Transwomen are not Women - Part 15

[Thermal]

When everyone keeps telling you that your communication skills are crap, and you keep telling everyone that they are all confused, that tells you its a "you" problem, not a "they" problem.

No, you just all bleat the same thing, thinking it makes it more convincing with repetition. Not one of you is as dimwitted as you pretend, and you'd be laughed off the forum if any of you tried this ◊◊◊◊ outside of your little echo chamber.

Eta: to be fair, many of you do get laughed off other threads when you try this same ◊◊◊◊, so there's that.

 

[Ziggurat]

Dude, there was a line of guys there harassing and cursing at him (it was ok they were hanging out in the girls room because... they were vigilantes? Off duty Penis Police?). They were not 'confused' about anything.

I didn't say confused. But most of those guys have no authority to remove him. They probably don't want to be arrested and prosecuted for doing what you think they should have done. Only the employees had authority to evict him. And they probably were not willing to, because they could get fired for it.

Talk to the videoer (and sole witness) who left with her boyfriend without notifying the cops.

You can blame her all you want, but we have a demonstration of a problem existing which doesn't get reported to the police and won't show up in your crime stats.

I never thought all crimes get reported.

But you have claimed that the crime stats show there's no problem. And this is a direct counter-example. There IS a problem.

Breaking out the crayons: you said a property owner/agent could remove a trespasser by force. No, they can't. They can call police, and police can do what they see fit to do. The owner has no right or authority to lay hands on anyone, or he would be a criminal.

Slapping a perv around is just garden variety morally justifiable criminality, which I also support. Not legal by any stretch, but I didn't claim it was.

You support slapping people around, but NOT forcibly ejecting them. Where's the logic there? Where's the moral principle? Why do you not only tolerate but actually encourage illegal violence as a means to solve problems? And you have the gall to criticize me for pointing out that men COULD resort to violence against women even though I think they shouldn't. You're the one who actually wants to use violence for social control, not me.

You have no grounds to lecture anyone about anything. You're a violent misogynist.

 

[smartcooky]

No, you just all bleat the same thing, thinking it makes it more convincing with repetition.

Facts bear repeating. This is especially necessary when driving them into the thick skulls of educating the ignorant.

Not one of you is as dimwitted as you pretend

We're not dimwitted at all, and unlike you, we don't keep flipping around from one position to another like a Mexican jumping bean.

and you'd be laughed off the forum if any of you tried this ◊◊◊◊ outside of your little echo chamber.

If you think that Gender Critical people are a "little echo chamber", then you truly are delusional.

Eta: to be fair, many of you do get laughed off other threads when you try this same ◊◊◊◊, so there's that.

Examples as evidence?

 

[d4m10n]

to be fair, many of you do get laughed off other threads when you try this same ◊◊◊◊, so there's that.

Pointing and laughing is an effective method of avoiding rational argument. Anyone who grew up enmeshed in an orthodoxy (religious or otherwise) knows that people learn this tactic fairly early and deploy it whenever the prevailing groupthink is called into question. In this thread, that tactic is employed against the dominant (gender critical) view, but in other threads here at ISF it is employed against those who question progressive ideology.

 

[John Freestone]

Dude, there was a line of guys there harassing and cursing at him (it was ok they were hanging out in the girls room because... they were vigilantes? Off duty Penis Police?). They were not 'confused' about anything.

Slapping a perv around is just garden variety morally justifiable criminality, which I also support. Not legal by any stretch, but I didn't claim it was.

So this is what your return to pre-transgender-free-for-all involves: stationing just some very "moral" (but happy to break the law) men in and around women's spaces to beat up any perverts. Sorted.

 

[Thermal]

I didn't say confused. But most of those guys have no authority to remove him.

Actually, according to you, all but one did, and that was the guy running his mouth (the woman's boyfriend). The rest were Planet Fitness staff.

Note: i rewatched the video and followed the links to a video of the woman herself fleshing the event out, and I am taking it as gospel that she is the woman, and every word she says is accurate.

Second note: you and I have gotten into a toxic death spiral of bickering, neither of us innocent in that. Can I propose a truce? This story, short as it is, is pretty illustrative for the big issues and it would be cool if we could talk about it without dragging in the ongoing baggage.

They probably don't want to be arrested and prosecuted for doing what you think they should have done. Only the employees had authority to evict him. And they probably were not willing to, because they could get fired for it.

