Is using TRA rude and dismissive (a bit like how the word T**F) is used?

Being 'included' in feminism doesn't mean being sent a badge, coming to special meetings etc.

ALL women are on the minds of feminists when issues are discussed. Not just the ones who are in the gang.

EG fighting for abortion rights will help trans and non binary females.

That's what feminism is for all women means.

It also draws a boundary. The things we are focused on are thinks that impact women. Some of the things agitated for will also help males, as a by product.

To say that feminism will work for what male trans people want, expands the scope of the remit. If some males are included why not others? As males have a lot of the same problems irrespective of gender ID.

And how and why should we be excluding trans men, when they need some of the same things as us?

It doesn't make sense. Especially given that our sexed bodies are the root of the enormous amount of oppression women and girls are under all around the world and for millennia.

The concept of trans exclusionary radical feminism I think is neutral

It isn't, because it is creating a term that is only meaningful if you accept transgender ideology. If focuses on 'exclusion' rather than on being critical of gender constructs.

Feminists and other people who are critical of transgender ideology are focused on protecting the integrity and the reality of the female experience; and on protecting the spaces, services and sports that have been set aside for females.

• Trans men don't want GC feminists as allies.

We've had transmen posting on here who do... who are 'GC feminists'. As they're female, they're part of feminism if they so wish.

Your silly generalisation leads nowhere useful.

However, like TERF, TRA is only used by people opposing the position, and unfortunately I don't know of a term that trans rights activist use. Transgender-inclusive feminists is a reasonable description, but I don't know if GC feminists would accept it

It's been said before, but not everyone who is critical of transgender ideology identifies with the label 'feminist'. I don't, even though I do centre women and girls/females in my thinking on certain issues, Gender critical is all that is needed.

This is sophistry. If you exclude trans women from your feminism, then you are trans exlusionary. Trans men do not consider gender critical feminists to be their allies.

How is this sophistry?

The claim is that we are 'Trans Exclusionary'. Yet not all trans people are excluded - so how does that make any sense?

It is not really relevant as to whether transmen (or non-binary, aromantic, agender, cloudgender etc) wish to be included in gc feminism or not - we are not including them by force, they are free to do as they wish but they are not being excluded on the basis that they are trans.

I do find this whole part of the conversation interesting. The first time I came across the term 't*f' was a picture showing an effigy of a woman with a noose around her neck being carried along at some sort of Pride event with the caption, 'Ritual hanging of the T*f'.

Which, I must say, shocked me somewhat.

I would be interested Dadjoke to know what term you would use for the transsexuals who support women's rights to single sex spaces? In general these people very much support the gc view. They can't realistically be called t**fs as that sounds utterly ridiculous but what do you call them?

I am very much a fan of live and let live. I am also a fan of not letting any male people decide to use single sex facilities, spaces and provisions that are intended for female people.

Gender critical feminism and radical feminism are two different things.

Whether or not transmen wan to be included by GC feminists is neither here or there. Feminism is for all women of the XX variety. And GC feminists are not a monolith either. Some will personally feel that transmen are included and some will not feel that way.

Trans men don't want GC feminists as allies.

www.huckmag.com/perspectives/opinion-perspectives/why-are-trans-men-always-left-out-of-the-conversation/

jayhulme.com/blog/transmen

The concept of trans exclusionary radical feminism I think is neutral, in the sense that gender critical feminists literally do not think trans women are women, so they exclude them from their feminism.

Gender critical feminism, radical feminism, second wave feminism all exclude males including transwomen. Not transpeople en masse. Any woman, regardless of how she chooses to present, is including in feminism. Transmen may have specific health or other needs based on their female biology and feminists will fight for their right to access whatever support they need accordingly. So 'TERF' is a factually incorrect term, and is mainly used in a derogatory fashion to try to shut down debate. Far from neutral.

The conflict is that transgender people should have the right to have their gender identity accepted, and be included in spaces which match their gender, while GC feminists dispute that gender identity is even a real thing, and that all spaces which benefit from such segregation by should be separated entirely on the grounds of sex.

