Eddie Izzard

So you are simultaneously conceding that transwomen have more aggression and strength than ‘natal women’, and insisting they are not a risk when in intimate contact in what used to be single-sex spaces?

And that ‘natal women’ need men/people with penises in the mix before we can fight our own battles? Wouldn’t it be better to level the playing field and let us do it on our own terms, rather than on those of people who ‘present as’ women?

trisher if you can't see that transwomen taking places supposedly for female sex women is a problem, then there's no hope. It's just jobs for the boys no matter how they present. If transwomen are not prepared to concede to women who do not want male-bodied people alongside them in prisons, hospitals etc I hardly think they're banging the drum for natal women's rights. Are you conceding that transwomen retain male aggression patterns and behaviours even when wearing nail varnish and a frock?

I notice you haven't commented on a man like Philip Bunce who believes they can switch from man to woman on a daily basis, and therefore use facilities and take rewards for both sexes as a "right".

Doodledog you made my points while I was typing. I'm the world's slowest typist

Rosie51 transwomen no doubt like most people have many opinions and will behave in many different ways. I could no doubt post on here instances of women and men who have done unacceptable things, but if I suggested that this was how all people behaved I would of course be entirely wrong. We cannot run society by making laws which are so draconian no one would ever be able to do anything seen as unacceptable. We legislate for the safety of most people not to suppress individuals.
I really don't know about male agression patterns. It has been pointed out that some men are not agressive but actually kind and understanding. It's a sliding scale for women and men anyway. The point not being any agression, but a willingness to stand. I believe transwomen coming from a minority group who have suffered from similar suppression as natal women would actually support women's aims.
I really don't know what individuals have to do with arguments. Philip Bunce I don't really understand, perhaps I would if I actually knew him and he was to explain his views. As it is I'm not going to comment on his situation based on a few scurrilous reports. However as the argument would seem to be that men in women's facilities are dangerous isn't he gay? Wouldn't that make him an unlikely danger to any women?

Philip Bunce makes much of the fact he's hetereosexual, married with two children, daughters I believe. I haven't said he's a danger to women per se, but he obviously has no regard to their wanting privacy from men in certain areas.

Sorry I thought you were referring to the Landrover case. No idea who Philip Bunce is.

trisher

Sorry I thought you were referring to the Landrover case. No idea who Philip Bunce is.

Oh I thought it made enough news coverage, Philip/Pip in various stereotypical gendered outfits, so proud to receive that women's award that nobody could miss it! There were even transwomen saying they thought it was wrong because he isn't solely woman, but alternates on a daily basis.

trisher

I entirely agree about women being allowed to join the Masons (although I've no idea why anyone would want to and men in my family have refused membership or dropped out).

As for transwomen taking places as executives etc well maybe that's a good thing. maybe they will have the agression and strength necessary to carve out more space and protection for women. We have after all had the vote for almost 100 years and yet we are still massively underrepresented in Parliament, transwomen standingwith women might shift the balance.

Seriously! We weak women need men/transwomen to ensure we are better represented in Parliament.
Shall we all just go away and leave the trans activists to ensure that we women have even less space, even less rights and are even less likely to be represented in Parliament.

Escaped my radar. I suppose he is much like Eddie Izzard. Not sure I understand either of them. I think it would probably be a better world if men were encouraged to develop their feminine side.
Anyway I googled her/him. He describes himself as gender-fluid. As Pippa I suppose most people meeting her in the workplace would regard her as a woman, so she would qualify for the list. Her aspirations and ideas seem pretty sound as well. Do I understand it- hell no! but then I don't understand quantum physics. I do think it must be hard work. I always thought getting up and getting ready for work in a morning was difficult, but having to decide which gender you will be must be a nightmare.

Iam64 No you can join the 50/50 Ask her to stand movement 5050parliament.co.uk/askhertostand-campaign/
But it is sometimes a choice between a transwoman and a man, because enough women are not standing.

So we have Pippa Bunce to show us women how to to be assertive women in the board room and India Willoughby to tell us how to shave our legs and look attractive all the time, and transwomen fighting for women's rights in parliament. How lucky are we. Let biological women just step aside and let the men run things so we can think of kittens and fluffy pink things!

Do we really have so little faith in women as a sex that we need transwomen to speak for us? I don't wish transwomen harm, but equally I don't want biological women to be pushed to one side to make way.

transwomen standingwith women might shift the balance.

What admirable but astonishing optimism.

petunia I don't think anyone especially me is agreeing with anyone telling anyone how they should live their lives. My philosophy is probably laissez faire with legal protection for the weakest.
I have faith in women but have no objection to a transwoman joining in the good fight.
FarNorth Thanks!

