Discussion: Transwomen are not women (Part 7)

[Emily's Cat]

They are. That was simple. Next thread.

Can you explain, in simple terms, what makes transwomen 'women' in your view? What characteristics, experiences, or attributes do transwomen share in common with females that they do NOT share in common with males?

 

[Boudicca90]

If you look at the full passage, you may well find it problematic nonetheless.



Seems to me the author has failed to fully internalize the idea that some "bodies with vaginas" are not experiencing "women's pain" but rather pain associated with being a uterus haver.

Pobody's Nerfect. They aren't perfect with it yet, and that's fine. Like how the same care isn't being given to trans men in similar situations. That is a group that they need to do a much better job on terminology with.

Things are changing at a fast pace due to new research and it can be difficult to keep up. Even with me, I took me a while to wrap my head around the concept of 'non-binary', but I do understand it now.

 

[Ziggurat]

When it comes to AGP, it's not like the concept itself isn't a thing. It is. And I do agree with you that it's a fetish or paraphilia, and that I don't consider them truly transgender. Where Blanchard is wrong is that there aren't different types of trans people. There are transgender people like me, and then there are transvestites or cross-dressers like Shupe. You even said the categories you put transgender people into are either AGP or HSTS, and I've been arguing that there is no such real distinction between us who are actually transgender.

There's a massive internal conflict with your position that I don't think you've come to terms with, and it's at the heart of the conflict you've had with many other posters here.

For the sake of argument, I'll accept that AGP people are not trans. But they say they are. So how do we tell the difference? You have advocated for self-ID as the only requirement for trans identity. But if that is the policy we adopt, then it is impossible to distinguish between AGP and true trans. If the AGP people shouldn't receive the same accomodations that we should extend to the true trans, that's a major problem, isn't it?

 

[Boudicca90]

You know, the activists complain about females insisting that sex is real and impactful, and call that "biological essentialism"... but 100% support referring to us as "bodies with vaginas".

It's insulting. It's also creepy af.

You can call me a "body with a penis" if you want, in a medical sense anyway, since it's an accurate description of part of my biology without mentioning my sex or gender.

But I can also see where you are coming from. An ex-girlfriend of mine was a former Marine and still had a lot of the indoctrination from Marine Corps training, even after 8 years out. And when she would want to teach me how to do things like martial arts, she would refer to me as a "meat puppet" since that what they called themselves when they trained with each other.

I made it clear I didn't like being called that, but she insisted and wouldn't let it go. In retrospect, it was an early sign of how our relationship would go. She was always insistent I had to see things her way.

 

[Boudicca90]

There's a massive internal conflict with your position that I don't think you've come to terms with, and it's at the heart of the conflict you've had with many other posters here.

For the sake of argument, I'll accept that AGP people are not trans. But they say they are. So how do we tell the difference? You have advocated for self-ID as the only requirement for trans identity. But if that is the policy we adopt, then it is impossible to distinguish between AGP and true trans. If the AGP people shouldn't receive the same accomodations that we should extend to the true trans, that's a major problem, isn't it?

That is where individual vetting comes in.

A women's shelter or prison for example would hopefully screen these people beforehand and make their own calls as to the safety of their residents.

When it comes to restrooms, locker rooms, spas, etc. I guess my policy is if you look like you belong there and you aren't causing a problem, then there is no problem.

 

[d4m10n]

You can call me a "body with a penis" if you want, in a medical sense anyway, since it's an accurate description of part of my biology without mentioning my sex or gender.

If a traditional Korean (nude) spa was careful to avoid mentioning either sex or gender, but instead posted a policy that "Bodies with penises please use the third floor" and "Bodies with vaginas please use the fourth floor" would that be enough to avoid accusations of transphobia?

 

[Boudicca90]

If a traditional Korean (nude) spa was careful to avoid mentioning either sex or gender, but instead posted a policy that "Bodies with penises please use the third floor" and "Bodies with vaginas please use the fourth floor" would that be enough to avoid accusations of transphobia?

That's why I said "in a medical sense". That wouldn't be appropriate to post publicly like that.

And it would be segregating us based on our genitals, which would definitely be transphobic.

 

[d4m10n]

And it would be segregating us based on our genitals, which would definitely be transphobic.

Nearly everyone thus segregated would be cisgender; why conclude the policy is intended to target a small minority of potential patrons?