Sex segregation is based on different biological needs. What would be the purpose of gender segregation?

The concept of trans exclusionary radical feminism I think is neutral, in the sense that gender critical feminists literally do not think trans women are women, so they exclude them from their feminism.

But include trans men and females of all gender identities so not trans exclusionary.

The concept of trans exclusionary radical feminism I think is neutral, in the sense that gender critical feminists literally do not think trans women are women, so they exclude them from their feminism.

However people are mortally offended by the term TERF, and it's been thrown around as an insult. "Gender critical feminist" is a term that people who don't think TWAM use here to describe their position, so I use it, too.

Trans rights activists is a fair description of those people who are fighting for transgender rights, even if GC feminists dispute that it's rights they are fighting for. The conflict is that transgender people should have the right to have their gender identity accepted, and be included in spaces which match their gender, while GC feminists dispute that gender identity is even a real thing, and that all spaces which benefit from such segregation by should be separated entirely on the grounds of sex.

However, like TERF, TRA is only used by people opposing the position, and unfortunately I don't know of a term that trans rights activist use. Transgender-inclusive feminists is a reasonable description, but I don't know if GC feminists would accept it.

I've started using 'gender extremists' to refer to those pushing the madder edges of the ideology.

(Longstanding poster here btw, just had a LoD-inspired name change.)

No one is threatening TRAs with rape and death threats, creating memes with nooses, baseball bats studded with nails or wrapped with barbed wire, making videos of having their backs broken, or being beheaded, guillotined, and garrotted. No one is cancelling or deplatforming TRAs, the police isn't arresting them for the hate speech that they produce, collude with, or remain silent about.

I could go on, but you get the picture. No one uses TRA with the same violent or insulting qualifiers that are typically used with the words b!tch, c*nt, and wh0re.

So some people are mildly dissatisfied with the implications that comes with TRA especially when their 'allies' behave like the above.
This is not a problem. This is a reflection of what they have allowed to happen in their name.

Oh and men are waaayyy worse to other men when it comes to short/ overweight etc. Let's not forget that.

Sorry that was a real diversion!

I suppose my main point is that

Too many men see women they don't personally know as 2D cutouts of a handful of 'types'

Too many men have been really strongly influenced to connect woman/ girl with trappings (clothes hair makeup etc) to the point that that's pretty much all they see, not even recognising that it's a person not an automaton designed to look sexy to men (sexual harassment of younger schoolgirls being a good example)

So many to men it makes sense to say. If I put on these trappings then I will be seen as a woman
If I put on these trappings then I'll be seen as a woman even if I only do it on Mondays and Wednesdays. The rest of the time I present as male. And anyone who misgenders me on a lady day is just being mean
If I put on these trappings then I am a woman because that's what a woman is

I am growing increasingly angry tbh.

Female people are half the population of the world. We are still oppressed horribly all over the world because of it.

The words female, woman, girl. Have well understood meanings. Yes there are social expectations overlaid but these words relate to sex.

And lately. Just lately. We get.

The word woman has always been an identity. Nothing to do with sex. Prove otherwise.

Sex is very complicated. On a spectrum. Not important in society. Gender is the important thing. Prove otherwise.

Opening sex segregated up on a self known gender is fine. And in fact how it's always been. Prove otherwise.

Women and girls are not oppressed on the basis of their biology. Prove otherwise.

Etc etc.

It's so insulting. Some person on I think it was UN women Twitter said women were a formless entity. Or something.

Wtf?

Yes I'm sick of it tbh.

And the way the people who use 'inclusive' language do not do so consistently... Shows that they don't really believe any of it, not in the end.

That's true Helen and I know eating disorders in boys etc are on the rise. That's just really awful. I don't want boys to end up in the same boat as girls. I want to hit reverse so both sexes are happier.

Another random thought (sorry I have a lot).

