That it's not just what you say, it's also how much you talk about it.

[NicolaHare]

Surprise, another trans thread! But the dynamics of online spaces fascinates me.

Take MWR. Some stats. Feminism Chat has been active since 2010. At this moment 364 pages of threads have been generated. 144 of those pages contain threads that were created or active since January this year. At the beginning of 2018 a significant portion of threads were trans themed and these threads tended to contain the most posts, and the board has only grown more fixated with the topic since then. You have to go quite a ways back to find a page of threads that isn’t 90-95% to do with trans people.

Nowhere else on the site is so obsessed. For example: on the LGBT themed boards you only have to go back 1 or 2 pages to find threads from 2017 and earlier. There aren’t any trans threads in the 1 and a fraction page of threads from 2018 on the politics board. There are, I think, about 2 in the half dozen pages of threads from this year in the currents affairs and news forum. And in 2018, all the education forums combined have generated about 5 trans threads.

This is weird, right? Why is a general feminism board with an overwhelmingly non trans userbase so fixated on a group of people they don't belong to and the issues surrounding them? It would be weird regardless of what anyone in any thread had to say on the subject.

Not surprising, though. Trans sceptical feminism ironically almost always ends up focusing on the transgender question to the exclusion of all other topics that its proponents believe that trans inclusive feminisms are neglecting, and so neglects them to an even greater degree. Honestly, I’m sceptical that they are being neglected at all: it seems to me that conversations about pregnancy, menstruation ect are happening in public view at far greater volume than ever before, taboos surrounding bodily functions are increasingly discarded by the discourse and pop culture, and that when we talk about erasure we’re actually quibbling about terminology, the trappings of language and not the substance of the conversation. To assign a motivation to the common theme on feminism chat of “We are being silenced elsewhere!” a significant part of it might be the catharsis of imagined persecution. “We are saying the truths THEY don’t want you to hear! We are rebels!”

(This interview with a former gender critical trans woman is worth reading. It’s American and several years old, but it describes the many of the other toxic intellectual cul-de-sacs you can observe in MWR. www.transadvocate.com/is-sadism-popular-with-terfs-a-chat-with-an-ex-gendercrit_n_18568.htm)

But to set aside the discussion of substance. Do you think that the mere volume of trans threads in feminism chat is indicative of a kind of transphobia? If it were a forum of straight people talking about nothing but same sex attracted people, even if what they had to say was positive would we not be inclined to see in it's users a troubling insecurity with regards to queerness. If it were a forum of white people talking about nothing but people of colour in the most effusive terms, would we take this at face value or would we assign sinister motives (as the resonance of Get Out suggests many would)?

Bugger I missed out sexism didn’t I? It’s four -isms that you have to shut your eyes to if you want to be a good trans ally, not three!

Racism often turns up too, Sophocles - this frequent assumption that black women aren't real women. An unholy quartet?

Cross-post. It's a pentacle!

Instead of reading that dire essay, I did the free online course about the history of women's rights in the UK. It was pretty interesting.

Take the menstruaters controversy. The words is a bit clunky, I agree, but from a certain perspective it’s also less euphemistic than a lot of the more standardised language on the subject

Take front holes. The words are horrendous, I'm sure you agree, but from a certain perspective is a lot more euphemistic than descriptive. Males have a hole in the penis -- pr'haps thats what it refers to? Everyone has several holes in the front of the face..... Oh noes, it's the Big One That Dare Not Have It's Name Spoken.

And, of course, dismissing the decades and decades of work women did in order to get the vagina identified by its scientific term rather than "hoo hah" or the unspecific "lady parts" for the polite crowd is just par for the course. Periods being mentioned wasn't accident. It took work, and work done by people "formerly known as women" to get women's health issues discussed in public.

That's just one little bit, and it's a bit men don't notice, and a bit men have done their level best to convince younger women isn't important because it's wimmin's work and wimmin is only exist in queer theory as an empty space that needs to be filled.

Get over yourself. Language and the right to name ourselves has always been feminist work. You may think it's overblown, but discussing an attempt to redefine the definition of women is core.

Look we're not all that interested in engaging with 'trans viewpoints' at this point. We're interested in protecting our rights to self-definition, freedom of thought and speech and assembly, female representation, and protection from male violence. We also want to maintain safeguarding and medical ethics to protect our children.

As far as I'm concerned I'll be available to 'engage' with the identity crisis evidently going on in masculinity once the rights and safety of women and girls have been secured.

