Gender Identity in Modern Ireland (Mod warnings and Threadbanned Users in OP)

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

LLMMLL wrote: »

I have compassion for you and your circumstances.

They still have nothing to do with gender identity.

Based on your post you seem to believe that compassion for your individual circumstances (which have nothing to do with gender identity) should influence people’s opinions on gender identity. Do you really think compassion for you individually should be part of this debate?

I honestly find this quite shocking.

Indeed they don’t. They have to do with my biological sex. I don’t have a gender identity. So, correct.

nolivesmatter

LLMMLL wrote: »

The benefit is that we can refer to cis women without implying that trans women are not women.

You keep claiming that trans people will feel left out of the cis group. Provide some evidence please.

In your opinion what does it mean to be a woman, but not a cis woman?

(wtf am I doing up at this hour!)

LLMMLL

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Indeed they don’t. They have to do with my biological sex. I don’t have a gender identity. So, correct.

The point still stands. Whether you think your opinions on trans issues relate to gender identity or biological sex, trans issues have nothing to do with your tragic circumstances.

Your reasoning seems to be:

1. Your biological sex has lead to tragic medical circumstances.
2. You have certain opinions on trans issues that you believe stem from biological sex.
3. Therefore your tragic medical circumstances and trans issues are part of the same debate.

It’s clearly flawed reasoning.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

LLMMLL wrote: »

The point still stands. Whether you think your opinions on trans issues relate to gender identity or biological sex, trans issues have nothing to do with your tragic circumstances.

Your reasoning seems to be:

1. Your biological sex has lead to tragic medical circumstances.
2. You have certain opinions on trans issues that you believe stem from biological sex.
3. Therefore your tragic medical circumstances and trans issues are part of the same debate.

It’s clearly flawed reasoning.

You have a brass neck, I’ll give you that. The cervical cancer literature debacle this year was a very neat demonstration of how willing our health service is to throw females under the bus or ignore our needs. And apparently in this case to appease a cohort who will never need cervical cancer screening (because if it wasn’t about that why couldn’t the phrase ‘women, transgender men and NB females’ be used?). Sparing the feelings of this cohort was apparently more important than reaching as many females as possible. This after a very recent scandal related to this cancer that has killed many women. Utterly contemptuous, mocking behaviour by our health service. But LOLs, no big deal, right?

Oh, and to pick up on an earlier point of yours.

Blonde women are female.
Brunette women are female.
White women are female.
Black women are female.
Tall women are female.
Short women are female.
Transgender women are male.

LLMMLL

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

You have a brass neck, I’ll give you that. The cervical cancer literature debacle this year was a very neat demonstration of how willing our health service is to throw females under the bus or ignore our needs. And apparently in this case to appease a cohort who will never need cervical cancer screening (because if it wasn’t about that why couldn’t the phrase ‘women, transgender men and NB females’ be used?). Sparing the feelings of this cohort was apparently more important than reaching as many females as possible. This after a very recent scandal related to this cancer that has killed many women. Utterly contemptuous, mocking behaviour by our health service. But LOLs, no big deal, right?

Oh, and to pick up on an earlier of yours.

Blonde women are female.
Brunette women are female.
White women are female.
Black women are female.
Tall women are female.
Short women are female.
Transgender women are male.

Was your cancer diagnosis delayed because you didn’t understand the medical literature because it used the term “person with cervix”?

With the greatest respect, that’s the only way your tragic medical circumstances could have anything to do with trans issues.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

LLMMLL wrote: »

Was your cancer diagnosis delayed because you didn’t understand the medical literature because it used the term “person with cervix”?

With the greatest respect, that’s the only way your tragic medical circumstances could have anything to do with trans issues.

Are you really this obtuse? My point is that women are having their language to describe themselves taken from them and obfuscated when things are far from rosy for them in the health service. My experience and the cervical cancer literature are two different examples of the difficulties FEMALES face in the health service. I didn’t think two different examples was too difficult for anybody here to digest but here we are. You do you, I guess.

