Women who have fought against prejudice recognise the facts of biology

SIR – Women of my generation (I am 65) had to fight very hard to be taken seriously in the workplace and the wider world. We were patronised by male bosses, talked over in meetings and passed over for promotion in favour of male colleagues because of male assumptions about “what women really want” – principally to stay at home with babies. But the effort was worth it: we made real progress and believed that our daughters would have an easier time of it.

It is therefore doubly galling to be told by a vociferous minority, often male-born, that we don’t know what it is to be a woman. Our understanding is very clear, and most of us believe that biology plays a significant part in it. Menstruation and menopause are our common inheritance. Many of us also experience pregnancy and childbirth. We don’t want to be limited by it, as our female forebears were, but nor do we deny its importance in our lives.

According to a Cambridge guide on how to spot “Terfs” (transexclusionary radical feminists), such a “conservative, binary, essentialist conception of sex” apparently goes hand-in-hand with “a deep hatred of trans women” (report, October 14).

No, it doesn’t: that is a complete non-sequitur. I don’t hate trans women. Why would I? I’m wholly respectful of them. But I reserve the right to claim that my own experience gives me a better insight into what womanhood actually means.

Kate Harrison

Oxford

SIR – I was born a female and do not believe that I am the same as a person born male who has had surgical and hormone treatment and become a trans woman.

That does not mean I would be rude or abusive to a trans woman. Nevertheless, I defend my right to be a woman and not the same as a trans woman.

Calling women who hold my view “Terfs” is sexist, abusive and insulting.

As to males self-identifying as female, this is the stuff of fairy stories. A man is a man.

Annabel Burton

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

SIR – Those who criticise the thuggish tactics of trans extremists in trying to shut down debate do them an injustice. They are acting sensibly by their lights, in that they know, as well as we do, that any debate would show up their novel ideology as clearly absurd.

So what else can they do but try by all and every means, criminal or not, to shut down all opposition?

Charles Lewis

London N2