Following on from the TERF thread...

[CailinDana]

Trying to get my head straight on this. Surely the whole malarkey around transwomen wanting to be recognised as women even though they have penises will eventually actually help to break down the idea of gender?

What I mean is, if a person with a penis can be labelled a woman simply because they want to be labelled in that way, surely gender becomes meaningless as it tells you nothing meaningful about a person except perhaps the clothes they like to wear?

This is a half-formed thought, feel free to develop/challenge.

great stuff beach

Yes, Beach, exactly. Very well said!

agree buffy, I made a similar point upthread. what brought it home to me was kim explaing about the f on her driving licence and the difference that makes. simple and measurable. vs the radfem perspective which is a bit out there at first.

[[Lightbulb][

Good point Buffy.

I do understand what you mean Buffy - I think where radical feminists disagree with liberals is to the transgressive nature of transgenderism.

As I say above, in radfeminism, transitioning is analysed as being deeply conservative and patriarchal. It is seen as a manifestation of gender and a consequence of a belief in gender as being a personal concept rather than a political hierarchy. Indeed of gender as existing as anything other than a tool of social and political control for men to wield over women. We are back to what was discussed above about men defining women for their own purposes.

I think your speculation as to how the situation came about is correct. Just, I would also add that the context of male supremacy has played an enormous (but disguised) role. In particular WRT the rapid change in laws such as the Gender Recognition Act, the mainstreaming of transpolitics and the colonization of women's spaces and issues (the F-Word is a good example). The privilege held by born men is another factor - this is a big difference between transwomen and transmen and IMO the reason for the male dominance in the movement and explains much of the success of the movement.

Transgenderism, whilst appearing (particularly to liberals and post-modernists) as a transgressive underdog minority which needs sympathy and cuddly feelly concessions, it is in fact a male centric movement operating in a male supremacy to the detriment of women and guided by the sense of entitlement held by men. The sympathy and (enormous) concessions that are being asked for are being primarily demanded of women - and this suits patriarchy down to the ground. This is the bit that liberals fail to notice in their desire to be righter on than thou. Never before has the term 'handmaiden' been so apt....

I'm glad there are people like you in academia. When I criticize the academy I mean the institution.

Thanks to all who posted thanks about my above essay! post. I feel very annoyed and concerned by the current third wave liberal post-modern depoliticized made up definition of oppression.

Beach that distinction between oppression and discrimination was really helpful. Buffy, I don't want to treat you as the voice of postmodernism or the person required it explain postmodernism 101, but under Beach's definition of oppression, what does postmodernism have to say about that? How does it measure it, demonstrate its existence, explain its existence etc?

Thanks to all who posted thanks about my above essay! post. I feel very annoyed and concerned by the current third wave liberal post-modern depoliticized made up definition of oppression

With you on that one, Beach I'm copying across what I posted on the other thread wrong thread Hope that's OK. THis is such a fascinating discussion & I'm learning a lot.

Thanks for a really interesting thread. I came to it because I've seen quite a bit of TERF-outing and criticism on my Twitter, and it's such a new thing to me (old 1970s/80s Women's Lib feminist -- hell, I was even in a consciousness-raising group in the late 70s, I'm that old). I guess in my extreme moments, I'd identify with radical feminist aspects of feminism/s. But I'm also very much aware of the Butler stuff (gender as performative, and sex not necessarily fixed).

I've worked with a couple of MtF people, when they've been both pre & post-op. Both identified as lesbian, but both had a gender-reassignment operation. The new emerging difference between the terms transgender & transsexual is interesting in this respect.

A lot of the TERF stuff is actually a misunderstanding of the complexity of BUtler's arguments, and also an emptying out of queer theory of any kind of politics. It gives few tools for analysing patriarchy as a STRUCTURE and sees gender as a set of personal choices a la neo-liberal post-modernism. All these young 20 somethings thinking they're being political and radical, hmmmmm

It seems to me that what we have is a lot of rather privileged young people (oh writing that makes me feel old) with a fundamental misunderstanding of theory around the DIFFERENCE or distinction between the terms "sex" and "gender" who've been educated in a post-neoliberal world (Fredric Jameson's good on po-mo as a symptom and tool of late global capitalism, not its destruction) and who think that if they want to break out of the socialisation of masculinity or femininity then they have to claim the opposite sex identity, rather than collectively work to destabilise gender identities which seem to coerce people into particular lives, styles, and behaviours.

And the fact that a number of vocal transgender activists seem to want to keep certain attributes of both male sex and masculine gendered behaviour (basic misunderstandings about women's rights over their own bodies, anyone?) I find very unsettling.

It all seems like another version of mansplaining to me.

isn't there an identified radfem (now vilified as a TERF) [Sheila Jeffreys??] who argues that a lot of people who identify as transgender (as opposed to transsexual) actually just want NOT to conform to the embedded and socialised gendered stereotypes of required masculine & feminine behaviour.

