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Cont: Trans Women are not Women II: The Bath Of Khan

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theprestige said:
To be recognized by society the social construct not specified by your biological sex.
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If there were no inherent properties of gender, if it is only a social construct, then your gender would simply be a choice. But the point is that they supposedly don't have a choice. That's central to their demand for accomodation.

Transsexuality is literally about reversing the binary social constructs.
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No it isn't. For many trans people, they WANT the binary social construct (see for example transwomen athletes). They just want to be put on a different side of that binary construct.

It's not coherent. It doesn't need to be coherent. As an ideological tool for exerting power, coherence is actually counter-productive.
 
Roboramma said:
Most things exist on a distribution.

I know there are detectable trans-people because I've seen plenty of them, who were obviously trans.
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And how would you know? Are they the famous trans women, Lady Gaga and Michelle Obama?

I understand the 'reasonable' point you're trying to make, but it's two levels missing the point. First, the argument that someone is assured of the rarity of a group that is in part defined by the inability of that person to detect that group is simply funny on the face of it. Nothing you said changes that.

Second, you realize you lack adequate data but you're not recognizing that you lack adequate criteria as well. How do you know they were trans women? No, I'm not arguing that all trans women pass all the time, which absolutely needs to be said in this thread sadly. I will however keep hammering home that the majority to a substantial minority of women people 'clock' as trans women are just cis women. Old women, fat women, tall women, black women, and all women who don't wear makeup are especially prone to this. Perhaps you specifically are really good at identifying, but almost certainly the less one is prone to false positives the more one is prone to false negatives. I've said it many times in this thread, but the number of times people have made the exact argument I have made earlier leaves me with no illusion anyone is paying attention, the most beautiful feminine woman I've ever known got called a 'tranny' a lot simply by being my height. She was told she had 'man hands' but that wasn't true either.

Whatever criteria you're holding trans women to, you're holding cis women to. These cis women who want to police what standards define women are giving power to a lot of men to also police these standards. They're not going to like it when they end up falling on the wrong side of them. It is better to recognize what upholding these standards really does, and who it gives power to.

And while Marcus was specific to trans women, your post wasn't and I'm going to, yet again, point out that trans men, you know, exist. Afab people consistently pass. It is likely that nine out of ten trans men you've seen you didn't even clock a bit. I've never seen my step nephew clocked, not even by his sisters who are younger than him. (I also know at least two trans women who I've never seen clocked, or heard speak of being clocked.)

Thank you for trying to question your perceptions and recognizing some limits in them.
 
The Atheist said:
Yep, we haven't come all that far out of the swamp.

Another point is, there are a significant number of trans people who, walking down the street, you wouldn't know were trans.

Must annoy the hell out of transphobic people to see an attractive person, be attracted to that person, then realise they've transitioned.
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Bangkok. I thought I was pretty good at spotting the ladyboys, even the ones who weren't coming on to me but this kid I met on the plane during a flight over there once, wow, that kid was a pro.

"There's one", That's another one" he'd say. I'd say, "are you sure" and he'd rattle off the clues like shoulder to hip ratio.

Funny thing with that kid. He'd saved up all his money, quit a job got a cash gift from his grandmothes and had enough money to have his holiday and even though I warned him about the costs of partying in Bangkok, when I ran into him a week or so later he'd spent almost all his money and was going to have to make that call to his parents.

In Thailand everybody seemed cool with the whole scene. Men moreso than women and I always wonder whether they kept that tolerance once they got back home.

I'm thinking there's a lot of what happens in Bangkok, stays in Bangkok going on.
 
Ziggurat said:
If there were no inherent properties of gender, if it is only a social construct, then your gender would simply be a choice. But the point is that they supposedly don't have a choice. That's central to their demand for accomodation.
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Just because something is a social construct doesn't make it a choice, that doesn't follow at all. For example nations are social constructs yet I can't freely choose my nationality. It's called a social construct and not a personal construct for a reason.
 
tyr_13 said:
And how would you know? Are they the famous trans women, Lady Gaga and Michelle Obama?
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Thanks for reminding me. I've certainly seen many cases of cis women who have been accused of being trans because they don't fit someone's idea of "feminine" enough.
 
