Cont: Trans Women are not Women 4

[Emily's Cat]

There are many, many documented cases of females raping males, often forcefully. And of females committing acts of extreme sexual violence against other females.

What are we to make of that?

What we should make of that is that the man many cases of females engaging in predatory sexual behavior accounts for approximately 2% of all predatory sexual behavior ever recorded.

I also infer, however, that you feel that "we" should all treat the extreme minority of offenses perpetrated by females as if they are at least as important as the extreme majority of offenses perpetrated by males. It rather suggests that you feel that females are less important than males.

 

[Emily's Cat]

But nonetheless I personally would doubt the sincerity of a convicted rapist who got sentenced to 10 years in a ********* prison who then suddenly decided that they were transgender and only just realised.

Call me an old cynic.

I don't call you a cynic for that, I call you a reasonable person with a functioning mind.

And that's kind of the point of a lot of these arguments. This incident should not ever have happened. It shouldn't have happened because Karen White had a history of rape already. And anyone with an even halfway decent ability to think critically should have considered that when he identified as she, and requested to be transferred to the female ward.

This is a case where on its face, this is a bad idea, with an easily foreseeable consequence. But the very real risk to female prisoners was disregarded by the prison system and the law - it was disregarded by the government - in favor of validating the feeling of affirmation for a male-bodied person.

That is the core of the problem: The feelings of male-bodied transwomen are being held as more important than the safety, privacy, and rights of females.

Offer a solution that doesn't do that, and I'm 100% on board.

 

[Emily's Cat]

This is an easy one...... I mean.... if I was to go into a room full of people and shout... could all the women stand up please... the one's standing up. They're women.

And when Zuba (or whatever the name is that damian linked to) stands up, you accept that as fact?

 

[Emily's Cat]

I don't know who would disagree with this statement though. So long as sex (male/female) is not being confused with or conflated with gender (man/woman). But anyhow, the real issue is not about biological sex: it's about the lived identity of gender.

Thank you for mansplaining to billions of females that their sex isn't a big deal. Thank you for also testiculating about how the "lived experience" is all that matters, while simultaneously ignore that 1) sex is a part of that lived experience and a fundamental element of the discrimination against females in the first place and 2) transwoman do not have the lived experience of women, they have the lived experience of males.

All so that you (a male-bodied person) can lobby for entitlements for transwoman (male-bodied people) as being more important than the rights, privacy, and safety of females.

 

[Emily's Cat]

That's entirely correct.

But in any case, it wouldn't neccesarily stand that even if Emily's Cat did speak for all (or even the majority of) women, this in and of itself should totally "win the argument" on issues such as this.

*caution - analogy incoming!*

1) Establish premise: if the majority of women (and the majority of men too, for that matter) disagree with certain transgender rights policies, this in itself should mean that those policies should not be enacted.

2) Show counterexample by way of analogy: in 1950s Alabama, the majority of white people (men and women) - indeed, very probably the majority of the population as a whole - disagreed with pretty much all black rights policies; this however did not serve as a determination that those policies should not have been enacted (and of course in time, there are very very few people who would disagree that those policies should have been enacted).

3) Apply the principle and precedent learned via the analogy to the initial premise. Stir vigorously, stand back, and leave to stand for 5 minutes.

FFS, we're back to this. You keep treating females as if they're the oppressor! You keep glossing over the fact that this situation is male-bodied people seeking entitlements that advantage other male-bodied people while reducing the rights of already unequal female people!

 

[Emily's Cat]

I'll say it again: the term "woman" is a magic word for people in both camps.

I think it's only a magic word in one camp. In the other camp it has a well-supported and very clear definition: an adult human female. Woman is to Mare as Man is to Stallion. Woman is to Cow as Man is to Bull. Woman is to Doe as Man is to Buck.

Or perhaps you were trying to be magnanimous?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Tbf they are claiming they "know" what it is like to be a woman, which is frankly a bit of a dodgy thing given they in the majority were brought up as dudes.

In many cases, they're claiming to "know" more about what it is like to be a woman that females do, without having either the biology or the lived experience that forms the entire concept of woman in the first place.

At the end of the day, it frequently boils down to male people insisting that female people accept their indefinable, unexplainable, eternally opaque meaning of "woman" without question... simply because those male people demand that it be so.

