Transwomen are not women - X (XY?)

[Rolfe]

Many workplace or otherwise corporate/private toilets are open to gender identification.

And that's fine, is it?

This is merely the effect of the predatory demands of the trans lobby being capitulated to by these corporate/private bodies. Women are losing all their single-sex spaces to this ideology, under the guise of "tolerance" and "inclusivity" and #bekind.

You may be comfortable with this, but a great many women are not.

 

[Francesca R]

No, I'm "stuck in the mindset" that calling your opponent unpleasant names is not a substitute for rational argument.

Not all trans women who wish to use female only settings are predators of women. That's my rational argument. Didn't realise it needed outlining.

And you disagree with it (you think they are all predators) because of . . . what argument exactly?

Also, it seems that everything the light touches is an insult or unpleasant name to you. Your double standard is brazen in that regard.

 

[Rolfe]

You perhaps need to read with more appreciation of nuance. I said I would happily embrace the epithet. But I'm still well aware that when you use it it is intended to be an insult, and take it in the spirit in which it is offered.

I, and EC, are putting forward the proposition that all transwomen who are aware that they are read as being male are knowingly and deliberately transgressing women's boundaries when they choose to place their evidently male bodies in a female single-sex space. You don't seem prepared to consider this perspective.

I also consider that these transwomen are overwhelmingly autogynaephiles. That is, men who get a sexual turn-on from performing their own conception of "womanhood". Part of that performance is going into women's single-sex spaces. This turns the women who are trying to use the space into props for that man's sexual fantasies. I don't consent to be a forcibly-recruited prop in an autogynaephile man's sexual fantasies.

 

[Rolfe]

Here is another one. There isn't enough information on the video to get a date, but it seems to be recent. It's in Colorado.

https://twitter.com/Edwin07011/status/1623931055513247744

The transwoman has been caught in a sting set to trap paedophiles. He has come to meet what he thought was a 13 year old girl whom he had been talking to online, and whom he had asked to go into a bathroom and film herself getting undressed. Instead he walked into a trap.

I presume we would all be comfortable using the word "predator" to describe this charmer. One of the things that concerns me is, how do we tell the difference between overt and obvious predators like this, and the sort of transwoman who is only going into the women's bathroom for the sexual thrill of being in a woman-only space and isn't actually going to assault anyone? Allow the second category in, and I don't see how we keep the first category out.

 

[jimbob]

<Yawns>

Once again this thread (and indeed ones that are even tangentially related to it) have degenerated into bad tempered bickering.

Calm down or we will put this on moderated status...(yet again)

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: jimbob

 

[LondonJohn]

Here is another one. There isn't enough information on the video to get a date, but it seems to be recent. It's in Colorado.

https://twitter.com/Edwin07011/status/1623931055513247744

The transwoman has been caught in a sting set to trap paedophiles. He has come to meet what he thought was a 13 year old girl whom he had been talking to online, and whom he had asked to go into a bathroom and film herself getting undressed. Instead he walked into a trap.

I presume we would all be comfortable using the word "predator" to describe this charmer. One of the things that concerns me is, how do we tell the difference between overt and obvious predators like this, and the sort of transwoman who is only going into the women's bathroom for the sexual thrill of being in a woman-only space and isn't actually going to assault anyone? Allow the second category in, and I don't see how we keep the first category out.

Here is another one.

British female paedophile, 62, who sexually abused seven-year-old boy on webcam and loaned him to a pervert who flew from Canada to the UK is jailed for more than six years

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...seven-year-old-boy-webcam-loaned-pervert.html


I presume we would all be comfortable using the word "predator" to describe this charmer. One of the things that concerns me is, how do we tell the difference between overt and obvious predators like this, and the sort of ciswoman who is only going into the women's bathroom for the sexual thrill of being in an intimate space for women and isn't actually going to assault anyone?

 

[d4m10n]

Edited by jimbob: 

moderated content removed

I think it's a bit much to ask gendercrits to adopt transgender identity affirming language, but if you believe someone has grounded their argument in denialism it should be relatively straightforward to demonstrate the truth of key propositions which they reflexively deny.

