Tiring stuff. Bits of light coming through though. A colleague completely out of the blue told me how tired she is with all the pronoun stuff at work. “It’s almost as if they say jump and we say ‘how high?’”.
It snuck in and started off slow. Now people are sick of the nonsense while told "Dont forget the struggles of this minority (to have their wank in public)!".
I have to have major surgery due to a gynaecological cancer soon (the good news is it's early and I should make a full recovery). I posted about my experience on FB and pointedly talked about encouraging other WOMEN to get checked out if they notice anything weird about their menstrual cycles.
Many of my FB friends are trans-supportive and I fully expected I might get at least one "friendly reminder" about "inclusive language". But I'm pleased to say no one went there. In fact, plenty referred to "women's health" being dismissed or ignored in their own comments. I increasingly think most people will uncritically accept the mantras and think "be kind" and "where's the harm, it's no skin off my nose to call Brian Desiree and she/her" (as I did several years ago) but I don't believe that the entire population is as thoroughly captured as it seems. Everyone knows what a woman is.
And let's ask BB of he'd be ok with people in garish costumes and with obviously hostile placards picketing outside his house if he'd said something that had offended somebody
The teeside story is brilliant i think! 'Woman accused of exposing her penis' is a satire of a news headline. Framing stories like the Onion has to peak more and more people.
Funny how the Lancet refers to ‘people’ who menstruate, but Teeside Live refers to a ‘woman’ exposing themselves. They could have said ‘person’ and let the readers draw their own conclusions. The only people allowed to be called women are men it seems.
I agree. Your average salt-of-the-earth Teessider will think 'WTF???' They won't think 'oh, OK. That's right'. Just like any normal rational person does.
This business with the Girl Guides. A lifetime ago I seem to remember swearing allegiance to God and the Queen when I was a guide. Has anyone forwarded all this dangerous crap to Her Maj to get her view. I think that’s overdue.
I think Teeside Live actually know what they are doing. They could have not used the word 'penis' anywhere in their article and just said 'exposed herself'. Including the word 'penis' will make more people go 'WTF???!!' because I some people still do not realise that a 'transwoman' can be a fully-intact male. I've had to explain to people (seemingly intelligent people!) that a 'transwoman' is not actually a woman (not in the TWAW way) who is gender-nonconforming or a man who has undergone sex reassignment surgery and is therefore minus his tackle.
Well, I must admit, I actually like the way Teesside Live handled it because it really made it obvious that, regardless of pronouns, we were talking about a fully functional male flasher.
As I recall, the flasher arrest in Wales a few months back was referred in the local press as a woman or someone who identified as a woman, and said 'she' all over the place and made no mention at all of a penis, which made it more ambiguous.
I'd say that it's not some people who don't know that but most people. Just like most people think that transwomen are feminine male homosexuals who take it a step further. Most people know very little about the whole phenomenon. Transactivists do their best to keep it that way. That's the only way they get away with their deceit and intimidation. (And when they in fact do admit that things are not what people generally believe they only ever do that towards relatively small audiences and in their language designed to hide reality by being unintelligible to normal people - to a degree where 99 per cent of all people will quit reading or listening after a few sentences. That's the whole point of the exercise.)
You're right. Until just over a year ago, I thought that if youngsters wanted to change their pronouns, so what. Then I started reading about the death threats to women and it all changed.
Yes, I was prompted to write to Teeside Live and then I figured out that the writer might have been constrained by unknown editorial restrictions but did the best they could to tell the truth. I still told them that they should be more forthright and say that a "man pretending to be a women did all this with exposing his penis". It's all the lying that makes me mad. I want them all to stop lying! It is hurting my head and heart to read the lies.
There's an awful lot of lewd women on the beaches in Denmark then in summer. Never understood this ridiculous prudery. What's lewd about breasts? And why the discriminatory attitude that it's not lewd if men bare their top?
But yeah I tend to agree that the Teeside article in deliberately including the word penis is more likely to peak trans more people than if omitted.
Yes, that's always been my reflex response. If they truly want to know what it's like to be a woman, they should ask to be demoted and paid 1/3 less than the men at their work.
I'm not sure breast exposure counts in the UK. I have a dim memory from ages ago of it needing to be an 'organ of generation' to count as indecent exposure. So vulva yes but breasts no. Obviously I could ve wrong or the law has been changed.
Grown men posing with airsoft rifles (copy of SA80- used by British Army) and making the Girl Guides a paramilitary organisation. No red flags or mental illness here…
Nullified woman and dug their claws into unstable childen with just a few signatures. Notice how the rest of the worlds males thinks this is genius. Puberty blockers for all!
Yes!! I had a wonderful email response from Miriam Cates MP, whom I'd written to in praise of her parliamentary speech on the dangers of gender identity ideology. What a woman! What a star! And I'm not even one of her constituents! This is the kind of politician one can actually like!
I really hope there is a group forming at Westminster behind the scenes who are going to prevent the 'anti-conversion-therapy' bill going through as planned.
I've just written AGAIN to my Labour MP about the article by Mark Jenkinson MP in Conservativehome.com ("My Twitter monstering about there being two biological sexes") I also spelled out the three definitions of "gender": term of grammar; performance of masculinity or femininity; WRONGLY: synonym of sex.
