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Epiphanies 2019: TERFs, gender, sex, etc.

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  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    In the US, anyway, rape is extremely common in men's prisons, AIUI. I'm not sure much is done to stop it. One of the last few presidents tried to do something, but not sure who.
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    Marsupial--
    Marsupial wrote: »
    Golden Key wrote: »
    I think one factor in reactions by non-trans people to anyone trans is that most people have never met a trans person, knowingly or unknowingly. AIUI, they're pretty rare around the world (Daily Dot). Some non-trans folks might not even know that transgender exists--or may think it even more rare than it is. Not everyone has the same education (in a loose, general sense), or the opportunities to know and learn.

    You may be right about knowingly. I would guess that most people have met at least one trans person, even if unknowingly, at some point in their lives. I grew up in a fairly middle-of-the-road middle class family and by the time I was 18 I had met at least two people whom I later learned to be trans.

    Ok. Just going by the numbers in the linked article: if those numbers are anywhere near correct, I think it's impossible for most people in the world to meet a trans person (knowingly or unknowingly). With billions of people in the world, and a tiny fraction of them being trans, I don't see a way that most people would have any direct encounters (knowingly or unknowingly). Many non-trans people may know of trans people via media. And that *might* help non-trans feel more comfortable about trans folks, but not necessarily.
  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    Golden Key wrote: »
    Marsupial--
    Marsupial wrote: »
    Golden Key wrote: »
    I think one factor in reactions by non-trans people to anyone trans is that most people have never met a trans person, knowingly or unknowingly. AIUI, they're pretty rare around the world (Daily Dot). Some non-trans folks might not even know that transgender exists--or may think it even more rare than it is. Not everyone has the same education (in a loose, general sense), or the opportunities to know and learn.

    You may be right about knowingly. I would guess that most people have met at least one trans person, even if unknowingly, at some point in their lives. I grew up in a fairly middle-of-the-road middle class family and by the time I was 18 I had met at least two people whom I later learned to be trans.

    Ok. Just going by the numbers in the linked article: if those numbers are anywhere near correct, I think it's impossible for most people in the world to meet a trans person (knowingly or unknowingly). With billions of people in the world, and a tiny fraction of them being trans, I don't see a way that most people would have any direct encounters (knowingly or unknowingly). Many non-trans people may know of trans people via media. And that *might* help non-trans feel more comfortable about trans folks, but not necessarily.

    I'm not completely following the numbers in that article, so I'm not entirely sure what numbers you're thinking about. But say the overall incidence is about 0.5%, which is one of the numbers they're throwing around. That's 1 in 200 people. Probability theory was a long time ago for me, but with those numbers I think the chances of any given person meeting at least one transgender person before the age of 30 are pretty decent. Not necessarily as anything more than an acquaintance, but enough for people to put real names and faces to the phenomenon.

    Of course, this assumes a roughly equal distribution, which may or may not be the case.

  • Golden Key wrote: »
    Marsupial--
    Marsupial wrote: »
    Golden Key wrote: »
    I think one factor in reactions by non-trans people to anyone trans is that most people have never met a trans person, knowingly or unknowingly. AIUI, they're pretty rare around the world (Daily Dot). Some non-trans folks might not even know that transgender exists--or may think it even more rare than it is. Not everyone has the same education (in a loose, general sense), or the opportunities to know and learn.

    You may be right about knowingly. I would guess that most people have met at least one trans person, even if unknowingly, at some point in their lives. I grew up in a fairly middle-of-the-road middle class family and by the time I was 18 I had met at least two people whom I later learned to be trans.

    Ok. Just going by the numbers in the linked article: if those numbers are anywhere near correct, I think it's impossible for most people in the world to meet a trans person (knowingly or unknowingly). With billions of people in the world, and a tiny fraction of them being trans, I don't see a way that most people would have any direct encounters (knowingly or unknowingly). Many non-trans people may know of trans people via media. And that *might* help non-trans feel more comfortable about trans folks, but not necessarily.

    Impossible? One in two hundred means that most folk will have a trans person in their year at secondary school. Certainly anyone at university will encounter trans folk. It means an average of three people on my tiny island are trans (I'm aware of one). I think you're massively underestimating how many people most folk meet.
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    It's also one of those fascinating virtuous/vicious circle things. In ye olden days when gay people were the subject of the moral panic of the day and anti-gay media went hunting for gay activists/criminals they could monster to blow up into a threat to all righteous and good people it went like this:

    How gay people were visible to my parents/older folk at church - 'But look at these horrible dangerous gay people! Peter Tatchell! Abseiling lesbians! Cottaging councillor in local news!'

    How gay people were visible to me - my pal Alan, my pal Bruce, my pal Simon, my pal Susan, my pal Mary, my pal Valerie etc etc.

    Gay and lesbian people weren't out (for obvious reasons) to people they knew or suspected to be homophobic and because the very discussion of the monstering cases was a red flag to them not to be out to people who did that, they were invisible to them and thus monstering worked.

