Trans women and single-sex spaces

Doodledog I understand that completely. I have not spoken of trans people losing any rights, I have stated that the rights trans people have as a protected group be respected. That is not the same thing at all. I am listening attentively but I would ask that my views be represented as they are. This is assuming that no one actually wants to take away the rights trans people do have and that isn't what is causing confusion.

Yeah I really wouldn't be following Indias legal advice, this is what I mean about causing damage to people.

Doodledog an excellent post. Thank you for clarity

Luminance

Doodledog I understand that completely. I have not spoken of trans people losing any rights, I have stated that the rights trans people have as a protected group be respected. That is not the same thing at all. I am listening attentively but I would ask that my views be represented as they are. This is assuming that no one actually wants to take away the rights trans people do have and that isn't what is causing confusion.

Right. So as you understand the issue, how would you deal with it? How can the rights of transpeople be respected without taking those same rights from the women who want same-sex spaces?

It is not realistic to compel everyone to instal unisex toilets, and in any case they are not what women are asking for - we want the right to deal with periods and to relieve ourselves privately, without men being present. Many men will prefer not to have to use cubicles as urinals are faster and easier to clean. Biologically men and women are different, and no more so than in their lavatorial needs.

I understand that there are those who want to feel that everything is 'fair' to everyone, and that would be good in an ideal world, but this is one of those situations where it is just not possible, as what is being asked (ie that men can become women by saying they are). It would be less frustrating, therefore, if instead of refusing to engage with the issues and talking vaguely about removing protections or rights, you would say how such protections can be continued whilst still respecting the needs of women. I am sure than nobody on this thread wants to remove protections from anyone, and the implication that we do is very annoying.

Thank you Grandmabatty, and thanks Molly for the India quotes. not the brightest button, is he? I daren't ask what the 'Pee For Me' thing is about.

I don’t understand why women can’t have the empathy to understand that someone who has spent years suffering from gender dysphoria , and has undergone long term irreversible treatment, is now told that they must now suffer even more humiliation.

This law has the potential to make the lot of true trans women a misery. They are not men coming into women’s space.

I was appalled to see women celebrating this yesterday. I am ashamed to be part of this and applaud the people who have protested today.

Doodledog I can only answer honestly in that, I don't know. I know of scenarios and organisations set up where it works well and that there are business and organisations that will find it harder. Personally I feel rather more comfortable in a single enclosed space for performing necessaries. I think it may be up to smaller organisations and businesses simply to do what works to allow everyone to do their jobs and feel comfortable.

Luminance

However gender dysphoria is a real condition. And while biological sex dictates many aspects of a trans persons life, this is a condition that is happening for a biological reason and therefore requires a level of medical care and a level of social acceptance in order for trans people to function in society safely. Society itself must work towards being a "safe space".

Yes, it is a real condition, but those who suffer from it are often the ones who go through major surgery and life-long hormone treatment to enable them to live as they want, or need, to. Most of us have known trans people who have done that and just get on with their lives quietly without drawing attention to themselves.

The transwoman whom I knew (briefly) was beautiful and elegant and talked in such a way as to make you think "This is a woman I would like to get to know" as she talked in the same way as any woman (I mean the way she talked and the things she said, not just the sound of her voice). I would have no hesitation in calling her "her" and in being in a toilet at the same time as her.

Jan Morris was a well-known example of the sort of transwoman who really wanted to be a woman, and came as close as it is ever possible for a biological man to do. Again, I think she definitely deserved to be called "her".

What has caused all the trouble, as others have posted, is the TRAs who have no intention of getting their bits cut off, but just want to dominate women. Some of them cannot make it as male sportsmen, but can beat women most times because they are biological males. Some people seem not to be able to see any difference between these two groups.

You will have to forgive me because again, discussing this issues usually I wouldn't receive a "but" every time I spoke and no one has ever mentioned a "TRA" so this to me does feel extreme in conversation. Is this a subset of gransnet? How does gransnet react in general to trans women? Does everything said get challenged with an essay about "TRA" because it makes me feel uncomfortable when a conversation has to be directed so heavily.

What do you mean by a subset of GN?

As for the comments about TRAs - it is because we want to differentiate between harmless TW and the ones we don't want to share space with that they com up so often.

We used to have a regular poster when couldn't (or refused to understand) when people said that TRAs had made life difficult for the 'quiet' TW. Are you able to see that it is not possible to legislate against one without affecting the other Luminance, and that saying so is not the same as suggesting that TW are 'all the same, which literally nobody is doing?

Ali23

I don’t understand why women can’t have the empathy to understand that someone who has spent years suffering from gender dysphoria , and has undergone long term irreversible treatment, is now told that they must now suffer even more humiliation.

This law has the potential to make the lot of true trans women a misery. They are not men coming into women’s space.

I was appalled to see women celebrating this yesterday. I am ashamed to be part of this and applaud the people who have protested today.

Women can and do have empathy, or sympathy for those suffering from gender dysphoria.
The examples you quote don’t show much empathy for the women harmed by TW.

The damage to those people however, has been, and still is being caused by the TW and TRA who have made true women’s lives a misery, by their threats, and attacks, including the current behaviour that you’re applauding.

Those people who you are applauding for doing to women what TW/TRA have been doing so long.

Men aren’t and never will be women. Why shouldn’t women celebrate the fact that it is now firmly stated in law?

