Different types of detransitioners?

Is the “Society for evidence-based gender medicine” a serious scientific body, or a hate group? On its home page, I found the false, debunked claim that 61-98% of childhood gender dysphoria resolves. But, its hundred members write scientific papers! Look, look, it’s got footnotes and everything! Unfortunately, it is profoundly silly.

Pablo Exposito-Campos suggests that there are two kinds of detransitioners- those he calls “core,” who have seen the light, and “reidentified with their biological sex”, and “non-core”, who detransition because of social pressure. The treatment each should receive from doctors should differ.

The trouble is retransitioners, whom Exposito-Campos does not mention. It is always possible that a detransitioner will retransition, just as it is possible a trans person will detransition, and what they say, even what they believe, is no guide to this. Someone who finds a supportive community among detransitioners hijacked by anti-trans campaigners, like Ky Schevers, finds themself pressured to say things they later go back on.

So various questions might help understand what a detransitioner might do. Where, if anywhere, are they getting social support? Are they likely to try to find the positives in any experience? Do they blame themselves, or other people, for their problems?

Do you think of gender dysphoria as a psychological symptom you have, or trans as a kind of human you are, like a left-handed or gay person? Exposito-Campos imagines GD is merely a symptom.

Charles Kane, now presenting male in their work as a barrister, has gone at least M-F-M-F-M, and possibly spent some time working male, playing female. When they first transitioned they wrote a book about finding their true self. When they detransitioned for the first time they had penis reconstruction and made a complaint against their psychiatrist, saying they had had a nervous breakdown. When they retransitioned, initially they did not have surgery again, but then did.

And, when they first transitioned they could not see their children, and when they retransitioned it was after their son saying “I love you whether you are a male or a female”. I cannot almost understand Kane’s complaint, when they were under so much pressure. But I can blame such as Exposito-Campos.

He uses the uncertainty of what patients might do as a reason to hold back on gender treatment. He claims clinicians have “epistemological responsibility” to know the future, what the patient might do. Might they regret and revert? If so, the clinician should be wary of supporting their initial transition.

This is the threat of the British government’s suggestion that cis to trans conversion therapy should be illegal. It does not exist, but a detransitioner might argue that support for their transition was such criminal conversion. So, clinicians will be deterred from supporting people through transition. However Exposito-Campos wants conversion therapy from trans to cis to be available- he says patients should be able to choose “non-affirming care”. But we only “choose” such care because of religious indoctrination, internalised transphobia, or fear of societal transphobia.

He says, the doctors should not create “unrealistic expectations” of transition, because that is the problem for those who detransition under social pressure. Do doctors ever do that? You can’t know what transition will be like, any more than you can know what a job will be like when you have the interview. I thought it would be terribly difficult, then found it was difficult in unexpected ways.

Exposito-Campos writes that some people detransition after a few months, others take several years. For him, it is as if they are realising they made a mistake. But some time living in the true gender may be the best thing for someone. Then their other circumstances change, and they revert.

We continue to suffer gender dysphoria after transition. He writes that even those detransitioners who decide they were wrong to transition will still suffer gender dysphoria after detransition. They need other ways of coping with it. But the detransitioners who know they are still trans, but detransition because of social pressure? He thinks they may decide they were never trans. Again, his bias is to think anyone who transitions is making a mistake, just some of us never realise it.

What does he think those who revert because of social pressure, but still know they are trans, need? He suggests they need information on stopping hormones, though they might want to continue. He says they need psychological support to deal with discrimination and anxiety, but not with gender dysphoria, which he does not mention for them. He also says they might need support making a legal claim of medical malpractice: again, he wants to deter doctors from supporting transition.

It’s a paper, it seems, and it has been published. It is readily available. But the “typology” of detransitioners does not fit real lives, and he will only support patients who do what he thinks they should. Which is what he accuses others of when they affirm their patients’ transition.

“Society for evidence-based gender medicine” is just another fancy name for a tiny group of anti-trans campaigners.

Court actions against trans rights

Millions of pounds are being raised and spent, attacking trans rights, and public bodies that have a reasonable view of trans rights, in the courts, forcing those public bodies to defend themselves. The aim is to make defending trans rights prohibitive, and to change the language, so that the word “woman” does not include trans women.

Arcane law having almost no effect on trans people in public life is attacked. That was the case in “For Women Scotland Limited” v Lord Advocate. The anti-trans hate group, with its disingenuous name, failed in its attempt to embarrass the Scottish government over the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018. The judge, Lady Wise, in the Outer House of the Court of Session, said “This case does not form part of the policy debate about transgender rights, a highly contentious policy issue to which this decision cannot properly contribute”. The only legal challenge concerned the powers of the Scottish Parliament, and the interpretation of the power to make that Act itself.

