214 posts
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Post by paulbrownsey on Jun 29, 2020 11:02:28 GMT
Totally normal experiences of growing up - so many girls have a passionate sparkles-and-pink-dresses phase that they just as passionately reject a couple of years later! - turned into an identity crisis. It's a very telling piece - I think for many kids this is the fall-out from the pink and blue aisles toyshops started bringing in about 20 years ago, to the horror of many women, especially feminists (I remember writing to a middle class catalogue I'd been sent for listing nature kits and building toys on pages designated 'for boys' and endless manicure, glitter and beautification crap on the pages 'for girls'.). And I really think the role of fanfiction and fansites hasn't been properly looked into for its role in shaping these teenagers' thinking. I noticed a few years ago that many at the younger end were starting to call themselves 'trans' - my initial thought was, are these particular fandoms very appealing to that group, in the way that Doctor Who had a very gay fandom, but there were so very many that it was clear there was something else going on. And I do think it has a similar pattern to the surge then clampdown on 'pro-ana' sites: chest-binding has come in to fill that space for teenage girls uncomfortable with their changing bodies and the attention and expectations they bring. Good point. Someone whose son is now in his thirties told me that when he was a toddler, things like dungarees for kids were unsexed and she and other mothers passed them around to each other as the kids grew. Then it came to be that there were dungarees with glittery butterflies attached, for girls, and dungarees with racing cars and footballs attached, for boys. (Patches fceaturing those things, obviously...)
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2,953 posts
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Post by crowblack on Jun 29, 2020 12:12:23 GMT
Then it came to be that there were dungarees with glittery butterflies attached, for girls, and dungarees with racing cars and footballs attached, for boys. (Patches fceaturing those things, obviously...) Yes - I get the feeling it started as a cunning plan to stop kids sharing or handing down toys and making parents have to buy everything twice!
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214 posts
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Post by paulbrownsey on Jun 29, 2020 12:35:13 GMT
Then it came to be that there were dungarees with glittery butterflies attached, for girls, and dungarees with racing cars and footballs attached, for boys. (Patches fceaturing those things, obviously...) Yes - I get the feeling it started as a cunning plan to stop kids sharing or handing down toys and making parents have to buy everything twice! And I can sort of glimpse that, if you were a boy that didn't have much time for conventional boy stuff like footballs and racing cars, you might feel it a bit alien to present yourself in that garb, posing as what you're not, and if you don't distinguish between mere conventions and reality, that could segue into "I'm not a boy." I'm old enough to remember boys wearing long hair in the 1970s and the number of cries there were of "Looks like a girl."
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4,038 posts
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Post by kathryn on Jun 29, 2020 12:46:19 GMT
Then it came to be that there were dungarees with glittery butterflies attached, for girls, and dungarees with racing cars and footballs attached, for boys. (Patches fceaturing those things, obviously...) Yes - I get the feeling it started as a cunning plan to stop kids sharing or handing down toys and making parents have to buy everything twice! I saw someone theorise on Twitter that it’s the absence of a trendy new band creating their own fashion subculture for teenagers to identify themselves with, a la Nirvana and grunge, or Punk, that is causing teenagers to look online for other ways of expressing their sense of alienation. Capitalism may have shot itself in the foot!
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1,093 posts
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jun 29, 2020 12:50:53 GMT
I'm completely trans supportive but it does seem like the more militarised element of the TRA is predicated on phallocentrism and gynaphobia. The unequal treatment of transwomen and transmen shows that. Cis-lesbians are told they must accept "ladydick" and are subject to screaming rape threats simply for wanting the right to sexual consent. But according to the TRA it's homophobic and triggering to even suggest that a cis-gay man might consider sex with a transman. A gay male organisation in Canada released a statement saying "Dysphoric females aren't men and can never be men and are naturally excluded and we don't care what trans rights activists say" and it caused barely a peep in the trans rights community. Yet cis-women asserting their right to sexual agency causes mass outrage. Why the double standard? And it's only ever cis-women the TRA target, when cis-men commit the vast majority of transphobic abuse and violence.
