Latest from Mridul Wadhwa

Thank you those who understood the question I asked about a theoretical situation, but one that absolutely could be real. I didn't expect a straight answer and that's exactly what I didn't get.

Duncan Bannatyne of Bannatyne gyms has male and female only changing rooms and a third space with individual cubicles complete with individual shower. Guess what, he has transwomen refusing to use them, they want in with the 'other' women. He's prepared to take all the flack directed at him, but too many aren't.

Oh well, we’ll disagree about that too. ?

Of course not, if you mean bars in pubs and places in universities, and I don’t think for a moment that you thought that was what I meant?.

But just as I don’t want a man in the bed next to mine in hospital, and I don’t want to see girls having to change in front of a man in a communal changing room, and I respect the right of any woman to be examined and counselled by another woman if she has been raped or sexually assaulted, I would absolutely afford those rights to men to have their own spaces for those things too.

Peasblossom

Women, men, homosexuals, religion, society. The list of people to be despised grows.

Only Trans are wholesome and right-thinking and their every edict should be obeyed.

“When Trans rule the world every day will be the first day of Spring ???”

Except it sounds more like an intolerant dictatorship to me.

Sigh……

I think your post says far more about you than it does me Peasblossom

Doodledog one of the things we fought for was the admission to men's spaces, are you saying they should have them back?

trisher

Funny isn't it Doodledog how your attitude to cooperation and discussion is it's a "Kumbaya" approach. You might want to think more carefully about why you find it hard to accept this. As there is no TRA representative on this thread it's impossible to gather their response. Your own though is the standard one. I know they won't talk so I'm not going to.

No. You are twisting my words again.

My attitude is that when faced with intransigence there is no point in aiming for compromise, and also, separately, that there are times when compromise simply is not possible.

It is naive to think that there is always a way forward when faced with a clash of something immutable, such as sex, and something potentially optional, like gender. When people who have opted for a gender that coincides with much of the behaviour, lifestyle and norms of a sex, and when some of those people scream 'No Debate!' there is no point in trying to reason. All the time the reasoning is going on, the women are losing their rights - even their right to be known as women.

Your views are very contradictory, as ever. One minute you are advocating negotiation (which you seem to define as being willing to give 50% ground), when previously you have said that you believe in fighting your corner - confrontation, campaigning, and not behaving as victims. Does the approach depend on whether the campaign is for men or women, or is there another value system at play that determines which you choose?

What has any of that got to do with trans issues?

Are you completely missing the point? Women are standing up for themselves and refusing to be victims when they speak out against being pushed aside by people who deny that being female is a biological reality.

It's not about winning or losing. It's about keeping the rights that women have fought for - the right to dignity, to safety, to privacy when we want it, and when we feel vulnerable. Men can have the same rights if they want them, although on the whole most men are not at physical risk from most women.

None of that means that we are not equal to men - why would it? Many of us on this thread (by the law of averages) will have husbands and sons, and those who don't will know many men who agree that there is just cause for women to be uncomfortable about sharing some spaces with some men at some times, and that if this means that they can't always do exactly what they like when they like to do it, it is a price worth paying to allow women not to feel that discomfort. It is the ones who insist on instant gratification, and on taking rights from the people who fought for them (whether historically or not) who are the problem. Them, and their supporters who also put male rights first every time.

Women, men, homosexuals, religion, society. The list of people to be despised grows.

Only Trans are wholesome and right-thinking and their every edict should be obeyed.

“When Trans rule the world every day will be the first day of Spring ???”

Except it sounds more like an intolerant dictatorship to me.

Sigh……

Funny isn't it Doodledog how your attitude to cooperation and discussion is it's a "Kumbaya" approach. You might want to think more carefully about why you find it hard to accept this. As there is no TRA representative on this thread it's impossible to gather their response. Your own though is the standard one. I know they won't talk so I'm not going to.

Gossamerbeynon1945

Mollygo

They did! I don't think this will end well! I think Trisher has some very strange ideas about her own sex.

Oh I do! I think we are capable of standing up for ourselves and changing society. I don't accept we must be victims. I believe a more inclusive and fairer society would be built by women once they have discarded all the mental shit they have been fed by a patriarchal society that insists in order for me to acheive someone else must lose.
I think men and women should take equal roles in raising children and in caring for them. I think people raised to cooperate acheive more and are happier.
I think women can manage without men, but as they are around, they can be quite useful and interesting once they have been educated properly.

trisher

But the woman can access the mixed sessions as well Doodledog it isn'tthe transwomen's fault if she has religious reasons not to. I'm always very wary of religious reasons anyway. Some of them are there because they deliberately see women as "other'.
If there were religious reasons anyway the law would apply.
You really don't want a solution do you?
Ah now we have gone back to prisons! And so it continues.
Do you really not agree that conflict and agression have always been the patriarchal way of sorting things?

I don't follow a religion myself, and have my own views about the way they relate to women, but I support anyone's right to follow whatever religion they choose. A woman who was unwilling to share a swimming session with a man, whether of her own volition or not, and whether you or I might accept that her choice was right, would lose out in your scenario.