Nor would the case, if it had been successful, have been likely to affect the life of a single trans woman. The 2018 Act provides that where a public board in Scotland has more men than women, is recruiting new members, and interviews candidates for membership who are otherwise equally qualified, a woman candidate should be preferred to a man candidate. For the purposes of that Act, “woman” includes a trans woman who is “living as a woman” and seeks to “become female”.

I don’t know how many positions on public boards there are, or how often candidates are equally qualified. Where candidates are equally qualified, interviewers can generally justify their choice by some reason to prefer one or the other, so perhaps the Act has never resulted in a choice of candidate being altered. Nevertheless, the hate group still wanted to challenge the rule, so that trans men would be treated as women under the Act, and trans women treated as men.

The Scottish Government negotiated an extension to its powers, and specifically requested power to make this Act. The Westminster Parliament duly amended the Scotland Act 1998 to give this specific power. Power to make law on “Equal Opportunities” and discrimination is reserved to Westminster, but there is now a specific exception in Schedule 5 of the Scotland Act to permit this specific Act.

The question before the court was then what was the interpretation of the Scotland Act, which refers to “the inclusion of persons with protected characteristics” on boards. Trans people have a “protected characteristic”.

If interview panels might rarely choose a woman over a man because they found them equally qualified, how much more rare would it be for them to find a trans person equally qualified with a cis person? Trans women “living as a woman” are about 0.1% of the female population.

The Equality Network intervened for trans rights, supporting the Scottish government and trans women. The judge found their submissions “detailed and helpful”. They argued that the concepts of “sex” and “gender” and the instances of discrimination relating to them were so interrelated that they could not be kept entirely separate. Many claims for cis women focus on socially constructed gender roles, such as responsibility for childcare. The Scottish Trans Alliance, a project within the Network, did the work. Here is their press release. They were supported by the Scottish Just Law Centre.

The Equality Network is a major campaign group for LGBT rights in Scotland. It won two “Campaign of the Year” awards for its campaign for equal marriage, the first in the UK. I take heart from the support of lesbian and gay allies against the bitter, but well-funded, hate groups.

The advocate for the Scottish Government stated that government policy was that transgender women are to be treated as non-transgender women unless to do so would be prohibited by law. She said that that reflected the recommendations of the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. “Trans women are women.” Technically, a “policy” needs an Equality Impact Assessment, so this is not formally a policy, just the attitude of the Scottish Ministers.

When the hate group claimed to be supporting the interests of trans men, the judge said “such people are visually and socially male and so not operating as women”. They would not want to be treated as women, even when it was a career advantage.

This is not a binding precedent, even in Scotland, but the judge pointed out that EU law acknowledges that trans people are to be included as being of the sex to which we intend to reassign- even before reassignment. This shows the haters are unlikely to succeed. In the European Convention on Human Rights, “transgender women will for practical purposes be indistinguishable from non-transgender women”.

There may be an appeal, to the Inner House of the Court of Session then to the Supreme Court. The haters’ pockets seem limitless. I hope they will pay the Scottish Government’s court expenses, but this is not yet decided. Still, in this case so far, the wealthy haters have lost. It’s a victory for all queer people.

The judgment is available here.

Hate crime against trans people in England

Hate crime against trans people is rampant and rocketing in England and Wales.

In 2011/12, the police recorded 313 hate crimes against trans people, but in 2018/19, they recorded 2,333. From 2012-2014, the Leicester Hate Crime Project researched hate, and interviewed 24 people targeted because they were trans. 21 of them reported verbal abuse, nine regularly, nineteen reported bullying, and fifteen reported violent crime. 36% of the hate crimes had occurred in public. Only 27% of trans victims reported the incident to the police, less than any other group.

The Law Commission has a consultation on hate crime, closing 24 December. I hope trans-excluders will respond, because their delusional rage will reinforce the need for law protecting trans people.

On race and religion, hate crime law is different from on trans. Assault, criminal damage, public order and harassment offences are recorded as separate, aggravated offences. For trans people, the offence is not different, but the penalty is. This is called “enhanced sentencing”, and has applied to trans people since 2012.

Because a hate crime against a trans person is the same offence as the same crime not motivated by hate, the same maximum sentences apply. The hate is merely one aggravating factor, leading to a longer sentence. This means to me that hate crime against trans people is treated less seriously than hate motivated by religion or race. The maximum sentences for hate against Black people are greater than the maximum sentences for hate against trans people.