Maybe I should have identified out of being a woman to get myself taken seriously. I mean, identifying as is the same as being, right? And if you don’t think so - OMG, bigot!

Smacruairi

Doesn't matter what's on a piece of paper, most people can see the difference between woman and trans. They can't give birth, can't play on women's teams, and most straight men won't date them. They are still entitled to be treated with respect, and their personalities and accomplishments will define them as people. Think that's it.

LLMMLL

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Are you really this obtuse? My point is that women are having their language to describe themselves taken from them and obfuscated when things are far from rosy for them in the health service. My experience and the cervical cancer literature are two different examples of the difficulties FEMALES face in the health service. I didn’t think two different examples was too difficult for anybody here to digest but here we are. You do you, I guess.

Maybe I should have identified out of being a woman to get myself taken seriously. I mean, identifying as is the same as being, right? And if you don’t think so - OMG, bigot!

Not obtuse at all. You’re correct:

They ARE two DIFFERENT examples and as such one example has no place on this thread. I think debating the cervical cancer literature is appropriate for this thread.

But personal tragic medical circumstances do not belong in this thread unless they came about as a result of the cervical cancer literature.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

LLMMLL wrote: »

Not obtuse at all. You’re correct:

They ARE two DIFFERENT examples and as such one example has no place on this thread. I think debating the cervical cancer literature is appropriate for this thread.

But personal tragic medical circumstances do not belong in this thread unless they came about as a result of the cervical cancer literature.

You’re not the arbiter of that. It’s not my problem that my point went over your head. Other people got what I was getting at. Seems like it fits in just fine.

Vic_08

LLMMLL wrote: »

It seems your reason for not believing trans women are women is completely tied up in the negative experiences that women face. Is womanhood all negative to you. I find it very strange. I’d like to think that women lead lives with at least some positive elements.

Firstly, I never said negative, I said different. Are there more negatives to being female in our society, on balance I would say yes but the differences certainly aren't all negative.

A trans person can create or project a facsimile of some of the physical characteristics of the opposite sex but certainly not all. They can also experience some of the differences of living as the opposite sex but again not all.

And again we are back to this whole belief thing, I don't believe nor disbelieve because belief is irrelevant.

This is really the focal point of all this isn't it. You want to be free to believe something, push that belief into the mainstream and not be taken to task for the factual inaccuracies inherent in that belief.


Male and Female are FACTS, observable, provable, documented, understood, facts. Patterns that repeat throughout the entire range of animal life from tiny insects through the largest mammals.

I am Never going to accept a belief system that flies in the face of basic known provable facts being given supremacy in thought, education, law or medical doctrine. That is equally true for replacing factually verifiable genders with self identity as it is for replacing evolution with creationism.

Believe what you want, just like the innumerable religions, faiths, superstitions and conspiracy theories there is no point waging a war on people's irrational beliefs. I will however insist on your beliefs not being forced upon the rest of us just as I would resist laws demanding adherence to any other fact denying belief system.

I am very happy I get to live in a time and place where fact, logic and science have more or less replaced religion and beliefs as the basic rules by which we define our world. Believe what you want, live your life however you want; I will absolutely stand by the right of trans or any other people to do that, right up to the point it negatively impacts others. However you can fukk right off with this back-dooring of a modern religion into our society at large.

_Godot_

Smacruairi wrote: »

Doesn't matter what's on a piece of paper, most people can see the difference between woman and trans. They can't give birth, can't play on women's teams, and most straight men won't date them. They are still entitled to be treated with respect, and their personalities and accomplishments will define them as people. Think that's it.

There are also cis/non-trans women who can't give birth or get pregnant.

Smacruairi

_Godot_ wrote: »

There are also cis/non-trans women who can't give birth or get pregnant.

There are also people born blind or deaf. Unfortunate, but I'm sure it doesn't define them.

Vic_08

_Godot_ wrote: »

There are also cis/non-trans women who can't give birth or get pregnant.