I'm not sure they had the authority to do anything much, although I'm not even clear what state this took place in. The videoer says they were young kids (and she looks to be a teen herself), and I'm guessing they didn't know what the hell to do, and the Bystander Effect might have kicked in when the boyfriend took action.

You can blame her all you want,

I blame her for literally nothing, except maaaaaybe, peeking under stalls and videoing in a bathroom and posting that vid on social media. I give her the benefit of the doubt that she was unsure if it was a crime (she says this) and wanted documentation just in case, so she should probably be excused for recording. Posting is another matter, that I'm not clear on which side of law she falls on.

but we have a demonstration of a problem existing which doesn't get reported to the police and won't show up in your crime stats.

Agreed, but that's not my point about crime stats. My argument is essentially nothing is showing as crimes, where I would expect something in a nation of a third of a billion. Surely we could expect a couple dozen per day stepping over the legal line, and at least a few hundred per day of the kind of instances in this video, which wouldn't show on crime stats? Why are lone. ambiguous instances spaced weeks or months apart the only ones showing up, and a Merager or Cox every few years?

But you have claimed that the crime stats show there's no problem. And this is a direct counter-example. There IS a problem.

It is, and the same problem exists in any policy. The one in a million weirdos will always be among us.

You support slapping people around, but NOT forcibly ejecting them. Where's the logic there?

I support self policing, like the boyfriend did here. Having law backing up one side only (and that means either side) is not something I support.

Where's the moral principle? Why do you not only tolerate but actually encourage illegal violence as a means to solve problems?

Sometimes. Although conceded, this was not one of those times, and I was knee-jerking an angry response. Violence was by no means called for in this one. You're right.

So again, with the sparring gloves aside: this woman says she has no idea why this blew up, as it happened back in May of last year (got that puppy right, John Freestone!). Looking at the link, it was submitted by... Tish Hyman. Yes, that Tish, of recent Gold's Gym fame.

The woman says the restrooms/lockers were both empty (off-hours, i guess?). She says she used a stall, and while washing her hands, the guy comes out of the shower with a towel on. She says it was uncomfortable, but she minded her business. So far, ideal behavior from my POV. That's exactly how I feel with a woman in the men's room. She says she noticed his shadow under the stalls. That part I'm a little unclear on. I can't picture minding your business washing your hands, but peeking under occupied bathroom stalls. Then she leaves and comes back 10 minutes later, and he is still waxing ye olde carrot, and she records it, Facetimes it to her boyfriend, and brings the matter to the front desk. She, much to her credit, says she has no hate for the kids working the desk, and they probably had no idea what they were supposed to do. Not something in the management's... ahem... handbook, I guess. Boyfriend got there and was not pleased, not so much about the guy being in the rest room, but about him cracking one off in a public area. She posts the incident to her insta, but not clear on if it was private or publicly viewable. She says in hindsight, she regrets not calling police, but at the time she wasn't sure if there was anything they could even do. My take is that she was just creeped out, but not violently furious as Hyman was.

So from my POV, this was just about perfect, with the caveats above. No force of law favoring either party, the woman tolerating an apparently docile transwoman, then getting rightfully upset at the creepshow behavior that follows. The boyfriend, with no police backup, self polices this action and lets the creepshow know that this is not tolerable, law or no law. Effective social policing in action, and reasonably applied at all levels.

This is pretty much my ideal, even if you posted it as a gotcha. No force of law, tolerance of docile non-conformists, and socially police any mother ◊◊◊◊◊◊ who even starts to get weird. This boyfriend is my hero. He even says "I don't care if you are gay trans, you don't do this ◊◊◊◊ bro".

 

[Ziggurat]

Actually, according to you, all but one did, and that was the guy running his mouth (the woman's boyfriend). The rest were Planet Fitness staff.

I never said anything about who was or wasn't staff.

Second note: you and I have gotten into a toxic death spiral of bickering, neither of us innocent in that. Can I propose a truce? This story, short as it is, is pretty illustrative for the big issues and it would be cool if we could talk about it without dragging in the ongoing baggage.

OK.

I blame her for literally nothing, except maaaaaybe, peeking under stalls and videoing in a bathroom and posting that vid on social media. I give her the benefit of the doubt that she was unsure if it was a crime (she says this) and wanted documentation just in case, so she should probably be excused for recording. Posting is another matter, that I'm not clear on which side of law she falls on.

