Men's and women's bodies are physiologically different, but our most striking differences are found in our brains and behavior. There's a reason why crime stats show 98% of sexual assaults are committed by men against women and children. Our behavior and desires are enormously different, which is why it's so important to keep males out of female spaces even if they claim a girl or woman identity. Men's violence towards women could be explained by patriarchal socialization that teaches boys and men they are superior to women, instilling a sense of entitlement, but this dimorphic pattern of behavior is more likely caused by brain differences. Unfortunately, many neuroscientists seem hellbent on finding proof that "trans women" are some type of woman rather than a type of man. That's a fool's errand that anyone who understands autogynophilia in "trans women" could have predicted. Men who think they are women perform a very male version of what they think women should look like and act like.
In my opinion, if we want to know why men and women exhibit such different behaviors, scientists should be studying the brains of lesbians, the one group that is routinely left out of neurological studies. Lesbians fall in love with, bond with and have sex with other women. Yet we are not rapists. Lesbians are welcome in female showers because like most women, we know what it's like to be creeped on by perverts. I'm not saying that a woman cannot rape, but that 2% of women who commit sexual crimes are primarily female drug addicts who have prostituted their own daughters, a sex crime against those children.
Men who call themselves women have a higher incidence of sexual crime than men who don't think they are (or wish they were) women. "Trans women" are clearly a subcategory of men.
But lesbians are the key to the puzzle of how men's and women's brains are different.
to assume that "traditional" women were "weak" ignores the incredible rigor of pre-industrial, pre-consumeristic society. All people needed amazing strength to live in the pre-consumeristic world. Surviving childbirth ... that killed huge numbers of women throughout the ages of humanity.
Yes, both free from social expectations yet distinctly different from each other. Gay men exhibit the epitome of casual sex in bar bathrooms. Gay men are free from women's relationship demands. My guess is that lots of straight men would like that life too.
Lesbians, being women, exemplify the opposite extreme. You know the joke about a lesbian bringing a U-Haul on the second date? Yeah. Women seek relationship commitment. Women look for resources. Women have expectations and hopes for love and longevity. Two women together is double trouble. Lesbian relationship problems maybe due to not enough separateness.
That's likely due to sexed brain differences, not socialization, as very few lesbians were socialized to find long-term relationships.
Sadly, some of the neuroscience studies have included every cohort except lesbians.
Meanwhile, my current personal catchphrase is “women don’t matter.” If there’s any doubt that women’s fight for equality is not over, the trans movement is proof of it. We know now that one is not supposed to define other people: indigenous people define and name themselves, black people define and name themselves … but all of a sudden, along comes this group of men who redefine what a woman is—to include them—and in fact *undefine* the sex class of women—and everyone just goes, Oh, OK. Why? Because women don’t matter.
Why are men allowed in women’s prisons to protect them from other men? Because women don’t matter.
Why do the girls on sports teams invaded by boys and men told to shut up, or else? Because women don’t matter.
Why is it forbidden to use the wrong pronoun on someone, but OK to promote the punching, torture and death of women who don’t agree? Because women don’t matter.
Why is the denigration of women in porn run rampant, completely unchecked? Because women don’t matter.
Why is it OK to continually depict women in movies and TV as sex objects (think of the hundreds of unnecessary strip bar scenes, for example)? Because women don’t matter.
Why is there still a thriving slave trade world-wide, that is never referred to as slavery but as “sex trafficking, sex-work, forced prostitution, etc.”? Because women don’t matter.
Every time I see some example of insanity that disadvantages women, or fails to recognize the truth about what is happening to women, after my initial outrage and bewilderment I remember, oh, right: women don’t matter.
Holly Lawford-Smith is right. We HAVE to reclaim our sex class, and then we still have a whole lot of work to do (Including addressing the harm that the trans movement has done to the idea of what a woman is, or can be) so that finally, maybe women will matter.
