What is a lesbian?

I see it as a form of passive aggressive bullying. I may of course be wrong

There has been no bullying from VS- she has tried to explain that trans people can change sex, not genetically, but in every other way. And that they are no risk or danger to other women. And also that some lesbians can be attracted to those trans women- and remain lesbians.

If there is one person who is being bullied here, it is not the one who left. My last post on this subject.

Iam64

I see it as a form of passive aggressive bullying. I may of course be wrong

Me too. It’s all about the DARVO, isn’t it? Deny the bullying, Attack those who speak out (being careful not to name them) then Reverse the Victim and Offender, so that anyone pointing out that it is going on is cast in the role of the bully.

It’s so obvious, and has gone on for so long that it’s hard to believe it’s still happening. We all know people who have left GN because of it - people with a lot to contribute - but nothing is done.

Galaxy

There is another transwoman whose name I always forget namsnanny, holds similar views to Debbie Hayton but very funny as well. Name begins with B I think. The name will come to me.

Do you mean Blaire White?

Fleurpepper

There has been no bullying from VS

In your opinion which is as valid as any other opinions which say there has been.*

she has tried to explain that trans people can change sex,
despite the fact that it isn’t true and dressing it up with lots of words doesn’t make it true

And that they are no risk or danger to other women.

And it has been explained on here, time and time again that it isn’t those TW who are a cause for concern, but the TW and TRA who threaten females, cheat and lie in order to harm females who are so worrying.

And also that some lesbians can be attracted to those trans women- and remain lesbians.

That’s her opinion, and may well be shared by some lesbians, but isn’t shared by all and is seen as damaging by those lesbians who do not accept that TW are anything except males.

In any case, what does insisting that a TW (male) can attend an event where his presence has been specifically excluded say about the behaviour of TW? Definitely bullying by those TW and their supporters.

Fleurpepper

There has been no bullying from VS- she has tried to explain that trans people can change sex, not genetically, but in every other way. And that they are no risk or danger to other women. And also that some lesbians can be attracted to those trans women- and remain lesbians.

If there is one person who is being bullied here, it is not the one who left. My last post on this subject.

she has tried to explain that trans people can change sex, not genetically, but in every other way

How is that possible?

It's not.

FarNorth

Galaxy

There is another transwoman whose name I always forget namsnanny, holds similar views to Debbie Hayton but very funny as well. Name begins with B I think. The name will come to me.

Do you mean Blaire White?

There was someone on the Gender Wars TV programme who is a transwoman who is good friends with a radical feminist lesbian, as both of them is able to respect the other. The transwoman understands that he is and always will be male, and made the point that a woman hearing his voice in a Ladies' loo or changing room might be disconcerted, as well as an understanding of other connected issues. More of that understanding and less shouting and shutting down would go a long way to further the cause of those who are not looking for trouble.

If anyone missed Gender Wars it is available here. There was a thread about it at the time.
www.channel4.com/programmes/gender-wars

Does anyone know where and when this nonsense all started, the first time someone said a man could change sex and be a woman?

If we could turn back time and there'd been a resounding NO, just think how much better our world would be for heterosexual women, lesbians and the trans gender community.

I wonder if those who kept silent at the time, those who were in a position to be heard, regret their silence. Maybe they thought it was all so ridiculous, it would burn itself out. If only that had been the case.

Smileless2012

Does anyone know where and when this nonsense all started, the first time someone said a man could change sex and be a woman?

If we could turn back time and there'd been a resounding NO, just think how much better our world would be for heterosexual women, lesbians and the trans gender community.

I wonder if those who kept silent at the time, those who were in a position to be heard, regret their silence. Maybe they thought it was all so ridiculous, it would burn itself out. If only that had been the case.

Well as men have been passing as women and women as men since time immemorial I'm not sure exactly what you mean Smileless2012.
Do you mean when the genetic evidence was first produced?
Because there had been transpeople before that.
The first sex change clinic recorded was in 1930's Germany and you can guess what happened to that. I suppose one of the problems transpeople have is that each time they have tried to gain acceptance, and thought they were taking steps forward there has been a massive backlash. Perhaps that's what some see happening now. There has been a massive swing to the right so I understand anyone with such fears.

