooms, which have their own problems.

Then there is how best to treat kids and adolescents who present with gender dysphoria, which is another issue that’s linked to the activism.

2651

I imagine film-making is just like other business. Who you know is even more important than what you know. If you don’t know the right people, you’re only going to get so far.

This works against minorities of all kinds.

2652

Why would I take a bet that doesn’t have jack-all to do with what I claimed? Let’s review for the reading comprehension impaired:
I simply do not accept that this allowance puts women at additional risk of assault. That is your assumption, one made with no statistical evidence to back it up. However, I’m a scientist at heart, and if such evidence did exist, actual fact confirming that letting transwomen use the Ladies’ Room increases the number of assaults on women, I’d adjust my thinking.

So, what I said was that I didn’t believe there is any evidence that allowing transwomen to use the LR increases assaults on women.

I’m very specific about this because the issue is about allowing transwomen to use the LR. It is NOT about whether or not people with Y chromosomes commit more assaults than people with XX chromosomes.

So, if women are NOT at greater risk of assault, then what’s the problem?

2653

Yeah. I should think it’s even more the case in film-making than in most businesses. There’s few opportunities and they are high risk, so they want someone they know and trust, and they don’t want to take a risk by doing anything differently.

Getting a book published should be a bit easier, since a lot more books are published than films and the risk is lower if it’s a flop. Plus the editor can see the product before endorsing it which makes the process a bit more objective. Even so we often see a rash of similar books published at the same time, which suggests they like to play it safe by jumping on a bandwagon, rather than take a chance on something different.

(Or is that down to us as consumers? If we see a good superhero movie, does that make us more interested in watching another superhero movie, rather than say a scifi or western?)

2654

You claimed this:

You didn’t stipulate transwomen; you just said “someone with a Y chromosome”.

So if you meant allowances for only transwomen will not elevate women’s risk, ok. But this takes us right back to the question that @filmore just asked. How do you ensure all Y chromosome-havers wanting to use the ladies room are truly trans? The honor system? Are you saying society must take it on faith that potentially predatory men are being accurate and honest about their gender identity when granting them access to spaces used by vulnerable women?

The onus shouldn’t be on the affected parties to prove that policy changes will increase their risk. The onus really should be on those arguing for the change. But anyway, here’s an article worth reading:

Given this evidence, why should women and girls support moving away from single-sex accommodations? You say you don’t believe our risk will increase, but where is your evidence that supports your disbelief?

2655

This is a good read; author is a gay man who was recently asked the questions we’ve dissected in this thread.

https://medium.com/@duncanrailton78/how-i-became-a-trans-rights-activist-then-turned-gender-critical-part-1-cc09c4027b12

2656

From your link:

Therefore, if a male obtains a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC), then they are legally female, and treated as such when considering sex discrimination. If any male can assert they are “a woman” without medical evidence, what evidence is needed? How does one “prove” they are a woman? It is not possible. “Woman” is not a costume. Wearing women’s clothes doesn’t make a man a woman. If someone’s gender identity does, then no one can validate this one way or the other. I believe the only way someone can be a woman, is to be born female, and that doesn’t contradict the idea that we should in appropriate circumstances treat trans women as women. Considering someone as something is not the same as thinking they are something.

This approach to legal sex/gender is further compromised by the fact that your sex observed at birth (it isn’t assigned, it is identified) is mostly the right observation and is your biological sex. That cannot actually be changed, so by changing your gender you change a fundamental property in the eyes of the law. This is a terrible mistake in my opinion and why the entire Gender Recognition Act is built on foundations of sand. In fact, if both gender identity and sex are separate, as Stonewall assert themselves, then why aren’t they pushing for legal recognition of gender and sex, so that someone can, when they are of age, declare their gender without needing to erase a fundamental truth about themselves and their medical needs? Pedantically were this the case I would demand my gender identity be left blank as “unknowable”, but that is a further essay on the nature of gender identity.

The argument that “no one will abuse self-ID”, neither stands up, nor is a valid reason to legislate, and in any case, there are existing trans women who I do not believe should be considered as legally “women”. When you consider women’s rights, women’s access to single sex spaces, and provisions made specifically for the female sex, these should not be applied to males because these rights and provisions are made because of biological bias against women in society. It certainly isn’t all about toilets. There are many examples where it would be inappropriate for a male to be acting “as a woman”. Here are a few examples. Remember, that most self-identifying trans women have not undergone reassignment and many do not propose to.