    I had a similar experience concerning Trans and non-binary folk. I had some older very dear friends who were anti-trans and very keen to convert me to their way of thinking, for a while they nearly had me with the 'monstered' examples but when I tried to go beyond misreported 'monstered' cases, the evidence for a significant general phenomenon representing a threat was not there - much like what happened with the claims made about gay adoption and equal marriage.

    So I then became vocal about that, and a fascinating thing happened - trans and non-binary and secretly gender non conforming people in my life became visible to me. I'm not even a conservative but lots of people weren't out to me or weren't telling me about family members in case I was prejudiced.

    You just have no idea - because the people who are really silenced... are silent. They're not on twitter/Facebook/in the newspapers telling you how they have been silenced because they are actually silent. That's what prejudice and selective monstering does - it silences people.

    I came across a very interesting article yesterday which was working hard to be fair to people like my older friends whose anti-trans beliefs are a product of how the issue is covered and what inevitably happens when you have few visible members of a minority to talk to and just see the 'monstered' cases.

    https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4090-i-m-not-transphobic-but-a-feminist-case-against-the-feminist-case-against-trans-inclusivity

    It's a long article but because monstering cases/techniques are coming up here, I'm going to cut to the chase - it being three academics writing, it's a bit wordy, so I'll do my best to snip for copyright while keeping the argument from this part of it.

    we're struck by the parallels between the argumentative devices we’ve encountered from feminists who oppose inclusivity, and certain points commonly made in the context of race and immigration.

    For instance, we note the at times almost obsessive spot-lighting of the statistically tiny incidence of violence by trans women against cis women, and are reminded of the determination of those on the racist right to draw our attention again and again to comparable crimes by Muslim men against white women and girls, even while the vast majority of rapists are white. And we note the frequent insinuation, in both cases, that both the alleged problem and the alleged failure to confront it are the result of excessively inclusive or ‘politically correct’ attitudes which leave those in a position to intervene unable to do so due to a fear of being called ‘racist’ or ‘transphobic’ (as the case may be).

    We note, in both cases, the leveraging of the fear that an inclusive and compassionate system will merely be exploited by those who are not the intended beneficiaries, whether ‘benefits scroungers’, ‘bogus asylum seekers’, or ‘fake’ trans women. ...We note the tendency, in both cases, to portray what are in fact profoundly disempowered groups as threatening to subjugate and overrun us, and to suggest that the ‘real’ victims – whether cis women or the ‘white working class’ – are being overlooked and not listened to while others monopolise the mantle of the ‘oppressed’.

    ... The feminists in question may be sincere in believing that they are innocent of such charges, on the grounds that they have not said anything explicitly prejudiced – and have, in many cases, explicitly disowned such prejudice. But so are the people who get upset and defensive at the merest suggestion that their ‘legitimate concerns’ about immigration might actually be a bit racist. Yet making that suggestion – or its counterpart in the case at hand – is not abuse, and the right to ‘free speech’ does not include a right to say racist or transphobic things without anyone pointing it out.
    (bold mine)

    Of course this isn't going to cut any ice with people who are genuinely making the right-wing argument where this is of a piece with stuff like racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, monstering benefits claimants... but it is worth thinking about how this kind of monstering of minority groups works.




  • KarlLB wrote: »
    You treat transwomen who sexually assault cis-women the same as any other sexually abusive woman. The prison problem isn't transwomen; it's sexually abusive women being given access to potential victims.

    And if it's a sexually abusive man pretending to be a trans woman, I don't think it makes any difference. You shouldn't put people who are likely to abuse in the same space as people who are likely to be abused (and if that means that rapists are in solitary confinement 24/7, because they're not safe in the company of other people, then do that.)
  • Marsupial wrote: »
    You may be right about knowingly. I would guess that most people have met at least one trans person, even if unknowingly, at some point in their lives. I grew up in a fairly middle-of-the-road middle class family and by the time I was 18 I had met at least two people whom I later learned to be trans.

    I have known two trans women who have transitioned as older adults (having had college-age kids), three trans girls who are still minors (all of these I knew before they transitioned). Then I know one minor who identifies as agender, and one current work colleague who is a trans woman (I didn't know her before she transitioned; I know she's trans, because she's open about it as part of the advocacy she does.)

    Obviously I don't know how many trans people I don't know I've met.
  • Thank you for that Louise. It's a widespread phenomenon, whereby scapegoaters are able to dig up actual cases of wrong-doing by minority people, and then the bigots say, see, I told you. I should think it's happened with most LGBTQ groups. As you say, the balance of victim/persecutors is reversed. During the arguments over equal marriage I remember the homophobes saying, "my marriage will be devalued if gays can marry", so gays became persecutory. The psychology of this is quite fascinating, however enough of that. The ironic thing is that trans people have been going in loos, changing rooms, for years. However, transphobia is staggeringly cruel and vindictive.
  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    Marsupial wrote: »
    I think the chances of any given person meeting at least one transgender person before the age of 30 are pretty decent. Not necessarily as anything more than an acquaintance, but enough for people to put real names and faces to the phenomenon.

    Sorry, I lost my train of thought here - obviously if someone never finds out that the people they meet are trans, it's not going to help them put names and faces to transgenderism. I was thinking of the people I met whom I later learned to be trans.