If the charge is murder motivated by hate based on race, religion, sexual orientation, disability or transgender identity, the starting point for determining the minimum term is 30 years. This can double the minimum term.

Hate crime can have a greater emotional effect on victims, because we are singled out for something we cannot control. It is more likely to cause a loss of confidence, or anxiety, than non-hate crime. It may make people change our behaviour. It affects others in the community, who feel they could have been victimised too. It damages social cohesion and divides communities.

That the crime is more serious justifies a harsher punishment, whether it is for deterrence, to show victims we are valued by society, or a punishment viewed as fitting the crime.

In Northern Ireland, the definition of hate crime is broadly similar to England’s, but hate of trans people is not included. In Scotland, the definition of trans people is different, and there is a new Bill to change it again.

The police define hate crime, for the purpose of recording how hate motivates crime, differently to the law. It also has a specifically different definition for transgender. It was agreed in 2007, before hate crime against trans people was recognised by enhanced sentencing.

The police say hate crime is “Any criminal offence which is perceived by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by hostility or prejudice based on” the characteristic or perceived characteristic. But for trans, it is any crime “motivated by hostility or prejudice”. For race, etc, the police look at the perception of victim or witnesses, but for trans people the actual hostility of the offender. When this definition was produced, hate crime law had not been extended to trans people, but the definition was not changed when hate against trans people was made illegal.

The police also record “hate incidents”, where the offender’s actions do not amount to a crime, but the actions appear to demonstrate hatred of a characteristic.

On race, religion and sexual orientation, but not trans or disability, there is an offence of “stirring up hatred”. The police have a power of immediate arrest, in private or public places, and it is sufficient if either the offender wishes to stir up hatred or hatred is likely to be stirred up. If that offence were extended to trans people, WPUK meetings might be criminal.

What is transgender? The Criminal Justice Act says that “references to being transgender include references to being transsexual, or undergoing, proposing to undergo or having undergone a process or part of a process of gender reassignment”. That means, being TS or intending to transition definitely counts, but because of the word “includes” other ways of being trans- thinking about transition but not yet committed to it, and, arguably, nonbinary or cross-dressing would count, as those are included in the ordinary meaning of the word “transgender”.

However the Law Commission in their paper misinterpret this wide, inclusive definition. At page 11 they say “gender reassignment surgery” rather than “a process of gender reassignment”, which means any change to gender presentation. If they make that mistake, they won’t be the only ones.

The Law Commission consulted in 2014, and people criticised the definition. Now, the Law Commission consider the definition should emphasise the identity and personhood of the individual- do you think you are trans? Do you think your gender is other than that assigned at birth?- but also, if the offender presumes the person to be trans.

The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Bill includes: female to male transgender people, male to female transgender people, nonbinary people and people who cross-dress. It has a separate characteristic for intersex people.

The Law Commission wants the language to be inclusive. They think the reason to make a crime more serious, or punishment harsher, is to condemn hostility and prejudice towards nonconformity with gender stereotypes.

So, I would make the category trans or gender nonconforming, to include people who do not fit gender stereotypes and indicate that by dress and behaviour.

The consultation paper, and information on responding, is here.
You can respond here. There are 62 questions, but you don’t have to answer them all, and could have a go at question 8, which is the most relevant to trans people:

Consultation Question 8.
11.89 We provisionally propose that the current definition of “transgender” in hate crime laws be revised to include:
• People who are or are presumed to be transgender
• People who are or are presumed to be non-binary
• People who cross dress (or are presumed to cross dress); and
• People who are or are presumed to be intersex
11.90 We further propose that this category should be given a broader title than simply “transgender”, and suggest “transgender, non-binary or intersex” as a possible alternative.
11.91 Do consultees agree?
11.92 We welcome further input from consultees on the form such a revised definition should take.

(c) Walker Art Gallery; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation

Transphobia and hate crime

The report on transphobic hate crime in Britain 2020 makes horrifying reading. Of 227 respondents, 42% had experienced more than ten transphobic incidents in a year. There is usually no accessible support for trans people facing hate crime. Hate crime has severe impacts, stunting people’s lives.

