Gender Discussion #14

[klarakluckbag]

I'm another who is glad to have found this topic covered here, there is literally nowhere else to discuss these issues, without being shouted down as some kind of bigot or "hater". I have to be honest, I didn't even realise the scale of the problem, I also wandered in here after seeing the weightlifting shocker, I thought that male athletes were already banned from women's Olympic events? Me and my husband were watching the coverage, and looking at each other, saying "Isn't that a bloke?"

I like to think that a trans woman, who has made a committed decision to live completely as a woman, prior to surgery, would be treated with dignity and respect by healthcare workers, colleagues and everyone else. I don't think that the majority of transwomen take this decision lightly, and it must be awful for those who genuinely believe that they have been born into the wrong body. And I honestly don't have a problem with a transwoman using the same toilet as me! I'm not qualified enough to state that it is always a mental health issue, I used to think that anyone who was prepared to go through the demands of hormone treatment, drastic surgery, and the ordeal of telling friends and family of their intentions, must be absolutely certain that they simply cannot deal with living a lie any longer. But suddenly, the whole trans experience seems to have been taken over by militant men, who are demanding that women's "rights*", should be bestowed on them, just because they wear a dress and lipstick on a Friday night.

(* Women's "rights". Like breastfeeding in public places, single sex hospital wards and toilets, safe spaces for abused women, the end of victim-blaming in assault or rape trials. You know, issues that actually affect only women)

The insidious hating on lesbians and gay men needs to stop. Gay people have fought long and hard for their freedoms in this country, and I think that most of us are quite gladdened to see same-sex couples holding hands in the street. My best friend's son has just come out (to the surprise of absolutely no-one!), my son's girlfriend works in a gay bar, they spend their whole weekends with a crowd of gay and straight people, it's just a normal part of everyone's life. The old homophobia is dwindling away, as gay people are seen and heard everywhere, from soap operas to weather forecasters, to radio DJ's to politicians. Now we're being told that lesbians who don't want to sleep with men, are "bigots"? Or gay men, who are horrified by the thought of having sex with someone who has a vagina, are "transphobic"? Surely we're going backwards?

These aggressive transvestites (which is what they are. No amount of whinging about "period pains" and access to HRT makes them female, any more than me wearing trousers and not waxing my moustache means I'm a man ffs) need to be put back in their box, and sharpish. No-one cares if Colin down the road, wants to wear a dress and make-up and call himself Cassandra at weekends. But when he starts demanding to use the female changing-rooms in Next, and attending the women-only swimmimg sessions at the local pool, we're gonna have a problem. Colin can just go fuck himself.

 

[Platformcrocs]

I have no problem in sharing a bathroom with trans women But if you are transphobic, thats your issue. But you go to alot of places where you are showing your genitalia? I never had them on display myself in public i must say.

Let's not start accusing people of being transphobic without any context. It's not transphobic to not want someone with a penis to be in women's spaces. A lot of women are actually in favour of a third space that anyone can choose to use and is not segregated by sex. Bathrooms and changing rooms have been mentioned but this also applies to prisons, hospital wards etc because these are places where women can be vulnerable and unfortunately, some trans-identifying men have taken advantage of this.

Trans very broad umbrella these days, and many trans people have chosen to self ID. This means that anyone can say they identify as whatever gender they want, and sometimes there's good reason to do so. The issue with self ID is that the number of people who identify as trans is much higher than the number of people who have applied for a gender recognition certificate (GRC) - details on that here. As you'll see, there's a number of criteria so it's not something you can simply do on a whim.

There's really no issue with a trans woman who has a GRC using the women's bathroom, but there IS an issue with men who use self ID to access women's spaces for the wrong reasons. It's naive to think that every single self IDing trans woman is legitimate because some simply are not. Some trans-identifying men are considered to be autogynephilic (this is being sexually aroused at the thought of being a woman - details on that here). When you bring that into the equation, plus the fact that it's very easy to self ID as trans, it's fair to say that it's simply not appropriate for these people to be in women's spaces where they could cause harm or upset to women.

 

[2020two]

Just catching up on this thread as a distraction as I've been admitted to hospital, but thought I'd share the absolute joy that there's a gigantic sign on the door stating that patients will only be admitted to bays according to sex and not gender

 

[AlanBanan]

Yes... because that's how lesbians tend to react in public places

Why did they feel the need to use such a sexual description when describing a woman’s body?

I am gay and I’ve never been in a nude spa but I’ve been in a gym, and I’ve never seen a woman changing in the changing room and thought “WOW LOOK AT HOW SWOLLEN AND WET HER FANNY IS” that’s only something a man would think of. Don’t compare lesbians to men.

Contrary to the male fantasy in their head where women walk around with their tits bouncing about and their fannies spread in the changing room, women tend to just dry off and get dressed as quickly as possible.