As George Orwell pointed out if you are careful to use language accurately then you THINK accurately. As legislators you would hope that they want to think accurately...?
Here we see the problem. Quoting from the Daily Mail on Jo Phoenix:
"Gender-critical views are the belief that someone’s sex — whether male or female — is biological and unchanging and different from their gender identity (whether they identify as a man or a woman). These beliefs are protected in law."
No. This is not a view. It is even less of a belief. To state that "these beliefs" are protected in law is patronizing to say the least. Even when it comes for a rather unlikely ally.
THIS is what public discourse has boild down to. Knowledge is cast as belief. This puts firmly established knowledge on the same level as someone's say so.
We might as well call someone who says: "The earth is round" someone how holds "flat earth critical views" and making his or her right to say that a mere concession - the same we give holders of absurd beliefs such as Anthroposophs, New Wavers or whatever.
Then we are wondering why ordinary people start believing quacks who say that vaccines don't work...
And yes, it IS exactly the same phenomenon. Firmly established facts are recast as mere beliefs and publicly put on the same level as the most lunatic claims.
What amazes me with the Daily Mail reporting on women being attacked for their views is the unexpected depth and thoughtfulness of their journalism. Contrast with the Guardian who refuse to interview those women directly and who always describe the LGB Alliance as transphobic when they've never spoken to their members.
I am very grateful for the Daily Mail doing that, by the way. No one else will. Particularly not the Guardian, which has become the Watchtower for New Creed of the Unicorn.
I know, I used to have paid subscription with them but I've switched to the Times. Although I don't really like the Times format, I'm grateful for their stance against trans ideology.
My subscription for the Guardian is due in a few weeks and I’ve cancelled it. What’s the point of the Guardian anymore. Their own journalists are not free to say what they know to be true. Also any paper employing the creepy Owen Jones is not worth spending money on.
t’s so sad really, I bloody read it for 25years, I trusted them. Then NYE Cologne happened and they didn’t report it for 5 days. Then I sat up and took notice... send them an email telling them why you are cancelling.
I know. It is what I believe to be a fatal flaw in an otherwise very positive verdict. But even independent of that, many activists for sanity are very defensive in their language. We must get out of that corner.
No, with respect, as I see it, she is just stating it in the terms that the judgment was made. So if called to defend yourself, say, against your employer, you should also refer to your own belief in biological facts as a “philosophical belief”. That is your defence.
Her job is to describe reality the best way possible. It is not to uncritically relay definitions that have already been framed by a very onesided discourse. That is just reinforcing the discourse and veiling reality. By the way, I am a journalist by profession.
Yes, I don't like the term 'belief' when we refer to something verifiable. That's why Richard Dawkins has finally thrown his hat in the ring I believe.
The other side doesn't much bother with legal considerations of any kind, and particularly not with the technicalities of legal definition. Nor, for that matter, does a wider public whom we hope to reach.
That much is true. Because of course, they are scientific facts. However, sadly, there are increasing numbers of scientists who dispute that. Very sad.
Yes and no. Many natural and social scientists will sign letters to that effect, hoping to save their careers. Very few of them will actually go out and dispute scientific facts. That is left to the employees of a handful of academic disciplines many refer to as "Grievance Studies". And very few of those do any research of any kind, let alone any that merits being mentioned with the word scientific in the same sentence. Which, btw, should be emphasized a lot more.
You know, all my working life (I am an early retired 58 year old), the subject of Child safeguarding was a hot topic. We were taught that if we had even the slightest suspicion of a child being in danger we must report it to the Police or we would be culpable. Rightly so. Children were being abused all over the place. A huge majority of men working in voluntary roles in churches were paedophiles. It was shocking. I remember being shocked to the core by what was happening in our society. Now, because a few men want to pretend they are women because it turns them on, all of that safeguarding has gone. We can no longer protect children because these Men are not to be challenged let alone offended. God help us.
It’s shocking how things that previous generations have known is now forgotten or purposely obscured. In all years up till about 2017 I thought we were moving forward, with women’s right and gay rights. Now these things are trashed.
The bit about we have 'anyone can use it' loos at home so why not the same for public loos - I've known quite a few women who insist their husbands and sons only use one specific toilet in the house.
We've often referred to our dogs as the underpants sniffers -- when we weren't referring to the Department of Health and Human Services the same way -- and now we have a dog who is the urinary supervisor.
Really? That seems a bit strange. If we segregate genders because of presumed danger why would someone have a problem sharing a toilet at home with their own family?
That was going to be my response but I was concerned this would start a torrent of counter argument. Happy to see the only person who responded was the Glinner troll
You know there’s no need to call me a troll. I don’t name call or be rude to anyone. Yes, I post studies and offer my point of view, but I always try to be civil and engage with people’s arguments. What’s the point of a comment section if everyone just says the same thing? I actually thought we had a lot of good discussions today, all civil and interesting, it’s a shame you’ve interpretation me the way you have.
