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What Does It Mean to Be a Woman?
This tweet came across my timeline this week, which at first made me laugh, and then gave me pause:
The idea that womanhood can be reduced to wearing dresses and nailpolish, and now, being moody once a month, has been one of the most troubling side-effects of the transgender movement. We are letting men with a mental illness (gender dysphoria) determine what it means to be a modern woman. Is it enough to feel like a woman? And does feeling like a woman just mean we’re cranky around our periods?
Spain’s beauty queen is a transgender activist with a message for the schoolchildren she visits: “There are women with a penis and men with a vagina, because the only key part of being a woman is to be and feel like a woman.” https://t.co/pxX9hwUv0E
— New York Times World (@nytimesworld) July 13, 2018
I’ve always been a tomboy; it didn’t occur to me to try my wedding dress on until a week before my wedding; too late to make any alterations to what amounted to a potato sack. I wore red sneakers and forgot to get a manicure beforehand. Does that make Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner or Angela Ponce more womanly than me, because they like to wear pretty dresses and high heels? Dressing like a woman doesn’t make them more of a woman than me, someone actually born with female parts.
Transgender activists understand the shaky ground they’re on; it’s why they’ve begun inventing new ways in which they are women. It’s not enough for them to feel like a woman emotionally, now they feel like us physically. The Twitter thread below by Ultrans Instinct Bria was instructive about how little even those who pretend to be women actually understand the biology behind reproduction. Like most men, they believe that PMS is just about being moody; that being a woman is exemplified by being cranky women once a month.
Without a uterus, what muscle exactly is doing the cramping?
The “around the 10th of every month” line made me laugh. This is a common misconception from men about our cycles; they are called monthly, but they vary dramatically; very few women have a predictable period around the same date every month. Months have different lengths (February has 28; July 31); and our cycles don’t align with the calendar. The timing never falls neatly on one date every month.
In the process of emasculating themselves, transgender individuals with the biological parts of men who nevertheless identify as women, are through their activism stripping women of what it means to be female. There is no female version of “emasculation,” but that’s exactly what is happening here.
By accepting the transgender narrative, we are letting men define what it means to be a woman. We are letting them take our female athlete of the year awards, win our beauty contests, and best us at our sports matches. One would think feminists would be standing up for the definition of womanhood, but they’re too busy playing along with this delusion.
Published in Culture
Meanwhile at the U of M
This is why this madness must be opposed. It’s one thing to be polite and call someone what they wish to be called, even if that means lying to yourself.
It’s quite another to force people to do it or lose your job.
I was being a bit facetious, @stad. Then again, all the men who become women can play together as women, and the women who become men can all compete against each other. Not enough people? Too bad, I guess.
Alright, this question is born of my ignorance. Is their hormone replacement therapy 365? Or do they have “periods” (and I use that term loosely) where they’re off of them and thus creating a “swing?” Or is this just another manifestation of their dysphoria?
Unfortunately women (real women) will have to be the ones that shut this nonsense down. We men (real men) have been marginalized out of the societal conversation. Feminists created this monster – I’ve been amused as they’ll have to deal with it. I hope they kill it but only after some humiliating introspection.
This is the patriarchy in action: Just pat them on the head, tell them not to worry their pretty little heads about it,
and keep them barefoot and pregnant.Read the tweet to my husband. He says “Sounds more like bi-polar”, but he is not a doctor :)
Seriously, though, hasn’t it been found that most people with gender dysphoria actually do suffer from some form of officially recognized mental illness?
I can’t remember when I first came across the term “TERF,” but I’ve learned that it stands for “trans-exclusionary radical feminist” — a feminist who excludes trans-women from the definition of woman. (Which is to say, a feminist who hasn’t completely lost her mind.)
TERF is considered a slur. Women — even radical feminists — who don’t sign on to the trans agenda will be destroyed in the media unless they find a way to control the conversation the way the trans activists have done.
And they must.
