Thread by @markmair

1/ My journey from TRA to GC.

I wanted to explain my views and to take away any misconception that they are based on some thoughtless prejudice as trans rights activists are quick to claim.

2/ I first approached this subject with an open mind. I was genuinely on the fence. I was not acting in bad faith, if anything I was leaning towards uncritical support for the GRA and broader trans rights. When I want to understand a topic, I will ask the ‘daft laddie’ questions.

3/ I’ll ask them from the perspective of each side That’s the way I have always approached a subject. Asking a question shouldn’t imply a view has already been formed,

4/ but it has been my experience of many trans rights activists to assume I have and react with hostility and labelling. I’ve not experienced that at all from gender critical contributors. To be clear from the outset, I support the rights of genuine trans people.

5/ What I don’t support is a movement that has in my opinion been hijacked by fringe elements promoting their own, nefarious
agenda.

The GRA and TR shouldn’t be an issue, it should have passed into law without any fuss.

6/ The current system was accepted and there was widespread support to make it shorter, less onerous and intrusive.

7/ Where it all went wrong was when Stonewall changed from being a LGBT organisation to one promoting essentially a single issue, ‘trans rights’, but defining trans to include people that are, by their own admission not trans in the accepted term. counselmagazine.co.uk/images/sites/f…

8/ Cross dressers, drag queens and anyone else who claims they are trans. This does a massive disservice to the, and I’ll use the word again, genuine, trans community who are vulnerable, and do deserve protections.

9/ That also includes protection from those within the TR movement that are causing great damage and risk turning public opinion against them.

Against that backdrop, here are my main issues with the trans rights movement in its current guise.

10/ Women’s rights and women’s identity: – the most vulnerable group in all societies to one degree or another are women and young girls. Domestic violence, sexual violence, FGM, sexual objectification the list goes on. They have a right to feel safe, in their own spaces.

11/ Women have had no issue with trans women accessing those spaces in the past, but that was when there was gate-keeping and those groups that fetishise what being women is (as opposed to genuine trans women), started demanding recognition and access.

12/ This includes groups that regularly threaten women with sexual violence. That cry homophobia at lesbians that won’t date biological men.

13/ For the record I don’t consider them to be genuine trans women, but as long as they can lay claim to women’s spaces it has to be NO ACCESS to women's spaces.

That said, the shared bathroom aspect is the least troubling.

14/ The redefinition of what constitutes a woman is far more concerning. It seeks to make biological women a subset of their own class. It strips them of their physical identity in order to indulge a group that claim to have a visceral sense of being women without any validation.

15/ If trans women have such a strong sense of being women, it logically follows that they should understand and respect the feelings of biological women that have equally strong
feelings to retain their female identity. One set of feelings should not be prioritised over another.

16/ The redefinition of 'women' significant implications for women in law, society and health care. E.g., replacing women with ‘people with a cervix’. This is a risk to women’s health in order to make trans men feel included.

17/ I believe that someone that thinks they are in the wrong body would know what that body consists of. Worryingly large numbers of women and young girls don’t know what a cervix is, so cancer screening is less effective.

18/ I will prioritise health over feelings every time.

19/ Children: - I believe we are sitting on the next big medical scandal, Thalidomide 2.0, where very young children are being affirmed as body dysphoric and any questioning has been framed as conversion therapy. You don’t affirm an anorexic child by telling them they are fat.

20/ You have to understand what lies behind that. This is where an ideology has side-stepped accepted medical and
psychiatric practice.

21/ When Mermaids & Tavistock are being sued by people that have transitioned and the statutory appointed Safeguarder at Tavistock is taking them to court there is a major problem.

22/ There are serious questions to be asked, not least about children are being ‘transed’ by homophobic parents for personal, social or cultural reasons. It reinforces regressive opinions on sexuality. bbc.co.uk/news/health-51…

23/ Sports: - Sports shouldn’t even be a topic for discussion. Trans women should not play women’s sports. It goes against the very tenets of what sport means, competitiveness, fairness and intergity.

24/ Why should a young girl train for a sport only to be relegated to an also ran by a late entry trans woman. People should play sport alongside their biological equivalents or in a trans league.

25/ There will always be the outliers like Caster Semenya, but those exceptions shouldn’t be used as the baseline to essentially render women’s participation in sports pointless, or even worse, dangerous.

26/ Stonewalls inexcusable decision to challenge the decision of World Rugby is a case in point and a massive own goal. The fact they wouldn’t allow comments on Twitter tells you even they know they can’t defend that position. The 1.6K retweets show’s they’ve not read the room.

27/ I say this because I had a friend that
spent 3 months in hospital with a broken neck playing rugby. Again, I will prioritise safety over feelings.

28/ I’m happy to support trans rights, but not when so many of the issues I’ve outlined above remain unresolved.