Now the term FGM is cissexist? WTAF?

Yes, of course. And Malala wouldn't have gotten herself shot if she'd prudently identified as a boy.

I keep thinking of the survivors of symphysiotomy. They, too, had a terrible medical procedure foisted on them which had left many of them in permanent pain, again, because they're women. Is is all cissexist of me to say that a man who identifies as a woman wouldn't have his pelvis broken to facilitate childbirth? Is there a gender neutral was of expressing that horror?

Yy Lurcio - is there a pre pubescent with a vulva who could avoid FGM by saying they considered themselves to be male? I don't think so!

Just made the mistake of googling and having a look at the reddit discussion. It's like stepping into a parallel through-the-looking-glass reality where everythings upside down, back to front, 2+2=5 and the world has gone fucking bonkers.

But on the plus side, googling also threw up this:

"Females do not have their genitals mutilated because they have vulvas.

Females do not have their genitals mutilated because they ~iDeNtIfY~ as females.

Females have their genitals mutilated because the societies have decided that people born with vaginas are just human enough to be fucked by and impregnated by men, but not human enough to have sexual autonomy."

Amen to that!

Seriously, to take the most horrific thing (short of gynocide, and there's a lot of that in the world) done to women as a class simply because they are women, and demand that it be redefined as "vulval mutilation" so that the "cis-sexism" of the term doesn't offend you - fuck right off to the far side of fuck and stay there.

Not all trans people are MtoF, though. The majority are.

But there are FtoM trans people, and as others said upthread, most people just want to do whatever helps them cope in the world, which is both very understandable and, I can see, horribly difficult.

I think some people do fetishise femininity in a disturbing and reactionary way, but those people (it seems to me) are a vocal minority.

I am reading all this with an ever-dropping jaw - I had no idea it was so out of hand! And I'm a bit loath to type what I want to now, because it could be personally risky to me - but I'll try to keep it vague enough that no one will feel like tracking me down, and it's already been alluded to upthread - it sounds like it's just another way to oppress women born as women. Women born as men are attacking women born as women - because they were born as men. Just another excuse for us to be the bottom of the pile then, eh?

As another aside, why do they perceive being a woman as some gold standard? When it's pretty clear historically and still now that women are often seen as second class citizens, if they even achieve that level in some areas of the world. That confuses me. I understand the "being born in the wrong body", "Having the wrong brain" - and completely sympathise with that and the need to do something about it - but I don't get that we're somehow lucky to have been born women and that makes us enviable.

Sorry I can't resist adding my DDs to the acronyms list

AFBB (assigned female before birth)

If I have the time and haven't been BBd I might do an experiment, copying a random selection of tweets from TAs, their allies and those accused of being TERFs. I think the language used by the different groups might be telling, but I'm not 100% sure.

ITA heart

I also hate it when someone who thinks they are a trans ally says something they think is supportive but that indicates in some way that transwomen have not always been completely female in every way. They get jumped on from a great height by people they are trying to be friends with or give support to. It's sad, especially when they try to apologise / capitulate and are ostracised and piled on.

noble there are very very few pitchforks raised against men who say transphobic things on social media or in the press.

Nope.

And interestingly, there has been some talk about how much more awful it would be for men to be threatened with rape online. Presumably because women have had it so long now they should just accept it? Or are immune to it or something.

I'm struck by the similarity to the tactics used by 'gamergate' supporters. Releasing personal details, rape threats, threats on women's families. Do these things happen to men?

Option B Noble.

Do they petition men's rights activists to support their causes in the same way? Do they complain about men-only spaces discriminating against women who identify as men? Prostate exams and testicular cancer campaigns?

Or is it just attacking women?

Yep, misgendering counts as violence when feminists do it.
Never noticed any men being called out on it though

WWFD, or you would get a torrent of abuse, including threats to reveal your identity, hurt your family/you or rape you. If you attempt to argue back you will be accused of trying to drive a TW to suicide and/or triggering a panic attack or similar. Denying their feelings and identity,

Even using the wrong pronoun by accident, easy to do on twitter, is violence towards the TA.

LRD is on that thread I thought she had gone.

I never get earnest, well-meaning young people.

WWFD, depending on who sees your tweets, you might, or you might just get some very earnest and well-meaning young people tweeting at you to try and educate you

(F)AMAB = (Forcibly) Assigned Male at Birth

AFAB = Assigned Female at Birth = the highest level of privilege in the universe, known or unknown

spirited I agree with what you've written and with others that have said that would be enough to make you a TERF even on feminist websites.

One of the most notorious "TERFs" who was banned from twitter after a campaign by TAs is Cathy Brennan. She's a US lawyer who did a lot of actual, real life, effective activism for LGB and T issues including successfully lobbying for legislation prohibiting discrimination against trans people in housing and the workplace. She co-wrote a letter to the UN suggesting that in cases of sex-segregated spaces, males could not claim to be women based on "gender identity" if they had no prior history of transgenderism. At that time, she used female pronouns for trans women and stated she accepted them "as women". She was immediately and viciously attacked for her "transphobia" including rape threats, threats against her children and publishing her home address etc. Rather than capitulating and meekly accepting her admonishment like a woman should, she initially tried to explain why she was not transphobic but then basically said "fuck you" and said she had only been using female pronouns / accepting TW "as women" out of respect which she no longer felt. She still supports anti-discrimination legislation for trans other than in sex segregated spaces.

Now she's banned from twitter, there is less chatter about her but many TAs and mainstream feminists consider her "literally" (sic) the worst person in the world.

So if I went on twitter and said 'penises are male, vaginas are female' I'd be labelled by some as a bigot, TERF, scum ...