I think it’s called “gender dysphoria.”
And there are frequently other mental illnesses present as well.
Yes, but gender dysphoria does not seem to be considered a mental illness; it’s more a condition to be treated with surgery. If gender dysphoria was really considered a mental illness by psychologists, we would not be having these conversations about how to integrate trans gendered people onto sports teams and into beauty contests.
Ding, ding, ding – we have a winner.
Ricochet Comment of the Quarter!
I was going to say that according to the DSM-V, it is considered a mental illness, but . . . I guess it no longer is. Or rather, it’s sort of a wobbly issue:
As I interpret this gobbledygook, it appears that it’s now considered an element of having the condition of “gender nonconformity.” So, not a mental illness in itself, but clinically significant distress that arises from a condition. Emanations of penumbras.
It used to be. Until gay “rights” activists had it changed in 1987. Up until 2016 it was still considered a mental illness by the World Health Organization. This is neither “science” or “medicine.” It’s politics.
great scene (from the Great Lebowski)
We can anticipate that the clinical article detailing the proper technique will be published shortly, with standard of care documents to follow.
This is what really gets me angry; people with gender dysphoria are being victimized by professional psychologists for political reasons. We have surgeons who are willing to maim and disfigure mentally ill people-and in some cases, children at the behest of their parents. This is a very dark era for the practice of medicine.
Bethany, you might be interested in this thread:
http://ricochet.com/534236/thou-shalt-not-lie
In all the years I had cramps, I never attributed it to not being ‘good enough’ – they is absurd and upsetting that this is being passed to school children – insanity…
That would not be a level playing field. There is a reason that there are no women in the NBA.
Unless I misunderstand you. Do you mean just one league for everybody?
Apropos of nothing, these gender identity crises seem to be much more common these days. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that we’ve got
• a large population whose parents and grandparents have been on legal and illegal psychoactive drugs, many of which act profoundly on the pleasure/reward pathways
and/or
• multiple endocrine disrupters in the environment and food supply
and/or
• social media to spread popular delusions and the madness of crowds
and heck, while we’re at it, Russian and Chinese trolls on social media.
Don’t discount the infestation of the school systems with people who want to ‘help’ young boys or girls who have some discomfort with who they are. Which means almost every one of them. They ‘help’ by encouraging them to find their real gender. Which usually is the opposite of their genitalia.
The easiest way for a mixed up kid to get adulation and attention is to come out as the opposite gender. Powerful people will show up to support you, buildings will be renovated, the medical profession reformed. It will feel like kindergarten when you won the prize, but every day.
Amy,
I think it would relevant to hold a poll amongst the Ricochet whether they trust Catbert or Dogbert more.
Regards,
Jim
Perfect.
It’s the most asinine argument I can imagine. What is this “what it feels like to be a woman” crap??? I’m a woman and I can’t even tell you what it feels like to be me. Trans is all about the superficial stereotypes of the sexes. It’s so incredibly incoherent, it would be laughable if it wasn’t ruining people’s lives.
Let me help you:
I wonder if the individual troubled by his periods would step up to the plate and undergo some kind of simulated childbirth to truly show the depth of his desire for that “transition”? I saw a silly daytime t.v. episode once where 2 husbands agreed to have certain main nerves shocked? stimulated? while their wives got to watch and the men doubled over, etc. It was hahahah from the audience and the men swore it enhanced their appreciation of the wives’ contributions (a.k.a. children). But of course it didn’t go on for hours and hours and culminate in a real delivery. OK on second thought some of these trans just might be crazy enough unless their supporters called it cruel and unusual etc.
Boo… we need some Shania Twain in this joint…
Once again, feelings are “reality,” and physical reality is ignored.
Many have said that going along with the “transgender” activists will end women’s sports. So, yes, women who want women’s sports should be revolting. (A noted by @wicon in comment #34, men can’t really push the matter.)
One of the reasons going through the sex “transition” doesn’t seem to lower the very high suicide rate.