Is Jenni Murray right about transgender?

LSP I find you ranting on about feminism a bit disconcerting. You seem very obsessed and that is not healthy. The way you are talking about transgender is extrodinary, You say you stick up for women, well someone like you does not represent me. I will stick up for men, woman and children who need it and who are vunerable. I find you very narrow minded.

What part do you find extraordinary?

Obsessed, no.

Concerned, yes.

Is it also a question of nature and nurture?

If nature is our biology which determines our physical make up /organs etc. and is definable by our chromosomes,hormones etc. generally we can define new babies as male or female.

As with all 'syndromes' and various other congenital abnormalities there will be babies born that have chemical imbalances, missing components etc and this may make their sex/gender less clear cut.

Nurture, all our experiences from birth onwards, will impact on our expectations of what constitues womanhood/manhood.

I think of Male <-------------> Female as a kind of continuum and we are all on it in different places. That place will be mostly determined by nature but we can change that place as a result of our nurture.
I consider myself a feminist. I see it as a campaign for full equality, where male/female are not limited /constrained because of their sex. Whilst it might be true that male/female are physically different (nature) this should not limit what people choose to do, how to behave, wear, look like or how people are treated because nurture has conditioned us to think more 'stereotypically'.

If some people feel they are more female/male despite physical attributes suggesting they are male/female and this causes them distress and unhappiness surely we need to be understanding and supportive? What type of man /woman those individuals transition to will depend on their nurture view on what men/women are.

I think it is hard for those of us who are clear about our sex and who are comfortable with who we are to appreciate the complexities faced by people whose bodies do not represent who they feel they really are.

'Academic' bonkersness:

"Pregnancy has been socially gendered as feminine" from the abstract of a paper.

Here's another gem from what I suppose is politely callled a gender studies paper:

"Although breast-feeding is assumed to be natural and a biological function, we problematize the practice as both gendered and heteronormative."

I'd love someone to try and convince me both this and the previous paper are not total bollocks <<< deliberately "gendered" word. Both quotes are from the abstracts of supposedly academic papers.

"problematize" !!!
"heteronormative" ???

rafichagran totally agree with your post.

Great examples thatbags , but should have been preceded by a snorting your tea over your iPad health warning.
If I thought I could even remember "heteronormative " and "problematise" I might try dropping them into the conversation now and again ??

Suzied , you asked a straightforward question IMO you must be amazed at what you unleashed!
Hope you've gone for a lie down.

Returned to this after a busy International Women's day and can't believe some of the stuff being posted. There were women killed in both World wars, they weren't on the "Front Line" but that was because they were not permitted to be by men. Does it matter if they were hospital staff, civilians bombed, fireworkers putting out incendiaries, resistance workers or spies? They died. History is of course written by men and many of the stories of the sacrifices and dedication women have shown have been lost in time. I suggest nina does less writing and more reading about women's history.
I still don't know what to do about transgender men but nor do I know what to say about a friend's 5year old GD who has announced she wants to be a boy, insisted on having her hair cut short, refuses to wear anything expect trousers and does look like a boy. All I can say is love him/her whoever she decides to be.

That should be except not expect it's a bit Wallace and Grommitt- the wrong trousers!

Trisher sounds like my sister, she is now the happily married mum of 3. Thank goodness no one filled her full of hormones!

Good grief, Thatbags. Bonkers!

Trisher, I don't think anything needs to be said about a 5yo who wants a boys haircut etc. They're simply five years old and at one time would have been called a tomboy. When my son was four or five years old he was convinced he was a duck and spent much time flapping his 'wings' and quacking. We didn't feed him duck food, though, and by the time he was six, he'd grown out of it.

Trisher I didn't mean you are like my sister. I meant that my sister sounds like your friends 5 yr old!

Re the 5 year old who wanted a boys haircut. I went to secondary school with a girl who had hair like a boys and walked and talked like boy. She loved my long hair and sometimes called me darling and would try and carry things for me. I don't think I took much notice of this as in those days I didn't realise the implications.
Apparently no one filled her with hormones either.
I met up with her a few years ago at a school reunion. She is a happily married mother and grandmother, although she was still wearing a trouser suit that looked more like a man's suit.

Understood that PamelaJ1. Think perhaps it was easier for us when we grew up although harder for anyone who thought they were in the wrong body. It is much more complicated now with so many decisions to make and so much pressure on all concerned. I think one thing I am now aware of is that any transgender person is someone's DC and someone's GC and that this affects the whole family.

thatbags those quotes are bollocks! I am amused at the convoluted invented vocabulary to say nothing very much!

