Complaining about an "anti-TERF" workshop at YIWW - help please!

Only misogynists use the word t* but I don’t think you can say there was a “ruling” in the Yardley case. A comment was made but I think you’re overstating it to say it has any kind of relevant legal weight.

Stick to what the others on this thread have suggested.

Here is page after page of horrendous abuse directed at people who disagree with TRA ideology. Might be useful.

terfisaslur.com/

DadJoke it is a fairly indiscriminately used term these days, though. Anyone can be labelled a t**f, including men like Graham Linehan and trans women like Miranda, and it doesn't necessarily have to be because you disagree that TWAW. The problem is that once you have the label, anything you might say is irrelevant and you will be ignored. I suppose I wanted to try to get around that somehow, but perhaps it isn't possible. I'm very disheartened tbh.

I see this, yes. People are unfairly labelled as terfs and dismissed for any disagreement with the TRA party line. It works like "witch" in that sense.

Well done GraceMarks. What you are doing is admirable and you're exclusion from these women's space is sad.

I think we need to look at clubbing together to start female-only events welcoming to all ages and beliefs.

The women's movement appears to have been co-opted. We need each other, young and old (I.e. older women are not alone in finding all this appalling). We can just start new spaces.

Yes, they'd be protested initially but if we just carried on doing it they'd get tired of protesting it in the end.

Need to crowdfund a pot of money for women who want to set up their own female-only spaces I think. I will put this on my list for "when I've extracted myself enough from harmful spaces" but maybe there are women out there who could do it sooner.

I can't see a way of explaining why it's insulting without saying that you don't think trans women are women, because it's an insult directed at women who don't think trans women are women.

If saying transwoman aren't women is transphobic then all doctors are transphobic, and all lawmakers. There are specific instructions in the equality act to reflect this.

However. You can easily talk about the issue without even mentioning it. Nic Williams does it all the time. She talks of bodies. Male bodies.

OP I would just draw attention to the inflammatory nature of the word, quoting some violent threats such as the twitter examples above, and say that you're shocked that people who are so effective - usually- at rejecting oppression and simplistic hate words, would use it. Overkill on how great they are.

GraceMarks, you are sensible to separate the analysis of what's going on from the presentation of what this means to people "outside" this issue. Persuasion is an important part of this and "proving people wrong" doesn't always win the day.

Give them information to enable them to open their own eyes. Don't go grabbing for their eyelids.

You could point out that, as people here have said, that it is a word often coupled with threats of violence and so liberally applied as to become a way to legitimise violence against women and girls who have any kind of alternate thoughts or opinions about this issue.

One does not have to actually believe in excluding trans women to be called one. Many "terfs" (so-called) believe that transsexual women should be welcome in female space (for example) because they experience sexism in the world, but do not believe that self-ID is a good idea because then males who id as women but look like men and do not experience any disadvantage from sexism would be allowed.

There are also people branded "TERFs" who believe in including trans-masculine and "non-binary" females in female space (I'd wager most would actually).

So it is a mostly inaccurate term applied to mostly women of a variety of views, which nuanced arguments and it is very much tied to threats and violence.

Additionally, people are called TERFs when they aren't even radical feminists.

So this terms is being misapplied, largely to women who have an opinion which is not the status quo opinion, or to men who support those women, and is used to encourage violence.

It is a sexist slur.

DadJoke Yes, I am aware of how the term 'phobia' is generally used, but interesting how you claim you don't want to mansplain/threadcrap whilst doing just that, maintaining the largest word-count and declaring to everyone your opinions which were not asked for to boot... To define women - ourselves - by our use of scientific facts does not imply transphobia in terms of projecting any hatred whatsoever to transpeople - and many who agree with us ARE trans people and get called 'truscum'. The term is used against GC feminists, but also anyone who dares question TWAW, I also have some examples of this.

I would suggest that the word others and dehumanises women. Whether they agree with gc way of thinking it is dangerous to give potential abusers a socially approved way to target women.

I would major on the violent and threatening language of fight and war: threatening violence against women is never a good look.

No it isn't. You can't just make up your own reality and expect everyone to fall into line when it goes against everything they know. What that does is devalue the word "transphobic" so that it applies to everyone in some way except the most extremist purveyors of the ideology.

Saying trans women are men is transphobia 101. Just look what happened when the gender critical women hijacked the LGBTQ march in London.