Yes boys feel more pressure BUT

in the media we consume- especially films from the usa- all sorts of blokes are presented. Ones who are smaller, ones who are geeky, ones who are overweight. Ones with no social skills. Etc etc. And the women and girls? Less of them. Still generally good looking. Often the romantic interest of the main bloke

Often she's not interested. Almost always she's not interested. And what happens? He pines. He presses. Maybe he stalks her a bit. Maybe he does some pretty horrible things to her. And then, she changes her mind. And falls into the arms of the geeky/ boring/ unpleasant/ short/ etc chap.

I know it's an aside but it's a terrible message and one that I've read (from an ex incel) really feeds into the 'owed a beautiful woman' view.

Flyingfox- yes. And it really is everywhere.

The majority of shop mannequins. When you're allowed back into clothes shops have a look

The male ones stand normally.
The female ones are often totally nuts. Feet pointing in and arms in all sorts of bizarre contortions. Head is often weirdly positioned as well.

I embarrass my kids by trying to adopt the poses of the female dummies

But I never used to even notice. Not at all. All this stuff, mostly we don't even notice it, it's so ubiquitous. But it's constant drip drip.

When you notice looking around becomes really annoying and I'm pretty annoyed a lot ! But you can't unsee it, because it's here there and everywhere.

Women are taught that they should look past the physical (haha).

Although there are some areas where men have it equally rough - in particular, the attitudes of many women towards short men seem to me very similar to how certain (/many) men can be about overweight women.

With women in society being much more sexualised, I think maybe those 'cues' embed more? And pretty much everything is for the het male gaze and it's so ubiquitous they don't realise. When I was commuting into London I used to look around and think. What if all these images of women were replaced with ones of men. Not David Beckham or the diet Coke thing. But men who are photographed like women. Passive, mainly. Like in some of the stuff for gay men (I found a pretty hard core magazine on the tube on the way home after a night out in the 90s... I had never seen pics of men looking... Dunno. Coy? Submissive? Flirty... Looking demurely up at the camera while toying with underwear type thing). Anyway. What if all the images of women were replaced with ones of men not looking powerful but vulnerable etc. I know for a fact it would feel like the pics were everywhere and most men would feel really very uncomfortable.

That’s a really interesting point, and I wonder about this sort of thing quite a lot too.

Meanwhile, as a het woman. Most men wear boring clothes. Suits shirts jeans. Not much flesh on show. Not clingy. Why? Because the most important thing about them is not their body. Or so we're told. It's their personality, how funny they are. How rich they are (FFS). So the presentation is not important really. Clean, smart, job done. (Not my type but anyway).

Absolutely. And it’s so universal and we’re all so completely used to it we don’t really question it until we consciously start thinking about it.

Completely agree jellyfrizz - very good point

Some believe gender norms are harmful and that being trans is a way of subverting those norms.

There are also many who believe that gender norms occur because males and females are fundamentally different physically and psychologically (e.g. that females are biologically programmed to be homemakers and carers because they can have babies) and that trans people are born with a mismatching brain and body.

On a feminist chat board there is very likely to be a lot to agree with people holding the first view, very little with the second.

@NiceGerbil - just a very small thought to add to your musings. I always thought that the men you see in the undies section of catalogues, mainly look really stiff and uncomfortable, often gazing impenetrably into the distance, whereas women, who are used to "the male gaze" look much more relaxed. It would be interesting to see men cavorting happily in silk boxers and looking a bit "come hither". Sorry if I have added to the derailing of the thread.

Regarding men looking demure and vulnerable in advertising, there is a film on Netflix at the moment “I am not an easy man” which explores these ideas. I really enjoyed it. Watched it with a teenage daughter at her request and we found it gave us lots to think about and talk about.

I think that there is so much in that idea Nicegerbil. We are bombarded with imagery 24/7 from birth all from the point of view of male as subject and female as object.

I really recommend the film “I am not an easy man”, it is a comedy and we found it pretty funny considering the deeper point it makes.