You tend to make a statement, then when it's challenged logically you don't acknowledge that the argument is compelling or you make a disingenuous reply. You move on to the next comment and then the next post as if nothing that's been said before has gone in. Your synapses must be Teflon coated.
You may not be screaming insults in full caps like a troll but the effect is the same.
I don’t know many TRA people as you call them. I follow a lot on Twitter and the ones I’ve engaged with seem to be intelligent, reasonable, and kind-hearted people. I don’t think it helps the discourse to call anyone who disagrees thugs, and that goes for both sides
Because it is in a private room with a lock on the door and most people dont invite unknown active wankers into their homes for dinner. Go back to the incel circlejerk, troll.
We don't (or at least didn't) segregate genders, we segregate sexes. Which by the way TRAs are at the forefront of insisting on the essential difference between the two and here I'm totally in agreement with them. And yes gender neutral toilets are a possibility it's fairly common in Scandinavia and other parts of Europe I believe. ( Which of course ironically enough means TWs don't get to use the ladies after all so that opportunity for validation then vanishes) But that doesn't mean the same goes for every other situation as well which the episode in the LA spa bath very pointedly illustrated. Women have and must have the indomitable right to be free of male ( that's male sex not male gender for the hard of hearing) sex perverts in spaces where communal nakedness takes place, which means banning ALL males from those spaces. And yes that does include males who would have preferred to have been females, (or in some cases wouldn't really prefer to actually be female but have a fetish about the possibility of presenting as such the gratification for which is dependent upon the adulation and celebration of them as such by other members of society.
Welsh Lib Dems tend to be careerists in my experience, years ago one of them stood as a trustee and sacked women’s aid workers who didn’t want their wages cut. Faith in politicians has been low for years
Have just messaged TeesideLive. . . as a journo this really REALLY boils my piss. . . And it would be career suicide if I started mixing up the sexes of the animals I write about.
Thank you for this and yes all this stuff can be so exhausting but this is a great mixed bag of good and bad.
Dr Bell now free to speak out doesn't hold back so I view this as a positive and thanks for the the Stonewall Christmas celebration page, that was a hoot.
Lovely to see Spanish women won't wheesht either.
The Daily Mail! The Daily Mail! or how we've suddenly stopped hating the Daily Mail. Good for them for following The Times with their defence of women against trans madness. They even have a link to the crowd funding at the bottom of the article. Amazing.
Worth reading Billy Bragg's twitter post, as most responses were calling him out for the hypocrite that he is. It made for some sweet reading.
On that same thread someone also posted this terrific Aldous Huxley quote:
“The surest way to work up a crusade in favour of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behaviour 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”
And a lesson to us all worth repeating, there's no point in debating with a TRA because their only response is ad hominem abuse and nothing more.
I think everyone should come off Twitter and stop arguing with them. Leave the ‘abusive marriage’. Walk away. Spend the time saved working together shoring up women, children and gay peoples defences and rights! There seems to be something wrong there.
I think for some, eg people with DSDs or detransitioners, it is a good way for them to get their message and stories out, which otherwise are being hijacked for the purposes of TRAs. They try to set the message straight and I really admire them; and have also learned a great deal.
The trouble is it's a useful platform and you can reach a lot of people. And a lot of politicians and organisations seem to give it undue weight, like other social media, so it leads the direction of policy and if you ignore it you can be sidelined without any platform. It's the first place many journalists turn. Opinion makers, legislators and influencers. That's why so many were unaware this rot had been seeded - they weren't the demographic exposed to this and it's generational. We've been fighting within generations which has been a distraction to the impact on us all.
But isn't this the problem? Should "journalists" be getting their "information" from Twitter? I understand it is a way to reach people -- Meghan Murphy stated that well and clearly -- but it is toxic and it is designed to be toxic by toxic people.
What a fantastic quote! Bullying posited as righteous indignation -- this is how I have been describing transgender ideology. I don't know what it's like in the U.K., but in the U.S. most political "activism" consists of patting oneself on the back for being a good person. Which explains in a nutshell why "activism" changes nothing except for the worse.
Which is why social media is so good at this type of activism/outrage/indignation - it's about the being seen to be doing whatever it is. And then you are shown more of the same. And so are others. Instantly. We've always had groups and echo chambers but now it's an exponential cacophony reaching billions.
I've asked Samaritans press office if their CEO is considering her position but they're saying no one is asking about her previous employment - completely ignoring the fact that she was responsible for inviting this scandal. It's easy enough to find their contact details so suggest others also ask what's being done about this liability of a CEO who has just wrecked a household name institution.
It was Julie Bentley that introduced all this and threw out those protesting. She is now CEO of Samaritans - which is probably why all the suicidal ideation reported amongst those with gender identities isn't questioned by Samaritans. They have only recently started keeping information on this.
Oh OK, I get it. I keep meaning to look into that merry-go-round that the CEOs of charities all seem to be on, just going from one NGO to another in rotation. Dodgy AF.
