I love women. Have I ever said that before? There are reasons for this. Firstly, my mother stuck it out and cared for us after my father ran off with the boss’s secretary. That man abandoned us! Secondly, I have three sisters or had before two of them died early. As the eldest, I was often the carer of my sisters and watched them grow up. A women growing up has to go through puberty and all that entails. It is a far more intrusive experience than we men can ever know and has significant emotional challenges. A women’s psyche is not a man’s and few men really understand that. The womens entire body, every single cell, is suffused with her XX chromosomes. That can never change. Once a woman then always a woman. Calling women people with a cervix is a lie. A woman is a woman, immutable.

Men

I am not a man’s man. A group of men, the lad’s, make me nervous. It is the typical laddishness of the police, the army and so many macho organisations. Women just don’t do that sort of thing because periods and unwanted pregnancy force them to mature, to grow up. Consequently, the women in my life were caring, sympathetic and specifically, non-violent. The men, my father and my destestable step-father, were bastards. In my world, no man can ever become a woman because he has not undergone the hormonal journey. That said, he can pretend to be a woman, wear lipstick and a frock and I will remain kind. I would also prefer that he be given counselling or psychiatric care.

People with a cervix

So, do I have to change my attitude? Do I have to accept that it is not women that I love but people with XX chromasomes? That lipstick is no longer an indicator of a woman. Well no, I am not abandoning women so easily. That word ‘woman’ is hard fought for. They and only they can become pregnant, which is one hell of a privilege. They go through emotional turmoil to qualify and that psychological turmoil makes them what they are, which is not men. There is no shortcut and if you are born a man then you stay a man. No amount of female hormones will change that, nor certificates nor the Scottish or Labour government. Please, support women. It is my human right to state that biological sex cannot be changed.