You touched on the history of the feminist movement in conjunction with societal norms, and I think this is very important. My mother was a very active second-wave feminist, and a sociologist. She railed against “sociobiology” which supported the idea that women were evolved to be monogamous, nurturing, etc. Coming out of the 50s where women had been coerced back into the home after proving themselves in factories during the war, feminists were fighting to to be recognized as being fully capable and equal to men in jobs that they were now seen as unsuitable for (plumbers, machinists, doctors, lawyers, business people). It was only 50 years previous that women were seen as fully inferior in every way, especially intellectually. By rejecting biological essentialism, women were not saying that they were physically identical, but fully capable in professions denied to them. But also, they were embarking into an arena that had never been explored in modern history. I’m sure they came to discover that some professions requiring physical strength put them at a disadvantage. But one only has to look at farming women throughout history to see how close in physical equality they could be.
Certainly the rise of serious, competitive women’s sports in the 60s and 70s was a huge step, and they may have thought that in time, women could rival men in sports as well. This has not been borne out, and as a widespread physical experiment we can now see that women are generally weaker at top performance than top-performing men. This is statistically undeniable, but may have come as a surprise to some feminists.
But what we have discovered over the past 60 is that women are fully equal intellectually. Again, this doesn’t mean that they are necessarily psychologically The Same.
As for children, the 70’s slogan was “Free to be you and me.” Which meant that boys and girls could express themselves how they wanted, play at what they wanted, and wear what they wanted without judgement.
What is truly, horrifically backward about the trans movement is its embrace of the very societal norms that the second-wave feminists fought against: blue for boys, pink for girls (the first time I saw the trans flag I thought it had to be a joke!); certain toys and behaviours for boys, and others for girls. Then they took this to an insane extreme: IF you prefer blue, and trucks and roughhousing, you’re a boy; IF you prefer pink and frocks and fairies and dolls, you’re a girl. Then they signify their gender affiliation by willingly adopting the worst of the worst pre-1960s gender conformities. (This is why the likes of Dylan Mulvaney are so obscenely disgusting, with his mincing, airhead act.) The trans concept of what a women is is based entirely on pre-feminist ideas. My poor mother would be rolling in her grave.
In the 1990's I had a conversation with feminists about why women weren't competing in the Tour de France bicycle race. They really believed that it was just sexism preventing women from racing at that level. In fact, there was a parallel race for women, it just didn't get the news coverage or sponsorship.
In the long tail at the high-ability end of the performance graph, even a very small average difference between male and female athletes makes the difference between winning and losing. So, if we insist on men and women competing together in these types of sports, we guarantee almost all winners will be male. And as we have seen, the sponsorship and prize money is for potential winners and actual winners, respectively.
Women's football has started to buck the trend, precisely because it is separate, and because the male game has become absurdly expensive. Therefore capital is flowing towards the women's game because it seeks better value for that money.
Always a pleasure to listen to Holly Lawford-Smith ! It's nice to hear about feminism and it's history (herstory would say the radical second-wavers) from someone who actually knows what she's talking about.
I remember mentioning to my then husband, after I discovered he'd been on secret crossdressing trips, deceitfully named "business trips," that his desire to be female would include the problems with finding accessible public women's bathrooms in NYC. He said, "Oh, I'm going to do something about that and be part of the solution." All too many "feminists" believed that these men would further the cause of equality for women.
It's completely consistent that the transfeminism of Judith Butler et al claims to be feminism, but has been appropriated and promoted by men. Transfeminism is as authentic as transwomen.
Why would we be believe anything a postmodernist claims, given that they don't believe in truth claims themselves?
thanks for introducing me to Holly Lawford-Smith....Im now following her. Also, Lisa I am wondering if you have been involved with Braver Angels. Thought I saw somewhere you have been. Do you know if they have done anything on gender ideology/transgender issues?
Holly Lawford Smith love your laugh! We need much more laughter and your "three ticks" on the scale of oppression is a lovely point and should be repeated widely.
Trans Women are by definition men. Men have an appallingly impoverished idea of what all is included in being a man. Men need to broaden their own ideas about maleness and work on including all of themselves.
As to "victimization" of men-who-claim-female-identity: we need to factor-in that many such persons work in prostitution, which is very high risk for assault. There's also not-insignificant domestic-type conflicts that turn violent and sometimes murderous (not too surprising considering trans is built on envy for what the person can never really have or be, true femaleness).