When I was little I was a so-called tomboy. Trousers, short hair, into Eagle comics, train sets, risky activities. My family and friends just accepted me.

I fear that had I been born now there would be general angst about my clothes, activities and boyishness and I might have found myself at the Tavistock Clinic being prescribed potentially dangerous puberty blockers. I grew up into a heterosexual woman, married over 50 years with children and grandchildren.

I dread to think what is going to happen to some of the children today who are like I was, with the trend of transgenderism becoming almost a fashion statement with many schools now having at least one, often more, pupils who have decided they want to be the opposite sex.

Oh, and about equality. I've always battled through and got where I wanted in a largely man's career because I was cussed and took no prisoners.But it should not be necessary to do well in spite of being female.

I always says that when mediocre women are promoted to the same degree as mediocre men, then we will really have attained equality

Whoputthecatout - thanks. When I was eight, I was given my first pair of trousers, hand me downs from one of my grannies more radical friends granddaughter. I wore trousers in the winter and shorts the summer at every opportunity. I didn't like being squeezed into frocks for family occasions, I suspect because I was long and skinny and felt out of place. I did have dolls as a little girl but found playing out with the boys, or in mixed groups was so much more fun than hanging out with the girl groups. I was described as a tom boy. I have three children and have been happily married for many years. I've always had heterosexual relationships

My nephew loved dolls and was boought a pram to push his favourite soft toy in. He is now 6'5" and in very 'male' identified employment.
I have male gay friends who knew they were gay from around age 8. Many of my gay women friends didn't come out/acknowledge they are lesbians until much later in life.
One of the places I was employed had a male to female transgender woman. In the course of employment I have known many people experiencing confusion or unhappiness about their sexual orientation.

I ramble on about these issues in an attempts to appear fairly ordinary in my approach to sexuality. The idea that those of us who speak from a feminist perspective are male hating, obsessed etc is just not on. The young women in my family and friendship are 'equal' in a way my generation just wasn't. Despite this, they face difficulties in returning to work after mat leave, many of them are in similar management positions to their male friends or partners, but by their early 30's are earning about £10,000 a year less. They still seem to do the bulk of the emotional and practical care for their children, despite loving relationships with partners - it just falls to women in most cases. So, forgive me if I feel that a man with a penis who identifies as a woman, doesn't know the half of it.

women have spoken out in Canada where these laws have passed. They are in a women's refuge and have to share with a man, in one case the same room.

Both women who have spoken put about their discomfort have been kicked out of the shelter.

This is so, so wrong.

Spoken out, not put!

Canada has become quite liberal. Many like Justin Trudeau for his liberalism. Him, or his party is liberal on drugs as well.

Most liberals don't realise the effect their policies have on women though. they have a liberal agenda that benefits men and harms women. I am pro Nordic model whereby the prostitute is innocent and the punter is the criminal. This model makes life easier for prostitutes but sends the message that women are human beings and shouldn't be for sale. Most liberals just want to decriminalise prostitution, they don't think about what message that sends out, women are the sex class, women are for sale.

the same with this mess, women kicked out of a women's refuge to make room for men. Misogyny is rife on the right and the left, the right through sheer bloody mindedness and the left because they are drunk on Kool Aid!!!!

Iam64, your first and third paragraphs are almost exactly what I could say, so thank you for writing them for me! (I don't have a 6'5'' nephew, so couldn't write your second paragraph.) I loved my first pair of trousers (or slacks, as they were called) and my hand-me-down shorts, which actually had a front zip fly - unheard of for girls in the fifties, and I did get strange looks.

Thank goodness we didn't have the pressure of people wondering if we needed hormone treatment! This whole thing has got out of hand at the moment, although I'm sure the pendulum will swing again.

I agree with several posters points about having been perhaps tomboys as young children....I as a small girl decided I didnt want to wear pink at all. My favourite colour was and is green, and any dress for parties etc until I was about 10, had to be lavender, blue or green.

I wonder what would have been made of that if I had grown up in these times. Green and blue are still my favourite colours and I have been married to a man twice! My sister liked wearing pink so that was ok.

As I walked through the local school grounds a couple of days ago, taking a shortcut, one of the younger classes was clearly having dressing up time and, as it was hot and sunny, most of them were playing in the playground. There was a boy wearing a pink princess dress and golden shoes with little heels, there was a girl dressed as a fearsome pirate, there was a child (a girl, I think but am not sure) wearing a frilly gypsy blouse and camouflage pants and sundry other mixed-and-not-always-matched costumes. Everyone was clearly having a great time and no one was being labelled. I think that's exactly how it should be.