[enoch_r]

> The reality is that transgender Americans have been doing these things, all these things, for many decades.

Do you have any evidence for that?

For example, do you have evidence of any of these happening in the US before, say, 1990?

- any openly transgender athlete participating in sports on the team of their preferred gender rather than their sex assigned at birth?

- large numbers of children receiving "gender-affirming" hormones or puberty blockers?

- transgender prisoners being housed with the sex they identify as, regardless of whether they actually "present as" that sex?

- a transgender woman being accepted to attend a all-women college?

Maybe all of these happened quietly, so common and uncontroversial that they were totally unremarked upon. But surely there's some evidence that they occurred?

For me it simply doesn't pass the laugh test that a trans woman with a penis could walk into a nude spa in the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s without anyone batting an eye.

[ok_dad]

Nice steel manning, of course transgender people without bottom surgery don’t walk into nude spas. If you find a single example, great, find me the hundreds of examples you folks claim there are which threaten you. You’re not arguing honestly, just coming up with wild situations that don’t match reality. You may be uninformed, or misinformed, I suggest you actually read more than surface articles on Fox News.

[enoch_r]

I don't claim that there are hundreds of examples of this.

My claim:

- A: today, the left, broadly construed, insists that there is a right for transgender women to go into women-only spaces, including nude spas. For my point, it doesn't matter how often this "right" is exercised - merely that the left asserts that there is such a right.

- B: this was not true of the left 6 years ago (or 45 years ago).

- Consteval's claim that the left is merely defending "settled," uncontroversial rights that trans people have had for decades is therefore wrong.

Evidence for A:

In 2021, a 52 year old sex offender who had been convicted in multiple instances of indecent exposure went into a nude spa. It caused a huge controversy with dueling protests and counterprotests.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi_Spa_controversy

In San Francisco, a Russian nude spa announced a policy that 1 night a month would be "ladies only" for people who were assigned that sex at birth, to provide a "phallus-free environment." For that decision, they were investigated by the San Francisco Human Rights Commission. They reversed their policy after this intervention.

https://web.archive.org/web/20250307232755/https://www.sfchr...

https://sfstandard.com/2025/03/12/archimedes-banya-ladies-ni...

In Washington, a Korean spa which requires nudity for some services restricted people from male genitalia from entering the facility. A transgender woman with male genitalia was denied service at the facility and sued: https://www.courthousenews.com/after-banning-trans-women-was...

So it seems to me that either:

- transgender women without bottom surgery could go into nude spas in 1970 without issue, or

- I'm wrong about A, and the left doesn't actually insist that trans women have a right to women-only spaces, or

- Consteval is mistaken, and people on the left are in fact pushing for more rights for transgender people that were not settled 6 years ago (or 55 years ago).

I'm asking for some evidence I'm wrong, you're just saying it doesn't really matter if I'm wrong - it's unlikely to affect me personally. Maybe! Nevertheless...

[monkeyfun]

Are you interested in hearing from the perspective of a trans person who mostly doesn't agree with the person you've been replying to, but does feel there's gaps in your perspective here?

I ask this way especially because I don't know if you'll actually see this since I see one of the comments is flagged, and given how it's been most of a day already.

[enoch_r]

I would be very interested, thank you. The flag is probably justified since HN is not really the place for these culture war things :) but I'm genuinely trying to understand the perspective here, because it does seem like a big gap between my understanding (the Democratic party has moved left on these issues) and theirs (the Democratic party is just playing defense on these issues).

[ok_dad]

I personally wonder if people were arguing and complaining that America was moving left or failing back when racial integration was the big fight. I’m sure there were people arguing that letting non-whites drink from the same water fountains was dangerous for white women. Think about that a bit while you lament transgender people.

[enoch_r]

You're proving my point here - the original comment claimed that the left was merely defending the pre-existing, settled rights that trans people have "always" had against the right's aggression, I'm saying that the left has been actively pushing for change and new rights. I think the left sees trans rights as a continuation of the civil rights movement. This is an empirical question, entirely separate from the question of whether this is a good thing.

[bobalob]

Could you explain the racial analogy in more detail please? It's not obvious how restricting males from using female-only spaces is similar in concept or principle to racial segregation.

[consteval]

> For me it simply doesn't pass the laugh test that a trans woman with a penis could walk into a nude spa in the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s without anyone batting an eye.

They weren't, and they still aren't. The idea that transwomen want to be around ciswomen and hang brain is a conservative fantasy. You would very much like to believe that is true, because you believe transwomen are inherently perverted sexual deviants. Not unlike how conservatives viewed homosexuals. Of course, this is not so. This is one of the most classical forms of a projection. Meaning, you cannot view transwomen in a light that isn't sexual, so you project your own sexual objectification onto them. Again, exactly how was done with homosexuals in the past. Even today, there are a lot of people I've met who can't see a gay man without thinking "dick in ass dick in ass!". That's not the homosexual's fault.

On the topic of gender affirming care: the primary recipients of gender affirming has always been cisgender people. I take testosterone myself, because unfortunately I lost my testicles to cancer. I identify as a man and I want to present as a man as much as possible, so I take testosterone. And again, with puberty blockers, same thing - mostly cisgender people.

To be clear, gender affirming care for minors typically includes things like a new haircut and new wardrobe. In some cases, particularly for teens, puberty blockers may temporarily be used. The idea that minors are mutilating themselves is, surprise, another conservative fantasy.

But, even then, the Conservative's desire to get in the way of the rights of parents, their children, and their doctors, is very out of character. If you told conservative's 10 years ago that the government is going to want to vet what treatment their children can and cannot receive, they would be aghast. Even today they would be. After all, a lot of them have a big issue with the principle behind vaccine mandates.

[enoch_r]

> They weren't, and they still aren't. The idea that transwomen want to be around ciswomen and hang brain is a conservative fantasy.

I think you're probably right that the vast majority of trans women are completely uninterested in such a thing. And yet:

In San Francisco activists protested a policy that excluded trans women from a nude bathhouse one night per month for a "phallus free" womens night. They were investigated by the city's Human Rights Commission after numerous reports and reversed course - no more "phallus free" nights. In Washington State a trans activist sued a nude female-only Korean spa for not providing her with service because of her male genitalia.

Are these specific people merely fighting back to try to retain a right that was already "settled" back in 1970? Or are they trying to claim a new right?