HarryLovesDraco thanks for posting that - it actually brought some clarity to my thinking.
What I object to so strongly is the generalisation being made here:
Gentle reminder that “gender critical” people aren’t just abhorrently prejudiced against trans women, they think disgusting, vile stuff like this about trans men too
Having now met a huge number of people from all walks of life who oppose self-id, from anarchist lefty backgrounds over centrists all the way to religious right wingers, there's actually a huge disparity in what they believe regarding trans people.
The GC feminists I met are accepting of trans people, supportive of their struggle and rights as well as concerned about women's rights and the safeguarding of children. And they have many different positions on pronouns, sharing spaces and what rights they are willing to concede to post-op and medically transitioning people.
The religious (right and left - and yes lefty religious people do exist) are completely split into many different responses to trans people too - some are supportive, some are not, some are outright hateful. Most however are not the least bit gender critical - that's a feminist position and most of the very religious people I've met don't agree with feminist beliefs either.
However, TRAs like the one who wrote that tweet do not distinguish between a position that says trans people are an abomination or those who say they should not be allowed to transition on the NHS and those who say yes to trans rights and to supporting trans people but maintain that it isn't possible for mammals to change sex or that gender ideology enforces harmful gender stereotypes.
The TRA default position is that unless you accept all of their ideology, you're a despiccable evil bigot.
So Posie tweets a thing in a standalone tweet and TRAs take it as proof of what they already and always accuse all GC people of - that we hate them and everything about them.
But that's clearly a nonsense. Those opposed to self-id have wide-ranging views and given their vastly differing backgrounds that should come as no surprise.
I see absolutely no point in demanding that only those whose views otherwise align with mine be allowed to join me in this fight, which is why I disagree with vilifying Posie in this way.
Her position that transmen who want to live and be recognised as men should be sterilised is mainstream in many, many countries - and many transmen do actually want to be and/or accept that this is the outcome of transitioning. I don't need to agree with her to understand why Posie thinks what she thinks.
WPUK made a decision based on how they wish to be perceived and I actually don't have a problem with that - freedom of speech does not equal freedom from consequences after all. I don't agree with their reasoning or how they did it. I honestly thought better of them and therefore fully expected them to contact Posie first to let her know they were not happy and what they wanted to do because of that. But WPUK is also just made up of individuals who have their own flaws.
IMHO Posie's words have not made a blind bit of difference to TRAs other than giving them one more soundbite out of many hundreds of utterings made by GC people daily - it's no worse than Long's parasitic squatters for instance.
I've seen so many words twisted and taken out of context by TRAs, some even edited and manipulated to make them seem transphobic and that's why I cannot get pissed off at Posie for what she said as "damaging to the cause".
The cause is damaging to TRAs and no matter how softly we tread and how uncontroversial we behave, we will always be the enemy. With or without Posie.