. . . transwomen coming from a minority group who have suffered from similar suppression as natal women would actually support women's aims.

This is absolute nonsense. There has been systemic discrimination against women for hundreds of years. This discrimination is 'validated' by pretty much all major religions, and has been entrenched in law until very recently.

Transwomen undoubtedly suffer from prejudice and a certain amount of discrimination, although they have the advantage over generations of women in that any discrimination is prohibited by law, and violence against them is treated as a hate crime, whereas misogyny is not. Women are massively under-represented in positions of power and influence, are paid 20% less than men, have even greater disparity in their pensions and so on, as anyone with remotely feminist beliefs will be very well aware.

How can transwomen understand 'women's aims' when by definition they have lived their formative years as men, with all that that entails by way of preferment in the workplace and the sort of socialisation that encourages assertiveness and 'alpha' behaviour? The very fact that some of them (and their supporters) cannot understand why many vulnerable women do not want men/people with penises in their supposedly safe spaces is testament to the fact that they do not.

having to decide which gender you will be must be a nightmare.

Surely a person just jumps out of bed knowing which gender they are that day.
I do.

Could Eddie Izzard not just ask to be referred to as 'Eddie Izzard' or simply 'Eddie'? ?

I think he is happy with that, Nannan. There is a link to an interview with him further up the thread where he says so .

Doodledog You are stuck in the 1970s when women thought the only way we could progress was by condemning men and striking out on our own.It might have been right for the time, but in doing so we rejected a whole history of feminist men. Google the Men's League for Women's Suffrage and the terrible case of William Bell. Third wave feminists recognise there are male feminists. That minority groups have been treated in much the same way women have and that united we stand a better chance of defeating patriachy.
Incidentally I still don't understand your obsession with penises.

Doodledog - another good post at 15.30 today.

Caitlin Jenner is one of a number of celebrity transwomen, who lived the majority of their lives as men. I don't dismiss the uncertainty and distress they describe but they have not lived life as a girl or a woman. They have been successful white men, with all the privilege that entails, before deciding to live as women. Or their version of women, shaved legs, fancy frocks, big hair and nails. I recall Caitlin Jenner saying the most difficult thing about being a woman, was deciding what to wear. yeah right.

trisher

Doodledog You are stuck in the 1970s when women thought the only way we could progress was by condemning men and striking out on our own.It might have been right for the time, but in doing so we rejected a whole history of feminist men. Google the Men's League for Women's Suffrage and the terrible case of William Bell. Third wave feminists recognise there are male feminists. That minority groups have been treated in much the same way women have and that united we stand a better chance of defeating patriachy.
Incidentally I still don't understand your obsession with penises.

I have no wish to exclude men, but I don't see the way forward as enrolling transmen to speak for women. Nor do I need a lecture on the history of feminism, thanks - I am well aware of the history of the campaign for women's suffrage. Again, you work from the assumption that you speak from a position of superiority when it comes to an understanding of these issues, and it is very irritating.

Where did I say that I do not recognise male feminists? I said that transwomen have not had the same experience as natal women, and I stand by that, as I see it as indisputable.

I don't have an obsession with penises either. I use the term 'tranwomen/people with penises' when posting in reply to you, as I am aware that any deviation from language which is 100% unambiguous will be pounced on as a way to divert the argument, and to discriminate between transitioned and non-transitioned transwomen. I find it amusing that the autocorrect on my phone will now suggest the word 'penises' if I type in 'people with', but this is not indicative of any obsession on my part, I can assure you.

Thank you Iam64.

I cross posted with trisher there - I do not want or need lectures about feminism what feminists believed in the 1970's. I remember it well. Not all women's groups believed the only way we could progress was by condemning men and striking out on our own. It really was much more complex than that. It helps no one to make sweeping statements and generalisations. Most of the women contributing to this thread were there.

I said that transwomen have not had the same experience as natal women, and I stand by that, as I see it as indisputable
But there is no universally shared woman's experience. Her experience depends on so many other factors, including the colour of her skin, her economic status and the country she is born into, not to mention her medical history. My mother lived without a uterus for the majority of her life, she never had a period after 26, so was she not a woman?

Oh now you're using the transwoman argument about periods etc. trisher .Your mother would have been seen and treated as a woman, with all the inherent attitudes of the day, and very few people, other than her closest family, would know she didn't have a uterus.

Of course they wouldn't Rosie51 but the idea that all women bleed is a common one, and supposedly part of our shared experience. Unfortunately closer examination always reveals that women's lives are different in many ways. And in fact some women and some transwomen share similar experiences