Is JK Rowling pushing the boundaries too far?

You can think people can't change sex. You can say people can't change sex. But in the workplace you show respect to others.
It's not just thinking it or saying it, it is scientific fact that you cannot change sex. You can have surgeries that will approximate external sex characteristics of the opposite sex, and take opposite sex hormones but not one cell in your body is changed. No mammal has the ability to change sex, we're not clownfish. Showing respect shouldn't mean I have to pretend that someone has changed their sex, and accommodate them in what were single sex spaces. I will use the preferred name but may avoid third person pronouns as far as possible. Gender always used to be a "polite" way of indicating sex. Against the category "gender" there'd be options to tick M for male, F for female. Hundreds of genders is a nonsense, they're personalities not genders. There are about 4 billion males in the world, about 4 billion females and 8 billion different personalities.

What JK Rowling said has by no means been forgotten, because she speaks for far more than a small minority. I don't think I have heard one woman say that she was wrong to speak up. Many have said that they agree with her.

Elegran

What JK Rowling said has by no means been forgotten, because she speaks for far more than a small minority. I don't think I have heard one woman say that she was wrong to speak up. Many have said that they agree with her.

It's wishful thinking. I see posts elsewhere that say the majority of women accept transwomen as being every bit as much women as themselves. In fact they're very often more woman than real women. I think there's a belief that if it's said often enough it will become true. A bit like the chant of old, TWAW no debate.

Rosie51 I find your post saddens me, it signals the demise of the true definition of women, the misogynists are on their way to the finishing line with a win…

GrannyGravy13

I agree Smileless2012

I have asked Glorianny a question several times on this thread to no avail.

I can only draw two conclusions
, 1) to answer truthfully would mean agreeing with me

2) I am being gaslit (which I guess is an achievement in itself)

Yes GrannyGravy. Refusing to respond usually means you can’t, without agreeing or admitting the truth of what has been said. Probably what is happening here.

GrannyGravy13

Rosie51 I find your post saddens me, it signals the demise of the true definition of women, the misogynists are on their way to the finishing line with a win…

I actually think the world is waking up to the insidious creep of the erasing of woman as a sex category that doesn't include men. It may not happen quickly but I do hope there will be a row back. At least some sporting associations are now saying any participant who has experienced a male puberty cannot compete in the female class. Most of the general public can recognise the total unfairness of letting men identify into women's sport. I can't remember exactly which health article it was but I read one recently that used the term woman, and added "and transmen or non-binary" That one always amuses, to say you're non-binary because you don't identify with the binary actually creates a new binary!

Rosie51

Elegran

What JK Rowling said has by no means been forgotten, because she speaks for far more than a small minority. I don't think I have heard one woman say that she was wrong to speak up. Many have said that they agree with her.

It's wishful thinking. I see posts elsewhere that say the majority of women accept transwomen as being every bit as much women as themselves. In fact they're very often more woman than real women. I think there's a belief that if it's said often enough it will become true. A bit like the chant of old, TWAW no debate.

You see that said on other social media sites?

You referred to the extension of language in your post @ 16.07 Glorianny but I don't see the erosion substitution of language as an extension.

Several weeks ago on a program discussing endometriosis, a doctor didn't say women, she said "people who bleed". That's not extending language or being inclusive, it's a ridiculous example of how our language is being changed for the sake of the minority of a minority group.

I also believe that JK Rowling is speaking for the vast majority of women, and not just women but men too. People with common sense who refuse to be silenced by threats and abuse because they dare to state biological truth.

Smileless2012 I totally agree 👏👏👏

People who bleed ! Surely that’s all of us. Endometriosis only affects women so far as I know

GrannyGravy13

Rosie51 I find your post saddens me, it signals the demise of the true definition of women, the misogynists are on their way to the finishing line with a win…

How can a transwoman ever be "more of a woman" than a woman?

You cannot be "more" of a biological fact - you either are a woman or you are not.

Does the transwoman mean their appearance is more that of a woman (than a woman's), and if so - which woman, or do they mean all women? - or is it their feefees they're talking about?

I've never heard such nonsense in my life.

We are being challenged - in more ways than we realise.

Back in the dark ages people went along with their feelings, rumours and fears. Women were kept by their men in the kitchen, or used as whores, the healers burnt or drowned as witches.