- I don’t think the “Phyllis Schlafly was a feminist” conclusion is a valid one, but it sheds light on whether only being an example can create change (in this case, change Schlafly didn’t want).
- This exhibit just opened in Chicago: https://art.newcity.com/2025/05/01/history-in-the-remaking-wrightwood-659s-the-first-homosexuals-tells-the-story/?utm_source=wordfly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=5%2F29%2F25&utm_content=version_A I’m curious if it will change my mind at all. Claire Lehman, founder of Quillette, just mentioned Katz in her interview with Andrew Sullivan as a book she was assigned in college. Katz’s argument is that Gay and Trans were born at the same time during Victorian England and its impulse to label everything. I’m not saying it’s a good argument for sublimating female’s needs for the sake of trans men, but I will check it out and see! Sullivan pointed out that Katz wants queerness to always be oppositional to the status quo, where he wants gays to be treated as normal. That seems about right.
Provocative! I’d think there’s a difference between being misgendered on the street (which I find embarrassing) and doing so as a media voice (books, Twitter/X, Youtube). Have any of these guys complained that you misgendered them? We’re the peons, the masses. I’ve taken a rather maligned sociological perspective: Ask the people. What’s your social world like? Have you ever been misgendered (& how does it feel?) Obviously we’re not always right. Easiest is to not gender (‘Sir?’ “Ma’am?”) I’d imagine many have been misgendered (at least once?) How many? Happens on the phone, too. Count that.
Public life is another story, made by author’s & videographers,, often academics. But, in interacting we don’t use third person pronouns, right? Just you, me, I.
Which is fine! Thanks for putting thoughts out there!
Men's and women's bodies are physiologically different, but our most striking differences are found in our brains and behavior. There's a reason why crime stats show 98% of sexual assaults are committed by men against women and children. Our behavior and desires are enormously different, which is why it's so important to keep males out of female spaces even if they claim a girl or woman identity. Men's violence towards women could be explained by patriarchal socialization that teaches boys and men they are superior to women, instilling a sense of entitlement, but this dimorphic pattern of behavior is more likely caused by brain differences. Unfortunately, many neuroscientists seem hellbent on finding proof that "trans women" are some type of woman rather than a type of man. That's a fool's errand that anyone who understands autogynophilia in "trans women" could have predicted. Men who think they are women perform a very male version of what they think women should look like and act like.
In my opinion, if we want to know why men and women exhibit such different behaviors, scientists should be studying the brains of lesbians, the one group that is routinely left out of neurological studies. Lesbians fall in love with, bond with and have sex with other women. Yet we are not rapists. Lesbians are welcome in female showers because like most women, we know what it's like to be creeped on by perverts. I'm not saying that a woman cannot rape, but that 2% of women who commit sexual crimes are primarily female drug addicts who have prostituted their own daughters, a sex crime against those children.
Men who call themselves women have a higher incidence of sexual crime than men who don't think they are (or wish they were) women. "Trans women" are clearly a subcategory of men.
But lesbians are the key to the puzzle of how men's and women's brains are different.
to assume that "traditional" women were "weak" ignores the incredible rigor of pre-industrial, pre-consumeristic society. All people needed amazing strength to live in the pre-consumeristic world. Surviving childbirth ... that killed huge numbers of women throughout the ages of humanity.
When I think of sex differences and differences in behavior, I think of two distinct groups.
Lesbians and gay men.
There are huge statistical differences in these groups.
They are both more free from societal expectations, aren’t they?
And yet they are so different.
Biology must play a huge part in this.
Yes, both free from social expectations yet distinctly different from each other. Gay men exhibit the epitome of casual sex in bar bathrooms. Gay men are free from women's relationship demands. My guess is that lots of straight men would like that life too.
Lesbians, being women, exemplify the opposite extreme. You know the joke about a lesbian bringing a U-Haul on the second date? Yeah. Women seek relationship commitment. Women look for resources. Women have expectations and hopes for love and longevity. Two women together is double trouble. Lesbian relationship problems maybe due to not enough separateness.
That's likely due to sexed brain differences, not socialization, as very few lesbians were socialized to find long-term relationships.
Sadly, some of the neuroscience studies have included every cohort except lesbians.