I mean the belief by some that it is possible to change sex Glorianny.

There is an acceptance of trans people but what isn't generally accepted is they can change their sex. Sex change surgery changes the body, removing male genitalia and creating female genitalia for trans women.

Hormones and breast implants to provide a man with the outward appearance of a woman, but that doesn't make a man into a woman.

Surgical procedures and hormonal treatment that enables a trans man to have the outward appearance of a man, doesnt make a woman into a man.

I feel sorry for the trans community because of the backlash that a small minority of TRA's and TW has, and continues to create.

I don't see this as a left/right dichotomy at all. there are as many authoritarian left wing regimes as right wing ones, so a simplistic 'authoritarian=right/libertarian=left' doesn't hold water, and feels like a dig at those of us with both left wing and biological realist views. Boris Johnson is a libertarian, but hardly left wing, and Mao was authoritarian but not on the right. But we've had that discussion before.

I agree that there have been occasional (recorded) instances of people 'passing' as the opposite sex, but that is not what Smileless is asking. What is now called 'transgender' used to be known as 'transexual', and that shift, I think, heralded the start of the misogynist approach to male entitlement. Sex is easy to prove in the vast majority of cases, but so-called 'gender' exists in the mind, so cannot be proven. It is, anyway, a nebulous concept, which changes across culture, time and place.

There was a time when it might have been possible to have men and women, girls and boys, all able to choose the behaviours and preferences that suited their personalities with nobody telling them that a preference for pink is 'female' and liking Meccano is 'male', so if they enjoy these things they are 'in the wrong body' and should 'transition'. When my children were babies and children (in the 90s) I don't remember any of the angst that children now are put through. Everyone I knew, plus the staff at the schools they went to, were tolerant of boys who wanted to be princesses and girls who wanted to be Power Rangers. They were encouraged to fulfil their own potential regardless of sex, and 'gender' seemed to be becoming less relevant. I don't know why that didn't continue to be encouraged, but at some point the 'authentic self' thing became fashionable, gender stereotyping really took off, and brought with it the mess we are now in.

Smileless2012
I feel sorry for the trans community because of the backlash that a small minority of TRA's and TW has, and continues to create.

This is so true.
Also, reading Glorianny’s posts saying people have been trans for ages endorses the truth of that statement.
Any rational person would admit that it is the actions of those TRA and the small but vocal number of TW, which have brought trans existence to the headlines and not in a good way.
Before the trouble caused by the small minority of trans-and the actions of any TRA, trans-weren’t insisting that they had the right to cheat and lie in female sports, or make it obvious that they were male in female Safe Spaces, or claiming that they had changed sex which gave them rights that belong to females.

There is a difference between " men have been passing as women and women as men since time immemorial" and the fact that has been stated over and over again - that people cannot change their sex, they can only change the way they present themselves and the way that their sex is perceived by others. The result of their changing these things is that they pass for the opposite sex.

If they wish to pass, then no-one is stopping them from doing so, and the vast majority of people will treat them as they wish to be treated. A few will not, because they just cannot accept the changes - just as a few of the trans people cannot accept that when a woman says she does not want someone who has all their male parts to be in what to her is a safe all-female, non-male place, then she means exactly what she says.

Doodledog

I don't see this as a left/right dichotomy at all. there are as many authoritarian left wing regimes as right wing ones, so a simplistic 'authoritarian=right/libertarian=left' doesn't hold water, and feels like a dig at those of us with both left wing and biological realist views. Boris Johnson is a libertarian, but hardly left wing, and Mao was authoritarian but not on the right. But we've had that discussion before.

I agree that there have been occasional (recorded) instances of people 'passing' as the opposite sex, but that is not what Smileless is asking. What is now called 'transgender' used to be known as 'transexual', and that shift, I think, heralded the start of the misogynist approach to male entitlement. Sex is easy to prove in the vast majority of cases, but so-called 'gender' exists in the mind, so cannot be proven. It is, anyway, a nebulous concept, which changes across culture, time and place.