It's not a question of them lying. Or a question of not believing them. It's about the fact they are convinced they want to kill themselves because they are in the wrong body, without adequate exploration of other factors that might be contributing to how they feel. A number of qualified practioners have said they have been discouraged or even prevented from questioning trans people's assertions. The idea that their problems stem from being in the wrong body, and these feelings will all just go away if they are given hormonal intervention/surgery has to be affirmed, without question, when actually there may be some other underlying reason(s) for their suicidal thoughts/ideation. The fact these cannot be explored by practioners means there is no way of finding out if this is the case, which is doing a disservice to people who feel suicidal, possibly leading them down a medical pathway they could come to regret. Then they might be just as unhappy as they were before, or even more unhappy than they were before.
I agree that a holistic approach must be taken when helping trans people who are suicidal. But given the staggering rate of suicide idealisation amongst them there’s clearly a common thread. I don’t see how you can challenge a suicidal person when they are in such a vulnerable position. Why can’t we trust that people know their own thoughts and feeling? Why does there have to be another reason, which seems to be the consensus on this forum?
It is not about challenging them. It is about trying to make sure you have a clear picture of why they feel the way they do, to ensure they get the appropriate treatment. Because as you said suicidal people are vulnerable, and not to be thorough would be medical negligence. This cannot be done if none of their thoughts and feelings beyond "I feel like I'm in the wrong body" can be talked about. How can a proper diagnosis be made without all the information? With regards to the rate of suicidal ideation amongst trans people, correlation does not imply causation. Only by exploring beyond "It's because I'm trans" (which doesn't seem to be permitted) is it possible to determine if there is cause and effect relationship.
Also, people may know their own thoughts and feelings, but counselling is about getting to the root of why they have those thoughts and feelings, and working through them, not just taking them at face value and treating them as immutable. Thoughts and feelings can change, can't they?
Samaritans have reporting guidelines asking that suicide is reported in a very low key sensitive way if absolutely necessary as there is a proven copy cat effect - especially amongst young people. By mentioning suicidal ideation in conjunction with gender non conforming people you're suggesting that this is a path they may choose. Samaritans themselves have put out messages like this on social media despite them clashing with their own guidelines.
OK, I don’t disagree if that’s what the Samaritans are doing, they need to follow their own guidelines. I don’t imagine a disphoric person calling them would be given much advice on the rights and wrongs of their gender identity and be guided to bodies that can help
Why don't we try to claw information from the myriad of privatised and contracted out health services, mental health trusts, providers and 'wellbeingists' that all bid to provide services, many out of area, so they have no clue of local populations and many think are the 'NHS'...that have a variety of different ways of collecting and presenting data and oh that's not statutory is it?
Presumably the Teeside flasher had a pink ribbon tied round "her" penis? After all, that's how you know someone's female, according to the experts at the Tavistock.
American health insurance sounds so confusing. You'd think they wouldn't want to pay up, but they do because it's turnover for the industry. Eucalele is wonderful (cannot spell her name and does it have some clever meaning that I should have sussed if I had a classical education?).
And because it's turnover for industry there is a vested interest in increasing numbers. Unlike the UK with our NHS (for now, at least) which doesn't have an interest in increasing turnover. This may be a clue as to why we are 'Terf Island'.
Tiring stuff. Bits of light coming through though. A colleague completely out of the blue told me how tired she is with all the pronoun stuff at work. “It’s almost as if they say jump and we say ‘how high?’”.
Hello there, friend!
And I’ve had another friend WhatsApp me today. What the hell is going on??
It snuck in and started off slow. Now people are sick of the nonsense while told "Dont forget the struggles of this minority (to have their wank in public)!".
I have to have major surgery due to a gynaecological cancer soon (the good news is it's early and I should make a full recovery). I posted about my experience on FB and pointedly talked about encouraging other WOMEN to get checked out if they notice anything weird about their menstrual cycles.
Many of my FB friends are trans-supportive and I fully expected I might get at least one "friendly reminder" about "inclusive language". But I'm pleased to say no one went there. In fact, plenty referred to "women's health" being dismissed or ignored in their own comments. I increasingly think most people will uncritically accept the mantras and think "be kind" and "where's the harm, it's no skin off my nose to call Brian Desiree and she/her" (as I did several years ago) but I don't believe that the entire population is as thoroughly captured as it seems. Everyone knows what a woman is.
All the very best with this and I hope it goes as well as it can. Wish you a speedy recovery.
Thank you very much! Not looking forward to it but it will be a relief to get it done.
That Twitter comment about JKR "weaponising house-living" made me laugh, thanks Graham, needed it 😄
Yes quite brilliant, parodies exactly the head up own arse logical abrasions they take for the genuine article.
"Women weaponizing trauma" BUT A WANKER MIGHT HARM HIMSELF.
And let's ask BB of he'd be ok with people in garish costumes and with obviously hostile placards picketing outside his house if he'd said something that had offended somebody
The teeside story is brilliant i think! 'Woman accused of exposing her penis' is a satire of a news headline. Framing stories like the Onion has to peak more and more people.
Funny how the Lancet refers to ‘people’ who menstruate, but Teeside Live refers to a ‘woman’ exposing themselves. They could have said ‘person’ and let the readers draw their own conclusions. The only people allowed to be called women are men it seems.
Men are men. Transwomen are the new 'women'. Women are history.
