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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

This is getting out of control - Ladyfest

238 replies

Chickpeasandpakchoi · 03/06/2016 19:52

Has banned the use of the word 'clitoris' at its feminist festival as it it trans exclusionary.
www.feministcurrent.com/2016/06/03/german-ladyfest-clitoris-exclusionary/
I hope it is boycotted by women. How DARE they tell us we cannot celebrate and talk about our female anatomy?

OP posts:
Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:32

So what can we do,to protect women's rights and not have them sidelined by non women?

Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:34

Radfem as well

Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:34

Libfem

Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:36

Can't even find some in my dictionary

NeedACleverNN · 04/06/2016 17:37

I know a couple
Sanpro is sanitary protection such as tampons and towels

Misogyny is male oppression ie keeping women in their place

NeedACleverNN · 04/06/2016 17:39

Trans phobia is basically like homophobic but of trans people instead

VestalVirgin · 04/06/2016 17:39

Trans exclusionary-nary,queer fenmenism,gender queer trans phobia misogynist

Sorry. I keep forgetting that not everyone knows the Ancient Greek words that are used in medicine.

Misogynist is woman-hater. The "Mis" part means hate, the "gyn" part means woman. You very often find this in medical language.

"trans phobia" - a made up word that doesn't make sense. Phobia is irrational fear, but is here meant to mean "hate". "trans" is shortened from "transgender". Transphobic means "hateful of people who identify as transgender", but is an accusation thrown at all women who put women first.

Can't help you with "queer" that doesn't seem to mean anything. Used to mean something like "weird" and I think that's the accurate meaning today. (Also used to mean homosexual once, but is devoid of that meaning by now. Can mean just any person who identifies as special snowflake.)

Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:42

So when I was called a terf earlier ,that was a compliment?

VestalVirgin · 04/06/2016 17:43

Radfem is short for radical feminist. Libfem is short for liberal feminist. There are more detailed definitions, but for the purpose of this discussion, all you need to know is that radfems are typically trans-exclusionary (i.e. do not consider males women, regardless of how those males identify), while libfems are not. This does not have to be the case, radical just meaning addressing the root of the problem (radix = root in Latin), but is a tendency arising from the way those feminists go about addressing problems.

VestalVirgin · 04/06/2016 17:45

So when I was called a terf earlier ,that was a compliment?

Depends. It is most often used as insult by transactivists, but I identify as terf because I don't think there's anything bad about being a trans exclusive radfem.

Some feminists also made up new meanings, like "totally excellent real female" Grin

Petal40 · 04/06/2016 17:47

So do you all know who you are,like do you all say I'm a rad fem or im a lib fem....or is it like voting where you don't tell anyone who you vote for,I'm sorry .i know I'm being a pain here.

NeedACleverNN · 04/06/2016 17:50

No

I had never even considered myself a feminist before mn but then I realised I am

I agree in equal rights for women

AuntDotsie · 04/06/2016 18:05

The ironic thing is, this whole shit makes me feel unsafe. I'm a bit paranoid about the whole room of people turning against me because I said something transphobic.

I hear you. Reading through the website, they are oh-so concerned with niceness. Not saying anything that could possibly offend anyone, anywhere, anywhen and providing 'awareness' staff who will take you into a quiet room if you feel 'violated' and try to 'empower' you. Libfeminism just seems to bother about all this surface stuff. You don't empower an individual by being nice to them. You can comfort, invigorate, challenge and help them, but you can't empower them. Empowerment requires power. If asking nicely worked, we'd've won true equality already.

Libfeminism of this flavour just seems to be about policing tones and thoughts to spare feelings. It doesn't address any structural oppression. It's just chucking a flowery tablecloth over the patriarchal bullshit. So no, it doesn't make me feel safe either.

Petal So do you all know who you are,like do you all say I'm a rad fem or im a lib fem

Well, I think feminism is a bit of a journey. You can be any kind you like, but it starts with the radical notion that women are people too. I tend towards the radical side of things, but mainly in theory.