 

[Boudicca90]

Nearly everyone thus segregated would be cisgender; why conclude the policy is intended to target a small minority of potential patrons?

Because I'm a part of that small minority of potential patrons.

The outcome would be the same for cis people, but would segregate people like me to the (basically) men's section, where I absolutely don't belong.

So I would absolutely oppose something like that!

You and Meadmaker can keep trying to redefine terms all you want to until you find the magic word that you believe can keep us out. Have fun with that.

 

[d4m10n]

The outcome would be the same for cis people, but would segregate people like me to the (basically) men's section, where I absolutely don't belong.

The policy, as stated, has nothing to do with men and women (i.e. genders) but rather a specific physical attribute which is generally obvious in a nude spa setting.

You argument appears to be that gender identity is a more important sorting criterion than the one posited in the hypothetical, but what is considered important varies from one individual to the next.

 

[Boudicca90]

I'm happy for you! I hope you find someone you can truly bond with.


I actually agree with your view here. The current challenge when it comes to policy, is that the lobby and activism groups that are driving those policy decisions do NOT draw a distinction, and have been pushing the narrative that transvestites, cross-dressers, and even drag queens are all transgender, and should all be treated in exactly the same way that we wish to treat you. The major trans rights organizations are all pushing that there is no difference between you and Shupe, or between you and Yaniv. I think there's a difference - a very big and important difference, even if it's difficult to nail down. The handful of transgender people I know are almost all similar to you in their experiences and motivations. There's different degrees of comfort or discomfort with their genitalia, but overall the way they describe their journeys, the way they describe their feelings of how they fit into the world, are very similar. Unfortunately, the lobbying groups and activist organizations aren't taking those differing motivations into consideration.


I agree. This is what I was trying to get at earlier, and bungled. I am NOT comparing you to pedophiles, I'm comparing those fetishists to pedophiles. Both are paraphilias, and both have the potential to cause harm to other people. And just as the association with pedophile groups prevented the progress of gay rights in the past, so too I think that the association of fetishists is preventing the progress of trans rights today.


Their presence may not, but the behaviors that come along with their presence do.

It's AGP males who verbally abuse, threaten with rape and death, and advocate for harm to females. It's AGP males who attack elderly females at meetings to discuss the impact of proposed gender recognition reforms. It's AGP males who vandalize and smear hate-speech across rape shelters. It's AGP males that lobby to get domestic violence shelters shut down if they aren't given free access. It's AGP males who sexually harass rape survivors in shelters. It's AGP males who rape the females they are imprisoned with. It's AGP males who video themselves masturbating in female restrooms and post it on line. It's AGP males who creep on young girls. It's AGP males who post long and disturbing diatribes online about simulating periods and delving for used pads in the ladies' restroom. It's AGP males who try to induce lactation so they can get a thrill.

True transgender people like you have almost always been accepted into female spaces. You've always been in our restrooms and our locker rooms, and you've always been accepted as women, because you behave like females. Because you have care and compassion for the females around you. Because you respect our experiences, and you really are just trying to live your life. True transgender people like you have never really been a problem, and have never been viewed as a material threat by females. Objections to true transgender people like you have almost exclusively come from extremely religious people, and largely from males. But it hasn't been a mystery to females, we know you're out there, and for the vast majority of our history, we've accepted you.

But we aren't willing to accept the fetishists. And it's the fetishists driving the agenda right now. The agenda they drive, particularly self-id, gives them cover, and grants them access to use both you and I to feed their sexual fantasies without our consent.

I know it's a barrier for people like you, but that is why I want a requirement of a competent psychiatric evaluation, and an appropriate diagnosis. I don't want to slow down your journey... but I can't figure out any reasonable way to keep paraphiliacs from using both you and I as wank-material without it.

I disagree with much of this.

The transvestites and fetishists who cause issues are few and far between, most are accepted just fine. But people like Shupe unfortunately still exist. The conflict isn't between transgender vs. transvestite, it's between respect vs. being an asshat. Which is an issue regardless of sex or gender.

Unlike Shupe, I do think Jessica Yaniv is genuinely transgender and refer to her as she/her. She is also a menace and a troll. She should be kept out of women's spaces not because of her sex or gender, but because she has been shown repeatedly that she does nothing but cause trouble. I wouldn't want her around me any more than you would around you.

