Can someone explain what's radical about a 'terf'?

[bathsh3ba]

I've been reading and trying to educate myself about what's going on in the current trans rights v women's rights debate and it strikes me that calling people who oppose self-ID 'trans-exclusionary RADICAL feminists' is somewhat odd. Surely wanting self-ID is the radical position and the opposite position is more conservative with a small 'c' than radical. Is this just a gaslighting tactic on their behalf or am I unaware of some definition of radical feminism? (This is entirely possible as I freely admit I've never read much about feminism until recently.)

[TyroSaysMeow]

No, bathsh3ba, because if I describe myself as a woman based on my biology I'm identified as a terf. The rape and death threats follow soon after.

I'm not sure which definition of "trans" you're using, but it sounds like it's tied up around 'rejecting one's sex class membership'.

Personally I'd find it quite helpful, when the topic of trans rights is being discussed, to be permitted to lay claim to that label, because otherwise my experiences and opinions are dismissed as the terven witterings of a cishet bigot. It's an adjective that indicates my relevant experiences, not a statement about my sex or 'gender identity'.

Can't transwomen just be men seeking treatment for gender dysphoria? It would make things a damned sight easier for actual female women.

[bathsh3ba]

@TyroSaysMeow well if you're female and are sure you are a woman, and do not identify as a man, then surely you're a woman and don't need the 'trans' prefix? Not sure why gender dysphoria necessarily means you need to be called 'trans'. Can't you just be a woman seeking treatment for gender dysphoria, since you say that is what you have?

[TyroSaysMeow]

I'm not entirely sure I follow your meaning here and I'm definitely not familiar with all the terminology as I'm new to this debate.

The Other Side are deliberately obfuscatory, so I'm not surprised if it's confusing!

If you mean something else by trans woman then please explain.

I mean someone born female (ie a woman) who meets the descriptor "trans", but does not identify as a transman or man.

What I actually mean is: as a female person with a whole host of gender issues that meet the definition of dysphoria, but who nevertheless is damned sure she's a woman, what do you propose I call myself, since you've accepted males' stealing of the obvious term?

[WhatAWonderfulDay]

TyroSaysMeow Oh!!!
So trans women ARE women!!! They are also transmen.
Grammatically TWAW is correct then but means something else and not what the TRA say.

You learn something new every day!!

[bathsh3ba]

@TyroSaysMeow

I'm not entirely sure I follow your meaning here and I'm definitely not familiar with all the terminology as I'm new to this debate.

I understand trans woman to mean someone who was born male and identifies as/lives as female. And I understand trans man to mean someone who was born female and identifies/lives as male. If you mean something else by trans woman then please explain.

If we mean the same thing, then I can't agree with you that the only difference between a trans woman and someone who was born a woman is sex class. If you haven't grown up female, you've had a different lived experience and you simply can't understand what it is to grow up female.

Being a woman is a combination of biology, lived experience and social constructions. A trans woman can take on some parts of womanhood but not all of them. And thus will always be different from someone who is born a woman. This isn't me erasing anyone (how on earth does one person have that power anyway), it's just a statement of fact.

And trans people would have more support from me if they stopped trying to make me say something I don't believe and never will believe and focused instead on how trans women and women can live side by side without infringing on each others' rights, because it really ought to be possible.

I would never raise this with a trans person if they didn't raise it with me. I'm not trying to hurt anyone's feelings. But I'm also not going to be made to say something I believe to be a lie, and a dangerous one at that.

[TyroSaysMeow]

It seems to me so obvious that a trans woman is different from someone who was born a woman.

I feel like a dog with a bone at the moment, but it bears repeating.

When you use "trans woman" to describe male people who believe themselves to be female, you're leaving me with no way in which to describe myself in this brave new world in which we find ourselves.

There are women who meet the descriptor trans, who are made completely invisible in this whole debate, because we don't claim to be men yet we're not allowed to claim both 'trans' and 'woman'.

A transwoman is obviously different to someone who was born a woman; they're of different sex classes. A trans woman - an adult-human-female-who-meets-the-descriptor-'trans' - is no different to any other woman in this respect.