 

[weeweegie]

Been reading these posts but first time commenting here. I’m a woman in my 40s and myself and my group of friends the same age feel they same way you all feel here. We have respect for trans people but feel that women are being erased. We talk about it quietly as you can’t say a thing without being shouted down. A lived experience of being a woman means nothing now it seems. I get quite down about it if I’m honest but reading on here makes me realise me and my friends aren’t the only ones thinking this.

 

[AlanBanan]

It really shows that the majority of trans lesbians are incels misogynists as they’re all lesbian obsessed while at same time hating any woman who has an opinion other than the general validation and appraisal.

They also love to try and spin the “BUT WHAT IF YOU FOUND OUT YOUR GF WAS ACTUALLY TRANS DOWN THE LINE” scenario even though you can clock a TiM from a mile away. Like .1% of trans women pass, so don’t try and kid a kidder!

I seriously fancy all women, of all shapes, race and sizes, yet never once fancied a trans woman. Because at the end of the day, they’re not attractive to me, as they are a male.

It is also very predatory and rapey, that they want people who aren’t in anyway attracted to them to have relationships and sex with them. Even though there’s many people completely fine to be in a relationship with a trans person. But that’s not good enough for them. They want to control people especially women.

They’re the same people who scream “YOU CAN’T HELP WHO YOU’RE ATTRACTED TO!” But at the same time will scream and cry with their legs in the air kicking when someone takes that advice and doesn’t want to date or fuck them.

Freaks.

 

[AlanBanan]

They’re so racist it hurts.

Black women are women because they’re born female and have the XX chromosome


TiMs aren’t women because they’re born male and the XY chromosome

Their racism is constantly coming out alongside their homophobia as they always have to speak about how we accept black women as women, as if black women are not women! Your skin colour doesn’t equate your sex your sex chromosomes do.

God! I despise them. Y chromosome degenerates.

 

[colouredlines]

Trans people were rare, we had a transsexual woman who came into a business I worked in on a regular basis. No one ever mis gendered them, it was never a question of what toilet they used and no one judged them. They were clearly just trying to blend in and get on with their life as a woman. (They didn't pass) but other than that the only trans people I saw were drag and cross dressing types in gay clubs.

Now trans gender people seem to be everywhere. Especially young people.

I think there is a large group of heterosexual men who are trans so they can become more disadvantaged than the woman they hate so much.

I think there is also a lot of young people that are lost and want to feel part of something and feel finding a new gender identity will solve their problems.

The traditional transexuals are still very rare.

This is potentially very outing, but fuck it. I had a trans lecturer at university. She usually wore trousers - no Pip Bunce-style party dresses and bows. At the time that I was a student, she was chair of that country's largest trans rights organisation. Interestingly, there were some areas of her subject which related to gender, but she never mentioned any trans issues in lectures or seminars.

It was a prestigious university, and ten years ago a national tabloid (this was not in the UK) deemed this to be front page news, with an "exclusive" headline along the lines of "sex swap prof". For a long time, that was what I thought of when I thought of transphobia - a gross, unprovoked piece of tabloid bullying against an individual.

Incidentally, my old lecturer later stepped down from her position in the trans rights organisation, which has since swung wildly to the far side of woke. I just had a look at her Twitter - no pronouns, no recent trans content, just lots of academic stuff.

I think about her, and about a trans friend I have, and they are people I strongly believe deserve legal protection. How sad that their stories have been hijacked by this new movement.

I despair at the loss of nuance; we should be able to say that it's not okay for tabloids to make a front page story out of "omg a trans!!! run for the hills!!" but equally, that single sex spaces should be protected, and that a man waving his dick around in a women's changing room is not okay.

 

[Falkor]

Well who would have thought that it would be the Police and Crime Commissioners across the UK taking a stand?

 

[witchofwestbyfleet]

This sort of thing is both absurd and deliberate. Wanting single sex spaces for women (including and especially marginalised women) isn't bigoted and it doesn't mean we want trans people dead or advocate violence against them.

I agree Britain in many ways isn't tolerant and can be very dangerous for some people. But this kind of rhetoric doesn't help in any way

 

[sheleg]

I'm not sorry, but you can't claim to be an oppressed minority when the fucking police are flying your flag.

 

[Apple In My Pie]

I think the thread name is fine as it is. If you come into a thread titled gender discussions and then fall over yourself when there’s discussions of gender then that’s on you. The discussions here are measured and thoughtful I think.

 

[Bitofthebubbly]

When I was growing up the word ‘gender’ was just another word for ‘sex’ because British people are weird like that. It was put on forms instead of sex but everyone knew what it meant.

Now gender is this mythical thing that just exists within you. Apparently you ‘just know’ if you’re a man or a woman, or ‘somewhere in between’ based on some feeling rather than material reality.