Why do you care what side of the law she falls on? Didn't you just explicitly advocate for breaking the law by beating him up? I really don't get what your standard is for adherence to the law.

Agreed, but that's not my point about crime stats. My argument is essentially nothing is showing as crimes, where I would expect something in a nation of a third of a billion.

Again, so what? There are problems which aren't even crimes. Because they aren't crimes, they will never show up in the crime statistics, no matter how often they happen.

And note, I'm not convinced that this was a crime either. It was absolutely inappropriate behavior, it's a problem that he was doing it, but because he was alone in a stall while doing it instead of exposed, it may have been perfectly legal.

I support self policing, like the boyfriend did here. Having law backing up one side only (and that means either side) is not something I support.

That doesn't make any sense. If one side is in the right, the law should back that side. If the law remains completely indifferent, then it gets settled by whoever can bring the most force to bear. Which just escalates the conflict.

So again, with the sparring gloves aside: this woman says she has no idea why this blew up, as it happened back in May of last year (got that puppy right, John Freestone!). Looking at the link, it was submitted by... Tish Hyman. Yes, that Tish, of recent Gold's Gym fame.

Which is relevant to the question of why it blew up now and not back then, but is otherwise irrelevant.

The woman says the restrooms/lockers were both empty (off-hours, i guess?). She says she used a stall, and while washing her hands, the guy comes out of the shower with a towel on. She says it was uncomfortable, but she minded her business. So far, ideal behavior from my POV. That's exactly how I feel with a woman in the men's room.

That discomfort is itself a problem. In those circumstances, I would not advise her to take any action against the intruder either, but it's still a problem caused by a policy which I don't think is correct. A policy of sex segregation would likely have prevented that discomfort, or at least given her recourse to address it.

She says she noticed his shadow under the stalls. That part I'm a little unclear on. I can't picture minding your business washing your hands, but peeking under occupied bathroom stalls.

You don't have to peek under the stall to see it, and I have no reason to think that she was peeking under the stall. The camera was not placed close to the floor, it was close to eye level. That shadow would be easily visible to anyone standing where she was standing, which was not a strange place to stand. It would have been easily within the field of view of an ordinary person who was in that area.

So from my POV, this was just about perfect, with the caveats above. No force of law favoring either party, the woman tolerating an apparently docile transwoman, then getting rightfully upset at the creepshow behavior that follows.

I have no complaints about her actions either. And I can't really fault the Planet Fitness staff, because their hands are largely tied.

But I absolutely do fault the policy. A policy of sex segregation for the bathroom would have allowed staff to demand that he leave, and revoke his membership so he cannot do that again. Only if he refused to leave would law enforcement need to be called, but there's no reason to object to law enforcement backing up property owners in legally removing people who don't belong on their property.

 

[p0lka]

That's a very badly phrased question. If you're asking about whether I or anyone else trusts her (which is what the literal reading of your post suggests, though probably not what you intended), that's not relevant. And if you're asking about how much she trusts others, why would it be only one category? I'm sure there are people she trusts, not trusts, and actively distrusts. So it's probably all three. You could narrow it down by specifying which person or person's you want to know EC's trust level of, but you didn't do so in this post. I could venture a guess, but I'd rather you actually specify, so as to avoid further confusion.

It was perfectly phrased in my opinion but I'll talk you through it. Regarding males, does EC trust males? ... does EC not trust males? ... does EC actively distrust males?
I think misandry is appropriate but let's hear your reply cos you disagreed.

 

[p0lka]

A trans-identifying male in the women's bathroom of a Planet Fitness was caught whacking off.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2007990639397679375

Thermal will be along shortly to notify us that this isn't actually a problem, and that if the woman who witnessed this didn't want to share a bathroom with a masturbating male, she shouldn't have gone into that bathroom at all.

A trans-identifying male in the women's bathroom of a Planet Fitness was caught whacking off.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2007990639397679375

Thermal will be along shortly to notify us that this isn't actually a problem, and that if the woman who witnessed this didn't want to share a bathroom with a masturbating male, she shouldn't have gone into that bathroom at all.

Is this the U.S.? I've heard that your toilet stalls were weird but what's going on with the gap? People can see you? that's ridiculous. So a male or female has no privacy wow.