When you use "trans woman" to refer to male people, you're erasing actual women with 'trans' experience.

[bathsh3ba]

Thank you everyone for your explanations, the word was bothering me! So, basically, it doesn't mean what I thought it meant but it's still being used inappropriately.

I have to say I'm one of the (probably many) who grew up thinking I didn't really need feminism and am fast changing my mind (I'm late 30s). The sheer vitriol/hatred being spat out in this debate is horrifyingly misogynistic - and generally I think that word is over-used.

It seems to me so obvious that a trans woman is different from someone who was born a woman. Not just biologically but also according to lived experience and shared cultural history. Different doesn't have to mean less than, and I certainly don't think anyone should be subjected to abuse of any kind, but saying there is no difference is just …. wrong.

[TehBewilderness]

I got paid less than the men because they had a family to support and my children were chopped liver long after the laws said businesses couldn't discriminate in that fashion. They knew we couldn't afford to file a complaint.

[TehBewilderness]

@FantaOra

I always used to think that radical feminist were the ones that thought marriage was a form of prostitution and sex within marriage was rape. I saw a woman on Wogan or Parkinson once talking about it, shows my age!

In the dark days of yore when Wogan was on the telly the feminists of the time did accurately describe marriage in that way as women could only access bank accounts and mortgages with the permission of their husband so most women were trapped financially with the man who had got his leg over at 17 and couldn't get out. I know it seems crazy now but I grew up in that Era. And of course men could rape their wives, it wasn't a crime.

Women did have to spell it all out pretty bluntly back then and of course Wogan and Parky just laughed at them and ogled their tits whilst back slapping pedophile rapist jimmy slavery as my dad called him.

I subscribed to Spare Rib at the time by purchasing a postal order with my paper round money from the post office, the only way women could use non cash money in those days without a man approving it.

I would read it with my eyes popping out and never looked back. I am a radical feminist.

My life experience too.
Cosigned.

[FantaOra]

www.theguardian.com/money/us-money-blog/2014/aug/11/women-rights-money-timeline-history

[Melia100]

Radical = root.

Please don't use the t word here.

[DidoLamenting]

I subscribed to Spare Rib at the time by purchasing a postal order with my paper round money from the post office, the only way women could use non cash money in those days without a man approving it

In the 70s? That really isn't the case.

[littlbrowndog]

Terf. It’s what men who know they can’t say women are bitches cunts hags use

Kinda makes them feel ok

If they said women you are bitches cunts and hags then they might get called out on it

So die cunt bitch terf it’s all good

[driverkatie552]

@gncq see I don't have a problem with with self identification for individuals I don't understand it but then I don't understand why people vote Tory however I can see why the eradication of all same sex spaces is an issue a very good friend of mine was a refuge a few years back and the thought of a man being able to just access that space would fill her with dread it wouldn't personally bother me but then I've never been in a position that I would fear men and those that do should be protected surely that's just common sense

[Gncq]

I agree with you, OP, The idea that it's somehow radical to want to preserve same sex spaces is gaslightly.

There's a whole problem surrounding the term "terf" as well.

"Terf" was invented by gender ideologists to slur women who think same sex spaces are important.

Virtually none of the people who get called "terf" are actually "radical feminists" or "exclude transpeople" at all.

It's a typecast.

If you're called a "terf" then apparently you

1. Want to deny the existence of transpeople.
   
2. Want to harm transpeople
   
3. Think transpeople shouldn't exist
   
4. hate transpeople
   
5. think all transpeople are rapists
   6/7/8/9/10) more bullshit.
   
   No one thinks any of the above apart from maybe a few terribly homophobic men, but women get typecasted in this way for basically saying "women's spaces are for women".
   
   It's not a "radical" position and it shouldn't be.
   
   Have read replies above saying "radical means root" and it's fine if you want to identify as a radical feminist yourself, but it's usually an accusation put on you for uttering the most ordinary "conservative" small c, opinion.

[driverkatie552]

The first time I heard about a terf was during a heated discussion at a session of lgbt plus awareness training when someone said that a terf is someone who classes them self as a feminist and is against trans rights I'm
Not at all convinced that is the case if it not just a way of insulting those who have different opinions and shutting down conversation

[FantaOra]

We still have to spell it out pretty bluntly now. Especially to all the feminist men demanding we agree that men are women. It's got worse frankly.

