Yep, my bad there, sorry.
Yes. After seeing gamergate and the abuse that men inflict on any woman who dares to have an opinion on the internet, it’s impossible not to see the similarity.
That survey you posted linked to this, another female athlete protesting the inclusion of transwomen in women’s sport:
It’s worth reading in itself, but yet again we see:
It hardly casts a good light on an ideology if it’s proponents behave in this way.
Before I looked into this, I still thought of trans as the ‘born in the wrong body’ narrative. But nowadays we have people claiming there is no need to suffer from dysphoria to be trans, no need to get medical treatment, or present yourself as a woman (or man), or have female-typical (or male for transmen) interests or personality. And they are busy denouncing the original sort of trans people as ‘transmedicalists’. Anyone who disagrees with the new dogma gets attacked, even if they are trans themselves. It’s kind of surreal.
You claim that a big part of your concern is how to enact policy that works. You claim that this is about recognizing biological truths.
I’d even concur that this is a super-complicated issue to nail down. Regardless of how one feels about this, coming up with definitive and flawless definitions for “man” and “woman” that correspond to our feelings about what “man” and “woman” mean in society is an impossible task. Everyone fails to use language consistently. There are flaws in every argument.
That said, you’ve revealed your motivation here. Trans women who want to use facilities designated for women are, in your words, “self-entitled”.
I think that, for all the stated concern about male predators, the true emotional hitch for most arguments is “who do these people think they are, barging in on our club? Why can’t things just stay the way they are (where trans people were invisible, and I didn’t have to think about including trans women when talking about women)”?
This is the exact same resistance that a lot of people and organizations have when looking at race; as long as they don’t have to deeply question or evaluate innate beliefs, or make changes that are hard or uncomfortable or cost anything, most people are all for equality. Just don’t suggest that equality might mean they have to give something up, or they’ll turn on the idea.
Again, I might even agree with some of the challenges you’ve raised. No one has perfect answers. But when you start arguing that trans women are “self-entitled” . . . well, I think that calls into question your ability to think clearly on the issue.
Requesting feminine pronouns, and to be called a woman and not a man. Using women’s restrooms.
“Appearing to be a woman” is part of it, too, but it turns out that’s pretty hard to define. For just about any property you can come up with, you can find plenty of ciswomen who don’t possess it.
And it’s only part of it.
Well, the gym employee might have access to the person’s enrollment records, which might include gender. Another random user might not be able to know, but as with most related things we rely on social pressure to keep people “honest”, so to speak. Most people don’t want to risk being humiliated or caught out, so we assume most people are following the rules.
Obviously this has holes and potential vulnerabilities. But so does any reasonable approach to the issue.
I admit I have no understanding of gender fluidity.
Powers &8^]
I know a transwoman who kept her immense black beard… In my opinion, this is a misstep, but it’s a significant part of her self-identity, and, besides, liberty and freedom, hooray.
That’s not what I said, though. “Trans women who are just trying to live their life without being transgressive and self-entitled…” is actually acknowledging the existence of trans women who aren’t using the women’s room for ulterior reasons.
My point all along is that the women’s spaces are not a club. It’s not a honor that is bestowed; or a privilege or right. The women’s locker room isn’t anything special at all. It’s a room where little old ladies with sagging boobs, self-conscious 11 year old girls, teenagers with tampon strings hanging between their legs, and mothers with tiger stripe stretch marks can be naked away from the male gaze, without worrying about someone groping or raping them.
So why does someone with a penis need to be in a space designed for these privacy concerns? When a biological male (regardless of their gender identity) demands access to female-restricted space, even when they are more than capable of using male-restricted spaces, it is more than reasonable to wonder why they feel so entitled. What need is being met by eliminating single-sex spaces for women? Why isn’t it important that women’s desire for privacy and safety be respected? Every day a woman is attacked by man in a restroom or locker room. Why should we discount this reality when deciding who to give access to our initiate spaces?
I’m fucking tired of these comparisons to racism. Y’all keep acting as if women are the oppressor class, as if we’re the ones killing and raping and mutilating men by the millions. As if women are the ones attacking guileless men in various states of undress. As if women are the ones who assault trans women and force them into sex trafficking.