Then with the dawn of the scientific age, the population became enlightened. All manner of things were discovered, explained and explored.

By the late 20th century women had access to all areas of education, business, workplaces and equal pay for an equal job as the next man.

Then for some inexplicable reason a small group (mainly men) decided that they disagreed with the medical world and if a man wanted to be a woman he could be and vice versa.

Not content with invading our female only spaces, they wanted to compete in our sports categories. Now they want to erase the word female and replace it with those who bleed along with chest feeders and the new in word girl dick

I can only assume that the rise of women has made some men feel emasculated and afraid, and that the only way to beat us is to infiltrate our spaces and put us back in our place

Of course the above is just my theoretical perspective of the current situation, but I do not think I am far off of the mark…

GG13, your post gave me the chills. I have one grandaughter aged five - when she was born we were all delighted, not that the five boys aren’t adored of course. She’s a joy, full of life and feisty. We want that maintained .

Where do you see that " the majority of women accept transwomen as being every bit as much women as themselves" Rosie51 ? That would seem to me to indicate that MORE people should be repeating what JK Rowling said so as to keep it on record that not everyone agrees with that.

As for them seeming to be "very often more woman than real women", that is because they are over-emphasising the outward appearance and trappings of womanliness, whereas "real women" don't need to over-egg the pudding.

I couldn't agree more, GG13. The trans movement is both patriarchal and homophobic, and if not resisted will push the cause of women and gay people of both sexes back a very long way.

fancythat

Rosie51

Elegran

What JK Rowling said has by no means been forgotten, because she speaks for far more than a small minority. I don't think I have heard one woman say that she was wrong to speak up. Many have said that they agree with her.

It's wishful thinking. I see posts elsewhere that say the majority of women accept transwomen as being every bit as much women as themselves. In fact they're very often more woman than real women. I think there's a belief that if it's said often enough it will become true. A bit like the chant of old, TWAW no debate.

You see that said on other social media sites?

A bit like the chant of old, TWAW no debate.

You do have to question the arrogance of an individual who demands that a matter in which millions of others are involved is banned from debate.

Even more conceited is the fact that such individuals want to identify as that demographic, yet insists it should not have a voice.

Worse, these individuals are - as someone else pointed out - a minority of a minority.

And organisations, businesses, governmental departments are falling over themselves to accommodate their stifling of free speech - going along with the cancelling, no-platforming, etc.

Why can't someone stand up and say that transwomen have the same human rights as everyone else, but not more and certainly not the right to insist that you can alter the trillions of human cells and there's no debate on the matter - without being challenged?

It was Shylock (definitely a man) in "The Merchant of Venice who said "If you prick us, do we not bleed?" Has new legislation been passed preventing men from bleeding ?

(There is no need for anyone to point out that he was defending himself, as a Jew, against being "othered". I am aware of that!! He was, however, a Jewish man not a Jewish woman )

GrannyGravy13

Back in the dark ages people went along with their feelings, rumours and fears. Women were kept by their men in the kitchen, or used as whores, the healers burnt or drowned as witches.

Then with the dawn of the scientific age, the population became enlightened. All manner of things were discovered, explained and explored.

By the late 20th century women had access to all areas of education, business, workplaces and equal pay for an equal job as the next man.

Then for some inexplicable reason a small group (mainly men) decided that they disagreed with the medical world and if a man wanted to be a woman he could be and vice versa.

Not content with invading our female only spaces, they wanted to compete in our sports categories. Now they want to erase the word female and replace it with those who bleed along with chest feeders and the new in word girl dick

I can only assume that the rise of women has made some men feel emasculated and afraid, and that the only way to beat us is to infiltrate our spaces and put us back in our place

Of course the above is just my theoretical perspective of the current situation, but I do not think I am far off of the mark…

I can only assume that the rise of women has made some men feel emasculated and afraid, and that the only way to beat us is to infiltrate our spaces and put us back in our place

I think this is exactly how some men feel - with the emphasis on some.

Only I don't believe they want to put us back in our place, rather to eradicate the very notion of woman as an entity. Maybe that's why they are not content to simply identify as women, they want to replace us.

And changing the language is part of that process - eliminating the word "woman" from it completely.

Smileless2012

If you find something unpleasant then you should say Glorianny because posting something unpleasant in response does nothing for your argument.

