So. I read JK Rowling's excuse essay about trans people and her recent controversial tweets.
I want to preface this by saying: I obviously feel bad for her. Nobody deserves to be abused or sexually assaulted. I understand that those things can scar someone and that they're very scary. So, of course, I feel bad for her.
But here's the thing: many of the points in her essay were simply wrong. And while I would spend time finding links to articles that disprove her, I'm not going to focus on that. What I am going to focus on is her point that, because of trans activism, any man can say he's a woman and go into women only spaces.
When people use this argument, they typically say that a man will claim he's a woman, go into a woman's bathroom, and then assault women. But the thing is, this isn't a new thing. Not really. Even before getting your gender marker changed on your ID, you're legally allowed to use the bathroom of the gender you identify as (at least in the US). So this is not a new thing. But, even if it was a new thing, do you really think a man who is planning on assaulting women cares about the legality of what he's doing? Do you think that he really cares if he's legally allowed in the bathroom? No. He doesn't care. By preventing trans women from going in to female bathrooms, you aren't preventing perverts and assaulters from going in to bathrooms; you're just stopping law abiding trans women from feeling comfortable and going to the bathroom where they want.
Not to mention that even with a simplified way to get your gender marker changed on your ID, there would still be lots of paper work to fill out, possible complications, and it would change your legal gender. Again, I don’t think most men who are planning on assaulting a woman would go through this much trouble just to make it more legal.
So, to JK Rowling: please, try to understand the arguments you're making. If you're going to be transphobic, at least use good arguments that aren't overused and easy to debunk.