Very good point
I showed the headline to my husband. He mouthed the words quietly, squinted, and went "what?" Read it again and shook his head. 😄
I imagine the rest of the sane world reacted similarly.
Basically.
I agree. Your average salt-of-the-earth Teessider will think 'WTF???' They won't think 'oh, OK. That's right'. Just like any normal rational person does.
I lean toward the theory that someone is intentionally ridiculing IPSO guidance.
I hope so too. I wonder how many people this article will peak?
I have to say I agree. Most of the general public will go “WTF!?!”.
This business with the Girl Guides. A lifetime ago I seem to remember swearing allegiance to God and the Queen when I was a guide. Has anyone forwarded all this dangerous crap to Her Maj to get her view. I think that’s overdue.
Please - Her Maj has enough on her plate with Andrew and Harry. We don't want to propel her into a tailspin....
Poor thing… it would probably finish her off. I for one would not want that.
I think Teeside Live actually know what they are doing. They could have not used the word 'penis' anywhere in their article and just said 'exposed herself'. Including the word 'penis' will make more people go 'WTF???!!' because I some people still do not realise that a 'transwoman' can be a fully-intact male. I've had to explain to people (seemingly intelligent people!) that a 'transwoman' is not actually a woman (not in the TWAW way) who is gender-nonconforming or a man who has undergone sex reassignment surgery and is therefore minus his tackle.
Well, I must admit, I actually like the way Teesside Live handled it because it really made it obvious that, regardless of pronouns, we were talking about a fully functional male flasher.
As I recall, the flasher arrest in Wales a few months back was referred in the local press as a woman or someone who identified as a woman, and said 'she' all over the place and made no mention at all of a penis, which made it more ambiguous.
I'd say that it's not some people who don't know that but most people. Just like most people think that transwomen are feminine male homosexuals who take it a step further. Most people know very little about the whole phenomenon. Transactivists do their best to keep it that way. That's the only way they get away with their deceit and intimidation. (And when they in fact do admit that things are not what people generally believe they only ever do that towards relatively small audiences and in their language designed to hide reality by being unintelligible to normal people - to a degree where 99 per cent of all people will quit reading or listening after a few sentences. That's the whole point of the exercise.)
You're right. Until just over a year ago, I thought that if youngsters wanted to change their pronouns, so what. Then I started reading about the death threats to women and it all changed.
Yes, I was prompted to write to Teeside Live and then I figured out that the writer might have been constrained by unknown editorial restrictions but did the best they could to tell the truth. I still told them that they should be more forthright and say that a "man pretending to be a women did all this with exposing his penis". It's all the lying that makes me mad. I want them all to stop lying! It is hurting my head and heart to read the lies.
I totally understand this! Whenever I hear someone speaking the truth on television or radio, it is such a bloody relief!
What would it mean for an actual woman to “expose herself”, anyway? Take her top off? Pull down her trousers and moon?
Showing your breasts is good enough in the US apparently https://www.npr.org/2019/11/21/781703956/utah-woman-charged-with-lewdness-after-being-topless-in-her-own-home
There's an awful lot of lewd women on the beaches in Denmark then in summer. Never understood this ridiculous prudery. What's lewd about breasts? And why the discriminatory attitude that it's not lewd if men bare their top?
But yeah I tend to agree that the Teeside article in deliberately including the word penis is more likely to peak trans more people than if omitted.
A WANKER MIGHT DIE.
Won't somebody think of the wankers?
They sure are.
Whereas flashing your dick in a women's changing room isn't necessarily as long as you say you "feel as a woman".
It's funny how they're all about the coquetish poses in hot pants but not so much the lower pay and the scrubbing shite streaks out of the u-bend.
Yes, that's always been my reflex response. If they truly want to know what it's like to be a woman, they should ask to be demoted and paid 1/3 less than the men at their work.
Good point.
I'm not sure breast exposure counts in the UK. I have a dim memory from ages ago of it needing to be an 'organ of generation' to count as indecent exposure. So vulva yes but breasts no. Obviously I could ve wrong or the law has been changed.
What can you expect in UTAH? Sorry, sensible Utahians. What do you call people who live in Utah? Mainers are called Mainiacs, and I'm not kidding.
Grown men posing with airsoft rifles (copy of SA80- used by British Army) and making the Girl Guides a paramilitary organisation. No red flags or mental illness here…
Nullified woman and dug their claws into unstable childen with just a few signatures. Notice how the rest of the worlds males thinks this is genius. Puberty blockers for all!
Yes!! I had a wonderful email response from Miriam Cates MP, whom I'd written to in praise of her parliamentary speech on the dangers of gender identity ideology. What a woman! What a star! And I'm not even one of her constituents! This is the kind of politician one can actually like!
I really hope there is a group forming at Westminster behind the scenes who are going to prevent the 'anti-conversion-therapy' bill going through as planned.
I've just written AGAIN to my Labour MP about the article by Mark Jenkinson MP in Conservativehome.com ("My Twitter monstering about there being two biological sexes") I also spelled out the three definitions of "gender": term of grammar; performance of masculinity or femininity; WRONGLY: synonym of sex.
