@RaspberryChouxBuns
Not sure if this warrants a thread or whether I can just piggyback on this, but can someone explain to me why transgenderism ( ? ) is a feminist topic? Not necessarily in terms of the sanctity of single sex spaces because that's quite an obvious one, but why transgender people expect feminists to help carry their cause and support it unconditionally?
I can understand that transgender people encounter ignorance, hate and discrimination but why in this case, does the perceived "discrimination" of one individual trump the security of all women who use these changing rooms. Surely rather than Monsoon wringing their hands promising an investigation, it'd just be better to change the returns policy so people can try at home and take it back if it doesn't suit - we know it's possible because we've seen it done during Covid!
I'm probably not making myself very clear, sorry. I'm a feminist and I have enjoyed single sex spaces for most of my life in the UK until I moved to a European country- they don't exist over here. There are no girls schools, no ladies only swimming hours, too few single sex toilets... I'm a Mum of three daughters and I miss these spaces, once you lose them they are gone forever.
Several reasons for that:
One is the odd expansion of the concept of intersectionality which in its original form is important, i.e., to address the fact that some women are not only discriminated against on the basis of sex but also on the basis of race or ethnicity or sexual orientation or class or age or disability, and that these types of oppression can work together in ways which is crucial to understand for feminist analysis.
Not understanding it runs the risk that our policies will only benefit those women who face the smallest amount of intersecting types of oppression.
What I mean by odd expansion of the intersectionality concept is that it is often now used to argue that feminists should also fix all other types of oppression, because they affect women, too.
If we go that route, then feminism must fix everything that is wrong with the world. The movement doesn't have the resources for that, and no other movement addresses sex-based oppression.
But this is why some argue that feminism should fight for all causes and perhaps not even prioritise the fight against sex-based mistreatment.
The second is the 'be kind' trend. It's easy to see on social media that women who refuse to 'be kind' in the doormat sense get truly vicious reactions from many while men who refuse to 'be kind' are not attacked in the same manner.
That's because women are expected to be kind and inclusive and to be mothers for everyone. Women are not allowed to have boundaries we set ourselves.
The third is linked on the above two: Once you accept them, then it is imperative to decide how to pick among victim groups when rights clash or when one marginalised group oppresses another marginalised group.
Some call this the oppression pyramid: Those most oppressed are on the top of the pyramid and they will be selected to be the group some types of feminism now will try to help, even if the group thus picked contains zero biological women or girls.
The way Laurie Penny, for one, wrote about the Cologne new year's eve 2015-16 mass sexual harassment is an example of what happens with this approach when it is carelessly used.
An even earlier example I saw had to do with how many who practise the new inclusive feminism couldn't process the fact that at one point black voters in California were instrumental in delaying same-sex marriage to be approved (i.e., one marginalised group had many of its members willing to vote against the interests of another marginalised group).
It seemed almost impossible for them to accept what happened, because their focus was not on the acts we disapprove, irrespective of which group is guilty of them, but on the identities of the groups themselves, ranked in some value sense.
The fourth is more specific to the transgender context and has to do with tying various causes together. Smaller movements often want to harness their issues to those of larger or more affluent movements, and this can be done very easily with feminism once we re-define 'woman' so that sex becomes invisible.
What that new kind of feminism fights for, once sex-based oppression cannot discussed is anybody's guess.
Wow. I did go on and on.