Claim: "Someone with a cock and balls will never be a woman"

Counterclaim: This is demonstrably untrue because Daisy Taylor has a cock and balls and is undoubtedly a woman, for some specific definition of the term "woman."

This would require making the effort to show why your interlocutor is factually wrong (rather than morally or epistemically wrong) but that shouldn't be difficult when denialism is genuinely in play.

The same may well be said of bigotry, since grounding one's conclusions in bigotry doesn't lead to strong arguments. Whenever one's opponent is doing bigotry or denialism, it ought to be easy to deconstruct and refute their claims, or at least show how they have failed to support them with good arguments in the first place.

 

[Francesca R]

Francesca, you appear to be content to allow at least some transwomen into female single-sex spaces.

No I am not content to do that, I have said consistently for years that I am not, most recently here, 9 days ago.

It is, however, allowed in many places. And while it is fine, and to be supported, to campaign to change this, I do not believe it is the case than every trans woman who wishes to use female only settings, and does use such where permitted, is a predator, behaving as a predator, preying on women, pick one. I believe it is transphobic intolerance to think so or declare it to be so in the general case.

Why do you prioritise the desire of a man who knows he looks like a man (despite dressing in women's clothes) to go in there, above the desire of many women for privacy and a space they can rely on to be male-free?

As before, I do not.

But I do not suppose that all trans women who wish to access female settings are narcissistic or autogynaephilic or misogynistic or other things like these. Many are, plain and simple, people who want to be female, believe they are female, identify as female, have a gender identity of female, pick one.

 

[LondonJohn]

I think it's a bit much to ask gendercrits to adopt transgender identity affirming language, but if you believe someone has grounded their argument in denialism it should be relatively straightforward to demonstrate the truth of key propositions which they reflexively deny.

Claim: "Someone with a cock and balls will never be a woman"

Counterclaim: This is demonstrably untrue because Daisy Taylor has a cock and balls and is undoubtedly a woman, for some specific definition of the term "woman."

This would require making the effort to show why your interlocutor is factually wrong (rather than morally or epistemically wrong) but that shouldn't be difficult when denialism is genuinely in play.

The same may well be said of bigotry, since grounding one's conclusions in bigotry doesn't lead to strong arguments. Whenever one's opponent is doing bigotry or denialism, it ought to be easy to deconstruct and refute their claims, or at least show how they have failed to support them with good arguments in the first place.

Maybe take it up with the mainstream medical community, who have already done the heavy lifting on all of this for me.

(You do realise that mainstream medicine now recognises transgender identity to be a valid lived condition (as opposed to a mental health disorder)? Don't you? And that therefore, for example, it's medically valid* for a natal female to consider himself a transman? Don't you?)


* And fortunately, thanks to progressive governments throughout the industrialised world - who are following the medical science - it's increasingly valid in law too**.

** Much to the anger of the likes of extreme right-wing political groups and fundamentalist Christian groups, both of whom have found willing allies among the "gender critical" organisations......

 

[d4m10n]

It is entirely possible that the "mainstream medical community" has commented on whether it makes sense to call "someone with a cock and balls" a woman, but I severely doubt they have ever used the phrase "valid lived condition."

 

[Elaedith]

Maybe take it up with the mainstream medical community, who have already done the heavy lifting on all of this for me.

(You do realise that mainstream medicine now recognises transgender identity to be a valid lived condition (as opposed to a mental health disorder)? Don't you?

You do realise that a few years after homosexuality was removed from the DSM, a revision was undertaken to many many diagnoses to insert the criterion that conditions should only be classified as disorders if they involve clinically significant distress or impairment, and/or risk of harm to others?
That this revision was done to what was then called 'gender identity disorder' as part of a routine revision to multiple diagnoses to avoid harmless traits and behaviours being classified as disorders, and not because scientists had made an amazing 'scientific discovery' that transwomen are actually women and transmen are actually men?
That this requirement for dysphoria as a condition of diagnosis has remained ever since and was already in place well before DSM5?
That the idea that the DSM5 declassified 'transgender identity' as being a disorder is propaganda put out by activists to draw spurious parallels between homosexuality and gender identity?
Don't you?