There was a time when it might have been possible to have men and women, girls and boys, all able to choose the behaviours and preferences that suited their personalities with nobody telling them that a preference for pink is 'female' and liking Meccano is 'male', so if they enjoy these things they are 'in the wrong body' and should 'transition'. When my children were babies and children (in the 90s) I don't remember any of the angst that children now are put through. Everyone I knew, plus the staff at the schools they went to, were tolerant of boys who wanted to be princesses and girls who wanted to be Power Rangers. They were encouraged to fulfil their own potential regardless of sex, and 'gender' seemed to be becoming less relevant. I don't know why that didn't continue to be encouraged, but at some point the 'authentic self' thing became fashionable, gender stereotyping really took off, and brought with it the mess we are now in.

If you could provide me with details of any society where sexual differences were as widely accepted as in 1930s Germany and where that acceptance was shut down by a left wing government I would be pleased to agree.
This is the story of the clinic It opened in 1919
www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-forgotten-history-of-the-worlds-first-trans-clinic/

I'm confused by your post Glorianny because Doodledog hasn't claimed the acceptance of sexual differences has been shut down by a left wing government.

Smileless2012

I'm confused by your post Glorianny because Doodledog hasn't claimed the acceptance of sexual differences has been shut down by a left wing government.

Doodledog
said I don't see this as a left/right dichotomy at all. there are as many authoritarian left wing regimes as right wing ones, so a simplistic 'authoritarian=right/libertarian=left' doesn't hold water
There is substantial evidence that the most varied and libertarian society in the world was in Berlin in the 1930s. This was shut down by the right wing Nazi regime, that sent what it considered deviants to the gas chambers. I simply asked for evidence of a similar operation by a left wing government

Yes I know what she said which is why I queried your post Glorianny because she didn't say the acceptance of sexual differences has been shut down by a left wing government, so why have you asked her for one.

Apologies if I'm being a bit thick, but I still don't understand.

Oooh we’re back to diverting into Nazis again. Sorry the CT scan got in the way.

Glorianny you’ve obviously researched this thoroughly to make your point. Are you able to give some evidence of where any TW you mention from long ago, behaved as badly towards females as some are now, and also any support by an earlier version of TRA if it existed?
TIA

Thanks, Smileless. I didn't say any such thing. I know that, but it's good to have it corroborated. It can feel like posting through the looking glass on here at times.

Thank you Doodledog I was beginning to think I'd lost the plot.

No, you’re not. What I said was that biological realism versus a belief that TWAW is not a left/right dichotomy. I made no reference to the Nazis or to any other ideologies as I don’t see political ‘wings’ as being relevant. To me this debate is more about misogyny versus feminism than about big or small state, and as I said, authoritarian regimes happen on both sides of the left/right axis. I think that a lot of talk about ‘right’ and ‘left’ is based on political naïveté and a misunderstanding of the terminologies, but as I say, that has been discussed on previous threads, and is not directly relevant to the OP.

I will, however, point to Russia and the former Soviet Union as evidence that being nominally left wing does not equate to tolerance of any deviation from heterosexuality as default.

What you actually mean Doodledog is that repressive regimes tend to clamp down on minorities, which is true. However the link with Nazi atrocities and the history of transpeople and homosexuals is absolutely clear. Russians have also repressed religions, including Judaism, but you would be unlikely to draw parallels between that and the Holocaust. So why are you unable to consider that one of the reasons transpeople have become militant is because they are more aware of their history?

The word transvestite was coined by the doctor who opened the sex clinic in Berlin. Some trans people still accept it, some think it links too closely to cross dressing and some reject it totally.

Gloryannie, Berlin in the 1930’s was hardly a safe space for anyone. I’m puzzled at the frequency with which you introduce the Nazi’s into debates.
I’m with Doodledog and others in seeing this debate as more about misogyny versus feminism. If we are reflecting on belief systems, the extreme left is like the extreme right imo, oppressive and inflexible

Xposted with you there glory
Here you go again, telling Doodledog ‘what she actually means ‘