Recorded hate crime has doubled in the last three years, but only one in seven trans people report our experiences. While much of the hate comes from the transphobia pervasive in the Patriarchy, nearly half of respondents were abused by people radicalised in trans-excluding spaces, who may imagine that they are feminist or left-wing. Online hate has real world consequences. The report refers to such transphobes as “transphobic ‘activists’”- I call them trans excluders, who may be physically violent, or troublesome by making vexatious complaints, rather than merely whining in their own spaces. It shows that whining trans excluders may become violent or vexatious. Their enablers and proselytisers cause great harm.

transphobia & transphobic gaslighting from family, even if it is less directly violent, can be devastating for young trans people’s sense of self and wellbeing… transphobia in what’s supposed to be your safe space, from those who are supposed to care most, is devastating.

Not just young trans people. I was 36. Family reactions had a lasting effect on me.

We also experience transphobia from strangers, LGBT+ people, colleagues, medical professionals, and “friends”. Twelve experienced it from police officers. I tend to feel my bad experience of the police comes from poverty rather than transphobia, but the police can be disrespectful.

Transphobia is not just hate crime. Abuse and harassment can be horrible to experience. When someone asks what I have between my legs I am demeaned. Someone treats me as if I am unworthy of respect, and I doubt that others will respect me as I deserve. I don’t get deadnamed, but that is a claim that how I see myself and present myself is somehow unreal, that others should be entitled to define me.

25 respondents had experienced death threats, 28 threats of sexual assault, 47 threats of physical assault, 16 physical assault and 14 sexual assault. But if we have any trans acquaintances, we hear about these things happening to others, and that can have similar effects.

More than half the respondents had contemplated self-harm or suicide. Nearly two thirds were unable to use public toilets, and half were unable to leave their house. Transphobia makes us insecure about our appearance and exacerbates gender dysphoria. It makes us less likely to trust strangers or open up to people, so that we become ever more isolated. 67 had panic attacks, 87 had trouble sleeping, more than half felt humiliated, more than half stressed, more than half afraid, nearly half hyper-vigilant. Transphobia drains our motivation. It causes symptoms of anxiety, depression and PTSD. Two thirds said the effect on their mental health and emotional wellbeing was big or significant.

Transphobia impacts our physical health, causing drinking, comfort eating and self-neglect. We might avoid exercise or avoid seeking medical help. One said they had developed twitches, and reading that makes me feel sad, but also reassured- it’s not just me.

Transphobia makes many of us us self-censor. We don’t feel able to speak up for ourselves. Transphobia intersects with ableism and other discrimination. Part of my reason for moving house was transphobia.

97 said transphobia had made them more active in trans activism, and 61 said it made them more open about being trans. These are healthy responses. Echoes within us, from our internalised transphobia, can make the experiences worse. We need Pride. However, being involved in the struggle had exhausted some of us.

Transphobia can distort the way we see ourselves and our gender. It prevents some from expressing their identity- I know people who put off transition for years. We are badly affected by ideas of what it means to be truly trans:

Every time I am not feeling crippling dysphoria, I am terrified that I am not transgender, and I have been told that I have to hate my body all the time otherwise I am not transgender.

Transphobia affects our relationships. We are less able to meet new people, and we get driven out of groups. 43 had experienced an abusive relationship, and our relative lack of power can make this more likely; and fear of transphobia may make us less likely to seek support. We lose touch with others.

I now assume everyone is transphobic until I’m proved wrong to avoid disappointment and ridicule.

So many of us fail to reach our potential.

The sheer amount of issues is staggering. I feel in a persistent state of battle.

Only twenty had gone to the police, and most had found the police unhelpful. Possibly the Samaritans would be more helpful, at least validating our feelings.

One officer said I left myself open to being abused because I “chose to be different”. Misgendering throughout the interview then told that the physical assault, death threats and threats of further violence against me weren’t strong enough to do anything about and maybe I should “go home, make a cup of tea, and dress ‘normally'”.

There are few positives to take from this report, published by Galop. One is simply that it exists, that work is being done to expose the levels of transphobia and the effects these have. I am glad Galop, which published the report, exists:

Galop is the UK’s LGBT+ anti-violence charity. For the past 37 years we have been providing advice, support and advocacy to LGBT+ victims and campaigning to end anti-LGBT+ violence and abuse. Galop works within three key areas; hate crime, domestic abuse, and sexual violence. Our purpose is to make life safe, just, and fair for LGBT+ people. We work to help LGBT+ people achieve positive changes to their current situation, through practical and emotional support, to develop resilience, and to build lives free from violence and abuse.

The report is timely and necessary, but flawed in that it does not make a clear distinction between transphobia generally, and transphobic hate crime. It is called a “hate crime report”, but includes things which are not crimes. Deadnaming may be part of a criminal series of actions, but I can’t see a circumstance where simple deadnaming is criminal, however hurtful it is. That does not detract from the report’s evidence of the effect transphobia has on trans people: it cripples many of us.