[worstwitch18]

Radical has two meanings that are being confused here:

1. relating to the root/affecting the fundamental nature of something
   
2. extreme or fringe edge of a set of ideas
   
   "Radical feminism" is one of the main branches of feminism, and the radical in its namer refers to the first meaning. It addresses the root causes of women's oppression.
   
   "TERF" is a term used initially by trans people and stands for trans exclusionary radical feminists. This is not a term radical feminists would have come up with by themselves because radical feminism includes trans men (people born female) and excludes anyone who is biologically male whether they are trans or not.

[SomeDyke]

Radical feminism says that the roots of female oppression are based on our sex, our ability to give birth and the fact that females tend to be physically weaker than males. As Ti-Grace Atkinson said:

"The first dichotomous division of this mass [mankind] is said to have been on the grounds of sex: male and female ... it was because half the human race bears the burden of the reproductive process and because man, the ‘rational’ animal, had the wit to take advantage of that, that the childbearers, or the 'beasts of burden,' were corralled into a political class: equivocating the biologically contingent burden into a political (or necessary) penalty, thereby modifying these individuals’ definition from the human to the functional, or animal."

WHY this has been used is because writing the above, I was talking about biology and sex, not social roles or gender or any other stuff. Hence it was radical feminists who tended to think it mattered that women were female, and not male, and that persons who were male could not and can never appreciate the position of female people.

So, anyone who opposes trans-ideology gets called a TERF, even those most of those haven't got a clue what radical feminism actually is. And radical comes from the latin meaning root, and radical feminists believe the root of our oppression comes from our sex, and is rooted in history, and at whatever point inhuman history males realised this. At which point I cannot forget the infamous, reasonably recent illustration from New Scientist (popular science magazine), illustrating an article on pre-history, where the only visibly female figure seemed to be stood there flicking her hair, whilst all the other figures doing stuff appeared to be male.................

[FantaOra]

I always used to think that radical feminist were the ones that thought marriage was a form of prostitution and sex within marriage was rape. I saw a woman on Wogan or Parkinson once talking about it, shows my age!

In the dark days of yore when Wogan was on the telly the feminists of the time did accurately describe marriage in that way as women could only access bank accounts and mortgages with the permission of their husband so most women were trapped financially with the man who had got his leg over at 17 and couldn't get out. I know it seems crazy now but I grew up in that Era. And of course men could rape their wives, it wasn't a crime.

Women did have to spell it all out pretty bluntly back then and of course Wogan and Parky just laughed at them and ogled their tits whilst back slapping pedophile rapist jimmy slavery as my dad called him.

I subscribed to Spare Rib at the time by purchasing a postal order with my paper round money from the post office, the only way women could use non cash money in those days without a man approving it.

I would read it with my eyes popping out and never looked back. I am a radical feminist.

[FloralBunting]

I tend to think defining 'woman' as someone who feels 'womanly' and likes 'womanly' things is fairly bloody conservative, tbh.

[DuDuDuLangaLangaBingBong]

Nothing ‘radical’ in making men the centre of your feminism

[TehBewilderness]

A bitch is a female dog but it is used to insult women.
TERF is also a pejorative invented to demonize Feminists and women who say no to men. Kkinda like last generations Feminazi and the generation before's bitch and your grandparents generation's man-hater.

It is inaccurate because Radical Feminists do not exclude females, aka transmen from their praxis.
But accuracy isn't the point. It's just another way to say shutupshutupshutup to women speaking truth to power.

[Thelnebriati]

And yes I agree that the idea of self ID is new, and extreme compared to how society has been ordered since history began.

One of the problems is that women are expected to conform to certain rules based on our sex. It can be dangerous to break them.
Now we have been ordered to forget them all and learn a new set of rules.

Women never get to make the rules, not even for ourselves.

[OhHolyJesus]

I always used to think that radical feminist were the ones that thought marriage was a form of prostitution and sex within marriage was rape. I saw a woman on Wogan or Parkinson once talking about it, shows my age!