I can't say I'm disappointed. To do so would suggest that I believe Stamer had any morals or prinicipals that he wouldn't be willing to drop, oh maybe except keeping capital gains tax low for the rich. Great leaders are able to shape public opinion and change their minds through convincing arguments against even unpopular opinions, weak leaders collapse at the first sign of political difficulty and bend to pressure deliberately used by the elite and the media to distract from the many political failings and huge issues that face our society. I'll likely still end up voting for them because of the way our voting system is structured, but it won't be with any enthusiasm, or hope, or any feeling in particular really apart from deep sadness about where things are going.

 

I'm still not convinced that Starmer isn't pro-trans (or that Corbyn or anyone else would be any better). The problem here is this is a Times interview, and the Times is a transphobic paper.

 

That makes it even worse, surely? To deliberately adopt a position, signal for and campaign against something that you actually support, in order to win political support and makes things easier for yourself. I can think of a few words to describe someone like that, I'll be polite.. most of them would be starred out here.

@1643551240335286274

@1643242038178074625

 

Tragic.

Ironically establishing a purity test for being feminine-looking enough to use women's spaces is only going to hurt women in the long run.

 

I can barely think of anything more anti feminist. I hope Germaine Greer and JK Rowling are happy...

Besides that I am honestly furious at what I do perceive as government & media collusion to suppress public knowledge of what rights trans folk already have by law in this country & have had for decades. (E.g. that before being allowed hormones or surgeries they have to start presenting as the new gender and use those facilities... meaning that people 'suddenly' outraged now have likely already shared facilities & didn't realise...)

 

The push to seed the narrative that trans people are new & that the British public oppose them is completely astroturfed and is picking up momentum simply by the daily repetition that "its what everyone thinks". We used to make fun of crazy American traditionalists for this kind of thing.

@1643551240335286274

@1643242038178074625

 

Tragic.

 

This is making me so angry, why can't they just let people be happy?

 

Sport. At present, to exclude trans women with a GRC from women’s sports, the organiser must show that it was necessary to do so in the interests of fairness or safety. A biological definition of sex would mean that organisers could exclude trans women from women’s sport without this additional burden.

 

So, are they suggesting that trans men should be able to participate in women's sports? Galaxy brain stuff here.

This is making me so angry, why can't they just let people be happy?

 

They aren't happy inside- they see everything as a competition and always have to put people down rather than acknowledge their own issues.

 

Re: bathroom bills. Some trans men are very masculine so are they supposed to use women's toilets? Ludicrous

Edited April 5, 20232 yr by Smint

Interesting (if depressing) thread here:

 

@1643908312092618754

 

 

It seems, incredibly, that people proposing these laws actually haven't thought through the logical ramifications on the 300k trans people in the country of what will ACTUALLY happen to those peoples' rights if they do go through. Just like with so many other things members of the government are acting as if they think they're playing an RPG about hypothetical situations.

Honestly I am so down about it all, why the f*** are we as a human race utterly despicable. Our entire histories are littered with attempting (and often succeeding) to hurt people.

 

They make me sick!

Anyway just signed this Government petition so they don't remove the rights of trans people from the Equality Act.

 

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/62...plJHbkqEsguuURw

As someone who actually fought for marriage equality (in the US and Australia it was a very hard fight unlike in the UK), and now wants to advance trans rights, my concern is the activists are doing it very wrong at the moment. The trans rights narrative looks nothing like the gay marriage narrative did, and I'm concerned that it is harming the cause. We have a proven successful model (almost every Western country has gay marriage now) but we are not following it.

 

If Keir Starmer is right about something, it's that trans rights needs a reset. The whole movement probably needs to be rebuilt, from the ground up. The leadership probably needs to be completely changed too.

 

I'm increasingly convinced that things went very wrong ever since the so-called trans tipping point (2014). Whoever is actually pro-trans, but said no to the current model back in 2015-18 or so (and there are many trans people in this category actually), should be given a chance to lead the movement out of its current wilderness. I think it would be best if the new leadership was solely made up of people who were already involved in trans issues in some way before 2013, to get rid of the recent baggage.

Edited April 7, 20232 yr by ta-ra*el~la

No, absolutely not. It's not the fault of any activists, it's the fault of media deciding that now's the time to use them as a laser focus to distract from people's economic issues, while column space is taken up by 'what is a woman' it's not shining a light on the failures of capitalism.

No, absolutely not. It's not the fault of any activists, it's the fault of media deciding that now's the time to use them as a laser focus to distract from people's economic issues, while column space is taken up by 'what is a woman' it's not shining a light on the failures of capitalism.

 

How long have you been following this issue, and how closely?

 

(Also, while I respect your socialist politics, please don't lump this issue in with capitalism. It has nothing to do with capitalism, and this distraction is not needed.)

Edited April 7, 20232 yr by ta-ra*el~la

Capitalism is always relevant.

 

It is all conservative pundits and politicians can talk about, to the exclusion of all else, because that's the ideological bankruptcy of conservatism, no solutions for people, just endless reactionary politics of new groups to attack, I've seen enough normal men just get casually consumed with the idea that the 'alphabet people' have gone crazy. That stems from somewhere. Conservative thought leaders desperate to find scapegoats for the inequality they create.

 

I have been following it for long enough to be aware of trans history and how they were treated decades ago, as well as personally following increased acceptance in the 2010s that started to increase the numbers of trans people. I hope you're not presuming to tell me what I can speak on. This isn't something I'm new at. And the attention economy is a very important point to make on this issue when it takes up so many column inches yet continues to rank at the bottom of issues people are concerned about.

