Tag: “TERF”

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Parent Private sector survivor

I am supposed to disregard the fact that he is in fact in possession of full male sexual organs

This matters to me because I am a 40 year old mother of a 4 year old daughter. I have been sexually assaulted (police involved) at my place at work as a steward at a premier league football club. I took it in my stride but my wonderful male supervisor witnessed it and had to remind me that it was unacceptable and called the police for me (I was conditioned to accept groping/casual sexual assault).

Beaten by a boyfriend between the ages of 16 and 19. Been called frigid/loose as a school girl by school boys. Flashed 3 times as a teenager, the third time the male adult masturbated in front of me. Received comments about my body/appearance constantly since teenage years. Sexually assaulted on a train at night, reported to police the next day, nothing they could do.

Most of this took place in PUBLIC! Fuck inviting this to a private (previously) safe space where nudity is involved.

I am an HR Manager and have supported a male colleague through transition. He subsequently gaslighted me and started using the female toilet 24 hours after becoming a trans woman, in the flick of a switch.

I am supposed to disregard the fact that he is in fact in possession of full male sexual organs. I ended up triggered and in counselling and uncomfortable to now use the shared toilets.  I don’t want this shit for my daughter. I DON’T WANT THIS SHIT FOR ANYONE!

I’ve followed feminists and dipped my toe in the water by asking Jon Ronson exactly what he felt that Graham Linehan had done wrong. Got threatened, terfed and gaslit. I am now prepared to level up!

I have also been berated and hated on by my woke sister, who in fact in her youth, witnessed me being beaten by my then boyfriend on more than one occasion. 😦

Owning womanhood for the first time in my life, anakindrytalker

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Others

Using public toilets already carries enough embarrassment and shame

I have a medical condition that makes my periods extremely heavy – it’s not uncommon for me to faint from menstruation-induced anaemia, or to sit on a toilet, weeping and free-bleeding for half an hour, building the resolve to attempt to deal with it. When I’m on, I live in a constant state of anxiety that I’ll bleed on clothes or furniture and everyone will see it. Using public toilets already carries enough embarrassment and shame, without adding the fear that the people hearing me rustle in cubicles, or seeing me wash blood from my hands, or using the toilet I’ve just had to makeshift clean, are male.

And I’m angry at the suggestion that my experience is somehow random, that it has nothing to do with being a woman, and the stigma around it is unconnected to it being a female experience. And it pisses me off that there are people who believe that I shouldn’t talk about my condition because periods are a ‘cis privilege’. It makes my stupid inconvenient blood boil.

I challenge inaccurate or illogical statements wherever I find them. I’m anonymous on Twitter and feel bad about it. Using a fake name and no picture saves me from the worst of the backlash that lots of women receive. I just don’t have the energy to deal with the hate from all sides that seems to come with a woman expressing even fairly innoccuous opinions. I live alone and on only my own salary, so when I see people being doxxed or their jobs threatened, it terrifies me and makes me feel incapable of revealing anything about myself. I’m not very important so maybe I’d fly under the radar, but it’s scary.

I engage in the discussion in real life, though, and on Facebook under my own name with people I know.

Where I’m anonymous on social media, it’s just name-calling (TERF, bitch, Nazi, cunt etc.) and vitriol like “die in a fire”. Nowhere near as bad as the non-anon people, but still pretty horrible.

I’ve lost a few acquaintances, been unfriended on Facebook, had people I otherwise get on with really well question my left wing / liberal credentials, express disappointment, refuse to have any conversation about it.

Lkh, Woman. You know what that is

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Others

I was terrified by the thought of periods

I had a number of moments in my childhood where I didn’t want to be female. I dreaded losing my flat chest, I was terrified by the thought of periods and if I had known I could  opt out, I would have done. I didn’t and now I am glad that this option wasn’t available when I was 10-15 years old.

I realise now that it wasn’t that I wanted to be a man, I just didn’t want to be seen as ‘less than’ or as a sexual object. I was never a girly girl  – i never liked labels, and always hated that being female meant that I wasn’t allowed to do woodwork or computer studies amongst many, many other things.

I have observed both sides of this debate very closely over the past few years and I have always fought openly against discrimination of any kind. Both sides have offensive representatives, but the more it has gone on, the more disturbing I am finding the sheer amount of people that shout TERF when someone is being inquisitive.

All my life I have fought against the old fashioned view that being a woman is about liking pink and wearing make up.

I believe that transgender women and men should have rights and support  and should never be subjected to abuse.

I also believe that transgender women should be able to use women’s toilets, but I feel very very uncomfortable with the ‘self id’ element that I see – where trans women have no intention to transition.

Most women I know have experienced some sort of sexual assault, and toilets always felt like safe places. My feeling is that toilets and female prisons are places that should never legally be allowed to be used by predators.