Saying TWAM pretty much kills any chance of your view being heard and accepted outside gender critical circles, however right it is. That's why Martina, Paula Radcliffe and others are able to engage respectfully and any accusations of transphobia are hollow to people watching their threads - the people you want to influence.

I am not doing the "what is a women" thing on this thread. If you want to start a thread on the topic I'll reluctantly engage, but I suspect we'll be retreading old ground. Also, an extended take my view on the subject is probably pretty worthless to people on this forum. I've been told this multiple times by you and others..
.

TERF is being used as a threat and an insult. It is used to silence people who believe that sex based stereotypes are harmful to all people and that we should not be categorised by the way we dress, speak or wear our hair.

Gender Critical people would like to break down gender stereotypes and see all humans as valid, respected and equal whatever their presentation and reject polarisation according to socially constructed stereotypes. They reject oppression based on sex and reject categorisation based on external factors. The accept the right of everyone to express themselves without harm to others.

The creation of hate surrounding the word TERF and the use of the word in association with threats of violence, doxxing and arrest is silencing those who wish to reject gender stereotypes and sex based oppression.

they are of the gender women

This idea that 'woman' is a gender is what I wholly reject. Woman is adult, human, female. I am a woman because I'm an adult, human, female. I don't conform to feminine ideals, I hate that we force people into gender boxes at all. The idea that that means in your philosophy I'm therefore not a woman is completely offensive.

Laws were written using the word woman to mean people like me - adult, human, female. They didn't mean people who subscribe to the idea of a woman being a set of sex stereotypes but who aren't adult, human, females. Sex. Not Gender.

Dad - Re "saying trans women are not women is transphobic"

Transphobia is about prejudice, hate, and discrimination directed at trans people.

"Trans women are not women" is a statement of biological fact. It's all fine to say "I feel like a woman", enjoy wearing makeup and dresses, take hormones and grow breasts, etc if that is what you want to do but unless you are a female adult human, you are not and can never be a woman.

If you disagree, I suggest you check out the word Woman in any dictionary and learn that it is defined as Adult Human Female.

And, whether you like it or not, saying trans women are not women is transphobic.

No it isn't. You can't just make up your own reality and expect everyone to fall into line when it goes against everything they know. What that does is devalue the word "transphobic" so that it applies to everyone in some way except the most extremist purveyors of the ideology.

Also: what's a woman? What is a male person identifying as to be a "trans woman"?

abuseofpowercomesasnosurprise Yes - it's easy to prove it's insulting. It's frequently used combined with death threats and dehumanisation. The issue is - who does it insult? And the answer is gender critical feminists. I suppose if you pointed them at the website with all the terf-based insults it might do the job, but there is a danger that they will say that it's only directed at gender critical feminists, thereby going against OP's request

Transphobia isn't "fear" of transgender people any more than homophobia is fear of gay people or Islamaphobia is fear of Muslims. The suffix -phobia has been broadened in meaning.

I think that trans women are male - that is they were born with the typical genotype and phenotype of a person with XY chromosomes. I call that male. I don't think people are assigned female I think they are identified female or male, or intersex. This probably makes me transphobic. If I am transphobic, then I am transphobic.

I think they are of the gender women, that is culturally and sometimes legally women. (I know everyone here disagrees with me and I don't want to engage again on this thread on this subject, partly because it gets nowhere, and partly because I don't want to be accused of thread crapping or mansplaining.)

The term is applied to people who are not radical feminists and to women who are inclusive of trans people who are female, ie transmen.

The term doesn't mean what those who supports its use say it means. So what does it mean? As this thread shows, it's a derogatory term used as a slur.

I have plenty more where these came from if you want them, there's no shortage of supply...

Or this very recent example of the term used on IWD:

twitter.com/KieranBennett/status/1103928452283944960

TERF graves are gender neutral bathrooms

DadJoke It's quite easy to explain how it's insulting actually, you just need to look at the examples I'm giving you of how it's used mainly by men and transwomen to threaten women with violence. Regardless of how objectionable you may find anyone's views - and no, to define people as male of female is not 'transphobic', not a 'fear' of trans people, but a statement of fact - to threaten violence is unacceptable.

Good luck Grace. I hope you have more success than I did. I didnt intend to quit on it but work life has gotten in.the way recently!