What do you think does make a difference? Do you think femaleness/womanhood is nothing but a certain state of mind, something purely psychological rather than biological?
Are Transwomen Women?
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Toilets aren't the only public spaces where this problem occurs: viewtopic.php?p=312973#p312973
If self-identification as a woman is all that is legally relevant for the status of womanhood, then lying pseudo-transwomen who are actually non-transsexual men can misuse the real transwomen's right to enter women-only places and spaces. How likely is it that this would actually happen? I don't know, but the probability is not zero. Bad people do bad things. It's a problem that mustn't be brushed aside as totally unrealistic. You say "I have never seen a strange man in the women's toilets," but in the past it was simply illegal for a man to enter women's toilets, no matter whether or not he declared to be a transwoman. (One exception: as far as I know, a father may enter a restroom for women together with his daughter if she's too young to do so alone.) But if self-identification as a woman becomes the only legal condition for womanhood, then a man in a women's toilet can simply legalize his presence there by declaring that he self-identifies as a woman. And this possibility would probably encourage perverts to do what they hadn't dared to do before. Is that acceptable to you?Greta wrote: ↑June 9th, 2018, 4:47 amHowever, as I say, for even sick men the humiliation of wandering around in drag would still be far greater than their desire to try peeping at women in toilets. I have never seen a strange man in the women's toilets - ever - and I am a senior citizen. You might as well about dangerous gangs storming into male or female toilets and having their way with the occupants. Maybe terrorists in the toilet? Probably more likely than strange men in dresses risking every aspect of their reputation in trying to gawk at women in bathrooms.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Note again that female toilets aren't the only women-only places/spaces where there is a problem and a danger if self-identification is all that matters:Consul wrote: ↑June 9th, 2018, 9:38 am But if self-identification as a woman becomes the only legal condition for womanhood, then a man in a women's toilet can simply legalize his presence there by declaring that he self-identifies as a woman. And this possibility would probably encourage perverts to do what they hadn't dared to do before. Is that acceptable to you?
* changing rooms for women (in stores, gymnasiums, or swimming baths),
* public shower rooms for women
* public saunas for women
* female prisons
* women's refuges
* homeless hostels for women
* public transport sleeper carriages for women
* all women-only public events or meetings (e.g. congresses and concerts)
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
It's unfortunate for you, the one who presented these arguments.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
You can't change your biology by chopping and reshaping parts of you. Taking hormones would be much more of a grey area as the unconscious influence of various chemicals in the brain does have a tangible, but incredibly hard to measure, effect. For example I was reading a recent study which suggested increased testosterone led to increased religiosity. Now I'm not sure how this adds up between correlation and causation but I think it's clear that we say I we normally think of ourselves as one conscious agent (through time). But in reality it is not so simple. For my money there are elements on one conscious agent and elements of unconscious behaviour and elements of say a captain steering a large ship whereupon he relies on crew and the vagaries of wind and tide. Seriously I keep on saying this, it's complicated. I don't have a perfect answer for you, I just don't like your answer. And the 'problems' you present are no threat whatsoever to my way of life.What do you think does make a difference? Do you think femaleness/womanhood is nothing but a certain state of mind, something purely psychological rather than biological?
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
So, if any flat-chested women try to use the bathroom, you look under their pants, or send a test-swab off to the labs? No problem there -
but wouldn't it be cheaper just to put doors on all the public toilets?
Such as? Scootching down on the floor and trying to twist their neck to see something displayed to its least advantage that they could see, presented at its fines, or dirtiest, in comfort and safety, on their laptops at home? Or flashing --- Oh, wait, they've dared that at least twice before.Consul wrote: ↑June 9th, 2018, 9:38 am But if self-identification as a woman becomes the only legal condition for womanhood, then a man in a women's toilet can simply legalize his presence there by declaring that he self-identifies as a woman. And this possibility would probably encourage perverts to do what they hadn't dared to do before.
If you mean actual attacks on women, how do you figure the current statistics would be affected?
Already dealt-with. Change rooms in stores and hospitals are single, curtained spaces; there is no reason the same can't be done in shower rooms and gymnasiums. Many people, of all sexes, are uncomfortable undressing in public and would prefer a degree of privacy.* changing rooms for women (in stores, gymnasiums, or swimming baths),
* public shower rooms for women
* public saunas for women
What percent of the population is transwomen who have been convicted of a crime or abused by a life-mate or destitute? How many of those convicts and refugees and homeless are intent upon committing crimes against their fellow inmates?* female prisons
* women's refuges
* homeless hostels for women
I suggest that this "danger" is statistically negligible; there is far more danger from guards, careless administrators giving out information, and "ciswoman" inmates.