Basically these are the problems with trans activism as it currently exists:

 

1) too much philosophy, too little practical reality (and this is an issue with what I call the 'theory left' in general too)

 

2) too much cancel culture, too little negotiation

 

3) too little focus on actually educating people about trans issues

 

4) failure to represent the whole spectrum of views within the trans community

 

5) too much weird jargon, too few attempts to find common ground with regular people

 

6) too often represented by radicals who are trying to sell something more unpopular alongside trans rights

 

This might sound harsh, but change is certainly needed.

 

(Just imagine if Labour or the Democrats lost an election, and this was the post-election review)

Edited April 7, 20232 yr by ta-ra*el~la

I have been following it for long enough to be aware of trans history and how they were treated decades ago, as well as personally following increased acceptance in the 2010s that started to increase the numbers of trans people.

 

Don't believe the 'progressive' media hype. Things have only gone downhill for trans people since ten years ago.

This might sound harsh, but change is certainly needed.

 

It's nonsense rather than it is harsh. Such a small community are not at fault.

 

Trans people are a great distraction from current failures and no 'radical leadership rebuilding' will change that — whatever that means. Trans people and their allies could be doing everything right and it wouldn't matter. Iz is absolutely correct.

 

 

Basically these are the problems with trans activism as it currently exists:

 

1) too much philosophy, too little practical reality (and this is an issue with what I call the 'theory left' in general too)

 

2) too much cancel culture, too little negotiation

 

3) too little focus on actually educating people about trans issues

 

4) failure to represent the whole spectrum of views within the trans community

 

5) too much weird jargon, too few attempts to find common ground with regular people

 

6) too often represented by radicals who are trying to sell something more unpopular alongside trans rights

 

This might sound harsh, but change is certainly needed.

 

(Just imagine if Labour or the Democrats lost an election, and this was the post-election review)

 

So what if a trans person was cringe somewhere? They're being attacked for their right to exist. None of these supposed problems with trans activism have any evidence backing them up. any evidence that they exist at scale among trans people as opposed to their opposites (I've seen just as much negotiation, education, populism etc from trans people if not more than these claims), whereas there is reams and reams of evidence of conservatives frothing at the mouth that people aren't living as their birth gender. Why on earth is your solution to blame the victims?

 

Any 'change' to become more docile, which to be QUITE FAIR they already are because the media has effectively already forced them to be so, is just telling them to shut up and accept their lot. Anyway this whole comment stinks of JKR making up 'trans activists' out of thin air to paternalistically make a point about the 'failures of progressivism' on a few individuals. Activists aren't the centre of this story, the transphobes are, and they're making it the trans community's problem.

 

(similarly if a left-wing political project loses an election the correct post mortem is not 'blame Becky the feminist who yelled in a Nazi's face a few times', that's literally what conservatives (friends with the Nazi) say the problem is. Why would you ever listen to those people?)

 

Don't believe the 'progressive' media hype. Things have only gone downhill for trans people since ten years ago.

 

I would think that based on representation, constant anecdotal stories and more coming out and acceptance, that this is actually far from being the case. More people know a trans person now - and that's the sort of visibility that breeds long-term acceptance.

It's nonsense rather than it is harsh. Such a small community are not at fault.

 

Trans people are a great distraction from current failures and no 'radical leadership rebuilding' will change that — whatever that means. Trans people and their allies could be doing everything right and it wouldn't matter. Iz is absolutely correct.

 

It's astonishing how much these critiques show up for every branch of progressivism, yet no conservative, transphobe or racist is ever hit with the same sort of step-by-step plan to get the public onside with them again.

 

But yeah, exactly, I don't know how the needle could ever be moved by a few trans people at this point. It has to reach a broader crowd, but that won't happen by trans people being model citizens, more likely people think the conservatives talk about it too much - already there are signs in polls that this is the case, where it will actually start harming the electoral chances of conservatives.

But yeah, exactly, I don't know how the needle could ever be moved by a few trans people at this point. It has to reach a broader crowd, but that won't happen by trans people being model citizens, more likely people think the conservatives talk about it too much - already there are signs in polls that this is the case, where it will actually start harming the electoral chances of conservatives.

 

Perhaps look at Australia, where anti-trans forces have developed a bad reputation since April last year, when they forced the trans issue into an election where it had no relevance. Letting the transphobes destroy themselves could be a good strategy indeed.

Sitting back and doing nothing is not gonna do anything though when the UK media are determined to use it to fuel the culture wars, and these newspapers are in high circulation and people can be very easily influenced, and even less so when their protection on the Equality Act is at stake. It's fortunate that the majority of polls published show the UK public generally doesn't see this as an issue, but that won't stop politicians and tabloids from using it as a distraction to the economic turmoil they've put us in. Look at what happened recently to the Youtuber, SophieFromMars after an encounter with a Tory councilor and the ensuing disgusting Daily Mail article that followed, as a case in point as to who is actually fanning the flames here.

 

I agree with Iz that I don't think it's all negativity that's happened to trans people in the last ten years either, visibility and awareness of gender dysphoria is much higher, a lot of high profile names using gender-neutral pronouns have increased awareness and from my experience, so many younger students are confident to come out and explore their gender certainly more so than when I was their age. Indeed, I think it's because of these positives that the bigots up top are trying to whip up a moral panic.