I did say so with a clear explanation of why.
I was told I misunderstood the poem. This is a poem I have known for almost 50 years.
Some people applauded the fact that I was told I misunderstood the poem.
I asked for an explanation of the poem from Doodledog who avoided the question then contradicted her assertion that I misunderstood, by some remark about understanding being in the mind. Which is certainly true of some poetry, but not of this one, which is an expression of regret from someone who watched others being suppressed by the Nazis, and didn't say anything because he didn't like those people, and was then imprisoned himself.
It is disrespectful to his memory to claim any other understanding of it. It's a poem of regret.

It must be 'unusual' to have such absolute confidence in one's own ability to be absolutely right about absolutely everything. I think it would be exhausting.

I did not avoid the question, however. I addressed it by acknowledging that there is a school of theoretical thought that forwards the reader over the author, but gave my opinion that in the case of this poem (which I believe is displayed in the Holocaust Museum) there is a widespread interpretation that it is a warning about the 'creep' of totalitarianism and how it is necessary to nip it in the bud before it is too late. I then showed how it could be relevant to the situation JKR finds herself in.

To paraphrase you, Glorianny, if you aren't able to understand my post, there is no more I can do to help you.

Apparently I haven't said what rights transpeople are denied.
Well read the thread

Transmen have to comply with any designation you decide. The fact that they have cervixes but don't want to be called women can't be recognised. The fact that they bleed can't be recognised. The fact that they give birth can't be recognised.

The really really weird thing is that you seem to attribute all this to men. There are no men involved as far as your beliefs are concerned. These are women according to your belief in sex. But somehow they have become women who haven't a voice. It's not only weird it's illogical. If you believe all women matter than those transmen are women who matter.

And all this is conducted with some sort of strange evangelical voice which blames tranwomen for everything. And labels anyone who speaks up for transpeople as misogynistic.

I am as always absolutely astounded at the abuse the wrong sort of women get on these threads. And you don't reserve this for transwomen. Transmen and any woman who advocates freedom of expression and consideration are all lined up and condemned.
It's illogical, it's untrue and it's ridiculous.
At least try to get somethings sorted.
If transmen are women why can't they be called what they ask?
and what on earth has that to do with transwomen?

Doodledog

I did not avoid the question, however. I addressed it by acknowledging that there is a school of theoretical thought that forwards the reader over the author, but gave my opinion that in the case of this poem (which I believe is displayed in the Holocaust Museum) there is a widespread interpretation that it is a warning about the 'creep' of totalitarianism and how it is necessary to nip it in the bud before it is too late. I then showed how it could be relevant to the situation JKR finds herself in.

To paraphrase you, Glorianny, if you aren't able to understand my post, there is no more I can do to help you.

About the poem (which has many versions)
Regardless of his exact words, Niemöller’s message remained consistent: he declared that through silence, indifference, and inaction, Germans had been complicit in the Nazi imprisonment, persecution, and murder of millions of people. He felt that it was particularly egregious that he and other German Protestant church leaders, whom he believed had positions of moral authority, chose to remain silent.

Today, the quote has entered public discourse and popular culture. It is variously referred to as a poem, a confession, or an aphorism. The quote is also frequently adapted and rewritten as a political tool, _often in ways that are not in keeping with Niemöller's original intentions_.
The last words are so true.

I haven’t commented on TIW Glorianny, any more than I’ve taken part in your earlier sweeping, untrue statement.
As far as I’m aware TIW are not part of those trans who lie and cheat to the detriment of females and/or are violent towards females supported by you, as are those TIM who do all or any of those things.
It is interesting to see such wriggling-avoidance of answering and twisting of wording to make it say what you want.

However all that won’t make it true that humans can change sex.
It wont stop it being true that some TIM are guilty of lying and cheating in a manner harmful to females.
It won’t stop it being true that TIM and their TRA counterparts threaten and carry out violence to females, or anyone else who speaks the biological truth.
I haven’t made this a question, to save you not answering. Just stated facts.

Niemoller is arguing against apathy and the outcome of staying silent - the creeping "normalcy" of the whole trans issue needs to be challenged by those who disagree. "No debate" silences all opinions and contributions except from those who are demanding total submission. That does not constitute a healthy community.