Non binary is just the goth/emo/scene kid of today. That I am sure of. Most nb kids will grow up to realise that gender is nonsense and they can just be themselves without a silly label. There’s that whole thing with teenagers where they want to be ‘different’ but not so ‘different’ that they can’t identify or fit in with their peers. NB fits that bill. It’s noncommittal and easy to say you don’t id as that anymore if you change your mind.

Don’t get me wrong I’m respectful and would never want to intentionally hurt someone but the way I feel is the way I feel. Gender is bullshit and should be abolished. Maybe then no one would feel the need to chop body parts off, squash their breasts into their rib cages, and take incorrect hormones in order to feel comfortable doing things typically associated with opposite sex gender stereotypes.

 

[colouredlines]

Iran, apparently. I’ve seen people praising Iran for its stance on “LGBT issues”. Completely ignoring the fact that it’s NOT welcoming and friendly to LGB’s, who are physically forced into surgeries so they are legally recognised as the opposite sex in order to claim the country has no lesbians or gay or bisexual people.

Oh god, a friend of mine did this too. It was the most bizarre, backwards thing I've ever seen - he was using Iran as an example of how progressive Islam can be. I very rarely speak up about this in real life, but I absolutely had to on that occasion. There is NOTHING even remotely progressive about it.

As an aside, the conversation was an example of something that a lot of woke types seem to do - fall over themselves to praise Islam. Islamophobia is indeed a huge problem in many countries, but that doesn't mean we should blindly applaud the government of fucking Iran! There's a huge irony there, every Iranian I've met despises the government and hates what has happened to their country, but we get right-on types in Europe full of "Wow, they're ahead of us on trans rights!" and "The burka actually empowers women!"

PS yes, the friend I'm talking about has a beard.

 

[SqualorVictoria]

We're on thread number 14 and we've had one new poster ask for the thread title to be changed. It's a complete non issue. Gender issues is the all encompassing term

(Discussions, not issues. Apologies)

 

[Vanelope]

I effing hate the insta gender police.
someone has written a very thoughtful post on the abortion issue in Texas with links to places to help women etc.

In the comments ‘friendly reminder, not only cis women need access to abortions and you should be more inclusive’

so person replies - thanks I will do better (pandering as they are a bluetick)

but a further come back - ‘adjusting the language in this post would be a great first step’

the arrogance and and tone policing and just …..

fuck off!!!

It’s not a friendly reminder - it’s a passive aggressive virtue signalling correction. I hate it. And all public figures who think they need to pander to these people because ‘inclusivity’ are feeding the beast.

 

[Ispyabudgetbeanblogger]

She seems like a fucking idiot. I honestly can’t stand people who go on about how it’s great to be morbidly obese. I’m all for acceptance and understanding but to be encouraging and “you go girl” and “you can still be healthy if your BMI is whatever” is just sad - no. No no no no. It’s not healthy. People may have many reasons why they overeat or have disordered eating patterns and I have 100% empathy for them - I know it can be an addiction. But it is not something to celebrate. So whatever guff she is spouting about not calling women “women” is only to be expected from someone as deeply deluded as she is.

I had a BMI of 33 when I came down with Covid last year. I felt AWFUL. I ended up in hospital for two days (not on ventilator). I'm otherwise fit and healthy. My husband who has a BMI in the healthy range got Covid at the same time and was ok. I know this is just anecdotal, but we know high BMI is a contributing factor in Covid symptom severity. Anyway, it was a real wake-up call. I'm down to a BMI of 26 now. It took me a year and I'm still not quite where I'd like to be, but I feel 100 times better than I did last year.

No need to body shame or tell fat people they should stop eating cake, but let's not pretend being obese is healthy or ok from a medical perspective.

 

[Satisfying Click]

I've spoken about it before, but I have no doubt as a teen I would have been swept up by gender ideology and declared myself non-binary to protect myself from hyper-femininity and the objectification of women. Sadly, it wouldn't have stopped the sexual violence and domestic abuse I experienced. My rapist certainly knew I was a woman, declaring myself as non-binary would not have changed the outcome

 

[Brigitjonesbuttcheek]

Did someime actually calim asylum in New Zealand on the grounds of transphobia in the UK? More fool new Zealand.

I think the UK is pretty tolerant in general. Yes there are some shitty people around, but the fundamental of our society is that people should have the right to live as the see fit,

Trans people have every right that everyone else has. What they want is additional rights.

 

[LaLa247]

Can you guys help me with an argument, speaking with a friend and I said it’s offensive to imply that infertile women are as much women as trans women, and he said ‘only if you instinctively view trans women as not women’ .. I can’t quite put into words a response.. help?

I just want to say as an infertile woman in my 20s if someone said this to me I’d probably cry. I don’t even want to get into it but I’d love to tell him my story and see if he’d be able to look me in the eye and tell me I’m wrong.