Once Upon a Time…
Once upon a time, most of us had never heard of gender ideology, also known as trans ideology. Everybody knew about transvestism and perhaps had read the odd sensational story about a transexual. The former was a fetish that mostly men indulged. The latter was a rare phenomenon (also experienced mostly by males) and generally considered an extreme measure to relieve extreme discomfort. Now, within a couple of decades, ideas around the manipulation of one’s sex have become mainstream. There are few who haven’t encountered gender or trans ideology either in school, university, the workplace, online, or in daily life.
Talking about it can be really difficult. When the topic comes up, the shutters go down. People often don’t know much about it, but they have a rough idea what they are meant to say. They say what they think is the right thing and then shut up before they betray a lack of knowledge or political correctness. End of conversation.
Reasonable, thoughtful, curious people with reasonable questions and concerns are staying silent on this issue. As a result, the only voices we hear are those with extreme and nonsensical ideas.
What Exactly Is Gender Ideology?
Gender ideology is the idea that boy or girl, man or woman, is determined by how you feel rather than your actual biology. So, if you feel like a man, you’re a man, regardless of your biology, and if you feel like a woman, you’re a woman, even if you have a male body. If you feel like both or neither, you’re nonbinary. The feeling is called your “gender identity”.
If the body you have doesn’t match the feelings, adherents of gender ideology believe you can alter it with hormones and surgery. They believe this changes your sex.
Gender ideology is a belief system, like a religion, and has no basis in science or fact. In fact, sex is binary and immutable - one is either male or female and cannot change.
People Don’t Know What They Don’t Know
There are some hardcore believers and activists out there, but there are many others who have been surface-level indoctrinated into what I can’t help but see as a kind of cult of trans ideology. The average person, I think, has been conditioned to say the right thing, but when you scratch beneath the surface, doesn’t fully understand what gender ideology is, and doesn’t agree with many aspects once they do understand. This includes people who work in medicine, law, politics, and education - people who we trust to help us make important decisions, or to make them on our behalf. People are confused about the terms, unaware of the statistics, and ignorant of the law.
Many people don’t know that a transwoman is a male who wants to be a woman and a transman is a female who wants to be a man. When they hear talk of transwomen using women’s bathrooms, they don’t necessarily know that it means men. And if they do know it means men, they usually assume that these are men who have had surgery, and so, what harm? In fact, only 5-10% of men who identify as women actually have surgery.
They have never heard of autogynephilia - a man’s sexual arousal and erotic interest in the thought or image of himself as a woman. Some data suggests that over 80% of men who identify as women experience autogynephilic arousal. This means that for at least some transwomen, there is a sexual component to being treated as a woman and accessing women-only spaces. This changes how people feel about men who identify as women in women’s spaces.
They don’t know about self ID. In Ireland, we have the Gender Recognition Act 2015, which allows for anyone aged 18 or over to legally change their sex simply by filling out a form. There is no assessment or oversight. This undermines women’s right to single sex spaces because any man can easily declare himself to be a woman and is then entitled to access. It means men who identify as women can play in some women’s sport, and compete for grants, awards, or roles that have been created for the purpose of increasing women’s participation in education, employment or other facets of society. It also corrupts data collection, falsifying public health research, equal pay audits, and crime statistics by allowing people to choose their sex.
People are unaware of the extent of the issue. There has been a dramatic rise in the number of young people, particularly adolescent girls, identifying as trans or nonbinary in recent years. In the UK alone, gender services went from handling under a hundred youth referrals in 2010 to over 5,000 referrals in 2022. This marks a huge shift, not just in volume, but demographically toward young women. Prior to this, the dominant demographic seeking to transition was adult men.
They confuse the issue with gay rights. In Ireland, people who are lesbian, gay, or bisexual have the same rights as people who are heterosexual. As a country, we overwhelmingly supported the vote for same sex marriage in 2015. Sexuality (who you are attracted to) is a separate issue from gender ideology. Supporting trans or gender ideology is not the same as supporting gay rights.
What Should We Do?
Stop saying you don’t know enough about this topic. You DO know. You are a man or a woman, and you live in the world with other people. You are entitled and equipped to have an opinion. If you’re reading this, you know what sex means. You know who is stronger, who has the babies, and who is more vulnerable to sexual assault. You know that children and teenagers are not capable of making decisions that impact their health and fertility for life.