Only a matter of time before birth deformities, injuries and medical conditions that cause serious and often physical and emotionally destructive lifelong effects to women are used as a lazy equivalence to try to gloss over the obvious physical differences between women and trans women.

Really classy.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

_Godot_ wrote: »

There are also cis/non-trans women who can't give birth or get pregnant.

I’m one of those, an infertile woman thanks to medical treatment. I have female anatomy, I have to present for female health screening. I don’t stop being female simply because I’m infertile. Not all females can get pregnant but only females can. Stop using infertile women in this way. It’s deeply ignorant. Infertile women still have the female experience. And now we have to enjoy being othered as if our infertile status makes us less female.

Vic_08 wrote: »

Only a matter of time before birth deformities, injuries and medical conditions that cause serious and often physical and emotionally destructive lifelong effects to women are used as a lazy equivalence to try to gloss over the obvious physical differences between women and trans women.

Really classy.

Yup. It is so unbelievably ignorant. Now that I’m infertile, apparently I’m analogous to a biological male.

patnor1011

One can never have rational debate with fanatics. History is full of examples how thought experiments always end.

FileNotFound

Always find this topic of gender identity gets me.

I support people identifying in their lives as anything they wish to be.

But I still accept the fact that we are born with certain chromosones which make us medically a or b

Sport is an area that's leaves me unsure for example.

I often wonder if the demand to fit into pre existing definitions isnt half the problem.

I don't know what's right, I try to be fair and decent and am willing to accept my opinion may be wrong.

One eyed Jack

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

The health service of this country saw it fit to obfuscate the language on public health literature related to a cancer that has needlessly killed a not insignificant number of women in Ireland in the last few years to spare the feelings of a cohort who will never need cervical cancer screening.

You have that arseways. It was to be inclusive of people with a cervix who do not identify themselves as women. They still should attend cervical cancer screening appointments, but the reality is that many of them don’t. That’s why the language was changed - not to appease a small cohort who will never need cervical cancer screening, but to appeal to the cohort who do not identify themselves as women.

Also, for what it’s worth, screening programmes aren’t solely based upon sex, nor are detection rates, referrals or treatments. In the example you gave earlier of your own experience and that of your husband, it’s an anecdote. You weren’t even comparing like for like. In reality, more men are likely to die from cancer than women. Even when researchers removed sex specific cancers from the equation, the discrepancy was even more pronounced -


The report (pdf), compiled by Cancer Research UK, the National Cancer Intelligence Network (NCIN), Leeds Metropolitan University and the Men’s Health Forum shows that men are 40 per cent more likely to die from cancer than women overall, and 16 per cent more likely to get the disease.

To find out if this was due to cancers that predominantly affect only one sex, the researchers removed certain cancers from their equation – namely sex-specific cancers (such as prostate and cervical cancer), breast cancer (which mainly affects women, although men can still get it) and lung cancer (which affects 8,000 more men than women every year).

The team found that when they looked at data from cancers that affected both men an women, the difference became even more striking. Men were 60 per cent more likely to get cancer than women, and 70 per cent more likely to die from it.

These figures are concerning not only for men, but for their families too.


Why are men more likely to die from cancer?


Your reasoning is as flawed as the recent attempts by some advocacy groups to suggest that while men are dying from covid at significantly higher rates than women, women are worse affected by the pandemic. It’s just divisive nonsense that has no basis in biology, and what explanations there are, vary greatly depending on who you ask.

Some people have chosen to use these statistics as a political football to further their own agendas, as you have done in claiming that the cervical screening scandal is evidence of how women are being thrown under the bus by the HSE. A sub-standard healthcare service affects everyone to some degree at some point in their lives, it’s not simply predicated upon discrimination on the basis of sex.

Smacruairi wrote: »

Doesn't matter what's on a piece of paper, most people can see the difference between woman and trans. They can't give birth, can't play on women's teams, and most straight men won't date them. They are still entitled to be treated with respect, and their personalities and accomplishments will define them as people. Think that's it.