I think it’s going to end up being a listicle, Empress. “Five isms you should be embracing on your way to being a real trans ally, and why all of them pale in comparison to transphobia”

Disclaimer: I have not read through this thread in it's entirety.

I just delurked to tell you @NicolaHare that my experience is that discussion is really being supressed on every other place for feminist discussion. I'm not originally english speaking but live in a Scandinavian country. I am an active feminist but come here simply because of that type of discussion. Simply asking questions around how gender related to reproduction almost got me excluded from my usual feminist circles so I will never be confident enough to raise those questions again. This was the only place I found after a google search where people who weren't right wing anti-feminists actually discussed certain questions I had wanted answered.

I would assume that many posters here have other outlets for their other feminist discussions but since this seems to be at least one of very few places I can assume it sort of exploded as others joined in because that was the one topic they didn't feel comfortable discussing in their other circles. That sounds like the likeliest explanation to me.

I agree some of the threads here are in really poor taste and I assume this doesn't feel including to many trans people. I didn't feel very included when I recieved a lot of hate for simply asking a couple of questions.

We were only missing a bit of ableism and we’d have had the holy trinity of thoughtless prejudice that seems to be standard issue for a trans activist.

Classism, ableism, sexism, homophia, racism, ageism and religious intolerance

All coming to a political manifesto near you soon, dressed up as progressiveness.

I'm not really sure what to make of your link to the essay - are you trolling? You think the essay is good?

My OP includes a long interview about how trans people are dehumanised in spaces like this. No one has engaged with it yet.

I'll reiterate a point I've made several times before. It is possible for more the one side in a conflict to do hurtful things. Two wrongs don't make a right.

As pp have said, we're not waiting on your reading list. Based on the quoted statement, she sounds like an idiot. We're not conversing for your benefit here. Try starting a thread in FWR in good faith if you genuinely want a discussion about an article.

You may think it's overblown, but discussing an attempt to redefine the definition of women is core.

You are giving them too much credit Lilly. To redefine would imply that they have an alternative definition to replace the old one - and they have none.

I think it’s going to end up being a listicle, Empress. “Five isms you should be embracing on your way to being a real trans ally, and why all of them pale in comparison to transphobia”

Sounds about right

I’m curious to know what is the correct term for someone like me, whose career as a menstruator was cut suddenly short by illness and surgery, can you help please, OP? How should I be referrring to myself - former menstruator? Retired menstruator? Irrelevant old hag? What’s the correct form in our brave new world?

I have never heard that Hamster or Miranda Yardley felt dehumanized in this space. No idea what OP is talking about, except for some version of 'be nice to the bullies'.

I also brought Andrea up because she's critical of the Riley Dennis school of trans messaging about desire that gets singled out for criticism so much on these boards.

Because I find “menstruator” exteremely dehumanising. I’m asssuming you don’t much care about that, though.

Why didn't you bring up Miranda Yardley? Miranda is also critical of Riley Dennis, I gather.

Fun fact. The gender critical trans woman interviewed used to write for the same site as Miranda. She has since been scrubbed from it.

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160113040633/genderapostates.com/who-are-gender-apostates/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">web.archive.org/web/20160113040633/genderapostates.com/who-are-gender-apostates/

Fun fact, I know what that person thinks about women they don't agree with, and it isn't nice.

deepwatersolo I mentioned women as an empty space in queer theory, but TWAW is a redefinition of women whether or not they know it.

My own read is that it's still just "not men", ie, women as a subset of the superior creature known as man.

Sometimes I do need to show my work ....

How should I be referrring to myself - former menstruator? Retired menstruator? Irrelevant old hag? What’s the correct form in our brave new world?

Strictly speaking, menstruators are quite a transient species, anyway. They generally do not exist longer that 3-5 days in a row, then again disappear into oblivion.

It is possible for more the one side in a conflict to do hurtful things.

I'm not sure which is more baffling - that you think our main concern is hurt feelings, or that you think posting an interview where a trans woman calls lesbians 'dowdy' is in some way helpful to trans people.

My OP includes a long interview about how trans people are dehumanised in spaces like this. No one has engaged with it yet.

Not sure why you feel entitled to people providing you with that service and mental labour, or why they should want to do so.

TWAW is a redefinition of women whether or not they know it.

I disagree. A definition is noncircular and objectifyable. TWAW does not fullfill that. 'Not a man' would include children, trees and pretty much the whole universe with everything in it - except men.
I get your point that they want to reduce 'woman' to a feeling, but not even that can actually cut it, definition wise.