And that therefore, for example, it's medically valid* for a natal female to consider himself a transman? Don't you?)

You do realise that 'transwoman are women, transmen are men, and nonbinary identities are valid' doesn't follow from stating 'transgender identity is not a disorder'? That if it did, we would have to say every human trait, behaviour or belief not classified as a disorder or a product of a disorder (ie. almost all of them) is 'valid', which makes the term meaningless?
That the idea that transwomen are women is purely philosophical or ideological, because it requires re-defining the word 'woman' to be based on identity or feeling rather than sex, and this is not something that medical science can declare, unless medical science is corrupted by ideology?
You realise that the philosophical basis of sex denialism underlying modern trans activism is based on ideas that deny the existence of objective knowledge and are therefore incompatible with science and scientific scepticism, as opposed to the philosophical basis of actual civil rights movements which are based on enlightenment values?
Don't you?

* And fortunately, thanks to progressive governments throughout the industrialised world - who are following the medical science - it's increasingly valid in law too**.

You do realise that sufficient, detailed evidence has been presented in this thread that governments are not following medical science but activist lobby groups that appeal to narcissism by convincing them that this is the 'new gay rights'? That you never respond to any of this evidence, which you would do if you were able to refute it?
That the world's leading expert on gender dysphoria, who chaired the working group that wrote the revision of gender dysphoria in DSM5 disagrees with you that governments are following the science?
Don't you?

** Much to the anger of the likes of extreme right-wing political groups and fundamentalist Christian groups, both of whom have found willing allies among the "gender critical" organisations......

You realise that when you never address any evidence but keep trying to smear by association, it is clear evidence to anyone with functioning reasoning skills that you have no argument?
Don't you?

 

[Myriad]

When perennial ideological opposites find common cause with one another against your position, the wise course is to regroup and reconsider why that is. Go ahead and try to smite them with embarrassment for the unseemly association instead. It's foolish, but it's a common enough pattern in history.

"Look at the landed rural elites who are whining about the new colonial taxation and governance policies, sounding just like the deplorable mobs in the cities! Goes to show they were just dimwitted Yankee Doodle Dandies all along."

 

[Rolfe]

That's a good way of putting it. Anything that has me and arch-unionist Joanne Rowling on the same page and singing from the same hymn sheet is likely to be a formidable position.

 

[d4m10n]

You do realise that 'transwoman are women, transmen are men, and nonbinary identities are valid' doesn't follow from stating 'transgender identity is not a disorder'?

I'd be really interested in seeing the chain of logic that supposedly gets from the highlighted bit to the first bit.

I'd also be interested in hearing when the "mainstream medical community" weighed in on transgender identity apart from any diagnosable condition, which is the claim being made in the highlighted portion.

 

[Rolfe]

Ah, the fabled mainstream medical community that always acts strictly according to well-researched evidence, always bearing mind the principle of "first do no harm".

Tavistock scandal ‘on a par with East German doping of athletes’
New book on NHS child gender clinic reveals how staff ‘regret’ routinely referring under-16s for puberty blockers.

She describes the service as “scandalous in its negligence and scale”.

In 2011, Gids began an “early intervention” study in which 44 patients aged 12 to 15 took part to see the longer-term effects of puberty blockers. But in April 2014 the practice of prescribing blockers to under-16s was introduced across the service before the data on their effects was available. A lower age limit of 12 was removed as Gids relied on a “stage, not age” approach based on where a child was in their development.

There are concerns about whether puberty blockers “temporarily or permanently” disrupt the development of children’s brains, as well as potentially stunting growth and affecting bone strength. Little is known about the long-term side effects.

Parents who complained (about their children not being medicalised) were referred to “clinicians who we all knew it was much easier to get on hormones through them, rather than other clinicians”, he said. There were also concerns that parents were pushing children into transitioning, in cases of fabricated or induced illness (FII), previously known as Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy.

