A transwoman who is in prison in the UK for manslaughter and attempted rape committed when she identified as male is going to be transferred to a women's prison. She wants gender reassignment surgery, but cannot have it since she is prison.
I have to admit that my joy at knowing that a transwoman's rights were being respected sank slightly when I read she was a sex offender. It is easy to think of rapists and have the attitude that they deserve all the discomfort and isolation they get in prison. But then again, there is the issue of equality, and cis females who rape other females both in prison and outside of it are imprisoned around other female prisoners. The same goes for men who rape their own gender. On a more general note, the fact that they will acknowledge this human right - even to a sex offender - indicates that it will be easier from now on for transpeople to be placed in the correct prison, and that the severity of the crime will not be an obstacle to their rights being respected. Still, it interests me to know what others make of this.
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To me, if they had refused to transfer her then it would have said more about their attitudes towards trans people than their attitudes towards the individual or criminals in general. Her punishment is to serve her prison sentence, not to be dehumanized in a way that is not possible to do to a cis person. I can see why some people might disagree with the decision, but you shouldn't be able to give someone extra punishment because they're trans and then try and justify it on the grounds that they're a criminal.
If you wouldn't put a cis woman in a men's prison, then a trans woman shouldn't be in there either.
This is taking 'human rights' too far.
I am deeply concerned that a rapist is going to be transferred into a women's prison.
Yes, of course some men rape other men, some women rape or assault other women. That is not the point. Firstly, those cases are vastly less common than male on female rape. Not much can be done about it in single sex prisons - but we also don't do things to knowingly increase the risk.
And of course measures are taken in prison to prevent rape, but nothing is 100% foolproof.
I simply don't believe this guy is a trans woman. He has never had any sign of being trans before, but suddenly, conveniently decides he is while in prison. He is also a rapist. What trans woman would willingly hurt someone of the same gender IN AN ACT OF MALE SUPREMACY?
And yes, I acknowledge that some women do hurt other women, but that is a different thing in so far as it is not inherently patriarchal. Misogynists can claim to be the gender they despise. This is sickening.
I don't think the guy should have been moved. If he is really trans he's waited however long, he can wait until he is released to get treatment, but I just don't think he is.
What about the women prisoner's rights?
Where did you hear "He has never had any sign of being trans before, but suddenly, conveniently decides he is while in prison"? (no snark, pure curiosity)
I understand where you're coming from, it crossed my mind too. But if this person - I'm going to assume she is trans - says she wants surgery then she's probably genuinely trans. Also, she has had breasts added. It'd be quite a way to go if you just wanted access to other women. Still, it does concern me too that even though it would be quite insane to fake it and I doubt anyone would choose to, it would certainly be possible, though I realise that's getting dangerously close to the comments some make about how 'men will fake it in order to gain access to women's rooms' etc. But that doesn't mean it's not worth discussing.
It's an interesting situation, which is why I posted it here. And yes, it is a good question as to why a genuine transwoman would rape another woman. It is a cliche to suspect the most homophobic people in the world of being gay themselves, perhaps some transwomen become misogynists. My mum once told me about a transwoman who, whilst identifying as male, was violent towards her wife and then was told by a psychologist that she was trans. After that it all made sense, and she transitioned and was no longer violent.
This makes me very uneasy. They are putting a convicted sex offender--presumably one who had attacked and abused a female victim--into an environment that is exclusively female. Her gender identity doesn't really matter in terms of the transfer; her inherent risk to other inmates does.
I too, am surprised that someone who would identify as a transwoman (trans woman?) would attack and degrade women, but there are outliers in every group, so that shouldn't really be the main focus of the conversation. Cis women have sexually assaulted other women and it is always somewhat surprising to me. It is perhaps more surprising that a trans woman would, given the assumption that she would have been thinking more about her gender identity more than your average cis woman her whole life, but these seem to be the facts of the case.
If she is transferred, they should isolate her in a higher security wing or something, similar to having her in the "vulnerable inmates wing" at the male prion. And that's a minimum precaution.
I agree a sex offender of any kind - particularly one who assaults their own sex - should not be placed in a cell with others.
We place murderers in cells with other people don't we? We place perpetrators of assault in cells with others don't we?