  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    Actually, evidence suggests being raped by a cis woman is not better than being raped by a trans woman. There has been research done on this - which I won’t go into because I don’t want to distress people reading this, but ciswomen can be just as violent as cis men.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    orfeo wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    orfeo wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    The preference for a racial group is by definition pre judging individuals by a supposed group characteristic.

    Really? If I find a particular skin tone, hair colour, or whatever attractive, that's "pre judging individuals by a supposed group characteristic", but finding a particular gender attractive isn't?

    Women of a particular racial background have an identifiable group characteristic, but there's no identifiable difference between the group "women" and the group "men"?

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean.
    That which fuels sexual preference is biological. Find the blonde preference gene and we'll talk.

    This is quite illogical and an invocation of 'biological' without unpacking what it means. There is no "gay gene", and so asking for a "blonde preference gene" is asking for an equivalent to something that doesn't exist.
    Yeah, we need pedantry here. Sexual orientation is biological, preference for blonde is very unlikely to be.

    And your basis for saying this is... what, exactly? Your overall sense of justice and how things ought to be? Not exactly scientific.

    I repeat, there is no gay gene. You've just been provided with a link to an article that summarises the best research on sexuality. I don't know what you mean by 'biological' because you think expecting you to unpack it is 'pedantry', but if you think that it's a synonym for genetic than you're engaging in a gross over-simplification.

    Which wouldn't be so bad if you weren't then attempting to use it to tell other people how they're engaging in prejudice.

    We DO need pedantry. Because science is pedantic. You don't get to misrepresent the science and then claim that attempting to correct it is 'pedantry'. That's nothing more than claiming that you don't have to have things right before telling other people that they're wrong.

    As the person who went down the route of distinguishing one thing as 'biological' and another thing as 'prejudice', it IS up to you to get the science right. Otherwise your opinion has no factual foundation.
    That would be a relevant point if there were anything close to a biological foundation for preference of blonde or Asian or heterochromia.
    Simple summary from Wiki
    Scientists do not know the exact cause of sexual orientation, but they theorize that it is caused by a complex interplay of genetic, hormonal, and environmental influences,[4][5][6] and do not view it as a choice. Although no single theory on the cause of sexual orientation has yet gained widespread support, scientists favor biologically-based theories.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    It struck me that the TERF position is a conspiracy theory. I happened to be reading about satanic child abuse, about which there were various panics in the 1980s, and some feminists got embroiled in that. But there are parallels to terfdom, covert villains who are out to get the vulnerable. It's fantasy. Of course, child abuse isn't, and men attacking women isn't.

    But there are some who do. To just say, "it's so rare that if you think that it's transpobic", is akin to "child abuse by [insert choice group; priests, teachers, women etc] is so rare that you are unreasonable in expressing fear".

    If trans people are defacto above suspicion then I would expect more and more depraved men to (likely) pretend or even live out as trans, just as in the past they may have become priests, teachers and policemen. I believe it's happened a number of times in jails in the UK already.
    Completely ridiculous. A straight man can dress as a woman and enter a woman's toilet right now and has always been able to.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
    edited July 2020
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    It struck me that the TERF position is a conspiracy theory. I happened to be reading about satanic child abuse, about which there were various panics in the 1980s, and some feminists got embroiled in that. But there are parallels to terfdom, covert villains who are out to get the vulnerable. It's fantasy. Of course, child abuse isn't, and men attacking women isn't.

    But there are some who do. To just say, "it's so rare that if you think that it's transpobic", is akin to "child abuse by [insert choice group; priests, teachers, women etc] is so rare that you are unreasonable in expressing fear".

    If trans people are defacto above suspicion then I would expect more and more depraved men to (likely) pretend or even live out as trans, just as in the past they may have become priests, teachers and policemen. I believe it's happened a number of times in jails in the UK already.
    Completely ridiculous. A straight man can dress as a woman and enter a woman's toilet right now and has always been able to.

    Jail and toilets are two different things.

    If you know that someone is a 60 year old rapist but only ever raped under 20's men then maybe you wouldn't put him in a cell with a 19 year guy?

    If someone is prosecuted for sticking their dick, repeatedly and violently in vaginas and sent to a male only prison, then maybe them professing that they are actually female shouldn't lead them to being sent to a female only institution?
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    And here we go with the poisoned framing again. Risk assessments get screwed up all the time, but if a risk assessment is screwed up on someone who happens to belong to a hated minority you can be sure to hear about it endlessly in the crudest possible terms, the better to monster everyone in that minority.
  • If someone is prosecuted for sticking their dick, repeatedly and violently in vaginas and sent to a male only prison, then maybe them professing that they are actually female shouldn't lead them to being sent to a female only institution?

    "Sent to a women's prison" and "placed in a cell with another woman" aren't the same thing. If a convicted rapist identifies themselves as female, they should be in a women's prison (because we don't house men and women together in prisons). If a person is convicted of raping a woman, they shouldn't be housed with another woman.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    It struck me that the TERF position is a conspiracy theory. I happened to be reading about satanic child abuse, about which there were various panics in the 1980s, and some feminists got embroiled in that. But there are parallels to terfdom, covert villains who are out to get the vulnerable. It's fantasy. Of course, child abuse isn't, and men attacking women isn't.