On his time at Gids, Spiliadis added: “We’re like, ‘Oh my God, will we look back in ten, 20 years and be like, what did we do?’”

Whistleblowers also allege the clinic, which treated under-18s suffering from gender dysphoria, was “institutionally homophobic” and bowed to pressure from parents who preferred their children to be transgender rather than gay. When homosexual clinicians raised concerns it was becoming a “conversion therapy for gay kids”, they were ignored because they were deemed subjective, it is claimed.

Spiliadis added that, after not even having an office when he arrived, Gids “eventually took over a whole floor”. “But because it was bringing in so much money they [senior trust staff] could not challenge it,” he added.

Hutchinson said that with high pay, trips to transgender conferences in Europe and as far afield as Buenos Aires, the culture of Gids “more closely resembled a tech start-up than the NHS”.

Such a stellar example of professionalism and good practice, these gender clinicians. We should all just shut up, accept that they know best, and not criticise. Oh wait...

 

[Rolfe]

Your midnight check-in on the petition reports 80,170 signatures, so 500 new signatures today. Picking up a bit again.

The new magic number is 291.6.

 

[Nick Terry]

The Sunday Times has a story based on the forthcoming book by BBC Newsnight journalist Hannah Barnes on the Tavistock Centre's GIDS clinic. Hadley Freeman has interviewed Barnes separately, but the news story summary includes some extremely worrisome details, including apparent direct interventions by former Mermaids CEO Susie Green to ensure referred children were put on pubery blockers.
https://archive.is/2023.02.11-18102...-puberty-blockers-nhs-investigation-ghrqxk8pn


The story references as usual the 2,700% rise in referrals within a decade from 2009/10 to 2019/2020, matching the data reported from US Medicare also showing a drastic rise.

What will be interesting is to see whether the full book breaks down some of these figures, since there seem to be two cohorts involved. On the one hand, teenagers with ROGD, who have usually seized on gender identity as a solution to other problems, including autism. The exponential growth in referrals basically confirms Lisa Littman's original ROGD hypothesis - as does the timing of the onset of gender dysphoria for this cohort, plus the growing number of desisters and detransitioners.

The other cohort are the preteens, some of whom seem to have been pushed into the transition pathway by their parents, in some cases out of homophobia, in one anecdotal case the clinicians suspected a father of paedophilic motives for wanting their child to go on puberty blockers. Several stories emerge of parents rejecting the advice of the clinicians and insisting on the drugs. This is where Susie Green seems to be lurking in the background, which is just unbelievable - a charity CEO with zero psychological, psychiatric or medical training intervening in explicitly medical decisions. Green's collaboration with struck-off doctors outside of the Tavistock becomes all the more scary when one realises her influence inside Tavistock at certain moments.

The Sunday Times story includes some anecdotes matching Jamie Green's whistleblower story from Missouri, of clearly deeply disturbed children, some who identified as ethnicities other than their own, one with three 'alters' two of whom spoke in an Australian accent. Green's account referenced patients who claimed to have Tourette's syndrome, tics or multiple personalities when they actually didn't. All of which can be incubated in obscure corners of Reddit and TikTok.


I'm sorry, LJ, but it would seem a colossal percentage of these children and teenagers did not have 'valid transgender identities' but were instead the victims of Transhausen by Proxy courtesy of homophobic or overly well-meaning parents, of peer-induced and social media-driven social contagions, of uncritical affirmation by school teachers who lack any competence in psychology to make proper judgements, and medicalised too rapidly because of an overwhelmed service that was being suborned by advocates.

All of this has to be set against documented increases in reported teenage mental health disorders - anxiety, depression, self-harming and suicides/suicide attempts - which started to rise a decade ago, around the time social media started to take its current form. Unfortunately, the evidence now emerging suggests that transitioning doesn't alleviate these mental health issues but makes them worse, with higher rates of suicide post-transition. Desisters seem much happier than those who remain in the cult, which is how the trans community functions online, complete with its phobia indoctrination and fear-mongering.