· Female only changing rooms and showers, where the presence of a male body will cause distress due to the biological strength differences in men, and the fact that men commit 99% of sexual offences, and over 80% of the time, women are the victims.

· Religious adherence where a woman is not allowed to have a male doctor examine her.

· Rape crisis centres for women, where the presence of a male bodied person will cause significant distress.

· Women only shortlists and constructs designed to redress the sex imbalance in work and society

· Women’s sport, where being male confers not only advantage but a significant risk to women, especially in contact sports.

This is far from an exhaustive list. In addition even if those people who identify as women posed less of a threat to women than other men, and even if they had the same risk profile as women regarding sexual assault, the fact that they have not medically altered themselves makes them indistinguishable from men, and it is unfair to force women to include people who cannot be distinguished from those who we are protecting them from in their own spaces and groups.

I’m in 100% agreement with Duncan on all of this. His evolution on transgender rights mirrors my own, and I found the second and third parts of piece to be a perfect synopsis of where JK Rowling et al. (including folks here) are coming from. I hope everyone here reads it.

2657

Normally, I’d agree with you, but when it comes to fundamental rights, I think the onus is on the people looking to deny those rights.

WRT the idea of “granting” someone access, I think it’s important to note that prior to the trans rights movement, there were no laws in place to restrict access to women’s bathrooms. We took it on faith that potentially predatory men would honor society’s unwritten prohibition on entering women’s bathrooms.

That doesn’t mean it’s easy or without potential problem, but I’d rather the discussion be how to make it work than how to stop it.

2658

No we don’t take it faith. Where single-sex policies are enforced, people are empowered to report men for trespassing if they are in the woman’s restrooms. These men can be ejected if they aren’t able to prove they are women. They can’t just say “I’m trans” and get a pass to stay in.

As simple as this, its sufficient to deter a lot of men from crossing into spaces they don’t belong. Not all of them, but a lot of them. We know this because we know there are differences between unisex vs single-sex changing rooms w/r/t sexual assault and harassment complaints. The vast majority of these perverts are cowards and they don’t want to get beaten up by a bouncer, a security guard, or an angry father/husband who catches them trying to get away with something. They don’t want the cops called him them for trespassing. So they behave when the policies aren’t in their
If you change the policies so that all they have to do is self-identify as trans, then all bets are off. You’re giving creeps an inch and then expecting them to not take a mile. That’s a sucker’s bet. Easy to take when Peeping Tom’s who stalk women in shitholes aren’t itching to see your genitalia, but can you blame women for not being so trusting?

2659

(Reposting to correct formatting issues)

No we don’t take it faith. Where single-sex policies are enforced, people canto report men for trespassing if they are in the women’s restrooms. These men can be ejected if they aren’t able to prove they are women. They can’t just say “I’m trans” and get a pass to stay in.

As simple as this is, its sufficient to deter a lot of men from crossing into spaces they don’t belong. Not all of them, but a lot of them. We know this because we know there are differences between unisex and single-sex changing rooms w/r/t sexual assault and harassment complaints. The vast majority of these perverts are cowards and they don’t want to get beaten up by a bouncer, a security guard, or an angry father/husband who catches them trying to get away with something. They don’t want the cops called on them for trespassing. So they behave when the policies aren’t in their favor.

If you change the policies so that all they have to do is self-identify as trans, then all bets are off. You’re giving creeps an inch and then expecting them to not take a mile. That’s a sucker’s bet. Easy to take when Peeping Toms who stalk women in shitholes aren’t itching to see your genitalia, but can you blame women for not being so trusting?

2660

Interesting read, and mirrors a lot of the thoughts espoused in this thread. I don’t think it will do much to change anyone’s minds, but would be interested to hear what @Kimstu, @iiandyiiii and others think (ie. those who believe that self-identifying as a woman is the only requirement to be considered a woman).