    But there are some who do. To just say, "it's so rare that if you think that it's transpobic", is akin to "child abuse by [insert choice group; priests, teachers, women etc] is so rare that you are unreasonable in expressing fear".

    If trans people are defacto above suspicion then I would expect more and more depraved men to (likely) pretend or even live out as trans, just as in the past they may have become priests, teachers and policemen. I believe it's happened a number of times in jails in the UK already.
    Completely ridiculous. A straight man can dress as a woman and enter a woman's toilet right now and has always been able to.

    Jail and toilets are two different things.

    If you know that someone is a 60 year old rapist but only ever raped under 20's men then maybe you wouldn't put him in a cell with a 19 year guy?

    If someone is prosecuted for sticking their dick, repeatedly and violently in vaginas and sent to a male only prison, then maybe them professing that they are actually female shouldn't lead them to being sent to a female only institution?
    Assigned at birth women who rape women are sent to female only prisons.
  • Louise wrote: »
    And here we go with the poisoned framing again. Risk assessments get screwed up all the time, but if a risk assessment is screwed up on someone who happens to belong to a hated minority you can be sure to hear about it endlessly in the crudest possible terms, the better to monster everyone in that minority.

    Yes, it gets generalized. Look, a nasty trans person did something bad, it just goes to show you can't trust them.
  • GwaiGwai Epiphanies Host
    edited July 2020
    Okay everyone, people committing sexual assault can, and generally does, happen completely regardless of trans people. So this argument, not being relevant to the thread, can go elsewhere. The constantly re-focusing of all trans threads onto theoretical rapists is beyond tiresome.

    Gwai,
    Epiphanies Host
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    KarlLB wrote: »
    You treat transwomen who sexually assault cis-women the same as any other sexually abusive woman. The prison problem isn't transwomen; it's sexually abusive women being given access to potential victims.

    But there clearly is a difference between sexually abusive cis and (pre-op) trans women as sexually abusive (pre op) trans women have a penis to sexually abuse with.

    Shock, horror: hardened criminals might not be the best people to take at face value for their sudden revealing of their new gender status. Especially if they are jailed for raping women. Especially if that new gender status puts them in a building full of women.

    Is it really beyond the prison service to keep dangerous offenders away from potential victims? Penilely equipped or otherwise.

  • orfeoorfeo Suspended
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    orfeo wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    orfeo wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    The preference for a racial group is by definition pre judging individuals by a supposed group characteristic.

    Really? If I find a particular skin tone, hair colour, or whatever attractive, that's "pre judging individuals by a supposed group characteristic", but finding a particular gender attractive isn't?

    Women of a particular racial background have an identifiable group characteristic, but there's no identifiable difference between the group "women" and the group "men"?

    I'm not sure I understand what you mean.
    That which fuels sexual preference is biological. Find the blonde preference gene and we'll talk.

    This is quite illogical and an invocation of 'biological' without unpacking what it means. There is no "gay gene", and so asking for a "blonde preference gene" is asking for an equivalent to something that doesn't exist.
    Yeah, we need pedantry here. Sexual orientation is biological, preference for blonde is very unlikely to be.

    And your basis for saying this is... what, exactly? Your overall sense of justice and how things ought to be? Not exactly scientific.

    I repeat, there is no gay gene. You've just been provided with a link to an article that summarises the best research on sexuality. I don't know what you mean by 'biological' because you think expecting you to unpack it is 'pedantry', but if you think that it's a synonym for genetic than you're engaging in a gross over-simplification.

    Which wouldn't be so bad if you weren't then attempting to use it to tell other people how they're engaging in prejudice.

    We DO need pedantry. Because science is pedantic. You don't get to misrepresent the science and then claim that attempting to correct it is 'pedantry'. That's nothing more than claiming that you don't have to have things right before telling other people that they're wrong.

    As the person who went down the route of distinguishing one thing as 'biological' and another thing as 'prejudice', it IS up to you to get the science right. Otherwise your opinion has no factual foundation.
    That would be a relevant point if there were anything close to a biological foundation for preference of blonde or Asian or heterochromia.
    Simple summary from Wiki
    Scientists do not know the exact cause of sexual orientation, but they theorize that it is caused by a complex interplay of genetic, hormonal, and environmental influences,[4][5][6] and do not view it as a choice. Although no single theory on the cause of sexual orientation has yet gained widespread support, scientists favor biologically-based theories.

    Your response makes zero sense. The Wiki summary is accurate... and says precisely nothing one way or the other about preference of blonde or Asian or heterochromia! It's not about other preferences.

    Honestly, that's a bit like providing material on the diet of bears as some kind of proof that raccoons don't eat fruit.
  • Do something to address (potentially legitimate) fears. Maybe stronger prison sentences, revoking trans status of trans women who sexually assault cis-women etc.

    Revoke trans status? Is it a government-issued card that one carries? How the hell does one revoke trans status?
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Do something to address (potentially legitimate) fears. Maybe stronger prison sentences, revoking trans status of trans women who sexually assault cis-women etc.