Women have every reason to fear men, because men are doing all of the above to us… Transwomen are not our concern; rather, it’s men who will gladly use trans accommodations to hurt us. Male encroachment of women’s bodies and spaces is part of long ugly history of female oppression.
So hell yeah, I used the word “entitlement”. Any penis-having person who demands women accept their presence in nude settings is showing the same kind of entitlement that has oppressed women for millennia. Gender identity doesn’t change that.
But we’re talking about the edge cases where that’s not the case. Those edge cases are explicitly the topic of this thread!
So you really think women would be fine with a burly transman entering women’s spaces just because he hasn’t had bottom surgery yet? Or do you want both transmen and transwomen excluded from women’s spaces? Is that the disconnect here?
There are a lot of things you cannot verify about people when they enter shared spaces.
But as you just said, you can’t tell the difference between “pretend” transwomen and “real” transwomen. So how do you “remove men from women’s spaces” without catching a lot of transwomen in the sweep? It seems like any such removal would catch at least 90% “real” transwomen.
Entry 2, Definition 2: “MASCULINE”. And the “masculine” definition does reference gender (at least one in the grammatical sense, true, but the second use is unqualified).
I was relying primarily on Wiktionary, which defines “male” as “Belonging to the sex which typically produces sperm, or to the gender which is typically associated with it.”
Dictionary.com does not use the word “gender” in its definition of “male”, but it does record “male” and “female” as the two primary genders.
“the behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex”.
My understanding is that women prefer to avoid the male gaze in such circumstances, yes? And to be in a space where it’s less likely anyone there has prurient interests in looking at disrobed women?
Powers &8^]
No, it’s precisely what you said. If you are a trans woman who uses the women’s room, you’re self-entitled.
Ok, “club” had unintentional connotations. Replace that with “space”.
Trans women are not planning on stalking bathrooms to rape cis-women.
So why does someone with a penis need to be in a space designed for these privacy concerns? When a biological male (regardless of their gender identity) demands access to female-restricted space, even when they are more than capable of using male-restricted spaces, it is more than reasonable to wonder why they feel so entitled. What need is being met by eliminating single-sex spaces for women? Why isn’t it important that women’s desire for privacy and safety be respected? Every day a woman is attacked by man in a restroom or locker room. Why should we discount this reality when deciding who to give access to our initiate spaces?
I’m not saying any of that, nor am I acting as if women are “killing and raping and mutilating men by the millions” (I’d like to know what in my post made you think that that was my take on things). I am saying that you do not accept trans women as women, and you justify that position by insisting that accepting trans women as women will open you up to predatory attacks by men.
My point is: if your acceptance of trans women as women hinges upon how safe and comfortable you feel in the hypothetical world where trans women get to be treated like other women; that they only should be seen as women so far doing so doesn’t infringe on cis women’s sense of security, then you don’t view them as women at all.
And, if your position doesn’t hinge upon how safe and comfortable you feel (for example, if it’s purely a biological argument), then why are we even talking about it?
To be clear, I don’t excuse male violence, nor do I think it should be used as an excuse to perpetuate violence and inequities against others.
Clearly.
Back at the top you denied this position, so I’m glad you stated it again. Trans women who demand women accept them as women are entitled and are oppressing women.
@YWTF
More on sports, apparently the US is about to pass an Equality Act that would allow transgender girls to compete in girls high school sports without any hormone suppression.
And Joe Biden supports this. What on earth are the Democrats thinking?
Butch lesbians have been a thing since forever. How many women-led protests have there been over them? How many bills drafted to exclude them? Zero? Okay then.
Women don’t have a problem with “burly” women. As you just pointed out, there are plenty of gender non-conforming women that use women’s locker rooms all the time. Just because a burly woman may choose to self-identify as a man doesn’t change an outsider’s perceptions of that person.
And not all trans men are burly. Join me in laughing at the idea that women would even notice these manly species of manliness walking around in their locker rooms.
Again with the whole using trans men as pawns in a discussion about males entitling themselves to female spaces. Please get new material, please.
Dictionary.com does not use the word “gender” in its definition of “male”, but it does record “male” and “female” as the two primary genders.
Pretty telling that the definitions for male and female make absolutely no mention of gender, though. Which contradicts your earlier assertion.