It does, because what’s written on that piece of paper recognises a person’s right to their gender identity in law, and provides protection from discrimination in law. That’s why what actually doesn’t matter is what differences people see between people, everyone is equal before the law. It’s also why the law does not recognise women who identify themselves as men as anyone other than the mother of any children they give birth to. They currently are not recognised as fathers on their children’s birth certificate. I don’t know whether or not that will change in the future, but for now people have the right to be recognised as parents on their children’s birth certificate.

As for the idea that people can’t play on women’s teams, they can, and they do, and vice versa too there are women who play on men’s teams, and as for the idea that straight men won’t date them? Most straight men won’t date most women either, and most straight women won’t date most men. You really don’t have any point there. It’s not as though anyone is being prohibited from forming relationships with anyone, certainly not since the marriage equality referendum was passed in Ireland and enacted into Irish law, something which previously would have meant people who are transgender were discriminated against because the right to their gender identity was not recognised in Irish law. That’s why what’s written on a piece of paper absolutely does matter - because recognition in law means nobody has to give a shìt for the feelings of people who would wish to discriminate against them on the basis of their gender identity.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

One eyed Jack wrote: »

You have that arseways. It was to be inclusive of people with a cervix who do not identify themselves as women. They still should attend cervical cancer screening appointments, but the reality is that many of them don’t. That’s why the language was changed - not to appease a small cohort who will never need cervical cancer screening, but to appeal to the cohort who do not identify themselves as women.

Nope. The phrase ‘transgender men’ DID appear on the offending literature, where the word ‘woman’ appeared not once. If you search this very thread, that peculiarity was noted. So no, you’re wrong about that. Transgender men were acknowledged but the word ‘woman’ was omitted completely.

Interesting, isn’t it? That transgender men were acknowledged but not women? Like the word couldn’t be said. For whose benefit would that be, do you think?

Smacruairi

One eyed Jack wrote: »

because recognition in law means nobody has to give a shìt for the feelings of people who would wish to discriminate against them on the basis of their gender identity.

Funny, because the piece of paper is literally just for the feelings of the person involved. A man becoming a woman won't bear children, menstruate etc. The rules of sports in Ireland are quite clear but the rules of nature are absolute. Everything else they associate with womanhood is just their own projection of what a woman should be. It's just a semantical change so that they feel better about themselves. Most people will still see them as trans women, not biological, natal women. Doesn't mean they don't respect their personality and achievements. You can't discriminate in Ireland based on gender, so changing it makes no sense.

suicide_circus

Vic_08 wrote: »

Firstly, I never said negative, I said different. Are there more negatives to being female in our society, on balance I would say yes but the differences certainly aren't all negative.

A trans person can create or project a facsimile of some of the physical characteristics of the opposite sex but certainly not all. They can also experience some of the differences of living as the opposite sex but again not all.

And again we are back to this whole belief thing, I don't believe nor disbelieve because belief is irrelevant.

This is really the focal point of all this isn't it. You want to be free to believe something, push that belief into the mainstream and not be taken to task for the factual inaccuracies inherent in that belief.


Male and Female are FACTS, observable, provable, documented, understood, facts. Patterns that repeat throughout the entire range of animal life from tiny insects through the largest mammals.

I am Never going to accept a belief system that flies in the face of basic known provable facts being given supremacy in thought, education, law or medical doctrine. That is equally true for replacing factually verifiable genders with self identity as it is for replacing evolution with creationism.

Believe what you want, just like the innumerable religions, faiths, superstitions and conspiracy theories there is no point waging a war on people's irrational beliefs. I will however insist on your beliefs not being forced upon the rest of us just as I would resist laws demanding adherence to any other fact denying belief system.

I am very happy I get to live in a time and place where fact, logic and science have more or less replaced religion and beliefs as the basic rules by which we define our world. Believe what you want, live your life however you want; I will absolutely stand by the right of trans or any other people to do that, right up to the point it negatively impacts others. However you can fukk right off with this back-dooring of a modern religion into our society at large.

It's a fascinating experiment in mass mental manipulation.