    Revoke trans status? Is it a government-issued card that one carries? How the hell does one revoke trans status?

    Are they a woman or a man legally?

    Can you "deadname" them legally?
  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    This depends on whether you think this a legal status, or a statement of a truth about a facet of the world. If someone is a woman, and you say they are not - in law or any other arena - you haven’t stopped them being a woman, you have just stated something incorrectly.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Do something to address (potentially legitimate) fears. Maybe stronger prison sentences, revoking trans status of trans women who sexually assault cis-women etc.

    Revoke trans status? Is it a government-issued card that one carries? How the hell does one revoke trans status?

    Are they a woman or a man legally?

    Can you "deadname" them legally?

    Gender recognition isn't a driving licence. It's not contingent on good behaviour, nor should it be.
  • North East QuineNorth East Quine Purgatory Host
    Golden Key wrote: »
    I think one factor in reactions by non-trans people to anyone trans is that most people have never met a trans person, knowingly or unknowingly

    It struck me that I know several transpeople amongst my children's contemporaries (mid twenties) but fewer who are gay. In terms of friends of theirs who have been a guest in our home*, two are trans, one was trans but is now detransitioning and only one is gay.

    I know two transwomen my own age, but many gay people.

    I know anecdote does not equal data, but I suspect this is not unusual. The number of people who have never met a transperson (at least in the UK) will shrink quickly.


    * using "have been a guest in our home" as a loose definition of someone they and I know reasonably well.

  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Host Hat On

    Following Gwai's ruling, please drop further discussion of theoretical transgender rapists on this thread.

    [Deleted User]

    Your comments suggesting special punishment for criminal offenders who identify as transgender are being referred by me to Admin.

    Barnabas62
    Epiphanies Host

    Host Hat Off
  • Golden KeyGolden Key Shipmate, Glory
    edited July 2020
    {LONG!}
    Marsupial wrote: »
    Golden Key wrote: »
    Marsupial--
    Ok. Just going by the numbers in the linked article: if those numbers are anywhere near correct, I think it's impossible for most people in the world to meet a trans person (knowingly or unknowingly). With billions of people in the world, and a tiny fraction of them being trans, I don't see a way that most people would have any direct encounters (knowingly or unknowingly). Many non-trans people may know of trans people via media. And that *might* help non-trans feel more comfortable about trans folks, but not necessarily.

    I'm not completely following the numbers in that article, so I'm not entirely sure what numbers you're thinking about. But say the overall incidence is about 0.5%, which is one of the numbers they're throwing around. That's 1 in 200 people. Probability theory was a long time ago for me, but with those numbers I think the chances of any given person meeting at least one transgender person before the age of 30 are pretty decent. Not necessarily as anything more than an acquaintance, but enough for people to put real names and faces to the phenomenon.

    Of course, this assumes a roughly equal distribution, which may or may not be the case.

    ~~~
    Impossible? One in two hundred means that most folk will have a trans person in their year at secondary school. Certainly anyone at university will encounter trans folk. It means an average of three people on my tiny island are trans (I'm aware of one). I think you're massively underestimating how many people most folk meet.

    Yes, distribution is a huge question. In addition to the linked article, I looked for more stats. The ones I found all basically came down to a) it's hard to know how many trans folks there are; and b) studies and surveys indicate indicate low, single-digit percents (e.g. 1%) or lower (e.g., 0.05%) wherever they checked. Surveys rely on participants telling the truth, and there are very good reasons for them to hide.

    Plus "trans" is sometimes used as an umbrella term (Wikipedia):
    Transgender, often shortened as trans, is also an umbrella term. In addition to including people whose gender identity is the opposite of their assigned sex (trans men and trans women), it may include people who are not exclusively masculine or feminine (people who are non-binary or genderqueer, including bigender, pangender, genderfluid, or agender).[2][6][7] Other definitions of transgender also include people who belong to a third gender, or else conceptualize transgender people as a third gender.[8][9] The term transgender may be defined very broadly to include cross-dressers.[10]

    (Definition continues for a couple of paragraphs.)

    But it seems like trans folks, by whatever definition, are very rare. (Not saying they *should* be rare, just that they seem to be.) So, just to make the math easier, let's say 10% of the people in the world are trans. (The stats I've seen are much, much lower--the highest I saw was 2.77% in Washington DC. But 10% allows for differences in definitions, questions about methodology (which I came across), etc).

    The Worldometers currently show that the world has more than 7.8 billion people. So let's round that up to 8 billion.

    .10 x 8,000,000,000 = 800,000,000

    So (if my math mind is awake enough), that would be 800 million trans people out of 8 billion non-trans people. 1 trans person per every 10 people.

    Keep in mind the caveats and estimates I mentioned; and that the world pop refers to everyone, whereas I don't know the ages of survey participants.

    So (very roughly) 1 trans person per every 10 people. But that doesn't mean that if you stop 10 people on the street or in a group, 1 will necessarily be trans.

    ISTM that trans folks are not necessarily distributed evenly around the world, particularly if we're talking about those who are openly trans. They may feel/be safer in a place where there's a trans community that's relatively accepted. That may well be a large "magnet city". San Francisco, New York...

