Obsession with transwomen fetishises sex difference

[spannablue]

Just read on Twitter:

'The problem with patriarchy is not due to men having penises, it's due to the lie that this random feature of birth confers & signifies rank, power & domination. We must not collude in that by fetishising sex difference & aggrandizing genitals that happen to be on the outside.'

What do you think?

I agree with the statement although I'm clearly a bit thick, as I had to read it twice to make sure I understood it

When I've worked out what it means, I might have an opinion.

It sounds to me like someone has an interest in denying that rape is one of the most powerful and devastating tools of patriarchy. Rape being, of course, committed with that unimportant, irrelevant little penis.

but the only physical difference between men and women is not just genitals

men are on average much bigger and stronger than women

any of the very civilised men I work with could marmalise me if they had the desire

that's the risk assessment women must constantly make

that twitter post was made by someone who hasn't given this much thought

Violent penetration can be achieved with things other than penises.

Although since I am an adult human female solely attracted to other adult human females,this would seem to say i'm fetishizing this accidental sex difference as well. So ineffect this statement is homophobic as well as sexist (because of course takes a male to ignore the physical and social effects of the ability to get pregnant versus the effects of being able to impregnate.)

It makes it sound as if it was a complete random accident that men have oppressed women throughout history.

It makes it sound as if this oppression was nothing to do with the male desire to control female fertility so they don't accidentally invest resources in children that are not theirs.

It makes it sound as if males' greater size and strength had nothing to do with their ability to oppress women.

In reality patriarchy has everything to do with which males have the 'right' to stick their penises in which females and which males are powerful enough to enforce this 'right'.

Obviously ignoring sex differences means we will never get a handle on sex based oppression or even be able to name it.

So what I think is it sounds like a load of disempowering, obfuscating pomo bullshit.

But what do you think OP?

There are large strong women who can cause other women damage of this kind.

I have myself been a survivor of this.

So given that fact, what do you think of the statement?

It was written by someone who thinks and writes a lot about this stuff (PhD, TED talk, etc)

Statistics about sex related characteristics, like male violence, aren‘t fetishizing anything, they are descriptive. Only when you are able to describe reality can you combat patriarchy. Obfuscating these differences only helps the oppressor class ( the one with the penis, ya know).

Women were literally enslaved by men because they had a valuable reproductive capacity and were weaker so could be captured. That’s it. That’s the whole bloody thing.

Black people were colonised and enslaved for their land and their labour and, without the technological capacity of the colonisers, they were overpowered. It’s the same thing.

Then the colonisers add the narrative that the captured ones were stupider or less morally upstanding.

It’s economics and productive capacity.

No. It's just simply acknowledging biology. Not pretending it is irrelevant or doesn't exist. If you deny sex differences between males and females, you are denying the roots of sexism. It doesn't arise in a vacuum, and just because you ignore penises doesn't mean the tendency of males to dominate over females disappears (biologically, as two sex classes). This is what we see in trans activism today, with the erasure directed at women, specifically, and the significant disadvantage of the ideology being borne by females. This is sexism. If you don't acknowledge the male/female divide, you cannot name or see it. I don't much care about the males who want to call themselves women to "escape" or "minimize" their role in this tendency, because they bring with them the same impulses, only now pretend to be part of the oppressed class and speak for the oppressed despite continually prioritizing their own needs and wants, not those of actual females. Curious, that, isn't it?

I'll tell you what fetishizes sex differences - saying that removing certain body parts will make you the opposite sex. Or that a predilection for certain behaviours or clothing makes you the opposite sex.
It's putting people on an impossible quest to "become" the opposite sex, which encourages people to deny reality in search of validating the feelings inside themselves. That is fetishistic, because you're telling women and men that if they just change the way they dress or change their name or surgically alter their genitals or take cross-sex hormones, they can pretend they were actually born in the opposite sex. That idea is what encourages people to pretend sex differences aren't real. What trans activists are doing sounds mighty like an irrational commitment or devotion to a particular thing (in this case, their ideology), to me.

I'm a lesbian myself. I'm not attracted to penises. I don't think the statement is homophobic as it's not about that. It's about the 'penis' theme running through discussions on trans rights.

