feminism and transsexuel people

[sparky159]

ive started this thread as the other thread[reccomend a book]has now finished!
why do some feminists find it so hard to even think that transsexuel people exist?
and why cant they see that transsexuelism is a femminist issue?

It's difficult to see two lots of people who are both discriminated against in various ways directing their anger at each other.

I can see why some women find it galling that someone born and raised as a man should have as much of a voice as they have in defining "women's experience". Obviously that person has had a totally different experience, and will do as long as society continues to treat men and women as separate & different groups. For one thing, in a sexist society that person has been able to "pass" as a man, and reap the benefits that that involves - something that women-born-women cannot do.

On the other hand the person who feels at odds with the culture of their assigned (male) sex is going to be oppressed by society as well. First by being denigrated by a patriarchy that values "male" behaviours above "female" behaviours, then being alienated from a society that values the gender binary and views their very existence as an affront to the law of nature.

But TBH I think the fact that some people who were born male want to identify as female is the least of our worries. That's as long as transsexuals don't claim to have an equal or superior view of what "womanhood" involves - rich as that concept is in the experience of being identified female from birth and encountering the biological facts of being female. Both women and MTF transsexuals are subject to abuse, discrimination, misogyny, rape, assault, hatred etc etc etc - the whole sorry catalogue.

Ideally there wouldn't be a third sex, ideally the idea of your sex being a totally defining part of who you are - your interests, appearance, abilities, mindset all being dictated by it - would die out. But as long as MTF transsexuals are subject to the same ill-treatment in society because of their female identification - i.e. because they look like women they are being treated as badly as other women are - I don't have a problem with banding together with identifying women no matter what shape they were born.

We've got a common enemy and that is a culture where femaleness is hated and undervalued and attacked at every turn. Regardless of how some of us got here, we're all under the heel of the patriarchy's boot now and might as well work together to rebel against it.

Hear,hear,Elephants! (and I cannot believe how much time I've spent thinking about this whole collection of issues/threads in the past few weeks....)

WastingAway: If you want to bring it down to the specifics of loos - which isn't a bad idea actually - think about it this way.
A transwoman is very unlikely to mean harm to ciswomen when she is going into a public loo. However, for a transwoman to use a men's public loo, given that many men are transphobic to the point of violence, she is exposing herself to potential risk - far more of a risk than she herself presents to ciswomen. So surely transwomen should be able to use female loos without aggravation.

I agree with you SGB. If there was a single instance of a woman being assaulted by a transwoman (in the toilets or out) I would be surprised. A large part of the oppression of transwomen is due to the women part, not the trans part, I would think.

Yes SGB, in that specific instance, no problem. And I was talking about unisex loos in general rather than with regards trans.

But as some transgendered MTFs may have a penis, and be attracted to women, which is a possibility from everything I've read these last few weeks, then I don't think it right they should be allowed into women's refuges. Which was one of the points raised on the original thread.

Of course, in the world we're working towards, there would be no need for refuges and it won't matter, but in the here and now, details matter I think.

Wastingaway: So where should a trans victim of abuse go, then? Given that abuse is a serious problem for transpeople, even if there were plenty of refuges for male victims of domestic violence, a transwoman would hardly feel safe there.
Also, WRT refuges, it must sometimes occur that women who enter them behave badly and may even be violent to other inmates: not everyone who has suffered is necessarily a nice person - surely a refuge could operate a policy of expelling those who behave badly.

I think this is why trans activists get so angry: transpeople (particularly transwomen) can be made to feel they are not welcome anywhere - despite the fact that they are generally unthreatening, nonviolent people: men are more likely to be physically hostile towards them so telling them they are only allowed in 'male space' could be percieved as not caring that they are in danger, because they are a minority and therefore 'don't matter'.

SGB,I've been working up to posting that same question.?
Hypothetical trans woman,living as woman for 20+years,battered by partner - where does she go? Why not to a womans refuge? Are there enough trans people suffering abuse to have dedicated refuges for them?

Whoops,too many question marks....

Surely the line is, if you're being beaten up by someone who perceives you as his property, partly because you are (living as) a woman, get yourself to a women's refuge.

That's what I wondered Pogleswood, as violence is such a big issue for the trans community, why not have a dedicated refuge?

SGB, I think that's the issue, that the non-male space is currently female space. That's part of the problem, that being not-male is equated with being female.

wastingaway,we aren't talking about a lot of people though ,are we.My question rather assumed that the answer to it would be "no",perhaps I am wrong though.
I still don't agree that not-male is equated with being female,any more than not-female equates as male.I do think that both are assumed in our society,because it is very divided on gender grounds,but not one more than the other.

oh i absolutely agree that not female does not equate to male

oh nopedey nope nope.

thats the whole point. its all one way traffic from that perspctive.

i mean, think about it, if you are a man (born) and you dont feel like a man, then wouldnt it make more sense to challenge what it means to be male? rather than co-opting being a woman?

It's been too long, Shrieking.

Female children are more at risk but if I refer to "females" it sounds weird, so I'm sticking with women.

Let's assume for the purposes of this and all discussions that I wasn't born yesterday and am aware of other forms of discrimination. The one we're talking about right here is gender based, kay?

Brilliant that you think rape and assauly are not gender centric issues. Nor is misogyny apparently.

sorry for hijack

ALso (sorry, RL intervened today ie had to go and work) - what is the average refuge policy on teenage boys? Given that a boy of 14/15 might be physically big and even intimidating to look at, that doesn't mean such a boy might not have to flee along with mother and siblings from an abusive father. A boy in his early teens can't live alone, yet his presence might be distressing to other women in a refuge even if he himself poses no threat to anyone and is as much a victim as his mother or any other inhabitant of the refuge - what happens in such a case?

So, everybody believes that XX = woman and XY = male?

How do you explain people who are XXY or XO or XY but with androgen insensitivity syndrome so will to all intents and purposes be female until they find out they're infertile because a womb didn't develop etc etc etc

Does everybody here believe that man and woman is as simple as XX and XY?

I think it is significant that the category into which an intersex baby is placed is usually determined by doctors at or very shortly after birth, obviously without the knowledge or consent of the intersex person. Trans people are re-assigned later in life with their knowledge and consent.(Currently the youngest post-operative MtF trans is 16 years old).

Doesn't the fact that people feel the need to physically change their appearance through hormones and surgery, suggest that the socially constructed ideas of "male" and "female" are not actually very accurately aligned to real life and how real individuals feel?

"i mean, think about it, if you are a man (born) and you dont feel like a man, then wouldnt it make more sense to challenge what it means to be male? rather than co-opting being a woman? " (frikonastick)

Who says that a MTF trans person is motivated by not feeling like a man as opposed to wanting to be (or believing s/he actually is) a woman?

MsHighwater - have you read any accounts from trans people? I have and the motivation is that they do not feel that they fit into the 'man' box, they feel like a woman.