Harry Miller

It’s amazing what whiny snowflakes transphobes are. After tweeting what a judge called opaque, profane or unsophisticated (para 251) and containing “abuse” (para 23) “gender-critical”, ie transphobic, tweets, Harry Miller had a half hour phone conversation with a police officer. He then claims that (para 93) he experienced a deep sense of personal humiliation, shame and embarrassment such that he withdrew from his own company and has not visited his office since. However this embarrassment did not stop him from tweeting continuously about his hatred of trans people ever after.

Some examples are necessary. They are vile, so I white them out: select text to view at your own peril. I don’t quote the tweets that abused individuals personally.  “Your breasts are made of silicone/
your vagina goes nowhere/
And we can tell the difference/
Even when you are not there/
Your hormones are synthetic
And let’s just cross this bridge/
What you have, you stupid man/
Is male privilege” (para 56)

This was not even original, he copied it from someone slightly more articulate.

Para 44 is an opaque one: “You know the worst thing about cancer ? It’s transphobic.” Apparently a certain type of brain tumour is different in men and women. He also spread the falsehood that a child-murderer is trans (para 37).

“I was assigned Mammal at Birth, but my orientation is Fish. Don’t mis species me. fuckers.” (para 42)

Enough of that garbage. As the judge says, Free speech includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative … Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having. (para 3). Unfortunately he does not give a useful analysis of hate speech: because it suppresses the speech of victimised groups, hate speech reduces the benefits of different perspectives that free speech should give.

Para 120: The claimant’s barrister quoted, it may be considered necessary in certain democratic societies to sanction or even prevent all forms of expression which spread, incite, promote or justify hatred based on intolerance …, provided that any ‘formalities’, ‘conditions’, ‘restrictions’ or ‘penalties’ imposed are proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued.

Para 228: Mr Giannasi, the police Hate Crime Adviser, said, Failure to address non-crime hate incidents is likely to lead to their increase, and ultimately increase the risk of serious violence and societal damage.

Para 248: Kathleen Stock argues “gender critical” comment is not hate speech.

The judge merely says, para 281, The Claimant’s evidence, which I accept, is that he is not prejudiced and that his tweets were sent as part of an ongoing debate. He does not want to address the issue himself, stating it is for the complainer to give evidence that it is hate. He says only one trans woman complained- I see wicked rubbish like Miller’s tweets, and shrivel a bit, or I just ignore it. Life’s too short. If one has the courage, mental energy and trust in the system necessary to complain, many other trans women seeing his profanities will find them hateful.

So here is the argument that it is hate speech: Miller’s quoted tweets and others first call trans women a threat to cis women, and then mock and vilify us as ridiculous. This is dehumanising. It makes violence against us more likely- after all, who could respect a trans woman? The sense that we are ridiculous is the basis of a lot of the hate I receive, which Miller encourages. I fear that the sexual thrill Miller gets from tweeting about our vaginas will not eventually be enough for him, and he will become actually violent; or, possibly, if he sees a trans woman he will be abusive, in such a way as to be intimidating or harassing- an actual criminal offence. It is reasonable for the police to assess the risk of escalation into more serious harm (para 104ff).

So it was reasonable for a police officer to speak to Miller. The judge disagreed, partly because he thought there was not enough evidence of the harm Miller had caused. He took Stock’s falsehood at face value, that some expressions described as transphobic are not necessarily so (unlike racist language which is always hateful and offensive), para 281, yet he thinks (para 245) that “TERF” can be a pejorative term.

The case is also notable showing the idiocy of Kathleen Stock’s position. She is an academic who tries to drive trans women out from women’s spaces. She says, I argue that there’s nothing wrong, either theoretically, linguistically, empirically, or politically, with the once-familiar idea that a woman is, definitionally, an adult human female. I also argue that the subjective notion of ‘gender identity’ is ill-conceived intrinsically, and a fortiori as a potential object of law or policy. In light of these and other views, I am intellectually ‘gender-critical’; that is, critical of the influential societal role of sex-based stereotypes, generally, including the role of stereotypes in informing the dogmatic and, in my view, false assertion that – quite literally – ‘trans women are women’. I am clear throughout my work that trans people are deserving of all human rights and dignity.

Where to start? There’s also nothing wrong with treating a few thousand trans women culturally and socially as women. Trans women exist, and have done for millennia, no matter what theory, gender identity or otherwise, is used to explain us. Trans acceptance subverts gender stereotypes, and our human rights as usually understood include recognition of our acquired gender: human rights caselaw led to the Gender Recognition Act and our Equality Act protections.