I think the person who wrote that should probably have waited till they sobered up first.

spannablue, were you born with a penis, by any chance?

The reason the penis theme keeps running through these discussions is because males (penis-people) keep trying to dominate females (non-penis-people). That is what sexism and misogyny is all about. That is what feminism tries to combat.
Funnily enough, this tendency doesn't seem to change, even when the penis-people put on some eyeliner and call themselves lesbians, and then shame non-penis-people for not wanting to have sex with penises.
THAT is why the discussion is about penis-people and their behaviour towards non-penis-people.
Yes, I am looking at you, Riley J Dennis.

The problem with patriarchy is not due to men having penises
I'm not sure anyone here has ever said that - so not touching that one

it's due to the lie that this random feature of birth confers & signifies rank, power & domination
The greater average size and strength conferred by being male has given men the ability to enforce patriarchy with violence
the fact that men wish to control women's bodies to guarantee the paternity of their offspring has given them the motivation

We must not collude in that by fetishising sex difference

Understanding that male bodies are very different to female bodies is not fetishising sex difference. It's understanding the real world.

& aggrandizing genitals that happen to be on the outside

what genitals aren't on the outside?

There are so many things wrong with the initial statement I don't know where to start. But I would also like a little context! Plopping down a, somewhat confusingly phrased, statement and then going "what do you make of that then?" Doesn't really do it for me, I'm afraid.

Good morning! I recognise this statement from yesterday's twitter.

Made by someone who's done amazing things for women (or 'people without genitals on the outside - though, er, ah well,never mind!') including the London Feminist Network.

Whilst I can sort of understand the statement on an academic level, on a real life level, surely a lot of the discussion right now isn't 'aggrandizing the male genitals' it's just an important statement of fact to acknowledge that the people who are attached to these type of genitals are male? That's not fetishising.

The person who made that statement has also raised a lot of eyebrows by stating on the same thread:

I'm just pointing out the incongruence, for example, of ppl like Posie Parker on national TV saying she wouldn't want her children changing in a cubicle next to a man, then emphasizing that she has a husband; who presumably shares home, toilet etc with her & their children.

twitter.com/Finn_Mackay/status/1050660534385688583

As someone else replies:

It’s one of those strange things people say that makes it clear how far they’ve drifted from the people around them. It has the opposite effect of what’s intended.

it's due to the lie that this random feature of birth confers & signifies rank, power & domination

But if you analyse men as a sex class, it turns out that this random feature of birth does confer and signify rank, power and domination.

I think pencils absolutely nails it.

In every society, in every time in history, women have been subject to some level of "getting the shitty end of the stick" relative to men.

Are we supposed to believe this is some sort of cosmic coincidence?

Of course it bloody isn't. Men have the means (greater physical strength), the motive (controlling our fertility) and the opportunity (creating sexist societies) to make sure women get the shitty end of the stick.

Pointing to the existence of a few rare instances where women hurt other women does not change history, or statistics round crime, or the reality of FGM, infanticide, women being stoned to death for adultery, "honour" [sic] killings.

To suggest otherwise is to engage in woman-hating propaganda.

We see you for exactly what you are spanna.

And yes, I was also bemused by the idea that my genitals are not on the outside!

I’m pretty sure women are always going to have to reinforce boundaries to keep men from controlling them. Everyone wants access to a uterus.

spannablue, were you born with a penis, by any chance?

Yet another OP who shouldn't take up poker, in my opinion.

What about pregnancy?

The fact women are the only sex who can be impregnated, gestate and birth babies, is one of the biggest elephants in any room where refering to sex as the basis for discrimination and oppression is forbidden.

In countries where birth control is unavailable this is all consuming. Childbirth kills vast numbers of women. Millions of women go through more pregnancies than they want and cannot refuse sex with their husbands or abort pregnancy resulting from rape. Infants and young dependant children are used to control their mothers.

In the west pregnancy and childbirth remain reasons women are discriminated against in the workplace, and in abusive relationships.

I'm just pointing out the incongruence, for example, of ppl like Posie Parker on national TV saying she wouldn't want her children changing in a cubicle next to a man, then emphasizing that she has a husband; who presumably shares home, toilet etc with her & their children.

I find it incredible that an academic cannot think this one through. Astonishing.