In terms of athletics, it is simply unacceptable that trans women are taking away women’s achievements.

I would love to discuss this more openly, but I have seen what happens when people ask questions and this whole thing is alienating me. I haven’t dared to.

I have been blocked by people on Twitter for following some gender critical people as well trans activists.

KM

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Private sector

I have been assaulted at work because I am a woman

I care because I am a WOMAN. This is not something I chose, I just am. As a child I was not feminine, I resisted dresses and prettiness, these days i would likely be told i was a boy. The sports I love are in danger of being invalidated because some men and boys “feel” like they are women. They are not, they can dress how they want but they are not and never will be women. I have been assaulted at work because I am a woman, I have been insulted because I am a woman. Women and girls must have single sex protections from men.

On a recent article on a work webpage, someone said anyone who didn’t agree that TWAW were TERFs. For the first time I made a comment with my real name, and said it was a term being used to silence and shame women on social media etc. I will admit I was scared to do it, interestingly the person who used the term never came back to comment. It now feels like I will have a mark against my name for speaking out, but I will have to wait and see. Don’t know yet, waiting to see if I get a call from HR to book me onto a diversity course.

Em, An adult human female

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Healthcare Others

I have a trans-identifying man (transwoman) in my extended family who is aggressive towards women

. The majority of our family are convinced our relative is only ‘lashing out’ because he is ‘oppressed’. (I used to be happy to use his preferred pronouns, but since his harassment of me and violent threats made to other women, I no longer extend him that courtesy.) This has been easy for him to achieve because there is so much propaganda that he can access from lobbying groups, from newspapers, from television companies.

He is over 6 foot tall, young and healthy, and I and some others of the women in my family are scared of his aggression. Currently, I feel unable to report the harassment from him to the police, as I’ve read reports of how police treat women who report these aggressive men.

I also know that his immediate family would be likely to seek revenge whether or not the police took it seriously.

I’ve had to stop speaking publicly in my real name on social media about many issues because I fear that the harassment from him will escalate into direct violence against me and my children. Even when I ‘liked’ a post about women’s rights on Facebook, that resulted in a day or two of abusive messages.

I’m branded as ‘transphobic’ because I fear this individual who happens to call himself trans. He was aggressive towards women before he started telling people he was trans, so I consider this fear to be rational. There’s nothing ‘phobic’ about it.

But I have to keep speaking up for reality because it’s the lies and propaganda about gender, trans people and ‘terfs’ that has created the atmosphere where this young man is able to get away with his abusive behaviour.

I have been able to contribute to the governments GRA consultation and have written to my MP as I don’t fear that confidentiality would be broken.

I also don’t fear that this description of my current situation will be able to be traced back to me because there are probably thousands of us in very similar circumstances.

I have a FB account in my own name that I now barely use, but I have anonymous accounts on other social media where I can share and like reasonable views without being further harassed.

The things I did to publicly speak up were so innocuous that I was surprised that the TW in my family became so abusive towards me so quickly. I shared a newspaper article from the Morning Star written by a transwoman (but apparently, not the right sort of transwoman) and I liked a Woman’s Place UK post on Facebook that wasn’t even about the gender/trans issue, but I was still told this was ‘bigotry’ because they are ‘all terfs.’ My first response was to try to reassure him that he didn’t have to agree with the other transwoman whose article I posted, but there was room was respectful discussion. That led to abusive and threatening messages not just left to me, but also to other women in my family, who were told to break all contact with me if they didn’t want to be called ‘transphobes.’

Before this happened, before he told his family that he’s a ‘woman’, he’d already been aggressive towards women and had been told not to return to his university, so I am wary that the likelihood of his harassment of me escalating is high.

The negative consequences of this are that some of my family no longer speak to me. I don’t know how much that is because they are scared of this abusive person in our family or how much they agree with him that I’m a horrible person for thinking that Women’s Place UK are not evil and for thinking that trans people are allowed diversity of thought.

Other negative consequences are that I am nervous when at home because I don’t know if he will just turn up at my doorstep or how violent he will feel justified to be. He often posts things on social media glorifying violence against the police and fascists. (He considers me to be a fascist.) This has affected my mental health to some extent. I’m sure he’d like me to be more adversely impacted than I am, but I will survive. I have to, because I need to do what I can to protect my daughter, my niece, and other women. I might keep a tactical silence in certain places, but I will not be broken.

AnonForSafety, I might be forced into anonymity for my immediate safety, but I have to keep speaking up for the safety of half of the population

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Private sector

At my London workplace the only accessible toilets for staff from other offices or visitors have been purposely made unisex

As a mum and a female at work I am concerned that we’re being duped into accepting delusion under the guise of D&I and equality. I see SLTs in schools and at work promoting and liking political groups that undermine the reality of sex. Eg: at my London workplace the only accessible toilets for staff from other offices or visitors have been purposely made unisex.