 

[theprestige]

It was perfectly phrased in my opinion but I'll talk you through it. Regarding males, does EC trust males? ... does EC not trust males? ... does EC actively distrust males?
I think misandry is appropriate but let's hear your reply cos you disagreed.

Risk management isn't about trust. It's about risk management.

 

[Ziggurat]

It was perfectly phrased in my opinion but I'll talk you through it. Regarding males, does EC trust males? ... does EC not trust males? ... does EC actively distrust males?

Which males? There's not going to be only one answer because there are more than one group of males with different levels of trust, which is why it's badly phrased. It's meaningless to ask about the category as a whole, because she is never going to deal with the category as a whole. She's going to deal with individuals, some of whom will be in one trust category and other is in a different trust category. Sometimes talking about a category makes sense, but this isn't one of those times. The fact that the category is sub-divided is actually critical here.

 

[Ziggurat]

Is this the U.S.? I've heard that your toilet stalls were weird but what's going on with the gap? People can see you? that's ridiculous. So a male or female has no privacy wow.

It's not zero privacy, but yes, it's less privacy than full floor-to-ceiling stalls. That's the way most toilets here are. There's a separate discussion to be had about whether that's the best way to construct stalls, but it's off topic here. For the purposes of this thread, you have to accept that this is the way it is right now, and will be for the foreseeable future, because we're not going to rebuild it all just to address the trans issue.

 

[p0lka]

Risk management isn't about trust. It's about risk management.

Ziggurat brought up the trust thing

I disagree with your characterization. Proper boundaries aren't about distrust. Proper boundaries are part of how you establish trust, for both men and women. Demonstrating respect for proper boundaries is part of how you establish that you are trustworthy.

as I had said that EC was doing the misandry and Ziggurat disagreed. Hence the three categories of trust I brought up.

 

[smartcooky]

Is this the U.S.? I've heard that your toilet stalls were weird but what's going on with the gap? People can see you? that's ridiculous. So a male or female has no privacy wow.

Seriously? You've never seen a public toilet or toilets in clubrooms, or sports changing facilities that look like this?

In this country, you'd be hard pressed to find one that isn't. They are pretty much all like this!

 

[theprestige]

Ziggurat brought up the trust thing

No he did not. He was replying to this post, by you, where you brought up the trust thing:

No not at all. Treating all males in a distrustful manner is though.

EC was talking in terms of risk ("threat"), not trust.

 

[Thermal]

I never said anything about who was or wasn't staff.

Well, you said 'most of them' didn't have the authority. All but the boyfriend actually did. Not meant as an argument, just a factual correction, having dug up a little more. I thought they were just a bunch of the gym guys too.

Why do you care what side of the law she falls on?

Because when we are talking about who is in the right or wrong, the legal lines have to be considered.

Didn't you just explicitly advocate for breaking the law by beating him up?

I take it you didn't read the post you were quoting before typing this. I copped to the overreaction.

I really don't get what your standard is for adherence to the law.

Comply when practical. Go Rosa Parks with a baseball bat when the law fails.

Again, so what? There are problems which aren't even crimes. Because they aren't crimes, they will never show up in the crime statistics, no matter how often they happen.

Already addressed. We don't even see the twitter reports in anywhere near the orders of magnitude they would be expected. That we don't see them strongly indicates that our predictions are wrong, and the problems aren't happening as they were predicted. The volume is so low that it seems to be no different than that expected under either policy. Cox would do his creepshow thing another way, as he had done before when he was convicted. Same with Merager.

And note, I'm not convinced that this was a crime either. It was absolutely inappropriate behavior, it's a problem that he was doing it, but because he was alone in a stall while doing it instead of exposed, it may have been perfectly legal.

Agreed.

That doesn't make any sense. If one side is in the right, the law should back that side. If the law remains completely indifferent, then it gets settled by whoever can bring the most force to bear. Which just escalates the conflict.

The law cannot be right all the time, because it is one-size-fits-all. It can't always be right all the time. Sometimes, says Rosa Parks lifting a finger, it's just wholesale wrong, no matter what the majority thinks. The whole trans debate is a thornier extension of Park's issue.

That discomfort is itself a problem.

It is. It's also one everyone is expected to occasionally endure. I'm discomforted by people talking at the movies. We are expected to get over our whims, till the behavior passes an unreasonable threshold. Just like in the Planet Fitness story.

A policy of sex segregation would likely have prevented that discomfort, or at least given her recourse to address it.