Meanwhile, my current personal catchphrase is “women don’t matter.” If there’s any doubt that women’s fight for equality is not over, the trans movement is proof of it. We know now that one is not supposed to define other people: indigenous people define and name themselves, black people define and name themselves … but all of a sudden, along comes this group of men who redefine what a woman is—to include them—and in fact *undefine* the sex class of women—and everyone just goes, Oh, OK. Why? Because women don’t matter.
Why are men allowed in women’s prisons to protect them from other men? Because women don’t matter.
Why do the girls on sports teams invaded by boys and men told to shut up, or else? Because women don’t matter.
Why is it forbidden to use the wrong pronoun on someone, but OK to promote the punching, torture and death of women who don’t agree? Because women don’t matter.
Why is the denigration of women in porn run rampant, completely unchecked? Because women don’t matter.
Why is it OK to continually depict women in movies and TV as sex objects (think of the hundreds of unnecessary strip bar scenes, for example)? Because women don’t matter.
Why is there still a thriving slave trade world-wide, that is never referred to as slavery but as “sex trafficking, sex-work, forced prostitution, etc.”? Because women don’t matter.
Every time I see some example of insanity that disadvantages women, or fails to recognize the truth about what is happening to women, after my initial outrage and bewilderment I remember, oh, right: women don’t matter.
Holly Lawford-Smith is right. We HAVE to reclaim our sex class, and then we still have a whole lot of work to do (Including addressing the harm that the trans movement has done to the idea of what a woman is, or can be) so that finally, maybe women will matter.
You touched on the history of the feminist movement in conjunction with societal norms, and I think this is very important. My mother was a very active second-wave feminist, and a sociologist. She railed against “sociobiology” which supported the idea that women were evolved to be monogamous, nurturing, etc. Coming out of the 50s where women had been coerced back into the home after proving themselves in factories during the war, feminists were fighting to to be recognized as being fully capable and equal to men in jobs that they were now seen as unsuitable for (plumbers, machinists, doctors, lawyers, business people). It was only 50 years previous that women were seen as fully inferior in every way, especially intellectually. By rejecting biological essentialism, women were not saying that they were physically identical, but fully capable in professions denied to them. But also, they were embarking into an arena that had never been explored in modern history. I’m sure they came to discover that some professions requiring physical strength put them at a disadvantage. But one only has to look at farming women throughout history to see how close in physical equality they could be.
Certainly the rise of serious, competitive women’s sports in the 60s and 70s was a huge step, and they may have thought that in time, women could rival men in sports as well. This has not been borne out, and as a widespread physical experiment we can now see that women are generally weaker at top performance than top-performing men. This is statistically undeniable, but may have come as a surprise to some feminists.
But what we have discovered over the past 60 is that women are fully equal intellectually. Again, this doesn’t mean that they are necessarily psychologically The Same.
As for children, the 70’s slogan was “Free to be you and me.” Which meant that boys and girls could express themselves how they wanted, play at what they wanted, and wear what they wanted without judgement.
What is truly, horrifically backward about the trans movement is its embrace of the very societal norms that the second-wave feminists fought against: blue for boys, pink for girls (the first time I saw the trans flag I thought it had to be a joke!); certain toys and behaviours for boys, and others for girls. Then they took this to an insane extreme: IF you prefer blue, and trucks and roughhousing, you’re a boy; IF you prefer pink and frocks and fairies and dolls, you’re a girl. Then they signify their gender affiliation by willingly adopting the worst of the worst pre-1960s gender conformities. (This is why the likes of Dylan Mulvaney are so obscenely disgusting, with his mincing, airhead act.) The trans concept of what a women is is based entirely on pre-feminist ideas. My poor mother would be rolling in her grave.
In the 1990's I had a conversation with feminists about why women weren't competing in the Tour de France bicycle race. They really believed that it was just sexism preventing women from racing at that level. In fact, there was a parallel race for women, it just didn't get the news coverage or sponsorship.
In the long tail at the high-ability end of the performance graph, even a very small average difference between male and female athletes makes the difference between winning and losing. So, if we insist on men and women competing together in these types of sports, we guarantee almost all winners will be male. And as we have seen, the sponsorship and prize money is for potential winners and actual winners, respectively.