I don’t understand why women can’t have the empathy to understand that someone who has spent years suffering from gender dysphoria , and has undergone long term irreversible treatment, is now told that they must now suffer even more humiliation.

Women are sick to the back teeth of being empathetic, understanding and kind; look where it got them. Our rape crisis centres forced to accept the biological sex that put the women there in the first place. Our changing rooms and toilets forced to accept men. Our prisoners forced to share a cell with men who had rapid, assaulted and abused us but decided that they were now women. Lesbians abused, insulted and attacked for refusing to accept "lady dick". The word "woman" removed from sanitary products for fear of offending men. The words "menstruating women" removed to become "people who bleed". Women have slowly but surely been faded out in too many areas, too many times and we're sick of it. So take your begging for kindness, understanding and empathy to men. Beg them to be kind to the biological men dressed in frocks and high heels and ask them to be more empathetic and understanding.

Well said, Carlotta.

Ali23

I don’t understand why women can’t have the empathy to understand that someone who has spent years suffering from gender dysphoria , and has undergone long term irreversible treatment, is now told that they must now suffer even more humiliation.

This law has the potential to make the lot of true trans women a misery. They are not men coming into women’s space.

I was appalled to see women celebrating this yesterday. I am ashamed to be part of this and applaud the people who have protested today.

Any sympathy at all with the women sexually abused in prison because an intact male was housed with them? Or maybe the sportswomen who have lost prizes and prize money to transwomen? What about those women who have requested same sex intimate care and are then 'cared for' by a transwoman who is not the same sex as them? Maybe the women with religious obligations that prevent them from mixing with men not related to them, do you care that they have to self exclude when transwomen are present?

Sex is fixed at conception. All the Supreme Court has done is confirmed that sex means biological sex in the Equality Act. Protection for gender reassignment is a separate category to protect transgender people. They have the same protections from discrimination as anybody else. Transwomen are male, you can't be a transwoman if you're female.

I'm a slow typist, you've said it much better Carlotta

I accept that all happened Carlotta and am glad much is to change:

but no, I won't withdraw my empathy, concern, and kindness from my friend and others from the quiet lives and the dilemmas that I have spoken of upthread.

Well said Wyllow3

I think it's perfectly possible to have empathy with people like your friend, Wyllow whilst still having clear boundaries about what we will accept when it comes to personal space.

If men would be more accepting of the wishes of TW, and if TRAs would show empathy to women, everyone's rights could be protected.

Carlotta and Rosie many thanks for clear, concise posts on how we got here.
Wyllow so far as I can see, no one here is withdrawing empathy for ‘the quiet lives’. That’s not and never was the issue.

‘Sex is fixed at conception. All the Supreme Court has done is confirmed that sex means biological sex in the Equality Act. Protection for gender reassignment is a separate category to protect transgender people. They have the same protections from discrimination as anybody else. Transwomen are male, you can't be a transwoman if you're female.’

So why don’t we all agree that facilities can be labelled female and TW?
Why cause such angst amongst the trans women who are just asking to live their lives?

Seems to me that it is an issue that has lurched from too far one way to two far the other way and now needs to find the sensible middle ground.

You don’t have to withdraw your empathy concern and kindness from your friend etc.
No one has asked that. The evidence on here is that posters do feel for those trans harmed by the actions of TRA or ill-intentioned TIM.

But where is the sympathy or empathy for those mentioned by Rosie51?

Any sympathy at all with the women sexually abused in prison because an intact male was housed with them? Or maybe the sportswomen who have lost prizes and prize money to transwomen? What about those women who have requested same sex intimate care and are then 'cared for' by a transwoman who is not the same sex as them? Maybe the women with religious obligations that prevent them from mixing with men not related to them, do you care that they have to self exclude when transwomen are present?

No.
Instead we see people being applauded for protesting against the truth. People being praised for weeing in public. All because of the legal confirmation that only biological females are women and that women are entitled to safe spaces, sports etc, free from males however they deifine themselves.

Seems to me that it is an issue that has lurched from too far one way to two far the other way and now needs to find the sensible middle ground.

Well that's got off to a good start hasn't it? Men dressed in frocks and high heels exposing themselves to piss in public en massè? Men like inndia Willoughby inciting men to go out and demonstrate and demand they be allowed access to women's spaces? Now I would have hoped that this would have been the optimal time for trans people to have demanded for their own safe spaces but no; they want ours. Far easier, as demonstrated on a few posts on this thread, to ask women to move over, make room for men, be kind, be tolerant and understanding. It's regrettable that there will be some trans people who, though quiet and peaceable, are suffering fear and apprehension but that's exactly what vulnerable women have been living with for years. C'est la vie.

Trans rights protesters have defaced a statue of suffragette Millicent Fawcett as thousands took to the streets of London to defend trans rights in the wake of the Supreme Court's gender ruling.

The menz are upset. But be tolerant, kind and understanding towards them because they're actually laydees.

At least two statues in the square were vandalised during Saturday's rally, with police now investigating after they revealed a total of seven statues had been defaced during the day of action - which saw activists take to the streets across the UK.

The statue of the suffragette was scrawled with "f** rights" on the banner grasped by the figure.
Meanwhile "trans rights are human rights" was spray-painted onto the plinth of South African military leader Jan Christian Smuts.

Not given this much thought have they; if they end up going to jail, they'll be banged up with the men!