It wasn't always like this; something has gone terribly wrong in the past decade, and the sooner this is acknowledged properly - beyond the repeated exposes from whistleblowers now on both sides of the Atlantic - then the sooner this will stop wrecking lives.

 

[Rolfe]

Hey, what am I, chopped liver? (See the post two before yours.)

Here is the companion piece, an interview with the author of the book under discussion.

How the Tavistock gender clinic ran out of control
Hadley Freeman meets the BBC’s Hannah Barnes, who spoke to dozens of former staff and patients, but had to fight to even get her book published

How did the country’s only NHS clinic for gender dysphoric children not even understand what they were doing, and yet keep doing it? Thanks to Barnes and her book, we now know the answers to those questions, and many more.

It's a long interview, perhaps even longer than the main article, and I would recommend reading it. Both the links I posted have share tokens, so there should be no problem with a paywall.

Clinicians recall multiple instances of young people who had suffered homophobic bullying at school or at home, and then identified as trans. According to the clinician Anastassis Spiliadis, “so many times” a family would say, “Thank God my child is trans and not gay or lesbian.” Girls said, “When I hear the word ‘lesbian’ I cringe,” and boys talked to doctors about their disgust at being attracted to other boys. When Gids asked adolescents referred to the service in 2012 about their sexuality, more than 90 per cent of females and 80 per cent of males said they were same-sex attracted or bisexual. Bristow came to believe that Gids was performing “conversion therapy for gay kids” and there was a bleak joke on the team that there would be “no gay people left at the rate Gids was going”. When gay clinicians such as Bristow voiced their concerns to those in charge, they say it was implied that they were not objective because they were gay and therefore “too close” to the work.

What if becoming trans is — for some people — a way of converting out of being gay? If a boy is attracted to other boys but feels shame about it, then a potential way around that is for him to identify as a girl and therefore insist he’s heterosexual.

That's something that has been suspected for a long time, but it's still shocking to see it in clear. Susie Green's little boy Jack was effeminate. Susie didn't mind but Susie's husband reacted very negatively to the idea of having a gay son and started taking all the toys and clothes he liked away from him, saying they were only for girls. Soon Jack began saying that he was a girl. Susie contacted Mermaids, and eventually took Jack to Thailand to be castrated on his 16th birthday. She became CEO of Mermaids, changed it from a low-key helpline for parents of gender-confused children into a huge campaigning organisation actively promoting transition, and became extremely influential at the Tavistock, pushing hard for children to be put on medication as early as possible, as described in the articles.

Jazz Jennings was pretty much the same. The story that is repeated is of Jazz wanting a sparkly bathing costume or something like that. He is now in his early 20s with massive health problems, and (like Jackie Green) sexually non-functioning.

 

[Elaedith]

Susie Green has just joined GenderGP!

 

[Elaedith]

I noticed this article 'In defence of medical heretics' made reference to the scandal over the 'transphobic questions' at the Royal College of Psychiatrists webinar discussed a while ago in this thread.

"Perhaps Dr. Hartland expected applause or silent compliance. He was unprepared for questions from the members of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and his reaction to being challenged was less than professional. He denounced the forty-five questions as “80 per cent transphobic”, posted a picture of nail marks he had made on his hand in an act of catharsis and then locked his Twitter account. This is surprising behaviour from one of the premier authors of a medical charter already signed by 80 per cent of UK medical schools. There are serious questions about the level of scrutiny conducted prior to signing this binding document and about its ambiguous contents.

According to its website, the GLADD (Association of LGBTQ+ Doctors and Dentists) charter was written by “queer medical activists” in conjunction with GLADD and Lancaster University Medical School. Its ostensible purpose is to effect a ban on “so-called conversion therapy”. Its critics are concerned that it is a flawed, unscientific document motivated by activism, not clinical considerations. They worry that it promotes the “affirmative care” paradigm which dominated the Tavistock and is currently under review by Dr Cass.

One experienced medic speaking under conditions of anonymity put it starkly. He told me, “This is not the language of medicine. It is the language of religion.”