As George Orwell pointed out if you are careful to use language accurately then you THINK accurately. As legislators you would hope that they want to think accurately...?
Here we see the problem. Quoting from the Daily Mail on Jo Phoenix:
"Gender-critical views are the belief that someone’s sex — whether male or female — is biological and unchanging and different from their gender identity (whether they identify as a man or a woman). These beliefs are protected in law."
No. This is not a view. It is even less of a belief. To state that "these beliefs" are protected in law is patronizing to say the least. Even when it comes for a rather unlikely ally.
THIS is what public discourse has boild down to. Knowledge is cast as belief. This puts firmly established knowledge on the same level as someone's say so.
We might as well call someone who says: "The earth is round" someone how holds "flat earth critical views" and making his or her right to say that a mere concession - the same we give holders of absurd beliefs such as Anthroposophs, New Wavers or whatever.
Then we are wondering why ordinary people start believing quacks who say that vaccines don't work...
And yes, it IS exactly the same phenomenon. Firmly established facts are recast as mere beliefs and publicly put on the same level as the most lunatic claims.
What amazes me with the Daily Mail reporting on women being attacked for their views is the unexpected depth and thoughtfulness of their journalism. Contrast with the Guardian who refuse to interview those women directly and who always describe the LGB Alliance as transphobic when they've never spoken to their members.
I am very grateful for the Daily Mail doing that, by the way. No one else will. Particularly not the Guardian, which has become the Watchtower for New Creed of the Unicorn.
I know, I used to have paid subscription with them but I've switched to the Times. Although I don't really like the Times format, I'm grateful for their stance against trans ideology.
My subscription for the Guardian is due in a few weeks and I’ve cancelled it. What’s the point of the Guardian anymore. Their own journalists are not free to say what they know to be true. Also any paper employing the creepy Owen Jones is not worth spending money on.
t’s so sad really, I bloody read it for 25years, I trusted them. Then NYE Cologne happened and they didn’t report it for 5 days. Then I sat up and took notice... send them an email telling them why you are cancelling.
And they still have some great writers and cartoonists. I don't want to see them without a home. We need a pluralist press.
The puzzles are good.
Yes. 6 down, "What are Trans women?" 5 letters.
The point is that the protection in law (Maya Forstater) is that of a “philosophical belief”.
I know. It is what I believe to be a fatal flaw in an otherwise very positive verdict. But even independent of that, many activists for sanity are very defensive in their language. We must get out of that corner.
But the journalist is not being patronising in putting it in those terms.
At best she is thoughtless.
No, with respect, as I see it, she is just stating it in the terms that the judgment was made. So if called to defend yourself, say, against your employer, you should also refer to your own belief in biological facts as a “philosophical belief”. That is your defence.
Her job is to describe reality the best way possible. It is not to uncritically relay definitions that have already been framed by a very onesided discourse. That is just reinforcing the discourse and veiling reality. By the way, I am a journalist by profession.
Yes, I don't like the term 'belief' when we refer to something verifiable. That's why Richard Dawkins has finally thrown his hat in the ring I believe.
Well, me neither! The trouble is, people keep contesting these facts, even ones which appear verifiable.
But it is still the nature of the legal protection.
The other side doesn't much bother with legal considerations of any kind, and particularly not with the technicalities of legal definition. Nor, for that matter, does a wider public whom we hope to reach.
That much is true. Because of course, they are scientific facts. However, sadly, there are increasing numbers of scientists who dispute that. Very sad.
Yes and no. Many natural and social scientists will sign letters to that effect, hoping to save their careers. Very few of them will actually go out and dispute scientific facts. That is left to the employees of a handful of academic disciplines many refer to as "Grievance Studies". And very few of those do any research of any kind, let alone any that merits being mentioned with the word scientific in the same sentence. Which, btw, should be emphasized a lot more.
Which, furthermore, is “worthy of respect”.
Very good point
You know, all my working life (I am an early retired 58 year old), the subject of Child safeguarding was a hot topic. We were taught that if we had even the slightest suspicion of a child being in danger we must report it to the Police or we would be culpable. Rightly so. Children were being abused all over the place. A huge majority of men working in voluntary roles in churches were paedophiles. It was shocking. I remember being shocked to the core by what was happening in our society. Now, because a few men want to pretend they are women because it turns them on, all of that safeguarding has gone. We can no longer protect children because these Men are not to be challenged let alone offended. God help us.
It’s shocking how things that previous generations have known is now forgotten or purposely obscured. In all years up till about 2017 I thought we were moving forward, with women’s right and gay rights. Now these things are trashed.
Known -- or learned to their cost! (Huntley, Savile...)
The bit about we have 'anyone can use it' loos at home so why not the same for public loos - I've known quite a few women who insist their husbands and sons only use one specific toilet in the house.
Yes, and many of us share our bed with a man, that doesn't mean we'd share it with any man.
I know all the people I share a bathroom with. They are not random strangers. Their "gender neutral toilet at home" argument is so lame.
Lib Dems… one more reason never to vote for them again :(
Yes, yet another example of a logic catapulted from the moon
Plus presumably you're not usually sharing the bathroom at the same time as others anyway, at least that's the way it worked in my family home.