Miller sought to do a great deal of harm. His case argued that Hate Crime Operational Guidance, under which hate crime is investigated, was contrary to his human rights so should be abolished. The judge threw that one out without hesitation. He is left with a decision that in his particular case, the police should have found more evidence of actual harm before a police officer phoned him. Such evidence could easily have been found, had the police sought it: contact a few trans people and see what we think.

To me, it is not necessary that hate tweets have a specific victim, a trans woman who reads them and feels hurt and fearful, for them to be dangerous and a misuse of free speech. Even if, as the judge suggests (para 74) the only readers are his fellow-haters, he still encourages them and they may commit crime because of it, as they radicalise each other. But some organised campaigning- say a team of a dozen trans women, finding complainants to say that they find a particular tweeter’s rants hateful and why, might fulfil the judge’s requirement.

The judge did not accept the complainant’s comment that “eighty years ago Miller would have been making the same comments about Jewish people”- para 60. Well, it’s not certain, and the slippery hater denies hating at all. But he certainly likes to mock and denigrate trans women, and he would probably find some other target if he was not aware of us.

Hate-media report it as you would expect. “Police compared to Stasi and Gestapo by judge” crows the Telegraph. The Daily Mail referred to the police phone call as an “Orwellian nightmare”. The nightmare of trans women abused in the street and by powerful media continues unabated. You can read the whole decision here.

anti trans propaganda

What about the rape victims excluded from women’s services by the presence of male bodied people?

That would raise feelings of concern and perplexity in kind, caring people. It does not mention trans women by name, because trans women also are a vulnerable group, who might gain sympathy from the well-meaning.

When seeking to exclude trans people, don’t name the trans people. Instead, suggest there are threats to vulnerable women, and make dark allusions to trans people. “Male-bodied” is a weird term to use in normal conversation, but does not have the sympathetic connotations of trans people. Instead it alludes to the well known phenomenon that some women after a sexual assault cannot bear to be touched by a man, even a male relative.

Make it a question. An assertion of fact- rape victims are excluded- could be answered by demands for justification. What about the vulnerable? demands compassion and care without leaving space for challenge.

Having raised concern and compassion in potential dupes, the propagandist can produce more and more detail, increasing emotion, until finally he names the solution-

Vulnerable women are excluded because we need single sex spaces.

There are no single sex spaces, because the male bodied people insist on going there.

At that point the natural sympathy for the underdog of the caring middle class person has been developed so far for the rape victims that it can outweigh their sympathy for trans people.

Stating that rape victims would not go to rape crisis centres because of the theoretical possibility that they might see a trans woman there would be obviously ridiculous, especially as there are so few of us.

Still the propagandist does not use the term trans woman. He refers to “trans rights activists”, unreasonable, domineering people pushing for the right to ride roughshod over everyone else, setting women’s rights at naught, entirely solipsistic and lacking any sympathy. Or to “male-bodied” people again, weird, as out of place in a rape crisis centre as a fox in a henhouse. Never mind that over half of Rape Crisis centres also help men who have been sexually assaulted.

To build up hate, avoid anything which could humanise your hate-group. That is the basis of the tactic of professing sympathy with “real transsexuals”, also allegedly the victims of the TRAs. Except that when pressed, no one is ever admitted to be a “real transsexual”, and even “trans women” are falsely distinguished from them. Even those who speak on behalf of WPUK are told to use the men’s loos.

See what I did there? I did not use the names of WPUK’s trans collaborators. I do not want the names to be remembered, because I do not want the people to be given too much significance, and referring without names dehumanises them a bit. They are “collaborators”, rather than people.

It’s about feeling. It’s about shutting off any sympathy for the out group, trans women, and creating a sense that they threaten people who deserve sympathy, such as children, or rape victims. The allegations have almost no substance, but can still be spun. So any act which can be portrayed as offensive by a trans woman is emphasised, and constantly returned to.

Of course people should be engaged and persuaded, but that should be primarily by facts. If you need to distort facts, and rely excessively on building emotion in order to persuade, you are a propagandist.

I tend to feel we need to persuade. Someone referred to anti-trans campaigners as “fascists”. That’s arguable: as she says, if its philosophy is of morally mandating marginalized groups out of existence it’s fascist. However, fascism is associated with nationalism, and British fascists like the BNP have sought to justify violence against Jews and non-white people. Fascism is abhorrent. Use of the word “fascist” without showing the arguments justifying that puts people off, even many trans allies. They think you absurd. Yes our opponents are arguably fascist- show what they are doing, building hate for a vulnerable group through lies and half truths, before naming this as “fascist”.