We have a tiny amount of people with let's say unusual and arcane introspections on their own bodies (contrary to all phyiscial evidence) and rather than accept this for what it is, it's the rest of society that needs to engage in a universal nod and wink deception and rewriting of commonly accepted truths.

Gruffalux

The reason why woman cannot be referred to as cis to supposedly correspond to trans is that it attempts to set up a falsity. Falsity is not ignorance - it is purposeful opposition to truth. It is deceit. The use of cis is an intentional ideological device that I believe is subversive. To reason and more broadly as a political tool.

The device attempts to prove or insist that the single indivisible category of woman can be subdivided into subcategories. Those purported sub categories are actually male and female though ideologues do not want to even admit that much because it echoes the reality of sex.

Woman cannot be subdivided as an ontological category. Woman means an adult female of the human species, female being irrefutably that sex which produces large gametes.

This ideological device to divide the category of woman into cis and trans, or trans and non trans, or any other political manoeuvre, cannot be permitted out of an excess of kindness or political correctness. Simply because it is false.

We are a civilisation that has moved past faith-based irrational beliefs and we seek scientific rigour. Personally I am a helpless metaphysicist by emotional nature but my reason still cannot and will not jettison proven fact. It is an odd combination, and everyone has their struggles , but no matter what I will never be able to deny empirical reality and embrace politically-motivated ideology.

For these reasons I refer to woman and trans woman. Both are equal as human beings. But different.

If someone really struggles and needs to somehow separate woman from trans woman I will accept natal woman because it eases their fret and most importantly does not function as an ideological device to subdivide the single category of woman.

All the above applies to man equally.

Gruffalux

Smacruairi wrote: »

Funny, because the piece of paper is literally just for the feelings of the person involved. A man becoming a woman won't bear children, menstruate etc. The rules of sports in Ireland are quite clear but the rules of nature are absolute. Everything else they associate with womanhood is just their own projection of what a woman should be. It's just a semantical change so that they feel better about themselves. Most people will still see them as trans women, not biological, natal women. Doesn't mean they don't respect their personality and achievements. You can't discriminate in Ireland based on gender, so changing it makes no sense.

This is also a thing - Feeling like a woman. I mean...? I cannot even know what it feels like to be any other woman and I am a woman. Maybe I am just a solipsistic wagon. How could anyone really know what it feels like to be the opposite sex.

Mind you I am very familiar with feeling what are typically described as masculine type thouggts and impulses. And himself can be far more soft natured than me which could be said to be a feminine expression. There should be no rigidities or expectations in expression of gender. This is another reason why I find this boy stuff and girl stuff indications of childhood transgenderism to be so backward, rigid and old fashioned.

One eyed Jack

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Nope. The phrase ‘transgender men’ DID appear on the offending literature, where the word ‘woman’ appeared not once. If you search this very thread, that peculiarity was noted. So no, you’re wrong about that. Transgender men were acknowledged but the word ‘woman’ was omitted completely.

Interesting, isn’t it? That transgender men were acknowledged but not women? Like the word couldn’t be said. For whose benefit would that be, do you think?

The inclusive language which people objected to was ‘anyone with a cervix’. Of course the literature included a reference to transgender men, and the change in language was absolutely done for their benefit, because while rates of of cervical screening tests are low among women, they’re even lower among women who do not identify themselves as women! It was a poor attempt to be inclusive of all women, recognising that not all women identify themselves as women. Men weren’t pushing for any change in the language. The HSE information page relating to prostate cancer hasn’t been updated to suggest that women need to be screened for prostate cancer for example -


Responding to the complaint, the HSE’s cervical cancer information service said it aimed to make the programme accessible and inclusive of everyone in the population and to reduce health inequalities where possible.

Advice had been taken from World Health Organisation and Government documents on the use of gender neutral language, while HSE communications guidelines advise the use of “gender-neutral text wherever possible”.

It pointed to a recent example of “language revision” during the mychild.ie campaign, when “your child” and “they” were used in place of “he” or “she” in communications.