Women's football has started to buck the trend, precisely because it is separate, and because the male game has become absurdly expensive. Therefore capital is flowing towards the women's game because it seeks better value for that money.
Always a pleasure to listen to Holly Lawford-Smith ! It's nice to hear about feminism and it's history (herstory would say the radical second-wavers) from someone who actually knows what she's talking about.
I remember mentioning to my then husband, after I discovered he'd been on secret crossdressing trips, deceitfully named "business trips," that his desire to be female would include the problems with finding accessible public women's bathrooms in NYC. He said, "Oh, I'm going to do something about that and be part of the solution." All too many "feminists" believed that these men would further the cause of equality for women.
It's completely consistent that the transfeminism of Judith Butler et al claims to be feminism, but has been appropriated and promoted by men. Transfeminism is as authentic as transwomen.
Why would we be believe anything a postmodernist claims, given that they don't believe in truth claims themselves?
thanks for introducing me to Holly Lawford-Smith....Im now following her. Also, Lisa I am wondering if you have been involved with Braver Angels. Thought I saw somewhere you have been. Do you know if they have done anything on gender ideology/transgender issues?
Sorry but it wasn’t “men and women were psychologically the same”
You’re practicing revisionist history
I can’t recall the number of times in the 90’s where separatist lesbians, older radfem dykes literally spat on me while screaming
“Don’t be so DAFT & reductive!!! Men have superior UPPER body strength- women have superior LOWER body strength!”
As tho women were routinely out running men in the 500yard dash~
ESP in lesbian feminist spaces- I presume it was around in 80’s I couldn’t get away from it in 90’s
Kate Millet is the feminist you’re looking for.
She used John Moneys research to make the claim ALL differences are social constructs.
She was on the cover of Time magazine mere months later… this was more influential than ppl who came later can possibly comprehend or logic out now…
Holly Lawford Smith love your laugh! We need much more laughter and your "three ticks" on the scale of oppression is a lovely point and should be repeated widely.
Trans Women are by definition men. Men have an appallingly impoverished idea of what all is included in being a man. Men need to broaden their own ideas about maleness and work on including all of themselves.
As to "victimization" of men-who-claim-female-identity: we need to factor-in that many such persons work in prostitution, which is very high risk for assault. There's also not-insignificant domestic-type conflicts that turn violent and sometimes murderous (not too surprising considering trans is built on envy for what the person can never really have or be, true femaleness).
Many disparate thoughts here:
- I don’t think the “Phyllis Schlafly was a feminist” conclusion is a valid one, but it sheds light on whether only being an example can create change (in this case, change Schlafly didn’t want).
- This exhibit just opened in Chicago: https://art.newcity.com/2025/05/01/history-in-the-remaking-wrightwood-659s-the-first-homosexuals-tells-the-story/?utm_source=wordfly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=5%2F29%2F25&utm_content=version_A I’m curious if it will change my mind at all. Claire Lehman, founder of Quillette, just mentioned Katz in her interview with Andrew Sullivan as a book she was assigned in college. Katz’s argument is that Gay and Trans were born at the same time during Victorian England and its impulse to label everything. I’m not saying it’s a good argument for sublimating female’s needs for the sake of trans men, but I will check it out and see! Sullivan pointed out that Katz wants queerness to always be oppositional to the status quo, where he wants gays to be treated as normal. That seems about right.
Provocative! I’d think there’s a difference between being misgendered on the street (which I find embarrassing) and doing so as a media voice (books, Twitter/X, Youtube). Have any of these guys complained that you misgendered them? We’re the peons, the masses. I’ve taken a rather maligned sociological perspective: Ask the people. What’s your social world like? Have you ever been misgendered (& how does it feel?) Obviously we’re not always right. Easiest is to not gender (‘Sir?’ “Ma’am?”) I’d imagine many have been misgendered (at least once?) How many? Happens on the phone, too. Count that.
Public life is another story, made by author’s & videographers,, often academics. But, in interacting we don’t use third person pronouns, right? Just you, me, I.
Which is fine! Thanks for putting thoughts out there!