Examples: “If Corbyn were to declare ‘my pronouns are she/her’ Labour would have its first female leader”. Yes, but why would he? This spreads the canard that transition is a whim or fantasy, rather than the only thing we can do.

“It isn’t about trans rights because gender critical feminists are in favour of trans people having the same rights as everyone else.” She would take away my Equality Act rights and expel me from spaces I have inhabited since 2002, but she refuses to countenance the language that describes that, or anything anyone could object to. She is preaching hate, but claims it is love.

Transphobic hate

The “Trans cult” is driving you away, you say. There is a culture of untruth, and you pick on the word “Hate”. You are trying to protect vulnerable children. Ha! How can you be blind to the hate? Look to your own side!

It’s hate to construct a campaign against trans women around a minor technical legal reform which would have no effect on anyone else. The changes to gender recognition are long overdue, and in line with international human rights law. Probably no-one will get their gender recognised as female in order to access women’s spaces, rather than because they are trans, but if anyone did they could be excluded under the Equality Act.

It’s hate which has led to women of masculine appearance, cis as well as trans, being mocked and vilified and humiliated in women’s loos.

It’s hate to flypost stickers saying “Women’s rights are not for penises”. That is a classic dehumanisation tactic, referring to trans women as “penises”, just like referring to Tutsi as “cockroaches”. Go on. Try to make a moral distinction. The hate campaign has not led to a murder yet, in Britain, but the tactic is the same.

It’s hard right hate to work with David TC Davies MP and Rupert Murdoch. The difference between their argument against trans women and yours is like the difference between Newton’s and Einstein’s theories of gravity: almost no-one understands it or cares, and it makes no difference practically to people’s lives. An astronaut returning from the International Space Station is younger that s/he would have been, remaining on Earth; but only by milliseconds over a year in space.

Davies, having failed to enlist feminists against Muslims and immigrants, has at last succeeded with his next candidate for hate-group, trans people. Listen to lesbian feminists debunk him! With all these new feminist allies, he may be emboldened to make yet another attack on abortion rights.

It’s obsessive hate to make a feminist campaign around the almost notional threat from twenty thousand trans women when there are real threats to women’s rights. It was good to read Julie Bindel on femicide recently: she is obsessive about trans, and prone to dehumanising mockery of trans women, but at least she occasionally works on real feminist issues.

We are the victims of violence and hatred from all sorts of bigots, yet you bring up “male violence” when talking about us. That’s hate. The A Woman’s Place campaign seeks to foment hatred and fear of us, and use it against us. Do the reading! Lesbians and feminists are on the side of trans folk!

If trans children and adolescents cannot get the treatment they need on the NHS, they will seek it elsewhere. If schools do not accept them and crack down on transphobic bullying, no other child will be able to be gender non-conforming either. “Transgender Trend” withdrew its stickers, acknowledging that they were used for transphobic bullying- it is hard to imagine any other use for them. It is transphobic hate to post stickers in a trans child’s school saying “children confused about their sex usually grow out of it”. Of course, once they have been published on the internet it will be easy for hating bullies to get hold of them, even if they are no longer on the originator’s website.

You encourage and empower bullies in your campaign against us. Look at your acts, and their effects!

Post-materialist

I have been a post-materialist since about 2000, but learned I was one yesterday. Before, I had understood it as a matter of spiritual maturity: people move from a position of condemning non-conformists and out-groups to seeing that every human being is doing their best, under difficult circumstances, to agreeing with Blake’s line, “Everything that is, is holy”.

I welcome diversity, which is part of the flourishing of each person, for the good of humanity. This is part of my identity, how I see myself as a good person.

Then the NYT explains me, quoting Ronald Inglehart: when people grow up taking survival for granted it makes them more open to new ideas and more tolerant of outgroups…bringing greater emphasis on freedom of expression, environmental protection, gender equality, and tolerance of gays, handicapped people and foreigners. It is no merit in me, but an accident of birth. This was shocking, even if in retrospect obvious.

As a post-materialist, it means I should seek understanding of my out-group, which previously I thought of as less mature: if you feel under threat, you circle the wagons. Less mature in me does not mean less mature in others. What is possible, for a person?

