Patrick Strudwick on why feminism should include TW

[Macareaux]

Feminist academics championing trans rights.

www.buzzfeed.com/patrickstrudwick/meet-the-feminist-academics-championing-trans-rights

Never heard of Patrick til now but if he identifies as a heterosexual male (I know nothing about him), would he accept transwomen as potential (even, if he's attached, hypothetical) partners?

That's where a lot of the male trans 'allies' fall down with their TWAW/ no difference from 'cis' women assertions.

"Except Emejulu is not baffled at all. For her, many feminists who oppose trans rights also ignore the rights of black, Asian, and other ethnic minority women. These exclusions are related, she said. “This has always been the dark heart of white, feminist politics: a jealous guarding of the boundaries of who gets to be a woman.”"

And now we're heading into territory that is really fucking insulting.

I think this one also comes from the USA and is about the suffragettes who excluded black women.

To take that and extend it across all feminists (where? not sure) is bizarre and frankly a bit insulting.

YES it is true that no UK feminists who are concerned about the direction of trans activism give a fuck about the plight of girls around the world - being raped, beaten, not being educated, being kidnapped, trafficked, all the rest of it, if their skin is now white. I mean fuck off with this shit. Who believes this? It's getting very tired now I'm surprised they are still trotting it out.

They assert that British women who don't like the direction of trans activism and are feminists DO NOT BELIEVE THAT BLACK WOMEN ARE FEMALE I mean it's preposterous.

Oh lol I read on and that is exactly the justification she uses.
These people read from a script:

"She cited several examples of white feminists excluding women from ethnic minorities, but began with the earliest. “In the US, we had the famous march on Washington for women’s rights in 1914 and the suffrage organisers did not want black women marching with them because they weren’t marching for their rights.”"

My own research area is violence against women and girls, and we know that trans women are more vulnerable to violence, harassment, and everyday abuse than other groups of women".

What does that sentence actually mean - is more vulnerable = actually experiences more violence. Is it actual physical violence or offending my feelings violence.

Any which way it still doesn't make them women - unless your definition of woman is simply a person who experiences the most violence...

OK skimming how

After saying that white women who are feminists and don't want unexpected dick in the Guides sleeping quarters are VERY RACIST

We move immediately on to accuse us of being Nazis. Lots of chat about Eugenics.

Yes women have been at the forefront of all genocides haven't we. Always a woman to blame, somehow.

"Trans women are capable of sexual violence just as any other group is, she said, but painting them as predators when they are routinely victims is unjust. And because perceived threat is not the same as actual threat, policies should be “based on actual levels of risk, which are low”. The risk of being raped by one’s husband, by contrast, is inordinately higher, which is why this furore is an odd paradox for Phipps."

Penis people should be locked in women's prisons on a self ID basis (hello karen white) because women get raped a lot by their husbands?

Yes that's a great argument.

Blah blah women are sexist bastards oppressing women though expectations around looks if they don't accept all transwomen as women in the same way that they accept transwomen who pass (but then they don't know they aren't women so WTF?).

Women saying men don't look like women as soon as they say "I'm a woman" are upholding the damaging beuaty standards for women WHAT TOTAL CUNTS THEY ARE.

Women, let me tell you how to do your womening properly.

No hon. Feminism is about women, not about men no matter how marginalised or distressed they are. That's something else. Go and tell the RSPCA off for not centering the children in Yemen.

And if you're worried about the marginalised, can you tell me what is going to happen to women of different faiths, older women, disabled women, traumatised women who have suffered assault and violence, young girls struggling with their body image and sexuality, you know the women and girls that are excluded as soon as the males walk into a women's space. How those males identify makes no odds. You cannot include men without excluding the most vulnerable women.

You'd think people who apparently care about feminism would notice this.

Centre men, they are the most oppressed women
Centre men, they are the most oppressed women
Centre men, they are the most oppressed women
Centre men, they are the most oppressed women
Centre men, they are the most oppressed women

Would that be an accurate summing up of the article without having to inhale the guff that's been farted out..?

In response to the title -

Nah, mate. We're good.

"The notion of keeping trans women out of women-only domains, said Phipps, also hinges on a false idea: that there is any such thing as a “safe space”, free from any prospect of sexual violence.

“It’s a misnomer,” she said, and it ignores a hidden truth: that it is not just men who sexually assault. Studies have revealed, for example, that women are victims of sexual violence in prison by other women inmates (who are not trans). Many men also already work in women’s prisons. So, she added, “If we’re worried about trans women in a woman’s toilet or in prison, why aren’t we worried about just women [generally]?”"

I don't even know where to go with this TBH

Mashup of

• Women are at risk anyway so you know they're going to be attacked anyway, what can you do?
• Women do it too!
• That women only spaces are belived by women to be 100% entirely risk free at all times (huh?)

Note the wordings:

"free from any prospect of sexual violence."

Extreme statement. Point is they reduce risk.

"it ignores a hidden truth: that it is not just men who sexually assault. Studies have revealed, for example, that women are victims of sexual violence in prison by other women inmates (who are not trans)"

Vague statement. It's not a "hidden truth" that women can sexually assualt - it's just incredibly rare when compared to how often men do it. Plus "studies have revealed! bears shit in woods!" > note, no stats.

I've given up too long and nothing new.

If the read the article, it's all given over to the views of female academics.

Still, the arguments they advance were awful - intersex is not a third sex no matter how much they want it to be, to help their argument. Arguing that intersex people prove humans are non-binary in sex is like saying the existence of people born blind proves humans are not a sighted species.