This seems to me to make sense: just because a boy plays with dolls or likes wearing a dress does not mean he has gender dysphoria/or is transsexual.

Is that a viable point?

"1. That trans* as a movement is not smashing a gender binary, it requires a gender binary in order to transgress by claiming to be the opposite to what one would conventionally be, and"

This makes sense.

The issue with po-mo is that a superficial reading of it (my 1st years on queer theory for example, but I make them read it!) gets too easily into what a colleague calls "vulgar post-modernism" aka the "It's just an opinion. Everyone's got a right to an opinion, innit?" response.

And it gets mixed up with post-structuralism, which is, for me, the more powerful analytical tool.

Really thoughtful post-structuralism calls into question the grand narratives of the Enlightenment & the 19C, such as rationality, reason, etc This critique can be a powerful tool in feminists' hands -- but then good old Mary Wollstonecraft was fairly hot on human Reason not being entirely value [patriarchy]-free.

Thanks Buffy. It is actually be useful to me beyond the context of this thread and trans issue. I am grateful.

Perhaps to make things fairer, everyone on here should have to take on the identity of straw something or other! As it is about TERF, someone should volunteer to be straw radical feminist etc.

Chimney, I did write out a response to your post but I have a poor Internet connection and it was eaten.

To cut a long rambling short, we can't assume that the vast majority of people who are not trans have gender congruence or a lack of sex dysphoria.

They are too stupid to understand the basic tenets and observations of feminism. They are too steeped in male privilege (and obliviousness of that privilege) to have even the most basic clue what the sex class 'woman' is and why it is important to human females

Exactly Beachcomber. Transwomen are all raised as boys and everything that goes with it, and because their default setting is fixed due to patriarchy they expect women to do what they ask. Actually, ask is wrong. Demand is probably the better word here.

My point is that the ordinary, tolerant, right on person is intellectually and politically disposed towards sympathy towards someone who claims discrimination (which is a better word for what I mean than oppression) for themselves. Such a person is instinctively likely to support a trans person who says how difficult their life is because of who they are and how they feel and the fact that their identity is transgressive.*

Completely agree Buffy. I try (and likely fail on too many occasions) to not discriminate, because I don't like discrimination. But I also agree with other posters who don't want transwomen in women only spaces. I was, initially, against banning transwomen from women only spaces but the argument about unexpected penes changed my mind, as did the whole male entitlement thing.

Buffy, I just think you are a person who knows something about the topic and has spent time trying to make it comprehensible to other people on this section. Which is really helpful.

There are some really great posts here, especially beach 'a post about the difference between discrimination and oppression. Thanks.

On a less intelligent point, the quote above from the DML organiser has this gem referring to a "playboy" club:

"They only let the REAL vaginas dance. THAT’S PATRIARCHY. "

How are lesbians falling for this porn fuelled bullshit?

I'm guessing they don't let the real 70 year old vaginas, or the real unwaxed vaginas, or the real size 16 vaginas dance either.

Damn you, patriarchal standards of fuckability.

I agree almondcakes. I don't consider myself trans but I felt that I was missing a penis from before I even knew what a penis was (about 4 years old). If I woke up tomorrow and I was a man I'd be overjoyed but I have no desire to go through mutilating surgery that won't actually make me a man. I've come to terms with the fact that I'm a woman and at the age of about 28 finally figured out that if I got chatting to a guy in a club he probably wanted to have sex with me rather than thinking I was an interesting person to talk to.

we can't assume that the vast majority of people who are not trans have gender congruence or a lack of sex dysphoria

No, of course not. And I think that's part of the "radfem" (for want of a better term) or even "ordinary feminist". Sometimes, I'd go so far as to say that part of coming to feminist consciousness is realising the extent of the contradictions between one's internalised sense of self and the social, and often externalised, roles one plays a particular gender.

I think that's part of the point of separating out sex and gender in most strands of feminism/s.

we can't assume that the vast majority of people who are not trans have gender congruence or a lack of sex dysphoria
Thinking more about this, because it's a really good point & interesting ... part of Judith Butler's point is that while feminists have been comfortable with

sex=biological/gender=socialised roles/ideologically produced

the dichotomy is not an absolute, and "sex" as biological state is as much produced through ideology as "gender" That it's not a dichotomy. So it can be seen as a fluid spectrum.

But it seems to me the trans*women throwing around the term TERF as an accusation are setting up another dichotomy, as if "cis" is a monolithic, unified identity.

I think it's often part of the state of being female to be in some sort of alienated relation to one's body and sexuality because of the action of patriarchy. Part of a number of strands of feminist thought/activism are about becoming more at one with one's own body, sexuality, etc (old 70s feminist who read Our Bodies, OurSelves at age 18. Brilliant book!)