I don't think we segregate rapists in male prisons (even those that rape other men). (Please correct me if I am wrong.) Why would a situation accepted in male prisons not be acceptable in women's prison?
I would guess, also, that this trans-woman (having breast implants) would be a target for rape in men's prison. More so than the other men there. All of the people in prison have committed crimes; that includes those in the women's prisons and those in the men's prisons, none of them deserve further victimisation by fellow prisoners more than any other.
Prisons are where we send people who commit crimes against other people. One prisoner is always going to be at risk from another because of the nature of the system. For this reason security in prisons needs to be first rate. It isn't. More needs to be done about this.
"why a genuine transwoman would rape another woman"
Ahem...It is a common misconception and stereotype that all transgendered and transsexual women are heterosexual.
Oh that's not what I meant. She could easily be a lesbian, but still to rape a woman is an act of misogyny and male supremacy. It is the crime of someone who hates women.
Misogany and male supremacy are dominant themes in rape, but it is over-simplifying it to say that explains all rape.
Men sometimes rape other men, women sometimes rape other women, and though very rare women sometimes rape men (here is a particularly bizarre example: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/21/russia_robbery/).
Sorry here is a link that works: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/21/russia_robbery/
In the article, it shows that she did identify as a transwoman before her sentence, and that she had also taken several steps to legally identify as a woman:
Kaufmann had described at a recent hearing how, although apparently born male, A had her womanhood recognised by law and her birth certificate had been amended to show her female sex.
Hair on A's face and legs had been permanently removed by laser and she had developed breasts after hormone treatment.
I don't get the thinking that someone that identifies a woman would be less likely to sexually assault women...
Like the bond between women means they don't sexually assault, murder, beat down or steal from one another.
It certainly does not stop men from doing the same...
And I think viewing the assault through the lens of male or female supremacy is off.
Its through a lens of self-supremacy.
The idealization of female-female interactions is a subtle form of sexism...
If you compare this positive idealization to any objective observation of male-female or male-male interaction, or an idealization of negative interactions, then your perception of the reality of these interactions is going to be unrealistic.
Especially when compared to the idealized female-female interactions.
And so this subtle sexism is going to pervasively color every observation about men and women that you make.
I saw a Law and Order where a transwoman who had identified as a woman for years (but not had surgery because she couldn't afford it) was convicted of manslaughter and sent to a men's prison. She looked like a woman, so she was immediately raped by the men in the prison. The episode made a really good case for why she should have been allowed to go to a women's prison.
It is a bit more suspicious if this person hadn't started transitioning at all before being convicted, so that's something that should be considered. But assuming the transition is genuine, she belongs in a women's prison, just like a woman who had abused another woman would be in a women's prison.
As the article points out, she's already in a vulnerable prisoners' wing and is quite some distance into her transition. Not knowing the circumstances or specifics of the crimes she's serving, I will not speculate that her crimes were a means of lashing out. Instead, I will point out that being trans implies nothing about a person's mental health by itself. Any number of factors could have contributed to a future transwoman committing such a patriarchal act, but she's being jailed for it nonetheless. I am a transwoman, and I am constantly noticing issues I am now sensitive to but which did not occur to me before. This prisoner's crime was deplorable, but being forced to live outside of her preferred gender identity is not part of her sentence and, regardless of the questionable effectiveness of our prison system, it is not humane for a gender-segregated prison system to punish her as a man.
Steven, of COURSE women are less likely to sexually assault other women.
I didn't say they NEVER do.
But of sexual assaults on females, probably it's 90:10 by males and females.
You are finding more males than females sexually assaulting other females because of an assumption of heterosexual men assaulting women. Gay males probably sexually assault fewer women as well. Why would they? Try looking into LGBTQQ women's reports of sexual assault by another woman.
http://www.sfrcc.org/same_gender.html
"Why don't we hear more about this?
Because many people define rape as penetration by a penis, woman to woman rape is not acknowledged or is not taken seriously. But in fact, it is estimated that 1 out of 3 lesbians have been sexually assaulted by another woman."
There used to be more resources available online, including access to the writings of Professor Lori B. Girshick, through
http://www.ibiblio.org/rcip/lgbtq.html
but most of the links on same sex sexual assault with data (like the original source of the "1 out of 3 lesbians" quote) have been removed just this year. I wonder why.