    Therefore, IMVHO, most people in the world don't knowingly know a trans person, and probably don't unknowingly know one, either.

    And *that* matters because it makes a huge difference in how non-trans people think of trans people, and how they react if they do knowingly meet them.

    FWIW, YMMV, keep on truckin'.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Golden Key wrote: »
    I think one factor in reactions by non-trans people to anyone trans is that most people have never met a trans person, knowingly or unknowingly

    It struck me that I know several transpeople amongst my children's contemporaries (mid twenties) but fewer who are gay. In terms of friends of theirs who have been a guest in our home*, two are trans, one was trans but is now detransitioning and only one is gay.

    I know two transwomen my own age, but many gay people.

    I know anecdote does not equal data, but I suspect this is not unusual. The number of people who have never met a transperson (at least in the UK) will shrink quickly.


    * using "have been a guest in our home" as a loose definition of someone they and I know reasonably well.

    I have no idea how many trans people I have met. I know of 2 - one almost 50 years ago, who was seeking advice at a community legal centre at which I was volunteering one evening. The other is a casual waiter at a café we visit at least once a week. I used regularly see a woman on a train, who looked as if she could have been trans but one whose transition had not gone smoothly physically. But who knows how many others I could have met unknowingly?
  • Golden Key wrote: »
    Therefore, IMVHO, most people in the world don't knowingly know a trans person, and probably don't unknowingly know one, either.

    The first is almost certainly true, the second a huge leap. I mean, it takes trans folk themselves time to figure out they're trans (not in all cases, admittedly) and some may frame it in other ways (2-spirit, 3rd gender) that wouldn't show up when asking about "trans" but butt up against many of the same barriers and misconceptions.
  • That's part of the fear-mongering, isn't it? There you are, harmlessly peeing in your cubicle, but the person next to you might be trans. Even worse, you have no way of knowing if they are. I know, let's invent a paranoid piece of legislation, which definitively bans trans people from facilities. But how will I tell if they are? We could produce very intimidating and nasty articles, in order to drive them out of public life. Job done.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    edited August 2020
    That's part of the fear-mongering, isn't it?
    Certainly part of it. But, [redacted]
    Anti-trans legislation is also about power and distraction, as well as the plain old phobia.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Host Hat On

    [Deleted User]

    Please note para 3 from the Epiphanies Guidelines
    3. This forum will be more closely hosted than the rest of the Ship. For example: Some phrases or sources may be ruled off limits on a particular thread as they are seen as unhelpful.

    I quote to you what the Hosts have, collectively, found to be unhelpful in your contributions.
    If trans people are defacto above suspicion then I would expect more and more depraved men to (likely) pretend or even live out as trans, just as in the past they may have become priests, teachers and policemen. I believe it's happened a number of times in jails in the UK already.

    Google Jessica Yaniv for a (probably) non-criminal missuse of a trans person's rights.

    Do something to address (potentially legitimate) fears. Maybe stronger prison sentences, revoking trans status of trans women who sexually assault cis-women etc. Not just say "so rare, why talk about it terf" and there will be a lot more traction, and less chance of backlash from the general public.

    And when you were asked how status could be revoked you replied
    Are they a woman or a man legally?

    Can you "deadname" them legally?

    These are the types of arguments typically advanced by transphobics.

    1. They cast suspicion over the sincerity of gender identity.
    2. They quote an inappropriate link as critical evidence of the behaviour of trans people.
    3. They suggest that the behaviour of trans people should be specially controlled for the sake of others' fears and concerns, if necessary by special laws based on their gender identity, not their behaviour.

    Please avoid comments along these lines and post with greater care in the future.

    Barnabas62
    Epiphanies Host

    Host Hat Off
  • Barnabas62 wrote: »
    Host Hat On

    [Deleted User]

    Please note para 3 from the Epiphanies Guidelines
    3. This forum will be more closely hosted than the rest of the Ship. For example: Some phrases or sources may be ruled off limits on a particular thread as they are seen as unhelpful.

    I quote to you what the Hosts have, collectively, found to be unhelpful in your contributions.
    If trans people are defacto above suspicion then I would expect more and more depraved men to (likely) pretend or even live out as trans, just as in the past they may have become priests, teachers and policemen. I believe it's happened a number of times in jails in the UK already.

    Google Jessica Yaniv for a (probably) non-criminal missuse of a trans person's rights.

    Do something to address (potentially legitimate) fears. Maybe stronger prison sentences, revoking trans status of trans women who sexually assault cis-women etc. Not just say "so rare, why talk about it terf" and there will be a lot more traction, and less chance of backlash from the general public.

    And when you were asked how status could be revoked you replied
    Are they a woman or a man legally?

    Can you "deadname" them legally?

    These are the types of arguments typically advanced by transphobics.

    1. They cast suspicion over the sincerity of gender identity.
    2. They quote an inappropriate link as critical evidence of the behaviour of trans people.
    3. They suggest that the behaviour of trans people should be specially controlled for the sake of others' fears and concerns, if necessary by special laws based on their gender identity, not their behaviour.

    Please avoid comments along these lines and post with greater care in the future.