Ultimately no system is perfect and people are always going to fall through the cracks, I just don't believe it's fair to punish the rest of us for the existence of people like Jessica Yaniv or Karen White. If there is reason to suspect that they may not be genuine and sincere, vet them and find out.

 

[Boudicca90]

The policy, as stated, has nothing to do with men and women (i.e. genders) but rather a specific physical attribute which is generally obvious in a nude spa setting.

You argument appears to be that gender identity is a more important sorting criterion than the one posited in the hypothetical, but what is considered important varies from one individual to the next.

I've always maintained that gender is more important in everyday society than sex is.

I am seen as a woman and female by anybody when I'm out in public and am treated as such. The exception comes when I'm in a doctor's office or the hospital and the doctor or nurse has to take my info down. That's when sex becomes more important as I make sure they know I don't have parts they assume I should have.

 

[Emily's Cat]

You can call me a "body with a penis" if you want, in a medical sense anyway, since it's an accurate description of part of my biology without mentioning my sex or gender.

But I can also see where you are coming from. An ex-girlfriend of mine was a former Marine and still had a lot of the indoctrination from Marine Corps training, even after 8 years out. And when she would want to teach me how to do things like martial arts, she would refer to me as a "meat puppet" since that what they called themselves when they trained with each other.

I made it clear I didn't like being called that, but she insisted and wouldn't let it go. In retrospect, it was an early sign of how our relationship would go. She was always insistent I had to see things her way.

I wouldn't want to refer to you as a "body with a penis". It might border on technically correct... but it's fundamentally dehumanizing. Even within the medical community, you're far, far more than just an organ. I wouldn't want doctors and nurses to refer to me as a "body with a liver", even if it's technically true. It robs me of personhood. Calling you a "body with a penis", does nothing at all to distinguish you from a stallion or a bull or a tomcat. But you ARE fundamentally different, even within a medical context. You're human, and you and I both deserve to have our humanity recognized and honored by those we trust to treat us at our most vulnerable.

 

[p0lka]

I can sympathize with this. When I was growing up, I liked girls, in that little kid way of course. Even later on in my childhood when I started wearing my mom's dresses and makeup, I never did it to attract guys, because I wasn't into that at the time (Which is why I don't like when people try to use sexual attraction as a reason why we transition). I did still get a thrill from it at the time, but I don't think it was really a sexual thing since I started when I was about 9.

But after I hit puberty, something changed. I started looking at the boys more and more and realized I was sexually attracted to them, but not that much to the girls I liked before. Over time as I realized a lot of things about myself, I think envy and jealousy of cis girls over what I didn't have at the time probably factored in. And the physical changes that male puberty brought helped make me more and more depressed.

I tried to fit in as a gay man, but that wasn't me, and I just isolated myself more and more from people. Now as a polysexual woman, I feel like how I should have felt all along and I'm finally happy. I've also started dating finally that I can feel like I can be with someone as me

If you are happy, nice one, love it.

It seems you were trying to fit into a label or category, eventually you found a label you are happy with which is polysexual woman.

I think that gender labelling should be ignored and or got rid of, what are your views on that?

Are you trying to fit in with gender roles?

There are other people that would like to get rid of them.

 

[Emily's Cat]

That is where individual vetting comes in.

A women's shelter or prison for example would hopefully screen these people beforehand and make their own calls as to the safety of their residents.

When it comes to restrooms, locker rooms, spas, etc. I guess my policy is if you look like you belong there and you aren't causing a problem, then there is no problem.

And that's essentially what I would like. I think it's entirely reasonable.

But it's also where Self-ID leaves us hanging out to dry. With self-id as a legal policy, the shelters and prisons do not have the ability to screen them out, because self-declaration makes them trans, and as trans they are entitled to be treated as the gender they declare.

Self-id robs both you and I of the right to consent to who we are surrounded with at our most vulnerable. It gives the right to those who fetishize us and wish to use us as objects in their fantasies. I don't want that for me, nor do I want that for you.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Because I'm a part of that small minority of potential patrons.

The outcome would be the same for cis people, but would segregate people like me to the (basically) men's section, where I absolutely don't belong.

So I would absolutely oppose something like that!