Train and ship cabins are private and neither the railway cars nor decks are segregated.* public transport sleeper carriages for women
In fact, I hear they're even allowing mixed-sex couples to sleep together now.
Name two such events where the presence of a woman with only one X chromosome would cause a problem that a woman with two X chromosomes could not cause, and outline the problem.* all women-only public events or meetings (e.g. congresses and concerts)
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
What about a meeting of female rape victims who may not be happy about seeing (recognizably) male persons there who (either truly or falsely) assert that they are transwomen and thus women too? Do you think the non-transwomen should be legally obliged to tolerate their presence?
I'm aware that this is a very complicated moral and legal issue, but the central general question is the following one:
Should all transwomen have the (legally enforceable) right to enter and use all women-only places/spaces, and to participate in all women-only events or meetings?
The non-moral/non-legal question as to whether transwomen are (really/real) women is certainly relevant to the (justification of the) answer!
Of course, to answer that question in the negative is not to say that there's no room for differentiation (particularly between physically feminized transwomen and physically non-feminized ones), since "not all" doesn't mean "all not" ("not everybody" doesn't mean "nobody", and "not everywhere" doesn't mean "nowhere"). But, in my view, the big problem is that an absolute, unqualified yes leads the very concept of a women-only place/space ad absurdum.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
If she's been raped, she belongs there as much as anyone.
If it's a closed meeting, it's not public. If it's private, the organizers can make whatever rules they want.Do you think the non-transwomen should be legally obliged to tolerate their presence?
If it's public, nobody's taking names or feeling up the crotches at the door, and anyone who doesn't like the company can leave.
Only if you insist on complicating it.I'm aware that this is a very complicated moral and legal issue
Public spaces and events, yes. Private spaces and events, at the discretion of the membership.Should all transwomen have the (legally enforceable) right to enter and use all women-only places/spaces, and to participate in all women-only events or meetings?
How complicated is that?
No, it isn't. There is no moral question regarding womanhood. Women have been blamed for everything from the invention of agriculture onward - we won't get any guiltier with the addition of a few voluntary sisters.The non-moral/non-legal question as to whether transwomen are (really/real) women is certainly relevant to the (justification of the) answer!
The moral questions regarding behaviour are the same as the legal ones: Who did what to whom?
If she feels like a woman, thinks like a woman, speaks like a woman, acts like a woman and wishes to be a woman, I see no harm done.
And to those women who are concerned that artificial woman will dilute the victim-pool, I's just like to say: There is plenty of ill-treatment to go around and with the global resurgence of fascism, it will double. If the ranks swell by 0.3%, you'll still get your share.*
* The real fan-hitting will start when women can get gene therapy to turn them into men, and they'll be indistinguishable.
That's what you need to worry about, not the deserters.
Exactly!ad absurdum.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
That's already been decided. Transwomen are generally not made welcome in those spaces. Are you unhappy with that situation?Consul wrote: ↑June 9th, 2018, 8:43 am"…other women-only spaces such as prisons, homeless hostels, public transport sleeper carriages…"
Source: https://medium.com/@kathleenstock/respo ... 263ffd87c8
One more example: women's refuges
I don't feel qualified to answer that one - should a person who wants but cannot afford the surgery be denied the benefits of those who can? Should those who can afford the surgery be denied rights because others cannot?Consul wrote:The question is whether all transwomen, including unfeminized and only partly feminized ones (who have a male body or male genitals at least), should have the right to enter and use all these women-only spaces in society.
I just think that people in that situation have very difficult lives and any help they receive might at least somewhat alleviate their inordinately high suicide rate. I do, however, draw the line at sport which I think is unfair. I don't think either men's or women's refuges are likely to give transpeople support they need - one cannot force caregivers to care. Showers and toilets - those who identify should be given the doubt because the alternative of forcing transpeople into the toilets of their genetics would disastrous.
Also, one needs to be careful with such accusations at times. There are a number of reports of regular women being attacked in women's toilets because they were suspected of being trans. It reminds me of a workmate who was almost brought to tears at lunchtime when a well-meaning shop assistant asked her about her pregnancy.
There needs to be care taken with these kinds of witch hunts, not only to prevent pointless conflict as above, but especially when the targets are amongst the most disempowered and unfairly reviled in society, with one of the highest depression and suicide rates of any demographic.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
With all the corruption among the organizers of FIFA and the Olympics, the economic and social disruption of those international spectacles on their host nations, all the illegal drugs and quasi-legal supplements, and all the commercialism of professional sport, it's one big global meat market anyway.
Why not just remove the old categories and sort competitors by weight-class or age-group or some other, more accurate criteria?
Or just stop doing it and go back to the neighbourhood sand-lot and frozen pond.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Of course they do have to define what female means and still can't always get it right.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
In the same age and weight class? I wasn't aware.
