TERF

[ReallyFuckingFedUp]

So I have seen this expression a lot lately... and TERF gets thown out a lot when feminists are discussing things that are only capable of affecting biologically female women.

And I just can't get my head around it tbh. I don't think feminism should exclude people I think it helps everyone. I get really upset when white feminists forget about WOC or Lesbians, or other minority groups because the point of feminism is to make women's lives better. SO if there an issue that is unique to black women (for example) it is still all of our issue and should be dealt with by all feminist.

So if trans women want in on feminism why do they think can exclude the majority of women by saying we can't discuss our issues? And if trans people want to be accepted and have their rights championed by feminism is that fair since the majority of feminists aren't also suffering those same problems? Is it not a huge double standard?

Abortion rights and prenatal care and contraceptive health, vaginal rape. Are these things off the table now for feminism?

Am I getting it wrong, missing something? It feels to me like male privilege, telling women what they can and can't talk about..and doing so in a way where they actually feel guilty as though they have done something wrong.

I think a lot of islamophobia is tied to racism but I don't think it's helpful to tell someone they're not experiencing islamophobia. It's similar, for me.

calmet I don't think it's bisexuals, it's apolitical gits

Yes I think the effect is the same, sorry if I seemed to be minimising that, not the intention, just that the cause is slightly different IYSWIM. Although maybe it's not, I've just realised that a thread on lesbophobia might be useful to discuss this. I haven't really thought that much about why there is such a thing as lesbophobia at all and what the causes are and how it connects to misogyny generally and anti-homosexuality. Am busy doing laundry at the mo but might start a thread later if anyone's interested in discussing this? Unless anyone else wants to start a thread of course.

Julia, I know it is women who are apolitical, but most lesbians even if they are actually anti feminist, don't want to have sex with someone with a penis. Bisexual women who are apolitical, don't have that same gut feeling. So they are easier to influence with this queer theory.

Basil, I think lesbophobia is a form of misogyny. Is it worth naming separately? I think it is along as we remember that it is ultimately about misogyny.

Oh My God! I couldn't believe my eyes today! I saw a tall, bearded man wearing a t-shirt with the word "dyke" on it!! Super offensive. I wanted to ask him wtf he was doing, walking around with a lesbophobic slur on his chest, but didn't.

Not joking, this happened. Immediately thought of this thread and the male lesbian video.

Men are really into fetishising lesbianism but in a way that allows them to ignore the whole point which is that it doesn't involve men.
Hugo Schwyzer being one hideous example.
Some guy just made a joke about how he'd make a great lesbian on a friend's fb wall. It's everywhere

It is all about laughing at and erasing the idea that some women are lesbians and so don't want to have sex with any man.

When I was youngish, men seemed to hate lesbians and seemed to me to be disgusted by them, like they were disgusted by gay men. Then in the late 80s (although it may have been more connected to my age), men seemed to get very excited about lesbians. My guess is that this is porn related and men wanted to appropriate lesbianism as a man-pleasing activity, carried out on their terms of course. It's like the lack of understanding of women being out without their owner along the lines of "Are you [three, fully adult] ladies on your own?" but ten times worse. Sorry if this is lesbsplaining, not meant that way.

Gay men don't seem to be targetted by this queer theory in the same way as women are though. I read something yesterday I couldn't get my head around. I have heard from lots of lesbians that FTM transition rates are quite high. I didn't realise there were women transitioning and then becoming gay transmen - having sex with gay men. The blog I read was very sad, talking about these transmen (without bottom surgery) having sex with gay men without condoms, getting into BDSM and having DP threesomes with two gay men. I know people IRL who are into BDSM, I know gay men who are very promiscuous, none of that bothers me at all, though not my thing but there seems something desperately sad about this that I can't quite put my finger on.

Men used to just deny that lesbianism existed at all didn't they.

And then I guess when women started to identify as lesbians and there was enough of a critical mass to not be able to deny the actual existence of lesbianism as a real thing, the only way to deal with it is to appropriate it. If the ruling caste can appropriate the sexual independence of the oppressed class, then it's no longer independent is it? It belongs to men, just like everything else.