You and Meadmaker can keep trying to redefine terms all you want to until you find the magic word that you believe can keep us out. Have fun with that.

Is there a compromise available? How about if they have a general policy based on anatomy, but explicitly allow exceptions on the judgement of the owners?

What if, for example, all patrons were given a key-card or lanyard that specifies which side they're expected to be in? Then in cases like yours, and that of other true transwomen, you'd have explicit permission from the spa, and the other people in that side of the spa would also be assured that the owners have approved you. It would put a lot of female patrons at ease, it would allow broader use in keeping with a person's gender identity, but ti would also allow the spa to make discretionary exclusions if they don't believe the person in question is legitimate, or if they've received legitimate complaints (not religious fringe complaints, but actual complaints of inappropriate behavior). It would also allow the staff to remove those few bigots who are actually objecting to the existence of trans people altogether. Additionally, nobody would be singled out, since ALL patrons, regardless of their gender identity, would be expected to have a lanyard.

Would that be a reasonable compromise? Or at least a starting point that we could work from?

 

[Emily's Cat]

I disagree with much of this.

The transvestites and fetishists who cause issues are few and far between, most are accepted just fine. But people like Shupe unfortunately still exist. The conflict isn't between transgender vs. transvestite, it's between respect vs. being an asshat. Which is an issue regardless of sex or gender.

Unlike Shupe, I do think Jessica Yaniv is genuinely transgender and refer to her as she/her. She is also a menace and a troll. She should be kept out of women's spaces not because of her sex or gender, but because she has been shown repeatedly that she does nothing but cause trouble. I wouldn't want her around me any more than you would around you.

Ultimately no system is perfect and people are always going to fall through the cracks, I just don't believe it's fair to punish the rest of us for the existence of people like Jessica Yaniv or Karen White. If there is reason to suspect that they may not be genuine and sincere, vet them and find out.

How do we vet them if self-id is the only arbiter?

 

[d4m10n]

I've always maintained that gender is more important in everyday society than sex is.

You said that the description used in the nude spa hypothetical avoids mention of "sex or gender" but now you're talking about the primacy of gender over sex in describing what is wrong with their sorting criteria. I find this somewhat confusing. How does "Bodies with vaginas please use the fourth floor" implicate the concept of sex, in your view?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Unlike Shupe, I do think Jessica Yaniv is genuinely transgender and refer to her as she/her. She is also a menace and a troll. She should be kept out of women's spaces not because of her sex or gender, but because she has been shown repeatedly that she does nothing but cause trouble. I wouldn't want her around me any more than you would around you.

What leads you to believe that Yaniv is genuinely transgender?

Ultimately no system is perfect and people are always going to fall through the cracks, I just don't believe it's fair to punish the rest of us for the existence of people like Jessica Yaniv or Karen White. If there is reason to suspect that they may not be genuine and sincere, vet them and find out.

I don't want to punish people like you because of the existence of Yaniv or white either. But I also don't want to harm females in order to advance your cause. White raped females while imprisoned with them. White had a history of violence and crimes against females.

the reason that White was moved to the female ward was because their self-declared gender identity was considered to be more important than the safety of the female prisoners.

There has got to be some rational middle ground that allows people like you to flourish, without sacrificing the safety and wellbeing of females. What would you propose to keep the Whites out of female prisons while respecting the identity of transgender prisoners?

 

[Emily's Cat]

I've always maintained that gender is more important in everyday society than sex is.

I know that this is delicate territory for you... but I think that this is a privileged view held by male-bodied people. Sex is not all that important to male-bodied people, because they aren't abused, mistreated, oppressed, and harmed on the basis of their sex. Male-bodied people aren't at risk because of their sex. They aren't dominated by their intimate partners and abused because their sex is weaker and less able to defend themselves. Male-bodied people aren't ogled and groped by strangers because of their sex. They don't have their genitalia mutilated and sexual pleasure removed because of their sex. They aren't sold as sex-slaves because of their sex. They aren't raped anywhere nearly as often.

Sex is less important than gender to you, personally. And I can understand that view. But I think it shows a distinct lack of care and compassion to dismiss the views of those of us for whom it is very important.

It would be quite similar to a white person declaring that skin color isn't important in every day life, and thereby dismissing out of hand the experience of black people for whom that skin color con be a real and meaningful barrier and source of disparate and sometimes harmful treatment.