LurcioAgain · 04/06/2016 18:10

Radical feminists (from the latin for "root") argue that because of biological differences (women are vulnerable during pregnancy and in the early years of childrearing, and are physically smaller and weaker than men because of the male testosterone surge in puberty), men have been able to push women into second place basically since... the beginning of the human race (there is argument about whether the oppression started with agriculture when passing your land onto your sons became important hence men wanted to control women's fertility, or whether hunter gatherer societies also have this sort of hierarchy - but it doesn't matter for the purposes of this argument). Radical feminists argue that you can't fix inequalities between men and women by tinkering round the edges, you need to dismantle the whole system

Liberal feminists (following on the liberal tradition in politics as a whole) believe in individual liberties up to the point at which you impinge on someone else's liberties - the "your right to swing your arm around ends where my nose starts" theory. Typically they tend to think that what we should be doing is to use existing political structures to make incremental changes to make men and women's life chances more equal. (One of the best explanations of political liberalism takes the form of a thought experiment: suppose you are trying to design society from scratch. You know that some people are luckier than others - they're born physically stronger, or brighter, or with more confident personalities... How do you organise society so that the less lucky people get a reasonably fair deal, while allowing the people who work hard to be rewarded for their hard work, and all the while keeping the extent to which the state is allowed to interfere in people's private lives to a minimum? It's fairly typical of liberalism that most liberals believe it's about balancing opposing needs of different groups within society, while giving everyone the best chance of getting ahead that you can, and keeping the "hand of government" as light as you can.)

Take for e.g. women struggling to get on in the workplace. A liberal feminist might campaign for workplace creches. A radical feminist might ask why we have a culture of presenteeism at work, why we think careers in the public sphere are more valuable than looking after children or having caring responsibilities, why society is set up to give the big financial rewards to work outside the home, but not redistribute wealth to cover those in caring activities...

I tend to find radical feminist critiques of what is wrong with the way we do things at present very convincing, but ultimately (because most of us in the West live in capitalist liberal democracies) that liberal feminism has more of a chance of actually changing things.

As a separate issue there's the question of what you mean by the word "gender."

Almost all radical feminists will agree that the primary meaning of gender is "social role or behaviour which society considers is appropriate to your sex." Additionally, they will argue that gender on this meaning is what's known as a social construct - i.e. it's not part of the natural world, but grows out of how societies organise themselves. For example, in the UK football is predominantly a game played by boys; in the US it's played by girls (hence a recent TV programme on which a father of a "transkid" said one of the early signs his child - born with male genitalia - was really a girl was that "she" liked soccer). And further more, it's a social construct which conveniently always seems to allocate the hard but undervalued work (looking after children, looking after elderly relatives) to women and the very highly paid work to men.

Transactivists typically use "gender" to mean an internal feeling of being a woman or a man (or anything in between, or whatever... this is the point where I start to get very confused).

And of course there's an additional layer of confusion, because gender has also come to be used in place of the word "sex" to talk about actual biology, because people think sex is a bit embarrassing.

So now we have a single word - "gender" - which can mean three things depending on the context in which it's used - "what society thinks are the appropriate roles for someone of your biological sex," "An internal feeling of womanliness or manliness", or "The same as biological sex, just we're a bit too embarrassed to say the word sex." End result: total confusion and lots of scope for people to talk past one another.

However, "radical" is often used as an insult, to mean extremist (and people using it this way will also then move on to insults like "feminazi", or - as on a recent thread - comparing radical feminists to members of ISIS - which of course is nuts when you think about it: one group wants equal rights for women, the other two groups are going round killing, raping, committing genocide). Hence "TERF" was coined by people who want to discredit anyone who thinks "gender" is a social construct. It's basically an insult which says "shut up, bitch" and is used as a form of social exclusion - once someone is described as a TERF on twitter or tumblr or most other social media platforms, they are then completely ostracised (because these platforms typically indulge in a form of guilt by association: "talked to a TERF about a recipe for chocolate cake? Then you're a TERF too!")