I was keeping up with this thread quite well until I got to Flora's post about lesbians becoming FtoM and then having sex with gay men......and then my mind refused to cope. It's sort of like a hideous, real life, double negative situation. Can I just comment on the bit upthead about whether women should find the thought of being in a changing room with a lesbian threatening (because the lesbian might be objectifying you). Well, apart from the fact that, of course it's not threatening because even in the remote likelihood of this happening (and I don't know of this ever ever happening to anyone I know), the lesbian is not physically stronger than than you and does not have a penis to rape you with (which is always the underlying threat when a man is objectifying you), apart from that.......you wouldn't know, would you? You wouldn't know that the woman getting changed next to you is a lesbian. Unless she has a sign around her neck or something (never experienced that either). But if it was a trans MtoF person - well, it would be pretty obvious when you see his/her penis that you are in the presence of someone who has the potential to harm you......and you'd feel threatened. Similarly, presumably gay men don't objectify women and are not a threat to them......but because they have penises nd no signs around their necks saying "I'm gay," you don't know that......so they are not allowed in your changing room. It's an obvious safety issue - if you don't have a penis then you can't rape me, please come into my changing room. If you do have a penis then, even though you may be gay or tans MtoF or impotent - because I cannot tell this, as you don't wear a sign around your neck, best you don't come in.

I know I am not posting very articulately on this issue, but I am finding it very shocking. Particularly distressed to read about young children having their bodies altered in such horrifying ways.

YY to all the above ^^

I've read some really horrendous stuff as a result of this thread. Stuff I didn't even realise was a thing iyswim. Women having their boundaries broken down like this, and being called bigots because of it... well, Not on. Not ever.

It's really opened my eyes to what all women are up against, and not in a good way.

Yes rosabud it's really shocking isn't.
And I even saw a "male dyke" today wtf!
Or perhaps it was just an ordinary sexist bloke with an ironic t-shirt. Difficult to tell the difference.

I must admit to being a raging TERF as I just cannot understand the illogicalness of the trans activist argument.

I am a bigot as I do not want penises in female only safe spaces.
If someone says they feel female then they are, I have no right to question it, they should be allowed to enter female only spaces, even if they have a penis and have no desire to change sex.
Cis women don't need to be protected from unwanted penis or else they're bigots.
Transwomen should be protected from unwanted penis, as it could trigger them.
I was raped in public toilets. I have no right to police who should be allowed into public toilets, if she says she is a woman she is. If I disagree I'm a bigot.
Transwomen are allowed to reject penis, if cis women reject penis it is bigotry.

Biology with all it's scientific proof behind it is really just bigotry
Gender without any proof behind it is fact.

Do I actually have this right?

Sadly, I think you do. Going by transactivists, anyway.

I'm sabrina, btw. nc'ed in awe of rik mayall.

Can I please become a FAAB person who decided she was a woman just so her opinion counted for something just this one time.

Just... well... what?

basil

Does the video link explain what was meant by harassment?

Sexual harassment. Of course.

I'm trying to understand why a person's "gender" is relevant when discussing them in changing rooms.

When you are naked all that matters is physical sex right? I don't give a fuck if you wear a dress, when the dress comes off, I don't want a strange naked man in the room with me.

Someone who likes women and has a penis, is a heterosexual man, and should not be there.

Nice, I like it when men tell me how I should take my feminism.

Dontcha just love it when a man tells women how to do feminism. Zero analysis of male behaviour in that article or indication that men should take any responsibility for transgenderism and the harmful constructs of gender.

I think that there is a certain amount of encouragement from men that women take on transwomen within feminism. It's women's role after all to be helpful. Upholds that aspect of gender hierarchy. That way they don't have to look at the way they treat them or any of the other aspects of the hierarchy of gender. It helps men to use up women's energy arguing about this or accommodating transwomen as it deflects attention away from other male behaviour. And they also get to blame violence against them on radfems. Radfems become the common enemy. Because we can't have them gaining too much of a voice with their uncompromising attitudes towards women's liberation.