Your policing method is "yelling at any person you deem insufficiently feminine-looking, whether they are trans or not" and if they are actually natal women, oh well, too bad, they should just femme it up. So much for gender stereotypes being bad things that only the brave TERFs are fighting against.
It is what it is. Despite what Eloise would have you believe, I doubt that she would have been more welcome in women's spaces in 2000 or 1990 or 1980 than in 2020, because this push to make observably male people welcome in women's private spaces is a very new thing. The only thing preserving female spaces as females spaces is the social norm, and the only thing upholding that social norm is that people speak out when it is violated. You'd have people not speak out when they perceive that social norm violate, in which case the only thing left preserving women's spaces is an honor system. Honor systems are without value, because the only people who respect an honor system are people with honor. The people an honor system fails to keep out are the exact people who the system is supposed to protect against. So you can see the dilemma.
What you (and trans rights activists and other boosters and supporters) are advocating for is for women to never question the presence of male individuals in sex-segregated spaces. You can feign concern for Eloise and ContraPoints and other sympathetic individuals, but that is what this boils down to. You want women to meekly accept male people individuals in private spaces without question. That's the indisputable outcome of what you're advocating for. And I can't accept that as anything except for a burden being placed upon women.
The point of your Eloise article (or the Eddie Izzard article, or any number of other articles chiding women for being fearful of men in their spaces) is that women need to put aside their own feelings for some alleged greater good. Which is pretty much the entire history of the human race, so perhaps you can understand why I don't see this as being as "progressive" as progressives seem to think it is.
Right because transmen don't currently use men's spaces?
Do they?
I never hear about trans men demanding to be put in men's prisons. I recall a trans man protester from Portland who wanted to be in the women's jails rather than the men's, he didn't think he would be safe in confinement with cis men.
I never hear of trans men demanding access to men's sports. The only trans man I'm aware of who is remotely competitive in men's sports is female-at-birth distance runner Chris Mosier. (Not a coincidence that Mosier is in distance running, one of the few sports where the top athletes are slim and slightly muscular rather than large and powerful.)
I'm sure that you'd point to Buck Angel as a trans man who would walk into a men's restroom without anybody taking a second glance; I'd say that like Blaire White that's an issue of being highly passing rather than an indication of widespread comfort among trans men in male spaces. I suspect that trans men who aren't highly passing are scared shitless of being in single-sex spaces with cis men.
Nothing, necessarily, just another example of the diminishing space between the so-called lefty TERF/SWERF and the so-con right.
It seems to me like the space between the "progressives" who think that sex work and p0rn are "empowering" for women, and the incels and MRAs is likewise pretty slim. It seems to me that the space between progressives who want lesbians to "unlearn their genital preferences" and the conservative Christians who want lesbians to undergo conversion therapy is so narrow you couldn't even slide a piece of paper in there. So... with the birds I share this lonely view, I guess.
So why do progressives have such a hard-on for p0rn and sex-work right now, anyway?
Because I thought the issue is behaviour, not simply someone's existence.
If you're trying to tell me that you think complaining to the management about that encounter would yield any possible positive results for either the woman complaining or for the business, you're either dumb or naive or perhaps just being dishonest with me. Self-identify as you wish, but I know that you're not dumb.
At least that's what you led me to believe until the sudden shift in tack a few posts back when suddenly it became a problem of insufficiently female-looking people creeping you out by their mere presence.
nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh. Hold up. That started when you posted a picture if a highly passing trans woman to illustrate why cis women should feel comfortable sharing women's spaces with trans women. If you want to posit the appearance of ContraPoints as a reason why women should feel comfortable sharing private space with trans women, you should be prepared to explain why women should feel just as comforable sharing their private spaces with somebody who looks like Morgane Oger or Charlotte Clymer. Michelle Winter was in the news last week. Google up Michelle Winter, tell me if you think women should have felt comfortable sharing a changing room with Michelle Winter.
Ah yes, that famously huge market presence.
But I keep hearing that most women love trans inclusion and that only a tiny fringe are opposed. Surely all a spa or health club would have to do is hang out a shingle that says "Trans Inclusive!" and cis women would flock to the door. Surely you aren't suggesting that most cis women don't really want to shower and change with
****-people?
Mask off.
Yes, I am going full mask-off as a heretic who believes that biologically female people have their own special needs and concerns that are separate from those of males who identify as females. So what apparel do you wear to signify your disagreement with that premise? A clown hat and floppy shoes?
What's the alternative? Assume everyone is a creep who just wants to perv out in women's bathrooms? Interrogate every transperson about their history of gender dysphoria before you let them pee? oh wait: it's "force them into situations where their own safety could be compromised because who really gives a ****."
I don't assume that everyone is a creep who wants to perv out in women's washrooms. I just recognize that this is something that will be exploited by creeps and perverts. And we know that's not a hypothetical, we know it's a fact. You earlier complained that I keep mentioning Jessica Yaniv. Well, the reason I keep mentioning Yaniv is that it forces people like you to acknowledge the reality of this. You guys always used to always respond to this type of thing with "that would never happen!" and now you can't do that anymore. Instead of "that would never happen" it's now "you gotta break a few eggs."
You mentioned earlier that you find it upsetting that the TERFs don't seem to care what might happen to trans women in men's prisons. Well, I completely empathize with that, because there are few things that have done more to harden my heart against trans rights activists than their continual insistence on responding to every concern with "that's a myth" or "that would never happen." Responding to every
**** thing with "that's a myth" or "that would never happen" shows that trans activists are either completely disconnected from reality, or have zero empathy for cisgender women, or both. Trans women and their boosters keep talking about what great allies they are for cis women in "smashing the patriarchy". That's a bunch of
****. The fact of it is this: if you guys can't understand the anxiety cis women feel when male people enter our spaces, you are not capable of being our allies in any capacity. You said you're taking some time off from this thread, so that's something for you to ruminate on while you're away.
-k