As somebody who whilst at the same company has experienced multiple miscarriages including an ectopic and an unpleasant experience of unwanted advances from a male (who eventually got moved on) I continue to protest against being confined to only using the unisex toilets when single sex toilets do exist.

I know there are others that are too afraid to speak up…it  has been confirmed I am not the only one raising this. The D&I director refuses to take responsibility though it was her that directed this arrangement. D&I initiatives are LGBT++++++ heavy. Webinars refer to TERFs “a minority of radical feminists that attempt to prevent all women from spaces”. I don’t want my daughter to grow up feeling she is not entitled to privacy.

As above I have raised the LGBT++++ webinar in a feedback survey. I continue to raise the unisex toilets issue and refuse to use them when visiting. I share what is most likely deemed as controversial posts on LinkedIn (including yours!).

Yes, I can detect that I’m an irritation to the D&I director. Some colleagues I have spoken to about unisex toilets shrug it off as trivial with the ‘well I don’t mind/sometimes the women’s toilets are in an awful state’.

Shuv

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Others

Every single one expressed concern and also fear /reluctance about speaking out

It feels like a step backwards in the fight for women’s rights. We need safe spaces. We are harassed from a young age. We are oppressed from a young age. We have to constantly work to get what men have easily. To open up access to womens rights to anyone declaring themselves as women, is to redefine the meaning of women and to dismiss and undermine our oppression, our needs, our history

I’ve spoken to women in my family ages 15 to 85 to find their thoughts. Every single one expressed concern and also fear /reluctance about speaking out.

I’ve raised the issue in local political party and with close colleagues.

I’ve posted on social media  – initially to defend transexual women, then to enquire about this new definition of trans and then to speak out strongly against it.

I’ve been called a bigot, right wing, terf and added to block lists on social media.

I’ve had my photograph taken at a demo by a man I do not know who did not introduce himself or request the photo. The photo was one of several posted on social media with comments calling women in it terfs and bigots.

c, Woman from Glasgow

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Healthcare Private sector

I don’t look like many women I know

I am a woman. I don’t look like many women I know. I am 5ft tall, AAA bust, short hair, don’t wear make up, am ordinary and I can be who I want. I was born in the 70s and in the 80s I could be who I wanted to be with a shaved head in a greatcoat and army boots. I was still a young woman and had relationships with young men.

My sister is 3 years young than me and was a tomboy and known as Steve for several years. She is now a happily partnered lesbian – thank goodness.

Teenagers need to know that they can be who they want and that struggle in life is normal – not a pathology. I have 4 children and the thought of any of them being told they should have surgery to identify as something is abhorrent to me. I have adult sons who have managed risks of knife crime and drunken idiocy so far ok.

My daughters are teens and they need to know the support of women and also know that the truth matters. If they think someone is a man they should be able to say so, not be forced to lie and tolerate a man in a space where I hope they aren’t at risk from men who upskirt, spy in changing rooms and generally perv over young girls – and now being able to do so in the open as transwomen.

My life in the body of a woman has been rocked by menopause and this has made me more aware of the effect of hormones on my body than pregnancy.

I refuse to believe or accept that a man can be a woman and it pains me that girls feel they can’t be women.

I created a new Twitter account to keep this thinking separate from my business. I also have a blog where I rant. I keep talking to my children about these issues but my 17yo already considers me to be a TERF.

I remain silent on these issues in my business environment. I voted Leave too so….

Rachel , An adult human female

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Others

We had a great conversation and hope to repeat it

This matters to me because I can not stand by while men lie about their intentions and their hijacking of the trans rights movement to allow male-bodied people into female-only spaces. They have no concern or regard for our safety and use gaslighting and emotional arguments to present themselves as victims and those who disagree as aggressors who threaten their lives.

I have written blog posts on the subject and engaged with TRAs on Twitter, trying to get a handle on their side of the story, which basically is “Accept us at our word you evil TERF, and stop whining about your safety and dignity.”

I have also spoken to the mother of a trans child on a Zoom call, working to build bridges between GC and TRAs. She shares my fears for women’s dignity and safety while wanting to create a world where her child won’t be shut out and rejected for not being a “real” woman. We had a great conversation and hope to repeat it. Her honesty makes it worthwhile.

I have been unfollowed, and some prominent people have tried to “correct” me. I’ve been able to stand up to them, though.

Wendy Cockcroft, Asker of awkward questions, lover of objective reality and truth

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Transwidows

I am a trans widow and now have a trans identifying son

I am a trans widow and now have a trans identifying son.

I have told my story in detail and will share it as much as possible. I have spoken out to friends, associates and anyone how show an interest in engaging.

I have been cut out of my son’s life, I have been cast as a terf, a bigot, unstable, dramatic, selfish and mentally ill.

Jennifer K, Mother, feminist, survivor, force to be reckoned with, Ireland