CervicalCheck information material has been created in consultation with patients representatives and stakeholders, the HSE also pointed out.

The Marie Keating Foundation told the woman, who does not want to be identified, it was “not in a position” to support her call for references to “women” to be put back into the communications material.

The HSE had taken expert advice before making the decision, “which was not one they chose lightly”, the charity said.

The HSE information page on prostate cancer refers frequently to “men” but has not been updated since 2011.


HSE defends removing references to ‘women’ in online cervical cancer information


There are a minority of people who are of the opinion that the skenes glands in women are analogous to the prostate glands in men, on sites which are by far more popular than the HSE information pages, websites such as Healthline for example -

Can Females Get Prostate Cancer?

I know you’re trying to assert that it’s men who are pushing for this gender neutral inclusive language nonsense or that it’s done to appease men, but that’s not borne out by reality -

Skene’s gland cancer (female prostate gland cancer)

Written by a woman.

Opinion: Creating a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who menstruate

Written by women.

And for what it’s worth, the Healthline article I referenced earlier in this post - also written by a woman.

Not the least bit interesting, nor is it peculiar, not least because of the fact that women appear to care more about their health than men do and so are quicker to highlight issues in the area of healthcare, but women also appear to care more about gender equality and inclusiveness than men do, which is why women are more prominent in that area too. Essentially, your argument isn’t with men promoting this nonsense, the fact is that the majority of people promoting it appear to be at least - women.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Yes, women can be misogynists. We’re from a country that ably demonstrates that, even in the recent past. I never said that the literature was written by men. You’re very welcome to direct me to where I said that.

CtevenSrowder

_Godot_ wrote: »

There are also cis/non-trans women who can't give birth or get pregnant.

Jesus are we really back to this.

Gatling

LLMMLL wrote: »

Your tragic circumstances have absolutely nothing to do with gender identity.

She's a woman .

The thing your trying to reduce to non existent to suit a cohort of men who are a subset of men who self identifies as women .

Typical male approach

Gatling

One eyed Jack wrote: »

The inclusive language which people objected to was ‘anyone with a cervix’


Responding to the complaint, the HSE’s cervical cancer information service said it aimed to make the programme accessible and inclusive of everyone in the population and to reduce health inequalities where possible.

Cervical cancer is a women's cancer, there is zero need for inclusive language , self identify as a woman sorry you don't need to be included in cervical screening programme unfortunately a penis hasn't got a cervix .
It was women who pushed for this yeah NGOs and Tra's under fear of backlash crying discrimination

One eyed Jack

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Yes, women can be misogynists. We’re from a country that ably demonstrates that, even in the recent past. I never said that the literature was written by men. You’re very welcome to direct me to where I said that.

I didn’t say anything even remotely like women can be misogynists? Jesus, how you even extrapolated that from my post :pac:

Seriously though, completely unfair to those women I referenced to call them misogynists because they don’t share your point of view or you don’t share their point of view. I don’t agree with much of the rhetoric they use either, but “misogynists”? That’s a damn low bar you’ve got there for what qualifies as misogyny.

I didn’t say you said the literature was written by men. Throughout this thread and the many previous threads to it you have consistently attempted to portray the issues involved as men attempting to subjugate women, even your “I voted to repeal the 8th” was about as useful and self-serving as “I carried a watermelon” in terms of issues which women actually give a shìt about. I don’t have to actually be a woman to know that much.

km991148

The entire argument on the "inclusive" language on the cancer document seems to be based on an assumption that it was language used to somehow cater to transwomens* (or whatever term you wish to substitute) feelings.

Has that assumption been tested? Because otherwise there is just going to be a heap of arguments over some very clumsy literature, without any real resolution.

*Edit to clarify: as opposed to being inclusive of transmen in the cancer screening programme.

FileNotFound

Gatling wrote: »

She's a woman .

The thing your trying to reduce to non existent to suit a cohort of men who are a subset of men who self identifies as women .

Typical male approach

The jenner chap got woman of the year soon as he reclassified.

Mad stuff