My dog does like to come in!!!
We've often referred to our dogs as the underpants sniffers -- when we weren't referring to the Department of Health and Human Services the same way -- and now we have a dog who is the urinary supervisor.
It’s so stupid, how dare they be so cocksure and arrogant that they can put that forward as an argument. How much money is behind this?!
It's like they are deliberately taking the piss.
They aint the brightest bunch thats why they tantrum a lot.
Really? That seems a bit strange. If we segregate genders because of presumed danger why would someone have a problem sharing a toilet at home with their own family?
Urine over the seat and floor. Contain it in one male space them the females of the house don't have to suffer.
We separate the 2 sexes for various reasons, only one of which is 'presumed danger'. As you know.
That was going to be my response but I was concerned this would start a torrent of counter argument. Happy to see the only person who responded was the Glinner troll
You know there’s no need to call me a troll. I don’t name call or be rude to anyone. Yes, I post studies and offer my point of view, but I always try to be civil and engage with people’s arguments. What’s the point of a comment section if everyone just says the same thing? I actually thought we had a lot of good discussions today, all civil and interesting, it’s a shame you’ve interpretation me the way you have.
You tend to make a statement, then when it's challenged logically you don't acknowledge that the argument is compelling or you make a disingenuous reply. You move on to the next comment and then the next post as if nothing that's been said before has gone in. Your synapses must be Teflon coated.
You may not be screaming insults in full caps like a troll but the effect is the same.
It’s actually useful to see the type in here.
Tell it to your thuggish TRA pals
I don’t know many TRA people as you call them. I follow a lot on Twitter and the ones I’ve engaged with seem to be intelligent, reasonable, and kind-hearted people. I don’t think it helps the discourse to call anyone who disagrees thugs, and that goes for both sides
Each to their own I suppose :)
Because it is in a private room with a lock on the door and most people dont invite unknown active wankers into their homes for dinner. Go back to the incel circlejerk, troll.
We don't (or at least didn't) segregate genders, we segregate sexes. Which by the way TRAs are at the forefront of insisting on the essential difference between the two and here I'm totally in agreement with them. And yes gender neutral toilets are a possibility it's fairly common in Scandinavia and other parts of Europe I believe. ( Which of course ironically enough means TWs don't get to use the ladies after all so that opportunity for validation then vanishes) But that doesn't mean the same goes for every other situation as well which the episode in the LA spa bath very pointedly illustrated. Women have and must have the indomitable right to be free of male ( that's male sex not male gender for the hard of hearing) sex perverts in spaces where communal nakedness takes place, which means banning ALL males from those spaces. And yes that does include males who would have preferred to have been females, (or in some cases wouldn't really prefer to actually be female but have a fetish about the possibility of presenting as such the gratification for which is dependent upon the adulation and celebration of them as such by other members of society.
You really don't see the difference between "one's own family" and "the general public" ie "complete strangers"?
Welsh Lib Dems tend to be careerists in my experience, years ago one of them stood as a trustee and sacked women’s aid workers who didn’t want their wages cut. Faith in politicians has been low for years
Have just messaged TeesideLive. . . as a journo this really REALLY boils my piss. . . And it would be career suicide if I started mixing up the sexes of the animals I write about.
Good for you!
Thank you for this and yes all this stuff can be so exhausting but this is a great mixed bag of good and bad.
Dr Bell now free to speak out doesn't hold back so I view this as a positive and thanks for the the Stonewall Christmas celebration page, that was a hoot.
Lovely to see Spanish women won't wheesht either.
The Daily Mail! The Daily Mail! or how we've suddenly stopped hating the Daily Mail. Good for them for following The Times with their defence of women against trans madness. They even have a link to the crowd funding at the bottom of the article. Amazing.
Worth reading Billy Bragg's twitter post, as most responses were calling him out for the hypocrite that he is. It made for some sweet reading.
On that same thread someone also posted this terrific Aldous Huxley quote:
“The surest way to work up a crusade in favour of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behaviour 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”
And a lesson to us all worth repeating, there's no point in debating with a TRA because their only response is ad hominem abuse and nothing more.
I think everyone should come off Twitter and stop arguing with them. Leave the ‘abusive marriage’. Walk away. Spend the time saved working together shoring up women, children and gay peoples defences and rights! There seems to be something wrong there.
I think for some, eg people with DSDs or detransitioners, it is a good way for them to get their message and stories out, which otherwise are being hijacked for the purposes of TRAs. They try to set the message straight and I really admire them; and have also learned a great deal.
*set the record straight
The trouble is it's a useful platform and you can reach a lot of people. And a lot of politicians and organisations seem to give it undue weight, like other social media, so it leads the direction of policy and if you ignore it you can be sidelined without any platform. It's the first place many journalists turn. Opinion makers, legislators and influencers. That's why so many were unaware this rot had been seeded - they weren't the demographic exposed to this and it's generational. We've been fighting within generations which has been a distraction to the impact on us all.
But isn't this the problem? Should "journalists" be getting their "information" from Twitter? I understand it is a way to reach people -- Meghan Murphy stated that well and clearly -- but it is toxic and it is designed to be toxic by toxic people.