 

[Emily's Cat]

The Pacific islands got it quite a while ago with fa'afafine.

I am perfectly happy to have a third gender, with equal rights protections of their own, unique to their circumstances, which allows for them to be treated as female in some circumstance and male in others.

Hell, I'm even happy to define a set of specific elements that can be met that would allow a person to move from that fa'afafine group into either male or female descriptors, and all of the rights and protections that come with those classifications.

What I'm being asked for, however, is that I accept people who are clearly not female to gain the rights and protections of a female, in addition to added entitlements that reduce the rights, privacy, and safety of females... and to do so with absolutely zero requirements at all. If those male people make the claim that they are women, then they want me to capitulate to their desires at the cost of my own rights.

 

[Emily's Cat]

No idea what your first sentence means up to the first comma. Can you rephrase it?

The model that has been adopted* is one that is only allowed to affirm the claimed identity. It is not allowed to question the patient's self-diagnosis. Thus, doctors do not actually go through steps to ensure that the person who self-identifies as transgender actually has any of the symptoms of gender dysphoria, nor are they allowed to recommend counseling or cognitive behavioral therapy as a treatment. The approach that is being used is to agree with the claim made by the patient, and to provide them support for being recognized as that gender by the rest of society - including when that person decides to do nothing at all to transition.


*I say 'adopted' as a courtesy and a kindness. This isn't an approach that has been willingly adopted by many practitioners, but one that has been lobbied for and essentially coerced into place by activists without medical backgrounds. And it is not unchallenged, as evidence by the resignation of many practitioners working in the field of gender who feel that the current approach is unethical and likely to lead to serious harm, especially for minors.

 

[d4m10n]

...doctors do not actually go through steps to ensure that the person who self-identifies as transgender actually has any of the symptoms of gender dysphoria, nor are they allowed to recommend counseling or cognitive behavioral therapy as a treatment.

Incredibly disturbing, if true.

 

[LondonJohn]

Thank you for mansplaining to billions of females that their sex isn't a big deal. Thank you for also testiculating about how the "lived experience" is all that matters, while simultaneously ignore that 1) sex is a part of that lived experience and a fundamental element of the discrimination against females in the first place and 2) transwoman do not have the lived experience of women, they have the lived experience of males.

All so that you (a male-bodied person) can lobby for entitlements for transwoman (male-bodied people) as being more important than the rights, privacy, and safety of females.

????

(And, as I said, what about all those women - women who are expert and experienced in this field - who sat on all those globally-important bodies (including the very body which sets the global standard on mental health diagnoses...) which have recently reclassified transgender identity as a real, valid, lived condition? Are you about to claim that all these women were somehow "muzzled" by all the nasty, misogynistic men who also sit on those bodies?)

 

[LondonJohn]

FFS, we're back to this. You keep treating females as if they're the oppressor! You keep glossing over the fact that this situation is male-bodied people seeking entitlements that advantage other male-bodied people while reducing the rights of already unequal female people!

My comparison has absolutely nothing to do with any considerations of prior oppression.

But if you insist on taking that line..... I'd say that transgender people could lay a pretty fair claim to having been oppressed by the rest of society - by us - up to now. Woudn't you?


Note also that in my counterexample, I suggested that one subgroup (white girls/women) out of the whole set of people whom the civil rights legislation was not aimed at helping (that whole set therefore equalling all white people) ended up being placed at potentially increased danger as a direct consequence of that legislation.

Just as, wrt transgender legislation, I suggest that one subgroup (cisgender girls/women) out of the whole set of people whom the civil rights legislation was not aimed at helping (that whole set therefore equalling all cisgendered people) might end up being placed at potentially increased danger as a direct consequence of that legislation.

Each to his/her own, I guess.

 

[Olmstead]

????

(And, as I said, what about all those women - women who are expert and experienced in this field - who sat on all those globally-important bodies (including the very body which sets the global standard on mental health diagnoses...) which have recently reclassified transgender identity as a real, valid, lived condition? Are you about to claim that all these women were somehow "muzzled" by all the nasty, misogynistic men who also sit on those bodies?)

"... real, valid, lived condition ..."

You keep using those words. I do not think they mean what you think they mean.

 

[LondonJohn]

"... real, valid, lived condition ..."

You keep using those words. I do not think they mean what you think they mean.

