Hadley Freeman on Self ID of gender in The Guardian

One of the things that really bothers me about this campaign is the closeness of some of its aims to restrictions placed upon women by some religions. It seems to me to be a short step from 'safe places for women" to "places for women" meaning that they are restricted to certain areas. I realise that the organisers probably have no intentions of such results but sometimes things take on a life of their own. I think that providing any sort of amunition to those who think women are different and need to be kept seperate both for their own protection and men's is very dangerous.

Oh trisher it's far more complex than that - it isn't just about protection - it's about what a woman IS. I'm not going to not fight self ID because it might give ammunition to certain religions. That issue is there whatever happens to self id. Women ARE different from men and in some circumstances need safe spaces and sex differentiated provision of services. We also need privacy and dignity in certain specifically sex related situations regardless of our religious beliefs. Thats not dangerous. What is dangerous is the behaviour of the Cardiff Hotel- its clearly been got at by the TRA - apparently they are hosting the StoneWall conference shortly so I expect they threatened to cancel and that was worth more money than the Woman's Place meeting.

So do you not see any danger in this maryeliza54 ? Complex it may be, but the parrallels with what is already happening in some groups in society are so many. I think any action which tries to seperate women risks giving credibiliy to the idea that women and men must be kept apart and the concept that men are unable to control themselves.
I would point out that in the cases of medical treatment it is already possiible to refuse to be treated by anyone without giving any reason. You simply have to ask to see someone else

ALL places should ideally be safe for everyone. That is one of the things that civilisation is all about. We are prevented from driving our car without a driving licence, road tax and insurance, and we shouldn't drink and drive. That is to make the roads safe from drunken or reckless incompetent idiots (or to try to). We are prevented from keeping a gun without a licence, to stop the discontented from massacring whole classrooms and dance halls full. For these safety measures the drivers and gun-owners have no choice.

We also supply safe houses where women who have experienced partner violence^ can choose^ to be away from their violent partners. The partners do not have the choice to go there. We have separate shower, toilet and changing facilities, where women in a state of undress do not have men eyeballing them. Men do not have a choice to go there, until the introduction of this self-identification process

In this age of equality, it is sometimes forgotten that even the mildest man has a weapon that a woman does not possess, and it is one which can, in the wrong hands, be used against women (and against weaker and vulnerable men)

Being safe has an emotional as well as physical dimension doesn’t it? Take the women’s refuge - if you arrive traumatised and beaten at the hands of a man, I think emotionally you would feel safer not having a man there to greet you and help you no matter how much you were assured he was perfectly safe and lovely

I do not think that there is a real problem with the acceptance of TG women except in the field of competitive sport, where someone with a male physique has an obvious advantage. The TG weightlifter Laura Hubbard has had to retire from the Commonwealth Games competition because of injury but her elligibilty was already being questioned, and I can understand why.

edition.cnn.com/2018/04/11/sport/laurel-hubbard-weightlifter-injury-retirement-eligibility-debate-spt/index.html

It seems to me that the posters on this thread have shown that they are sympathetic to true transgender people.
It seems that self IDing by all and sundry is an invitation to “troubled” souls to jump on the bandwagon. Seems scary to me.
It surprises me a bit because I thought I was very tolerant of the different roles the sexes these days.

Maybe the young man in the toilets was only on lesson3 of How to be a Women.?
Protocol in the ladies.
Lesson 4- ideas anyone?

On the other hand you could meet at a women's refuge a woman who was agressive and violent maryeliza54. There are women who have to be removed from refuges because they disturb or threaten other residents. Women sometimes have to be protected from other women.
The idea that a penis is a weapon Elegran indicates that you believe violence is sex related, in fact like rape it is more to do with power.
I am not saying all men are perfect just that we need to keep a sense of balance and the tiny numbers of men this might involve can be dealt with.

Only some men use sex as a weapon/power, Trisher, but then, in this country only some people use a gun as a weapon, As the saying goes, "Power grows out of the barrel of a gun".

Tbh one bearded young man lounging about in the womens loos with a phone in hand saying ‘he identifies as a woman’
Will be the tip of the iceberg if this SI thing is not challenged right now.
The appointment of Lily Madigan was a PC move and a ludicrous one.
As others say, there is a world of difference between a man undergoing all the necessary changes to become ‘a woman’
And SI.