Absolutely
What a fantastic quote! Bullying posited as righteous indignation -- this is how I have been describing transgender ideology. I don't know what it's like in the U.K., but in the U.S. most political "activism" consists of patting oneself on the back for being a good person. Which explains in a nutshell why "activism" changes nothing except for the worse.
Yep - nothing but performative. No genuine concern to take actual action which will do actual good.
Which is why social media is so good at this type of activism/outrage/indignation - it's about the being seen to be doing whatever it is. And then you are shown more of the same. And so are others. Instantly. We've always had groups and echo chambers but now it's an exponential cacophony reaching billions.
I've asked Samaritans press office if their CEO is considering her position but they're saying no one is asking about her previous employment - completely ignoring the fact that she was responsible for inviting this scandal. It's easy enough to find their contact details so suggest others also ask what's being done about this liability of a CEO who has just wrecked a household name institution.
Why the Samaritans? Have they done this too? I thought it was Girl Guides.
It was Julie Bentley that introduced all this and threw out those protesting. She is now CEO of Samaritans - which is probably why all the suicidal ideation reported amongst those with gender identities isn't questioned by Samaritans. They have only recently started keeping information on this.
Oh OK, I get it. I keep meaning to look into that merry-go-round that the CEOs of charities all seem to be on, just going from one NGO to another in rotation. Dodgy AF.
You summed it up perfectly. There are some honourable exceptions and they leave places rudderless when they move on.
Why would you question the suicidal idealisation of trans people? Why would they lie?
It's not a question of them lying. Or a question of not believing them. It's about the fact they are convinced they want to kill themselves because they are in the wrong body, without adequate exploration of other factors that might be contributing to how they feel. A number of qualified practioners have said they have been discouraged or even prevented from questioning trans people's assertions. The idea that their problems stem from being in the wrong body, and these feelings will all just go away if they are given hormonal intervention/surgery has to be affirmed, without question, when actually there may be some other underlying reason(s) for their suicidal thoughts/ideation. The fact these cannot be explored by practioners means there is no way of finding out if this is the case, which is doing a disservice to people who feel suicidal, possibly leading them down a medical pathway they could come to regret. Then they might be just as unhappy as they were before, or even more unhappy than they were before.
I agree that a holistic approach must be taken when helping trans people who are suicidal. But given the staggering rate of suicide idealisation amongst them there’s clearly a common thread. I don’t see how you can challenge a suicidal person when they are in such a vulnerable position. Why can’t we trust that people know their own thoughts and feeling? Why does there have to be another reason, which seems to be the consensus on this forum?
It is not about challenging them. It is about trying to make sure you have a clear picture of why they feel the way they do, to ensure they get the appropriate treatment. Because as you said suicidal people are vulnerable, and not to be thorough would be medical negligence. This cannot be done if none of their thoughts and feelings beyond "I feel like I'm in the wrong body" can be talked about. How can a proper diagnosis be made without all the information? With regards to the rate of suicidal ideation amongst trans people, correlation does not imply causation. Only by exploring beyond "It's because I'm trans" (which doesn't seem to be permitted) is it possible to determine if there is cause and effect relationship.
Also, people may know their own thoughts and feelings, but counselling is about getting to the root of why they have those thoughts and feelings, and working through them, not just taking them at face value and treating them as immutable. Thoughts and feelings can change, can't they?
Samaritans have reporting guidelines asking that suicide is reported in a very low key sensitive way if absolutely necessary as there is a proven copy cat effect - especially amongst young people. By mentioning suicidal ideation in conjunction with gender non conforming people you're suggesting that this is a path they may choose. Samaritans themselves have put out messages like this on social media despite them clashing with their own guidelines.
OK, I don’t disagree if that’s what the Samaritans are doing, they need to follow their own guidelines. I don’t imagine a disphoric person calling them would be given much advice on the rights and wrongs of their gender identity and be guided to bodies that can help
They don't give advice at all just listen and provide emotional support.
Are there reliable statistics on suicidal ideation among transexuals, cross-dressers, AGP males etc?
Why don't we try to claw information from the myriad of privatised and contracted out health services, mental health trusts, providers and 'wellbeingists' that all bid to provide services, many out of area, so they have no clue of local populations and many think are the 'NHS'...that have a variety of different ways of collecting and presenting data and oh that's not statutory is it?
I'm on it. I'll report back...probably in 4 years.
Presumably the Teeside flasher had a pink ribbon tied round "her" penis? After all, that's how you know someone's female, according to the experts at the Tavistock.
What an image!
American health insurance sounds so confusing. You'd think they wouldn't want to pay up, but they do because it's turnover for the industry. Eucalele is wonderful (cannot spell her name and does it have some clever meaning that I should have sussed if I had a classical education?).
She has a British sense of humour.
Go terf Island! Go scanditerfs! Go euclalaee!
And because it's turnover for industry there is a vested interest in increasing numbers. Unlike the UK with our NHS (for now, at least) which doesn't have an interest in increasing turnover. This may be a clue as to why we are 'Terf Island'.