Radfem2012 banning trans people

[allthegoodnamesweretaken]

www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/may/25/radical-feminism-trans-radfem2012?fb=native&CMP=FBCNETTXT9038

Has anyone seen this? I don't really understand this bigotry against trans gendered people.
If we're trying to make the world a better and equal place through feminism, surely excluding people who also want to do this because of their genitals or the gender they assign themselves is going to make this impossible and is a bit hypocritical?

I'm under the impression that the reason for the radical feminist conference is to discuss issues that have arisen as a direct result of the biology of being a woman born woman. Would it not be rude for anyone not willing to participate to turn up and insist the agenda be modified? I'm under the impression that tranactivists (not necessarily individuals like Kim) are seeking to cause disruption to the planned event. There's certainly disruption before the event in the form of this thread.

There are some incredibly articulate posts that explain this earlier in this thread. Beachcomber springs o mind. And starsand'somethingorother.

WW, it's already been explained a number of times on this thread that in order for an oppressed group to fight their oppression, they need to organise politically on the basis of what they hold in common. Women-only organising is a political strategy, not an ideological reification of gender.

"to discuss issues that have arisen as a direct result of the biology of being a woman born woman."

Itsnotunusual - they also discuss things which directly affect transpeople, or do you reckon Sheila Jeffreys will not air her anti-trans views at the conference?

prolesworth - oh, it's a "strategy", not "ideology". Rightyo.

I dont view MTF trans people as women

if it is all so fluid and undefinable, and less defined 'man' 'woman' is what you are after---why would trans people have such a problem with being born into a mans body; if you are saying that genetalia/boobs etc are not important?

Widow adman -I have no idea! It a guess th issues that also directly affect transpeople affect them in a different way.

I confess I'd have to google Sheila Jeffries which feels like cheating !! And I have no idea whether she plans to say anything anti-trans.

Are radical feminists the biggest source of problems to the trans-community? I'd have thought the patriarchy is more anti-trans than radical feminists.

As an aside, the welsh for auntie is anti - so you can imagine how much I need to concentrate when I'm reading! :)(imagine Ruth jones shouting "yoo hoo Anti Trans, ar'ewe'aving'uh'drink down uh social after now" )

I dont think saying MTF trans are not the same as women, is anti trans, is it?

WW the whole point of feminism is that it is "what about the wimminz" that's kind of the whole idea and I find your response terribly flippant given that it was in response to posts about the situation for women globally including the missing millions.

How exactly is refusing the slave-master access to slave shack, upholdi.g the status quo?

"The idea I get from the radfem posting on here though is, that instead of wanting to get away from the binary, they insist on reinforcing it - because what else is the insistence on "women born women only" spaces, if not separatism and upholding the status quo."

Because women born women might not "feel" that they have a gender, or that if they have on it is more in line with the stereotype for male. That doesn't mean they aren't women though.

I still want to know what you are going to do with girls who do not "feel" feminine / female gendered, and just feel like themselves. What do you want to call them?

You need to stop confusing sex with gender. Maybe that will help.

My sex is female.
My gender (that I feel inside) is none to speak of.
My gender as assigned at birth and reinforced throughout my life externally is female.

I have rather come round to the opinion that in this specific case, the transactivists demanding access to this event are doing the rest of the trans community no favours at all. It's a small group with opinions regarded as extreme by some feminists; it's a group that has no power at all to harm transpeople as a group. The Radfems are entitled to one bloody afternoon to discuss their stuff with people who agree with them FFS. It would have been a far, far better idea for the transactivists to organise another event, elsewhere and big it up as 'for all women, FAAB or not'.
I'm coming at this I suppose from my own core principle, which is anti-censorship and which means that you don't suppress people who are doing or saying stuff you dislike and disagree with (unless their method of expressing their view involves direct actual harm to their opponents' bodies or indeed property) - you put your own argument forward to everyone else.

I find the statement 'foetuses are by default female til testosterone kicks in' really problematic. there is no development of external genitalia at 6 weeks. Absence of a penis/testicles does not equal female, it is ludicrous to suggest it is.

embryos at 5 days or so (before gastrulation and neurulation) resemble a blackberry. does that mean the default human state is a blackberry? Or before 12 weeks or so, they are limbless or have limb buds. Is that our default state? Perhaps it is that stage where embryos have gill slits.

can you see how offensive and wrong it is to define 'woman' as 'not-a-man'?

And, if on the inside that blackberry is XY, it is male.

"The idea I get from the radfem posting on here though is, that instead of wanting to get away from the binary, they insist on reinforcing it - because what else is the insistence on "women born women only" spaces, if not separatism and upholding the status quo."

Or is it it the transexuals reinforcing the binary, by insisting on getting into the most exclusive of women-only spaces? I think that might be the key issue for the activist transexuals (acknowledging that most of them aren't anywhere in sight, they're just quietly living their lives)--they insist on being taken seriously as women, under any and every set of circumstances, including among women who take the most radical positions as far as women's rights are concerned. It's as if a radical-feminist conference is the last peak left unconquered, so it has to be done "because it's there". And some might say, that's actually a very male view of the world right from the start.

who cares about foetuses?

its life expereineces in formative years, and biology once born which makes a woman a woman.

Stop turning it inside out and denying women being women

I think do I care about the point that foetuses are somehow 'default' females.

Women?s biology has been central to so many misogynistic arguments. The idea of a woman as a biologically aberrant, inferior form of a man goes to the roots of Western culture. It?s in the Bible story that Eve was formed out of Adam?s rib and so is a lesser, defective version of him. Adam is a man in God?s image ? and Eve is a tiny part of that. Then people believed women were biologically aberrant because we bleed monthly and blood is associated with pollution or death. And people believed we were less than men because our wombs made us too weak or irrational to cope ? even as late as 1900, serious arguments were put forward that women?s bodies were physically incapable of standing up to the rigors of higher education, and that women who tried to think too hard would damage their reproductive abilities. People have theorized that women?s sex organs are an inversion of men?s, and have tried to find a female ?g spot? so as to provide some pseudo-scientific ?support? for the idea that the kinds of sex that are best for most men should also be best for most women. Loads of men (and women) still do not have much awareness of female biology ? see how many people know where the clitoris actually is! But no-one would be so ignorant of male biology. If you look at almost any thread about problems with periods or labour or breastfeeding or the menopause, you?ll find examples of the medical community simply not having the foggiest idea about women?s biology. Or not caring. How many women will have shared the experience of someone dismissing their biology by belittling them when they?re in pain or by claiming there is no solution to that pain.

This is why I find it so upsetting when people dismiss women?s biology, or say women are just ?non-men?, or say foetuses are ?default female? because they don?t have male genitalia. This argument is so rooted in the misogynistic views of women?s bodies I can?t help finding it appalling.

There is a huge difference between the statment 'a man is not a woman' and the definition of 'woman' being 'not-man'. One is an observation, the other summarizes a misogynistic perspective from which 'woman' is primarily an absence of 'man-ness'.

I could also say a man is not a cow, a flower or a wall. None of these suggest the word 'man' does not a have a rich meaning to it, or that male identity is definitively negative.