I think they mean "a condition which is valid in and of itself (as opposed to a disorder, or the product of a disorder), which is real (as opposed to imaginary - within the psyche of the person concerned), and which is lived (meaning it manifests itself in the way that the person concerned identifies their existence and conducts their life)".


What do you think those words mean?

 

[Paul2]

Note also that in my counterexample, I suggested that one subgroup (white girls/women) out of the whole set of people whom the civil rights legislation was not aimed at helping (that whole set therefore equalling all white people) ended up being placed at potentially increased danger as a direct consequence of that legislation.
.

I think this is your claim: because racial civil rights legislation was proper even though it increased danger for some, trans civil rights legislation is proper even though it increases danger for others. That is, legislation that helps the civil rights of one group is proper even if it increases the danger (to some degree) for others.

Do I have that right? If I don't, what is the purpose or function of your analogy to racial civil rights legislation?

 

[Paul2]

I think they mean "a condition which is valid in and of itself (as opposed to a disorder, or the product of a disorder), which is real (as opposed to imaginary - within the psyche of the person concerned), and which is lived (meaning it manifests itself in the way that the person concerned identifies their existence and conducts their life)".

1. Can you define "disorder" as you mean it?

2. Assuming there need be no biological basis for trans identity, does there need to be some conformity between what is in the person's psyche and social definitions of gender for trans identity?

3. If there need be no conformity, then wouldn't trans identity be within the psyche of the person concerned?

 

[d4m10n]

I think they mean "a condition which is valid in and of itself (as opposed to a disorder, or the product of a disorder), which is real (as opposed to imaginary - within the psyche of the person concerned), and which is lived (meaning it manifests itself in the way that the person concerned identifies their existence and conducts their life)".

The word "disorder" is doing much of the heavy lifting in many of your posts, LJ.

Suppose the experts in society A label ephebophilia^WP a disorder, but the experts in society B do not. Suppose further that we've some reason to suspect both sets of experts have been influenced to some extent by their respective broader social norms, which have changed over time. Are the people in society B correct to say that ephebophila is "valid in and of itself" because they place trust in their experts?

Sent from my SM-T560NU using Tapatalk

 

[Elaedith]

I think they mean "a condition which is valid in and of itself (as opposed to a disorder, or the product of a disorder), which is real (as opposed to imaginary - within the psyche of the person concerned), and which is lived (meaning it manifests itself in the way that the person concerned identifies their existence and conducts their life)".


What do you think those words mean?

What is meant by 'reclassification of transgender identity'? Gender dysphoria is not transgender identity, even if many people with dysphoria end up identifying that way.

 

[LondonJohn]

I think this is your claim: because racial civil rights legislation was proper even though it increased danger for some, trans civil rights legislation is proper even though it increases danger for others. That is, legislation that helps the civil rights of one group is proper even if it increases the danger (to some degree) for others.

Do I have that right? If I don't, what is the purpose or function of your analogy to racial civil rights legislation?

No. Not at all. And I've never said or implied that.

My claim is no more or less than this:

1) A premise has been proposed that it cannot be right for cis women to be (potentially) placed at higher risk as a direct consequence of the introduction of certain transgender rights.

2) I showed a counterexample where a group of people were (potentially) placed at higher risk as a direct consequence of the introduction of other civil rights (here: black rights).

3) I am saying that (2), IMO, demonstrates that the "cannot be right" part of (1) is not a logical truism.


So... I'm NOT saying: just because something similar happened wrt the introduction of black rights, this necessarily means that transgender rights legislation should be introduced even though it puts another group at higher potential risk.

I'm purely claiming falsification of the premise that it should never be allowed to happen.

(Or, to put it another way: if transgender rights legislation were proposed, and if as a consequence some women were to be placed into a position of potential increased risk, it wouldn't (IMO) be logically sound to claim that this consequence should - by definition - affect the viability of the proposed legislation)


I hope I've explained this more completely here now.

 

[LondonJohn]

What is meant by 'reclassification of transgender identity'? Gender dysphoria is not transgender identity, even if many people with dysphoria end up identifying that way.

I know that.

But transgender identity (as opposed to gender dysphoria) is the only thing that is relevant to (eg) discussions about which changing rooms trans women should use.

However, yes - strictly speaking, when talking about reclassifications or legislation, both transgender identity and body dysmorphia form the set of people concerned.