“the behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex”.
Do you believe men inherently have different “behavioral, cultural, or psychological” traits than women? Do you believe a man that exhibits “female” traits (which strangely are never specified…we’re all supposed to just know what this means, but whatever) cannot be a man?
If your concept of gender is held widely, then I can absolutely see why we’re seeing so many transitioning young people. They are imbibing the idea that people belonging to a certain gender must act and think a certain way. “I don’t identify with stereotypes and norms that men exhibit and follow, so a woman I must be.”
I don’t believe trans women are women, you are correct. I believe “woman” means more than just a title someone can claim in a flight of whimsy or because they feel more feminine than masculine or whatever. I’m a believer in words actually having meaning.
This opinion is separate from my concerns about opening up women’s spaces. A policy that allows penis-havers to occupy women’s space will not be able to exclude men who falsely claim to be trans. So even if I believed TWAW (for certain individuals), there is no way to refute someone’s claim to a gender identity. This is big gaping flaw in the whole gender ideology construct.
Trans activists do not want any gatekeeping; they want no checks and balances standing in the way of males accessing female-exclusive spaces. And they are branding any woman concerned about the implications of this as TERFs.
I’m tired of seeing progressives blindly defending this bullshit.
They are thinking, “Let’s figure out a new and atrociously horrible way to not only lose an election that should literally be a cake walk, but also go down in history as the party that set women’s rights back several decades.”
Words change meaning when circumstances change.
And, you’re wrong: trans activists want safeguards in place to prevent abuses. For instance, nearly all trans activists respect the need for pre-transition counseling. Very few favor “drop of the hat” transitioning, or transitioning, as you said, “in a flight of whimsy.” They favor informed, intelligent decisions, made with full awareness of all the repercussions. So, wrong: false accusation on your part.
Is that still true? I looked up transmedicalism/truscum when DemonTree brought it up, and found this:
I just find it wild that we ourselves gatekeep an experience that’s always been gatekept by others. I think we need to stop seeing being trans as something medical, but instead view it as a personal experience of your own gender and gender expression. I think we’ll all be a lot happier and people will feel a lot freer to express themselves if we do.”
It seems hard to reconcile this view with any kind of counseling.
The article defines “truscum” in its glossary in a strong fashion; including views that surgery/hormone replacement is necessary for someone to be “truly” trans. But that definition is at odds with what the activists themselves are saying: that any kind of gatekeeping is considered harmful.
Maybe these views are still in the minority, but they are out there.
A lot of people are still working off a 2015 understanding of transgender. Like @DemonTree, it wasn’t until fairly recently that I realized that, based on the prevailing opinion within the community, “ trans” is open to anyone who wants in. It’s not a condition that requires you to treat and seek therapy for. According to GLAAD, transgender is an umbrella term for people whose gender identity and/or gender expression differs from what is typically associated with the sex they were assigned at birth..
If you don’t have gender dysphoria—just a desire to be seen as the opposite sex—then I could totally understand why you wouldn’t want the trouble of psychotherapy. Trans activists are much more interested in advancing the freedoms of this group as opposed to affirming the concerns of those who are reviled as truscum, who believe gender dysphoria is necessary to be trans.
Not a false accusation at all. Stonewall U.K characterizes requirements for counseling and medical assessment as “traumatic” and “demeaning”.
Where are your cites?
…that isn’t what Stonewall said. They talk about the specific processes of the Gender Recognition Act which were put in place in 2004. Not all “requirements for counseling and medical assessment.”
It’s odd that they get lumped together, since the two groups have very different needs. If I had gender dysphoria, I don’t think I’d be too happy if another group moved in, claimed the same name, and then started making demands that diluted my own cause. Dysphoria sufferers have needs, medical and otherwise, that non-sufferers do not.
It’s not clear to me why the non-dysphoria people want to use the trans label anyway, since they seem to be all over the place when it comes to gender presentation alone (let alone all the other stuff). There’s already an umbrella term for people not easily categorized–queer.
Indeed. Medical treatment is moving towards the ‘Informed consent’ model:
So this when you show evidence that Stonewall believes pre-transition counseling is a need to ensure safeguarding, as @Trinopus has ascribed to trans activists.
You won’t be able to find this evidence because that is not their position.