It wouldn't stop people playing a game. What I'd be doing away with is the insane competitions of the big world-class and professional events that cripple the participants emotionally and socially in their youth and physically by middle age. I'd be okay with that.If you got away with female/male splits you would do away with female sport.
But, whatever. That's another topic.
Those big spectacles have their own rules already, sequestered from normal life. The adjudicating committees have to keep setting new standards and rules every time a technological breakthrough changes the conditions. Athletes are forever having to undergo blood and urine tests, so it wouldn't be any harder to monitor.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Even if "she" is physically completely male?
I've been talking about publicly accessible places/spaces, events etc. only.
What you seem to forget is that "ciswomen" have rights too.
So transwomen with a male body and male genitals, who are physically indistinguishable from non-transsexual men, should have the legally enforceable right to use women's locker rooms and shower rooms? So all the girls and women there should have to tolerate the sight of penises and testicles at these places?
An ought cannot simply and directly be derived from an is, but facts are always relevant to moral and legal issues.
"Any moral problem one cares to take is bound to be divisible into the following elements. There are first of all questions of fact. To take the example I have just been discussing: the question, whether the psychologists are right who say that it is possible to identify genetic elements in the causes of crime, is a question of fact, which can be investigated empirically. In most practical moral problems it will be found that the huge majority of the questions which have to be settled before we can solve them are factual ones. This has tempted some philosophers to think that the only questions that have to be answered before we can solve them are of this sort—that once all the facts are known, no further problem will remain: the answer to the moral question will be obvious. This is, however, not so, as we shall see in due course. But certainly the factual questions are the ones that cause 99 per cent of the trouble. We can see this if we study any two people arguing about a moral question. We shall nearly always find them disputing each other's facts. To revert for a moment to the problem of the draftee who has to decide whether to go into the army: most of his problem is to find out what is actually happening in, for example, Vietnam, and what the actual consequences of various courses of action, whether on his or his governments part, are likely in fact to be.
Nevertheless, it is fairly obvious that one might find out all the facts that anybody wanted to adduce, and still be in doubt what one ought to do. We can see this more clearly if we suppose that there are two draftees and they are arguing with one another about the question. It is obvious that they could agree, for example, that if they went into the armed forces and obeyed their orders, they would find themselves killing a lot of civilians in the course of attacks on military objectives. One of them might think it morally indefensible to kill civilians in the course of fighting (especially if the civilians had nothing to do with the fighting, but were innocent bystanders). The other might think that this, although in itself an evil, had to be done if necessary in order to secure some greater good. One can agree about a fact, but disagree about its bearing on a moral issue."
(Hare, R. M. Sorting Out Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. pp. 35-6)
That's a factual, i.e. non-normative, question. How people behave is one question, and how they ought to behave is another.Alias wrote: ↑June 9th, 2018, 3:18 pmThere is no moral question regarding womanhood. Women have been blamed for everything from the invention of agriculture onward - we won't get any guiltier with the addition of a few voluntary sisters. The moral questions regarding behaviour are the same as the legal ones: Who did what to whom?
How does an MtF transsexual know that she feels and thinks like a woman?
How do women feel and think (as opposed to men)? There are many women, and they don't all have the same feelings and thoughts, do they?
What exactly makes a feeling or thought a (typically) female one?
Whatever, so you think being female or a woman is totally independent of biological (physical/physiological) characteristics?
I'm afraid a genetic feminization/masculinization will never be feasible, because all cells of a male/female organism contain male/female chromosomes and it's impossible to replace them with female/male chromosomes.
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Do you think female athlets should start at the paralympic games?
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Re: Are Transwomen Women?
Special rights that other people don't have? Why? Who gave them these special rights?
Have you still not grasped the concept of walls, doors and curtains?So transwomen with a male body and male genitals, who are physically indistinguishable from non-transsexual men, should have the legally enforceable right to use women's locker rooms and shower rooms? So all the girls and women there should have to tolerate the sight of penises and testicles at these places?
As an irrelevant aside, what's so horrific about a penis, anyway?
You have made the case that a consensus on this subject has not been reached.An ought cannot simply and directly be derived from an is, but facts are always relevant to moral and legal issues.
You have, so far, failed the make the case for its application and importance.
Yet the main burden of your argument seems to be what people will do or might do - on no discernible evidence that they have, do, or intend any of those unspecified actions.[Who did what to whom?]
That's a factual, i.e. non-normative, question. How people behave is one question, and how they ought to behave is another.
If you don't know these things, WtF qualifies you to discuss them?How does an MtF transsexual know that she feels and thinks like a woman?
How do women feel and think (as opposed to men)? There are many women, and they don't all have the same feelings and thoughts, do they?
What exactly makes a feeling or thought a (typically) female one?
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