There’s an interesting clip linked in the article to the a video talking about Alex Drummond, who identifies as a transgender lesbian. I don’t see anything wrong with pushing gender norms, but find it hard to accept that people like Alex should be unquestioningly granted access to female safe spaces, granted female scholarships, be allowed to participate in women’s sports, etc. Especially considering that it seems like the majority of Alex’s lived experience was as a man.

Ultimately, I feel like there really needs to be at least 2 criteria for someone to be considered a woman:

  1. They feel like they are a woman (whatever that means - much like monstro, I don’t have a strong innate sense of gender identity, so I can’t even say I really know what it means to feel like a man, much less a woman)
  2. Others perceive them to be a woman

Obviously, criteria 2) is one which not everyone will universally agree with, though I think the female-passing appearance would meet this requirement for essentially everyone (while there are those like YWTF and RickJay who believe man/woman should correspond solely with biological sex, I think in practice they would treat any female-passing person as a woman). In today’s milieu, I believe making an effort to present as female, even if you aren’t female passing, is enough for the majority of people to consider someone a woman. Obviously this is where there is a lot of grey area, as to some people Alex Drummond presents as female, but to me and many others she does not. Nevertheless, I agree with monstro that you can respect someone’s wishes to be addressed as their desired gender without having to consider them a proper member of it.

Having delved through this mammoth thread, I am starting to align with the belief that there would be value in retaining simple terms for biological sex (eg. male/female) as separate from sociological gender (eg. man/woman). While things like bathroom are somewhat grey as to whether they should be segregated by gender vs. sex (I have found arguments for both to be compelling), I feel like some things are simply undeniably segregated by sex as opposed to gender (eg. sports performance, health issues, sexual discrimination - ie. based on childbirth).

One thing I am curious about is if neuroscience advances to the point where we could pinpoint what causes gender identity in the brain and were able to change it, would society still feel that transitioning your body to match your mental gender is the right approach, or would the proper treatment be to change your mind to match your body?

2661

I’m terrified by the latter approach, while I find the former approach sensible and valid and (with proper medical advice) laudable.

The latter approach makes me think of various “gay cure” notions that keep circulating. If there’s a “gay gene,” should it be modified or eliminated? The idea scares the hell out of me.

2662

Logically, of course, how could I not? If someone “passes” as a woman, then, by definition, I would assume they were a woman. That’s what “passing” means.

Alex Drummond passes as female to no one. I realize there are many who will axiomatically claim Drummond is a woman, because that’s their ideological position and they have to stick to it, but you know as well as I they don’t really believe that.

But those are not equivalent. Homosexuality is expressed in behaviour. Making a person not gay serves no purpose. A person’s sexual preference is a point of indifference, like whether they have brown or blonde hair, and is not a delusion; if you find yourself attracted to the same sex you are then you are. It’s a self-proving thing. If you are male, but think yourself female, that is delusional. Making a person accept the fact they are a particular sex does have a positive purpose.

2663

Most of the problems with being gay are caused by lack of acceptance by society rather than the orientation itself. Whereas people who suffer gender dysphoria, even if fully accepted by society, still have the problem of ‘being in the wrong body’. In other words, medical science has only a limited ability to change primary and secondary sexual characteristics, and at a high cost in terms of side effects, having to go through major surgeries, potential loss of sexual functioning and definite loss of fertility, as well as the financial cost. Depending on how successful these interventions are, or if the individual chooses not to undergo them, they may have trouble finding sexual and romantic partners, because external sexual characteristics are pretty crucial to sexual attraction for most people.

So yeah, if gender dysphoria can be helped by therapy, or changing society to be more accepting of gender non-conformity, or raising kids differently, or whatever, that would be much preferable to medical interventions on an otherwise healthy body. Even if these are only effective on a subset of cases, such as the ones starting in adolescence rather than childhood, it would be a much better outcome for that subset.

Unlike with sexual orientation, there are also reasons to suppose this may be possible. The fact that a majority of childhood cases resolve at puberty, while others first present at adolescence or in adulthood with no prior signs, suggests gender identity/dysphoria is not necessarily permanent. The desisters and detransitioners, plus adults who say they could easily have identified as transgender had they heard of the idea as teenagers (and are extremely grateful that they didn’t), are also evidence for this.