It's just went on like that, really

Reading on a bit to see who teh feminist academics they spoke to are -
I'm sure I've heard of sally hines but cant remember why

Anyway it goes - when women are attacked by penis people who have been given the right to enter women's spaces, it's anecdote. Nothing to see here, move along.

When trans people are attacked it is very serious and not anecdotal and needs tackling.

When anyone is attacked it is very serious.
Strangely, with this comment, the concern seems one way only.

Then

"Phipps is disturbed, too, by the links forming between anti-trans feminists and the far right"

???

Most of the women I know who are angry about where this is going are dyed in the wool lefties!

What we are finding out is that the neitehr the left nor the right give a fuck about women, really.

Had high hopes for teh WEP but. They don't know what a woman is either so what's teh purpose? A party for people with lady-brains who have a shared love of glitter and looking up through through their hair coyly like lady di?

That's like 99% of cunty people out then, for a start.

Sundaram echoed this. “My own research area is violence against women and girls, and we know that trans women are more vulnerable to violence, harassment, and everyday abuse than other groups of women.

We don't "know" anything of the sort.

I read it. As someone else said the article quotes directly from most of the women academics. I came away with the overriding feeling that 'anti'-trans women/feminists are white racists who don't give a shit about anyone who isn't white and that transwomen are massively more vulnerable to violence than women. Also that we should quit our moaning about stuff like women-only spaces because no woman is safe anywhere and can be raped by their husbands so let's just drop this whole 'safe-space' nonsense. We're women for God's sake we should care about everyone else - that's what we're here for. Depressing.

Well, quite. Five women regurgitating the same staggeringly silly mush of arguments, given the platform by a Man who frames it all with male-centric language.

Compare and contrast with the Janice Turner and Martina Navratilova in the press today. In fact, don't bother with compare and contrast, just give your time and attention to the women with real gumption and leave the penis-people to it for a while. They will still be there pontificating in the new year.

But the evidence, she said, does not show trans women to be anything like as sexually violent as men, and perhaps no more so than women generally

Would REALLY like to see which "evidence" she's drawing on here, because I would find it reassuring. I know of no such evidence.

Although Jensen is “exhausted by the willful ignorance in which so much public debate is swimming”

Yes, I find the complete disregard for women's rights of people like you quite depressing too. But won't use a silly melodramatic word like "exhausted" to describe my feelings about it.

This is why men make shit feminists.

I think consdiering who "we" is, is useful.

To me this reads that trans women should be prioritised over women and girls in research, funding, assistance etc.

I read the news and I really don't feel that women are girls are ready for that to happen.

The setting it up as a competition or hierarchy where trans women are a more at risk group than other "types" of women > lesbian women, black women, disabled women, and, yes, "angry women" (lol) and presumably also eg all the other sorts of women in different countries all over teh world (cunty women) > and therefore should be prioritised > framed as a feminist stance and in fact the only "correct" feminist stance > is disturbing.

essentially it just means that all resources for women and girls globally should be reprioritised towards people with dicks. So, nothing new there.

Why not fight for their own resources? Because takint money and time from feminist orgs and LGB orgs is easier obiously.

LGB+ is ALL and pretty much ONLY about the T now, and the T has NOTHING to do with sexuality and many T orgs contain openly homophobic people, plus plenty of others who are simply extremely sexist and wed to horribly regressive views about what it "means" to be a man or a woman. Me Tarzan you Jane that's it that's what it's all about.

"But the evidence, she said, does not show trans women to be anything like as sexually violent as men, and perhaps no more so than women generally

Would REALLY like to see which "evidence" she's drawing on here, because I would find it reassuring. I know of no such evidence."

I think it goes:

Transwomen are not sexually violent.
You can't see inside anyone's head to see if they are "really" trans or not
Therefore any trans penis person who commits sexual violence is not "really" trans
However, at the same time, a woman is anyone who says they are a woman
So, who decides who is a woman? Trans groups. Self ID for all but disowned if embarrassing to the cause
Meanwhile, cunty people who disagree with them are also not "real" women

Interestingly > seems to add up to "men are whatever they say they are, women are whatever men say they are"

same old same old

i wibble occasionally about whether I have this all wrong / have got extreme

But. I've been posting on here about thsi for years. literally. It is not a new thing amongst feminists, as this article claims. We have been discussing it for ages, and more loudly as laws start to change and orgs change their policies and throw safeguarding of female children down the drain.

I reflect and think. And I know that the idea that all a woman is, is an idea in a mans head, is regressive claptrap. The idea that humans can change sex is claptrap. The idea that women present the same risk of sexual violence as men is claptrap. And so on.

It's good to reflect. But the arugments are just bonkers, they don't make any kind of sense, at any level.

These women are not feminists. They don't care about women and girls as an oppressed class of people. They need to get themselves a new word for their "inclusive" social justice movement which does not centre female people and as pp said, aims to dedicate most available resources to the plight of male people.

Emejulu is not baffled at all. For her, many feminists who oppose trans rights also ignore the rights of black, Asian, and other ethnic minority women. These exclusions are related, she said. “This has always been the dark heart of white, feminist politics: a jealous guarding of the boundaries of who gets to be a woman.”

Is Emejulu Peter Thatchell in drag? When is the last time a gender critical feminist suggested women of colour were not actual women. FFS, this person is a Professor, which increasingly would appear to be an award for incoherent and evidenceless thinking.