    Barnabas62
    Epiphanies Host

    Host Hat Off

    You seriously think that it's transphobic to question whether repeat male rapists who suddenly declare themselves women when they are jailed might be doing under false presences, and if so it might not hurt trans acceptance?

    But no, rather than that it's easier to just ignore the problem and call anyone who raises it transphobic!

    If a priest abuses kids, is it wise to allow him access to kids? Nah, just call anyone who suggests it a religious bigot!

    This is exactly why there is a backlash against trans rights, and you're too morally self righteous to recognize it.

    Hence the "admins the moderators of radical woke left" thread and "where is the ship going thread".

    Please delete my account and any information you have on me as per gdpr legislation and eu privacy rights.
  • Leorning CnihtLeorning Cniht Shipmate
    edited July 2020
    You seriously think that it's transphobic to question whether repeat male rapists who suddenly declare themselves women when they are jailed might be doing under false presences, and if so it might not hurt trans acceptance?

    It's just not relevant. If a person is jailed for raping women, and is reasonably considered to be a risk to women, they should not be housed with women, for the safety of their potential victims.

    If that person is a man, they'll be in a male prison, and so they won't put women at risk. If that person is a woman, they should be in a women's prison, in solitary confinement or some similar environment that doesn't place the other inmates at risk.

    If you're housing people who attack women in the same cell as other women, you're doing it wrong. This statement is independent of the gender of the attacker, or of whether or not you think they're lying about their gender.

    ETA: On a related note, I have zero tolerance for jokes about rape in US federal prisons being "part of the punishment that criminals have to accept". We have a duty of care towards the criminals we jail.
  • GwaiGwai Epiphanies Host
    edited July 2020
    [Deleted User] If you are serious, directly contact an admin. They do not necessarily read this thread. And hosts don't have access to that information for good reason.
  • edited August 2020
    [redacted]
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    edited August 2020
    [redacted]
  • edited August 2020
    It seems to be a debatable point that trans identity frequency is increasing because of visibility or other factors such as societal social development. [redacted] The social policy issues particularly about individual self identification without medical, mental health, developmental assessment and care seem important for children and young people.
  • North East QuineNorth East Quine Purgatory Host
    Here are the NHS figures for referrals to the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS)

    https://gids.nhs.uk/number-referrals

    Amongst teenagers, referrals of those assigned female at birth are far higher than referrals of those assigned male at birth.

  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    edited August 2020
    It seems to be a debatable point that trans identity frequency is increasing because of visibility or other factors such as societal social development. [redacted] The social policy issues particularly about individual self identification without medical, mental health, developmental assessment and care seem important for children and young people.

    [redacted]

    Like LB I find the idea that young women are pressured into being transgender rather than lesbian beyond comprehension. I'm fairly certain that between lesbian and transgender, most parents would be absolutely relieved to discover their daughter was "only" lesbian. Equally to the point, there was at one point a now-discredited therapeutic approach to transgenderism in young people that tried to steer them toward being gay rather than trans. [redacted]

    The GIDS website that NEQ linked to appears to have a great deal of useful information including, e.g., about links between transgenderism and autism. It seems like a much better place to find reliable information than some random piece by a novelist with a bee in her bonnet. And based on that website I find it very difficult to believe that young people in the UK are being encouraged to identify cross-sex "without medical, mental health, developmental assessment and care."
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Nice, trying to tar both autism and trans.

    To quote an autistic teen girl of my acquaintance, "all these girls used to be nice, and then they hit puberty and went weird". She had a rough time for a couple of years because she didn't think at all like her female friends, and didn't understand why, and had a much better time associating with boys, because they were fairly straightforward. Her female friends thought she was trans, and were offering her emotional support, help coming out to her parents, and so on.

    She's certain she's not trans, and now has a better handle on how her autism presents, and understands herself better.

    But if you told me that girls in similar positions could be persuaded that they were trans boys, I don't think I'd be surprised.

    This is just an anecdote, and we all know what that's worth, but it's the experience I have.
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    edited July 2020
    Here's a couple of big Swedish academic studies on detransitioning

    https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24872188/

    Note the last sentence on the abstract - 'There was a significant decline of regrets over the time period.'

    https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9570489/

    And a conference abstract for recent NHS research - Detransition rates in a national UK Gender Identity Clinic

    Warning - link is to PDF download

    https://epath.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Boof-of-abstracts-EPATH2019.pdf

    The page number is p. 118.

    Detransition rates are very low - especially in the modern NHS study which would reflect the most up to date practice. The most common reason for detransitioning seems to be social pressure to go back into the closet (not thinking you made a mistake about your gender ID) and to take the NHS study on the list, their rates were well under 1%.

    I'm not sure exactly why I should be listening to unsourced claims from a fantasy novelist with a highly questionable track record on this rather than the NHS or large academic studies, but considering the damage done in the field of vaccines by listening to unqualified celebrities it seems a highly dubious route to be going down.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    Dubious. That is the most polite euphemism for batshit crazy that I’ve heard for a while
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Nice, trying to tar both autism and trans.