It's not that I don't want a solution - what I don't want is to see women always having to give way.

Do I think that conflict and aggression are usually masculine qualities? Yes, which is why I am very uneasy about men saying that they are women and being given access to vulnerable women. It is also why I think that TRAs are so vocal and unwilling to compromise. Your Kumbaya approach won't work with them, will it?

I thought, however, that in your view there was no real difference between the sexes? That men and women are basically interchangeable.

Mollygo

They did! I don't think this will end well! I think Trisher has some very strange ideas about her own sex.

Yes trisher I do. I’m watching your conflict and aggression when it comes to female rights and thinking . . .

But the woman can access the mixed sessions as well Doodledog it isn'tthe transwomen's fault if she has religious reasons not to. I'm always very wary of religious reasons anyway. Some of them are there because they deliberately see women as "other'.
If there were religious reasons anyway the law would apply.
You really don't want a solution do you?
Ah now we have gone back to prisons! And so it continues.
Do you really not agree that conflict and agression have always been the patriarchal way of sorting things?

But I thought it was Stonewall who wanted the change on the medical records in the first place.
I suspect trisher’s ardent support of transwomen rights over female rights may have a deep rooted reason-in which case discussion with them is a waste of time.
It is only my opinion.

Today, Stonewall are complaining the Trans men are missing out on smear tests, because their medical records are changed from F to M.

Yes, it would be lovely to sit and sing Kumbaya, but when there is a situation in which there is no compromise - if one person attends the other can't - then it won't work, will it?

And however much you enjoy provoking people, you won't rattle me with your tit-for-tat insinuations that asking you this question is 'masculine', or that needing sensible rules is somehow perpetuating the patriarchy?.

People need to have a baseline - someone 'refusing to take a side', and being 'astounded' that they need to know their rights is no help whatsoever.

Obviously this was a hypothetical situation, but the bottom line is that you have been given another opportunity to say whether you would put a transwoman's wants above those of a woman's, and yet again you have done so. At best, the woman in your scenario has to give up half of her swimming hour, if she agrees to your compromise solution. The transwoman gains that half hour, as she is able to access the mixed sessions if she wishes.

You might argue that giving up swimming is not a big deal (obviously, I wouldn't), but it is far more serious for the woman who has to share a cell with a transwoman, or for the woman who has English as a second language and doesn't realise that she is a 'body with a vagina', or a 'person with a cervix', so doesn't get her smear test, in case a transwoman takes offence at the term 'Well-woman's clinic'.

These days, there is little time for doctors to see their patients at all, much less an opportunity for them to sit them down nicely and explain that they are no longer 'women', but 'people with cervices'.

Out of interest, who wrote the bible of 'real feminism'? I wasn't aware that there was a root of it, or that there was a vision we should all blindly follow - when did that happen?

Why on earth do I have to "take a side"? It is such a masculine attitude I am astounded. If there was a conflict between a women and a transwomen I would expect to sit them down discuss the problem and reach some sort of compromise. If I couldn't I would refuse to take any side. At the root of real feminism is a vision of seeing things done differently. I realise that doesn't fit your perception of things but that's tough. If it was a swimming session of an hour for example I might suggest that a reasonable compromise for both would be for each to use half of the session so they didn't encounter each other.
You are now going to accuse me of avoiding the issue which will just prove how ingrained the principles of patriachy are.

No, I'm not saying that. I am saying that you are deliberately misunderstanding what Rosie is asking.

She isn't asking about the law - we all know the law. She is asking for you to decide whether, if there is a conflict of interest between a woman and a transwoman, which side would you take? The question has been asked in the context of my post saying that I have never seen you take the side of women over transwomen (or men, for that matter) - a point which I am sure was not lost on you, or on anyone else still bothering to read this.

The "moral" right WTF does that mean?
It's a swimming session and the law is what matters. It isn't "obeying orders" as apparently no one is doing it anyway.
What you seem to be saying is you don't like my answer so you will criticise it. It's dangerous ground to venture onto. My morals, your morals and someone else's morals might all give you different answers, which is why we have laws. You may not like it but it is what matters.

Obfuscation!

No, trisher. That's not what Rosie said. She was asking who you think has the moral right to use the pool.

Hiding behind the law - the 'only obeying orders' defence doesn't answer the question, and I am sure you know it.

I am now responsible for the failure of any other organisation you can find not applying the law or being ignorant of the law.
It seems to me that if what you really want is that these spaces and facilities should be protected, rather than ranting on about transpeople you would be better ensuring, firstly that the law is widely circulated, and secondly that it is applied.

Rosie51 you have tried many times to push me into a corner with your accusations and questions. I have many times on different threads quoted the law which applies
I said this time.
The law is quite clear. If there is a service or facility for women which they would not use if a transwomen was present that service or facility is protected and transwomen (even those with a GRC) cannot use it. _So I would apply the law_
Apparently that still isn't enough for you

I don't recall asking you that question before, I thought I formulated it today, but I've obviously never had an answer if I'm repeating it.