I have lots of trans friends and they all want to be allowed to live their lives in freedom and peace. Most of them care passionately about issues like sexual consent and women's rights. Yet there's a huge disconnect between ordinary transwomen who are far more likely to be a victim of abuse and sexual assault, and TRA. A disproportionate number of high profile TRAs used to be members of the MRA/incel community or have a history of sexually predatory behaviour. They appear more concerned with claiming ciswomen shouldn't be allowed sexual agency, or closing down rape crisis centres, or supporting the rights of convicted rapists to be held in women's prisons, than advocating for trans rights. The "MAP" community (Minor Attracted Persons i.e. child rapists) is also trying to align themselves with and exploit the trans rights movement. I consider all of that deeply transphobic, because it exploits trans rights and pushes the dangerous lie that transwomen are sexual predators or paedophiles. Yet it's ciswomen who raise legitimate concerns about safeguarding who are attacked and smeared as transphobes.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2020 18:41:18 GMT
Genuine question - because as a straight woman who doesn’t follow the LGB Alliance, I’m not in a position to know - might it be because up to now, lesbians have tended to bear the brunt of the radical side of the trans lobby? (As in: “if I am a male-bodied person who identifies as a lesbian woman, you should be as happy to have a relationship with me as with a lesbian who’s a natal woman. If not, you’re transphobic.”) I’d say that’s more an LGB specific concern than one for the more generalist women’s groups (who tend to focus more on the perceived risks of self-ID and potential losses to female achievement/representation in sports, arts and politics etc - which of course affect all natal women, whatever their sexuality)? Or is it that the LGB Alliance tend to post these generalist women’s concerns? It’s interesting - my perception so far has been that it’s mainly women who’ve spoken up against radical trans ideology (for obvious reasons; see paragraph above!). I’ve heard a couple of gay male friends (of a certain age) make comments that suggest they’re less than impressed by some things that go on in the name of the T in LGBT, but it’s really only since the tragic killings in Reading that I’ve been aware of a real outspoken-ness (if that’s a word!) from gay men generally, insisting on their right to be recognised specifically as gay. But it sounds like your perception of that may be very different, so I’m interested to hear more. Would you say some gay men have been as uncomfortable as gay and straight women over this issue for a while now? REPLY (I seem to have screwed up the replying mechanism). You may well be right that women have been at the forefront of setting up the LGBA and that as women they BOTH perceive threats to women as women AND are particularly aware of what appear to be threats to lesbians (apparently, some lesbians have got abuse for refusing to date trans women, and the LGBA thinks young lesbians are particularly liable to persuasion that they are 'really' boys). But, as I said, to be convincing as a gay rights organisation, the LGBA needs to locate its position on T within a much broader conception of gay rights and gay campaigning. That would help to defuse the common charge that it's 'just' an anti-trans group. I think, too, that the emphasis on women's sensibilities ignores men's (though I realise that women are more likely to be victims of violence from men than vice-versa). Sometimes the idea seems afloat that whereas women are rightly disturbed at male-bodied people in their changing rooms, men are insensitive clods who don't mind female-bodied persons in male changing-rooms. That idea needs questioning. My own concerns have two sources. First, as a gay man, I find it increasingly odd that i should be perpetually glued to trans people as a "LGBT person". The House of Commons recently went so far as to issue a report on "LGBT health needs", whereas I don't think I share any healthy needs with T that I don't have with the rest of the population. Moreover, I thought we were getting away from the old stereotype according to which gay men were women on the inside and lesbians thought of themselves as men, but the relentless use of the "LGBT" initialism suggests that gay and trans are fundamentally the same. I have seen a number of comments outwith the activist bubble which suggest just that misunderstanding. In the Wolfenden Report of 1957, homosexuals were treated in common with prostitutes; in the 1970s, paedophile groups tried to cloak themselves in the gay movement; then gay people were told that they were to be termed "LGBT people". Can't we ever just be ourselves? Some LGBA posts have talked of it as defending the interests of gay people, women and girls, and I worry that "LGBT" is going to be replaced by "LGBW". Second, as an ex-academic I do find myself seriously doubtful about many of things asserted by trans theorists. With me, the question, "Is there any reason to think that that is true?" usually bubbles up when I see claims like "Trans women are women" or "A woman is someone who dientifies as a woman." Some of us do care about truth simpliciter. I think there was a time when people were much less clear on the crucial difference between gay and trans. Many gay men seemed to have thought they had to act girly (see, for instance, a mid-century novel like City of Night); perhaps T people somehow felt that they had to think of themselves as basically gay, but with a sort of add-on. The differences are now clearer. On issues like shared bathrooms and changing-rooms, I have no fixed views. In any case, I think the idea that people are happy to strip off in front of their own sex needs to be looked at critically. Certainly, I loathed communal showers at my all-boy school. A bigger emphasis on cubicles for all might defuse some of the issues. On some boards I come across as a defender of T people. For instance, there is a Roman Catholic poster in The Herald (Glasgow) who repeatedly dismisses T people as mentally ill; I routinely tell him that since he believes that what is empirically bread and wine has the substance of flesh and blood, what was the problem about adapting that metaphysics to accommodate the idea that what is empircally a man might be in substance a woman? Thanks paulbrownsey, that’s really informative. I agree, men’s take on sharing space with female-bodied people definitely needs to be discussed. As I say, I rarely see men speaking out in support of sex-based rights on forums like Twitter. The ones that do tend to be speaking personally and not affiliated to any kind of group. It sounds like the LGB Alliance could usefully provide that, for some men at least. You are SO right about communal showers/changing rooms. When I used to go swimming I’d shower in my cozzie and if the two changing cubicles were in use, I’d dry off as much as possible and then scoot to the toilets to do a contortion act and put my clothes on again!
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Post by oxfordsimon on Jul 19, 2020 0:18:21 GMT
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724 posts
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Post by basdfg on Jul 20, 2020 18:39:23 GMT
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2,953 posts
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Post by crowblack on Jul 20, 2020 20:58:03 GMT
I don't know how to post the full details of the survey on here (It's easy to find online though), but when you go beyond the headline the actual findings were different when respondents were then asked their opinions on male-bodied transwomen (i.e. not had surgery, and with a penis) and on the legal changes that would follow. This indicates that many people initially believed this debate was about 'old school' transsexuals, like April Ashley, male-to-female and sexually attracted to men, rather than the much bigger group who now fall under the new, wider 'trans umbrella'.
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