    To quote an autistic teen girl of my acquaintance, "all these girls used to be nice, and then they hit puberty and went weird". She had a rough time for a couple of years because she didn't think at all like her female friends, and didn't understand why, and had a much better time associating with boys, because they were fairly straightforward. Her female friends thought she was trans, and were offering her emotional support, help coming out to her parents, and so on.

    She's certain she's not trans, and now has a better handle on how her autism presents, and understands herself better.

    But if you told me that girls in similar positions could be persuaded that they were trans boys, I don't think I'd be surprised.

    This is just an anecdote, and we all know what that's worth, but it's the experience I have.
    It compares with experience of emotionally dyscontrolled and socially isolated person in My extended family. My thoughts have been that adults frequently fail to consider enough the developmental vulnerabilities of adolescents and children. Developmental psychology isn't a strength for many professionals.

    Parallel: cognitive psychology (this isn't cognitive behaviour therapy) and memory as poorly understood led well meaning practitioners In the ~1990s into "false memory syndrome", harming those who truly were sexual abuse survivors by attributing mental health conditions and social/sexual adjustment problems for most people to experiences of sexual assault/abuse and creating false memories. We've added the internet since then.
  • lilbuddhalilbuddha Shipmate
    Gas lighting trans and non conforming people is essentially the same thing.
  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    edited August 2020
    Here are the NHS figures for referrals to the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS)

    https://gids.nhs.uk/number-referrals

    Amongst teenagers, referrals of those assigned female at birth are far higher than referrals of those assigned male at birth.

    I've been thinking about these numbers which, incidentally, contradict what used to be standard view that gender dysphoria was much more common in natal males than in natal females. I recall that back when I started reading up on this topic, about 15 years ago, the incidence numbers that were floating around for "transsexualism" was about 1 in 30,000 for trans women and 1 in in 100,000 in trans men. I think there was already significant skepticism about these numbers back in 2005; I don't think anyone would take them seriously now.

    That said, I don't think anyone really knows what the "true" numbers are, and whether they should be comparable for trans men and trans women. The 1-in-200 figure from the article quoted upthread seems high, if it's supposed to be an incidence for full-on cross-sex identity. (The GIDS service website cites studies with numbers ranging from 1 in 2000 to more than 1 in 100.) It's possible that the numbers could legitimately skew toward one gender or the other because of different prevalance levels for biological etiological factors involved. For instance, some people think that autism and transgenderism specifically in natal females may have common biological etiologies in at least some cases, which could cause a skew towards more trans men (and/or nonbinary transmaculine people, and/or gender-nonconfirming girls - not that I would claim to be able to say exactly where each of these categories ends and the other begins).

    [redacted] seem to think that the skew for natal females is largely a factor of peer pressure and the Internet. My (nonbinary natal male) perspective on this is that I'm very skeptical. IME gender identity (both cisgender and trans) is too deep-seated, and too "sticky" so to speak, to make it believable that a more-or-less cisgender person is suddenly going to identify full-on cross-sex because of something they read on the Internet or because all their friends (really?) are doing it. The other reason I'm skeptical about this is that proponents of this view, [redacted] usually have broader anti-transgender axes to grind. If there were actually reliable evidence of this coming from people who seem to know what they're doing then I might have to re-think my skepticism.

    There may be a kernel of truth though [redacted] in that: (1) transgender is much less stigmatized in 2020 than "transsexualism" was 20 or 30 years ago, and (2) nevertheless, deviation from "normal" gender identity is still much more fraught among natal males than natal females. The old incidence numbers I quoted above reflect a milieu where people thought about trans either as transsexualism or transvestism, and both were stigmatized both in the medical profession and in the wider community. Nobody was going to raise their hand and identify as trans unless they really absolutely had no other option. Now we actually see people who do not appear to be intensely transgender voluntarily thinking of their identities in minority-gender terms. IME, though, this is still something we see much more from natal females than natal males. We now see people publicly identifying as nonbinary who probably would have simply identified as lesbian 20 years ago, and probably (I assume) seen the gendered aspects of their identity simply as part and parcel of being lesbian. But I can't think of anyone I've ever known of who now identifies publicly as nonbinary and formerly identified as a gay male.

    In short, we may be seeing more natal females being referred to GIDS because trans is still less stigmatized for trans men (and nonbinary transmasculine people) than it is the other way around. It would be interesting to see if the numbers on actual transition reflect the intake numbers, or whether at the end of the day the numbers start to even out more.

  • SimonSimon Editor
    Dear all, the Ship has very limited (i.e. no) legal funds so please take care when discussing the views of people with unlimited legal funds and a willingness to use them. Posts which the Admins think might might cause legal problems for the Ship will be deleted on sight. Thanks.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    edited September 2020
    [deleted - see post below]
  • quetzalcoatlquetzalcoatl Shipmate
    edited September 2020
    [deleted - see post below]
  • edited September 2020
    This is a long read. https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/number-50-fall-2016

    It reads skeptically about the state of science re sexuality. Review and commentary. Looking at the impression of the journal as described in general, it's described as socially conservative. Which isn't a reason to accept nor to reject. The review article reflects I think that so much about humans is idea and opinion, not science at all. Though it seems very clear to me that transgender is seen as human rights, with other considerations secondary.
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