I don’t need validation. I KNOW I’m not a woman. Neither did I freely choose this path. Now that I have & almost literally cut off other possibilities there are certain realities to my life. Social relationships are real & women do exist in a broad but distinct social reality
You can dismiss that as stereotypes but I conform less to female stereotypes than most women do. Even Julia is not immune to the social norms, pressures & context in which we live. No-one is, that’s an impossibility. We are a social species & we conform to some norms that help
us to navigate society. I was unable to fit into the social reality of men because of how oppressive, menacing & isolating it was. Yet we still live in a deeply binary world in which people like me, a tiny minority still have to live day to day.
My reality is not wholly a male one. I experience sexism & misogyny, sexual harassment by straight men etc & I have a body attractive to some men & some women. One of those women is my wife, a lesbian not interested in men ever. I am biologically & socialised male but my life
on an everyday level is a kind of partial social-physical womanhood. Day to day we don’t meet each other on a chromosomal or biological level but on a socio-physical level so that experience is real and not that of a feminine man. It makes matters a little more complex than
fitting simply into neat biological boxes, especially for the purpose of everyday descriptors which recognise I too am oppressed & part of a vulnerable minority trying to find shelter in the refuge of the social reality both inflicted on women & partly created by women
in a brutal binary world. We too have a right to have a say in our own labels. I have never insisted that women use them and have consistently defended women’s use of labels that I do not choose. I am sensitive to the fact that the discriptor transwoman is controversial
particularly in the current context and I will think more on this. Nevertheless, whilst insisting on the uniqueness of women as a sex I will defend my distinct social physical reality from those who want to ignore the complexities of our lives and paint us all as men in drag
In the meantime does a disagreement over a label prevent gender critical transwomen/transsexuals from uniting with women in common cause to fight self-identity & gender identity ideology? I’d argue that my contributions, Debbie’s & others have added to the fight not detracted
from it. Of course if women feel that’s not the case I’ll gladly respect that and be on my way.