It might be that if you can make people feel safer, they will be less angry with the outsider, foreigner or non-conformist. Mr Trump and Mrs May go the other way, encouraging the anger. If you feel looked down on by “liberal elites” who tell you not to feel that anger, you may be tempted by moneyed elites who tell you the anger is right. Trump, never worried about survival, bends others’ anger for his own ends. Encouraging the anger, making people feel OK in themselves and rejecting liberal scorn, pleases them so that he does not need to give them anything worthwhile. How do you benefit, really, from excluding refugees? What gain is there, from making Muslims feel as excluded, powerless and angry as you feel?

Are Trump’s patsies capable of empathy, or of recognising their own feelings? Unable to admit how angry and frightened he feels, a man clings more tightly to his world-view, we are right and everyone else is wrong, and those people over there are a threat. This is simply the truth for him, separate from any anxiety he feels about being able to pay his rent.

Is Trump going to permit discrimination against LGBT on “religious grounds”? The NYT said a draft executive order has circulated, but administration officials denied it would be adopted. They take the pulse of the nation. Will this energise their support, or the resistance? What are people saying about the proposed order? The order would increase hatred, and disempower non-conformity.

I am post-materialist because I am in one of the first hate-groups to be victimised. Thank God for the Windrush, I say, bringing Afro-Caribbean workers to Britain, beginning our long march to tolerance from which I benefit.

Looking for work

-Why didn’t you get that job?
-Because I am useless.

This is the way my mind works. His psychiatrist told my friend to stop looking for work, because the pain it caused was too great for him. I find it difficult, I hate completing the forms, and I feel dreadful after interviews, which might make me perform worse while there. I resent the whole process. I project my own judgment onto the recruiters.

Not getting the job because they are hateful might be just as unhealthy.

Not getting the job also proves I am useless. Right now, I feel intense anger and hatred which I aim only at myself.

I can find excuses for other people. I can find them for myself, if I think about it. This is where I am, now. This is the situation of those looking for employees.

Even after yearly meeting, I am depressed, now, because of that job. Did I let my friend down? That slothfulness is wicked in me. And the rest. And the loss of it, because it would have been a good thing to do.

This is how my mind works. I would like it to work otherwise. It is the root of the insanity I noticed aged 20, that I felt at once the Centre of the Universe, and worthless. Neither of those views was rational, and I could not come to a sane view in between. Even once I worked out the sane view-

I am a human being- fearfully and wonderfully made, yet one in seven billion-

the insane views still affect me. And they affect my actions now, my fear of acting.

Wish me well.

I hate myself

Googling “I hate myself”, with quotes, produces 902,000 responses. Images are dark with text like “I lie I cut I’m a terrible person I’m lonely” and “Everyone is better prettier skinnier funnier than me”. I am unsure what to make of “I hate myself but that’s OK”.

We kill ourselves because we hate ourselves. I wonder how common it is? Trigger warning, below, for sexual violence- the actual text is minimised and there is a further warning.

I loathe the first entry on Google. Figure out what you CAN change and do it!

If you don’t like something about yourself that you can actually change, start to do that today. Maybe you don’t like your weight you can start eating properly, and getting exercise TODAY! Has he any idea how difficult people find dieting, and what comfort people get from eating? Possibly they could find better comfort in exercise, the runner’s high, but they need to know the mechanism. It is not so simple. The next suggestion, find out what friends and family value about you, is better.

How common is self-loathing? According to Psychology for Everyday Life, most of us. It tells us to challenge our Inner Critic.

Liz Jones hated herself and found herself inadequate despite being a successful writer who went to receptions at the House of Commons. “My male side has retreated, meaning people don’t respect me.” Useful information for trans women. When she had just started primary school, some older boys

trigger warning for sexual violence: highlight to reveal text

_{pushed her into the boy’s loos, stripped her and repeatedly kicked her.}

Would that-

I feel that hating myself performs a useful function. It holds me in restraint. This could be useful for any number of people- first my parents, then bosses, anyone but me.

I felt decades ago that I was at war with myself, that I pulled in different directions.

I wonder if saying “I hate myself” is a superficial, emotional reaction for some people. You get upset, you feel you have made a mistake, you hate yourself. Then there is the deep, settled, constant loathing.

Hello.

It sits under consciousness, manifesting as anxiety and depression, sometimes surfacing as the inner critic- manifesting that control for the behoof of others-

I want to see it and recognise it.

I hate myself. I hate my reactions, my responses, my weakness, my hiding and running away, my failures.

Perhaps it comes from not being loved as a baby.

Hello, back.

Yes. It has been so difficult, terrifying, enraging. All that feeling which is so hard to admit, which is shit me.

I want to pay that respect. It has served a function. It has been so strong. All that pent up rage. I wonder if I can loosen it: talk to it, calmly and reasonably: make friends with it, because it is part of me.