MimiLeBonk · 04/06/2016 18:21

I think of it as......do you have (or have you had) at least one ovary, Fallopian tube or uterus? No.......splendid! Well.......there are the male toilets then.

But I also respect your right to choose to identify as a woman in your life, dress etc how you want to dress, but you are actually male.

And you shouldn't try make others feel guilty for having bits you were never intended to have. Or stop them from mentioning they do have them!

KimmySchmidtsSmile · 04/06/2016 18:54

I live in Germany. If you look back at their facebook, the organisers say they are being misquoted. They will be having female genitalia in their display and scrolling down they've been collecting tampons and sanitary towels for ages now for women without. The fact that it is inclusive and not ''women only'' doesn't surprise me in the least, it is clear they support transwomen and want to include them.
Similarly I attend the Christopher Street Day here each year even though I am not gay as the organisers make it open/welcome to everyone/all supporters.

singingsixpence82 · 04/06/2016 19:08

Does that mean that "cis" men can go to Ladyfest too then? Or that one at least Kimmy*? It's great that they don't feel that using a term like "female genitalia" is being exclusionary.

AuntDotsie · 04/06/2016 19:12

Yes, they have addressed it here

To quote:

Our leaked internal protocol was clearly misinterpreted and misquoted, we do not think that the subject of female anatomy is problematic at all, but equating femininity/womanhood with vaginas and clitorises is definitely problematic.

What is womanhood equated with then?

NeedACleverNN · 04/06/2016 19:13

I think of it as......do you have (or have you had) at least one ovary, Fallopian tube or uterus?

That won't work.

A friend of mine has MRKH and she has no uterus, tubes or ovaries. She's no less a woman though

Hrumphing · 04/06/2016 19:13

The other thing that sometimes gets confusing when you first start to really think about feminism (or for me anyway) is that it talks about women as a group or class and men as a class. This does not mean 'all men' are rapists or somehow have it in for women but that when you look how our society is organised, the way things work is more likely to benefit a person if they are male and cause harm if they are female. The system may also do harm to individual males and to certain groups of males but the overall tendency is for women, in general, to lose out.

Feminists do not tend to hate men but they do want things to be fair. In many respects one could argue feminists have a better view of men than society in general - feminists do not believe that men are innately violent, rapey and unable to control themselves but that this is just the way society has deveoped to ensure men as a class benefit from the exploitation of women. Radical feminists believe men as a class can do better and be better. If this system (the patriarchy) were dismantled then men as a class would have to start pulling their weight and get less benefit just by being a man - which would be fair. However they too would reap rewards in other areas such as better mental health, lower suicide rates and be at less risk of violence themselves.

The other question you talked about earlier petal was whether the law woyld be on your side if you asked a male to leave the female bathroom. The answer is possibly at the moment - but probably not if the recent trans parlimentary enquiry findings get into law. Then you will be able to simply declare you are a woman and get a gender recognition certificate without any other evidence or alterations to your appearance or clothing. Then your gender status is protected in law - with no exceptions such as womens refuges, counselling groups for rape survivors, hospital wards or prisons.

singingsixpence82 · 04/06/2016 19:14

Well that makes sense.

singingsixpence82 · 04/06/2016 19:15

My last comment was in response to the ladyfest organisers' quote.

AuntDotsie · 04/06/2016 19:16

Then you will be able to simply declare you are a woman and get a gender recognition certificate without any other evidence or alterations to your appearance or clothing. Then your gender status is protected in law - with no exceptions such as womens refuges, counselling groups for rape survivors, hospital wards or prisons.

Sometimes I think the solution is for us all to declare ourselves men. Just to see what happens!

Hrumphing · 04/06/2016 19:18

Sorry sixpence I got carried away and am probably derailing sorry. Grin

Another term for petal: peaktrans - the point at which you suddenly realise all this trans stuff is complete bollocks and dangerous bollocks at that.

singingsixpence82 · 04/06/2016 19:19

That might be a good idea - like the Jedi Knight thing they did with census forms but 100 times better! All feminists declare yourselves men and let's cause some chaos!

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