The vast majority of physical and sexual violence across the globe is carried out by men - they are usually bigger and stronger and have PENISES. Some raped women have horrific internal injuries. I’ll post the link to a Scottish case

www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/10-years-keeps-him-streets-12338476

Given that 1 in 4 women will endure domestic violence in their life and two women a week are murdered by their partners, I think there is good reason for women to be fearful of men, whether they present as men or SI as (male-bodied) women. It seems to me that there are an awful lot of violent men out there, unless we are to believe it is only a few men who are perpetrating all the DV that occurs. The irony is that male-bodied transgender women who commit DV are noted down in statistics as crimes perpetrated by women.

Rape is well-acknowledged as a weapon of war, as history tells us, so yes, a penis can certainly be regarded as a weapon in some situations.

I don't believe there's any danger that safe spaces for women could morph into restrictions on women. We have separate male and female wards in hospitals (and there is currently an investigation going on into reported sexual assaults on mixed-sex psychiatric wards) and we have women's refuges. Neither of these place restrictions on women, that I'm aware of.

trisher, you don't seem to have got the point of this. It's not just about safe spaces, it's about men saying they are women just because they 'feel' like one, and vice versa. It's not about people with true gender dysphoria. It's ignoring basic biology. It's ludicrous. It's intimidating. It's any number of things, but most of all it's lies masquerading as truth.

Maryeliza54 I know the patient involved in the case you mentioned earlier of a women who requested a female to perform a smear test. I've spoken of it before on here, though the veracity of my post was doubted at the time. The story later appeared in the Sunday Times - I think they'd smell a rat if it wasn't true!

Sue I’m 100% certain the story is true. Meanwhile, over on MN HQ have decided to hide all the Feminst threads because there was too much discussion on trans issues. Apparently it’s for a trial period until everything calms down but over in the twitter sphere there are celebratory tweets from TRAs ( the same people who got the Cardiff event cancelled). The world is going mad - I feel slightly discombobulated this evening by the MN saga.

Sorry Sue meant to say I was always 100% sure etc

Thanks, Maryliza.

Wow at MN - more silencing of women??

Sue , I’d seen it in the Times before you reported it so always believed you.

Well GN silences left-wingers, if by other means.
Some injuries during rape are not caused by penises but by the use of other items-horrific yes but not a normal occurrence and most men would be as revolted as anyone else. And men are raped as well.
In fact the murder rate for men in the UK is almost 3 times that of women.
www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/articles/homicideinenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2017
I am not saying that men are not violent, some men are. But providing safe spaces for women implies that the only way to deal with that violence is to hide somewhere and be protected. I think everyone male or female should be able to live peacefully and in order to do that the causes of violence need to be tackled and proper treatment for the violent provided.

I haven't noticed GN silencing left-wingers. There is more silencing of the kind of extreme right wing nonsense that sometime erupts - it is quickly reported and deleted. Advocacy for social and financial reforms to improve the lot of disadvantaged citizens (and non-citizens who are living amongst us) don't get attacked or deleted.

Can't discuss that -but 3 left all at once didn't they? You have to wonder why? And they are silenced.

Derail alert⚠️⚠️

Most Gransnetters support transexuals in their very difficult circumstances, and appreciate how long and painful the surgical/medical transition is. With the proposals for self-identification and changing a birth certificate we are faced with a quantum leap in the length of that transition and in the amount of discomfort required to "earn" it, and crucially there will be no medical input.

There are safeguards proposed - and it is to be earnestly hoped that applicants will be required at the very least to have read and understood all the details, preferably with expert advice on hand.

A six-month cooling-off period is proposed, during which the decision can be cancelled, and after that there would be provision to cancel it ONCE. Fears of people changing back and forward frequently and thoroughly confusing the certification paper-trail are unfounded

What some people are concerned about is that it may not be taken seriously by a few. What if a teenager who is still experimenting with his/her sexuality and has a temporary same-sex "pash" commits his/herself to such a life-changing decision? What if some drunken bridegroom at a stag do is persuaded by his friends to self-certificate himself as female? What if a randy chancer self-certificates to gain access to a women's prison, a nunnery, a female hospital ward, a care home, a home for the disabled?

These possibilities, and proposed safeguards against them, are not mentioned in the consultation document I posted a link to earlier, despite that being in general a very good account of what is proposed and what happens in other countries.

Elegran that’s from the Scottish consultation isn’t it? We haven’t had one yet