Puppycow said:
Thanks for reminding me. I've certainly seen many cases of cis women who have been accused of being trans because they don't fit someone's idea of "feminine" enough.
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Haha!

Our former Prime Minister, Helen Clark was a perfect example of that. Stern, unattractive - decided by Real Blokes - very deep voice, quite tall at 5' 8". People questioned her gender for years.

Still do, in fact, even though she's been out of office for 12 years.
 
caveman1917 said:
Just because something is a social construct doesn't make it a choice, that doesn't follow at all. For example nations are social constructs yet I can't freely choose my nationality. It's called a social construct and not a personal construct for a reason.
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No.

The issue with nationality is that what's operative isn't what YOU think your nationality is, but what government recognizes your nationality as. That's the only thing preventing you from making a choice. There's nothing in you that would prevent you from choosing your nationality.

In the case of gender, you could say that transgender people also face a problem of their gender not being recognized. And that's part of it. But it's only part. Again, the demand for acomodation is based in large part on the claim that they have no choice, that there IS something intrinsic about them that makes them a different gender than their sex. And that part isn't socially constructed. Supposedly.
 
Well, the fact that so many transwomen choose to present as an over-sexualised cariacature of "woman" would suggest otherwise. They seem extremely keen on the social constructs of masculinity and (especially) femininity, it's just that they want to perform their own fantasy version of the role opposite from the one they'd normally be expected to adopt.
 
Rolfe said:
Well, the fact that so many transwomen choose to present as an over-sexualised cariacature of "woman" would suggest otherwise. They seem extremely keen on the social constructs of masculinity and (especially) femininity, it's just that they want to perform their own fantasy version of the role opposite from the one they'd normally be expected to adopt.
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It's not so much a fantasy as going huge boobs and heavy makeup just to make them feel as girly as they can.

I'm often aghast at otherwise beautiful trans girls who don't just want hormonal breasts so get size DDDDDD+ boobs inserted. Leaves a fairly nasty scar, too. For god's sake, nobody but drag queens has boobs like that.

It's also a reason why they want to start hormones early - they get proper breasts rather than the often weird ones they end up with when starting oestrogen post-puberty.
 
Rolfe said:
Well, the fact that so many transwomen choose to present as an over-sexualised cariacature of "woman" would suggest otherwise.
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why so?
Rolfe said:
They seem extremely keen on the social constructs of masculinity and (especially) femininity, it's just that they want to perform their own fantasy version of the role opposite from the one they'd normally be expected to adopt.
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Oh dear.
 
Rolfe said:
It's true though.
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This being a skeptic forum and all, I'd expect some sort of citation instead of expecting us all to have the same intuitions or experiences.

(I mean, I've seen what you're talking about often enough, but only on attention-seeking social media. Bit of self-selection bias to be expected.)
 
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The Atheist said:
Haha!



Our former Prime Minister, Helen Clark was a perfect example of that. Stern, unattractive - decided by Real Blokes - very deep voice, quite tall at 5' 8". People questioned her gender for years.



Still do, in fact, even though she's been out of office for 12 years.
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Disagree people questioned her gender. Just knew she was a butch type gay chick.

It is like a lot gay dudes doing the whole over acting camp thing for some odd reason.

Stuff that it would look weird even if a straight women acted like.

Kind of over compensating.
 
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Camp gay guys aren't pretending to be that way. That is the way they are.

When they are being non-camp - that is when they are acting.
 
Rolfe said:
Well, the fact that so many transwomen choose to present as an over-sexualised cariacature of "woman" would suggest otherwise. They seem extremely keen on the social constructs of masculinity and (especially) femininity, it's just that they want to perform their own fantasy version of the role opposite from the one they'd normally be expected to adopt.
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Prove that it is so many. I reject your claim until you present the numbers for it.
 
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