If you care about women’s rights, children’s mental and physical well-being, truth, and freedom of speech, then you must have conversations about them.
Here are five key points that are hard to disagree with:
Sex is binary and immutable - you’re either male or female, and you can’t change this. There is no new science that challenges this. A tiny number of people are born with a disorder of sex development, also known as intersex, but these people are still either male or female. People remain either male or female, no matter how they dress, what they call themselves, or what their sexuality is (who they’re attracted to).
Single sex spaces exist because statistically, the overwhelming majority of sexual offences are carried out by males, and the overwhelming majority of victims are women and girls. Most men do not pose a threat to women or children, but we can’t spot the bad men just by looking, so we exclude all men from spaces where women or children may be vulnerable. We don’t let some men in because they seem trustworthy. The same applies to men who identify as women - we can’t spot the bad ones just by looking, so we must exclude all of them from women’s spaces. Most men understand and respect this. Why can’t men agree to be kind and respectfully accommodate men who identify as women in men’s single sex spaces?
Autogynephilia (AGP) is a component of trans identity for many males (over 80% according to one study, as mentioned above). Most people, even those who thought it reasonable for a man who identifies as a woman to use women’s spaces, are not entirely comfortable with the idea of essentially indulging a man with a fetish.
Self ID means that in Ireland, as in many other countries, it is possible for anybody aged 18 or over to legally change their sex simply by filling out a form online. Most people are unaware of this, believing that there is a process of assessment and treatment to be gone through in order to officially change sex. Anyone, including predatory men and men for whom AGP is a driver in their trans identity, can legally change sex and access women’s spaces. In Ireland, we’ve had sexually aggressive and violent men incarcerated with women thanks to the Gender Recognition Act.
Teaching children that it is possible to be born in the wrong body and to change one’s sex is dishonest. No child is born in the wrong body. It is not possible to change sex. Attempts to modify one’s body in order to look like the opposite sex involve ineffective, risky surgery and lifelong dependence on medication that has serious side effects. We have a duty to protect children’s health and safety, to be honest with them about human biology, and to prepare them for life as adults. A progressive society would allow children to play, dress, behave, and dream free from the restrictions of sexist stereotyping. Any child can wear pink, play with trucks, enjoy tea parties, or dream of being a firefighter or a nurse. Preferences like these are not determinative of one’s sex. To suggest that a boy who likes dolls and fashion or a girl who likes trucks and football might be “born in the wrong body” is regressive and sexist.
Keep It Simple
People are complex, but this issue is really quite simple. In terms of our sex and our abilities and vulnerabilities related to our sex, nothing has changed. Sex is still binary and immutable (this can be your mantra).
Gender, which is really just behaviour - masculine or feminine - doesn’t matter. Male or female, it doesn’t matter how we dress, what jobs we do, whether we like to crochet and wear nail polish or chop wood and dress like a lumberjack.
Sex, which is biology, often doesn’t matter either, but when it does matter, for example in sport, or in protecting women and children from harm - it really, really matters, and we must take it seriously.
Children and teenagers now, just like all of the children and teenagers before them, do not have the maturity or wisdom to make decisions that will permanently impact their future health and fertility.
Let’s openly, respectfully call out and challenge this dangerous ideology that’s harming young people and eroding women’s rights. When it gets difficult, take comfort and confidence from the knowledge that you have truth, facts, science, and common sense on your side.
Catherine Monaghan is an Irish women’s rights activist and founding member of Wicklow Women 4 Women.
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"Reasonable, thoughtful, curious people with reasonable questions and concerns are staying silent on this issue. As a result, the only voices we hear are those with extreme and nonsensical ideas." Yes, that is somewhat true. And those reasonable people such as myself, who write about it and who want to have a conversation, are being silenced by emotional blackmail/bully tactics and threats. So we are losing reasonable voices from direct attack as well.
I’d add a twist.
Gender ideology is a variant on a behavior called sexual mimicry.
In humans, it js a compulsion to hide sex, in order to deceive others by mimicking the opposite sex.
By claiming to have a gender which doesn’t “match” sex, the behavior attempts to conceal actual sex during mimicry.
People who “support” gender ideology have been successfully deceived by mimicry, much as a Cuckoo has deceived a host bird with its eggs in the nest, eliciting disproportionate support.