It would. So would the policy of your opposite number. Each extreme doesn't really work.

You don't have to peek under the stall to see it, and I have no reason to think that she was peeking under the stall.

Have you ever looked under someone else's occupied stall for more than, say, a tenth of a second? I haven't. I avert my eyes as soon as I identify human feet. You would have to look for a while to realize what the creep was doing, as opposed to unrolling toilet paper of whatever. I think the young lady might be aware that she had crossed an invasive line.

I mean, flip the script. How would you react to a transwoman looking under the occupied stalls and recording a cis woman he thought was masturbating? Does that seem a little less credible to have been accidentally studying shadows in places your eyes had no business being?

I have no complaints about her actions either. And I can't really fault the Planet Fitness staff, because their hands are largely tied.

But I absolutely do fault the policy. A policy of sex segregation for the bathroom would have allowed staff to demand that he leave, and revoke his membership so he cannot do that again. Only if he refused to leave would law enforcement need to be called, but there's no reason to object to law enforcement backing up property owners in legally removing people who don't belong on their property.

Right, but again, the opposite policy works just as effectively. Full tolerance solves the same problem that zero tolerance does. Neither is doing the right thing all the time, and some will be uncomfortable with the rare trans person around, and some will be uncomfortable with being part of a society that advocates open bias against them.

In this story, the main issue is general inappropriate behavior, which I think management should have the right to refuse accommodations to anyone engaging in, and order them out. I further think the use of physical force should be legal to use against someone trespassing, either staff or Good Sams, and sort it out later in court if need be, but that's a different topic.

 

[p0lka]

Seriously? You've never seen a public toilet or toilets in clubrooms, or sports changing facilities that look like this?

In this country, you'd be hard pressed to find one that isn't. They are pretty much all like this!

That's ridiculous. I'm going up to my local town centre on saturday and I will take some photos of our toilet cubicles for comparison (hope I don't get arrested haha), the doors there are basically scraping the ground when you close them.

 

[Thermal]

Seriously? You've never seen a public toilet or toilets in clubrooms, or sports changing facilities that look like this?

In this country, you'd be hard pressed to find one that isn't. They are pretty much all like this!

Same in the US. Ease of cleaning the floor, ventilation, and seeing if stall is occupied without being too nosy.

 

[Ziggurat]

Ziggurat brought up the trust thing

as I had said that EC was doing the misandry and Ziggurat disagreed. Hence the three categories of trust I brought up.

No, actually, I did not bring up the trust thing. You did. This was the exchange, in order:

If a hen wants to toss a fox-tail around their neck and go hang out in the den, well, the hen has put themself and only themself at risk by doing so - the hen is not a threat to the foxes. On the other hand, if a fox shoves feathers up their butt and tromps into the coop, that fox puts ALL OF THE HENS at risk.

This is the post which prompted you to make the accusation of misandry. I clipped it for brevity, but nowhere in the post is "trust" brought up. theprestige is correct, she talked about risk.

Not all males are an inherent threat. Same as not all females inherently want to steal your husband then ice pick you to death. Aren't you doing the misandry thing?

Here was your introduction of the charge of misandry. To which EC responded:

Are you of the opinion that females not wanting males to have the legal right to override our consent when it comes to exposure and voyeurism is "misandry"?

Still no mention of trust. So when did trust get introduced to the conversation? In your next reply:

No not at all. Treating all males in a distrustful manner is though.

You brought trust into the conversation, not me. Now, I don't think this was an unreasonable issue to bring up in context. But you're still the one who brought it up. It's at this point that I entered the exchange with this post, and I did address trust as well.

I disagree with your characterization. Proper boundaries aren't about distrust. Proper boundaries are part of how you establish trust, for both men and women. Demonstrating respect for proper boundaries is part of how you establish that you are trustworthy.

But again, this is in response to you bringing up trust, this is not me bringing it into the conversation. And again, note that I did not object to you bringing up the issue of trust, but rather the specifics of how you handled it.

 

[Thermal]

That's ridiculous. I'm going up to my local town centre on saturday and I will take some photos of our toilet cubicles for comparison (hope I don't get arrested haha), the doors there are basically scraping the ground when you close them.

I actually do remember seeing long stalls in Europe, i think in France somewhere. It felt really weird, like I was in a coffin. The floors were not remotely clean where the partitions hit the floor.