Recommend me a book!

[RibenaBerry]

Right, reading these boards recently has given me a bit of a kick up the arse on my feminist principles. I've done a bit of 'light' reading in the area (think The Beauty Myth as a teenager) but think I need something a bit more serious without being so weighty I never pick it up. I'd rather have something published in, say, the last 15 years than any of the 'classics'.

Any ideas?

yay! thank god im not the only one who objects to the cis-woman thing.

and arent we getting off track here?

we are talking about men who want to be recognised as women.

much furhter up the thread i said to earwicga that in alot of ways this whole issue sounds to me like another version of 'what about the men'.

im not saying that we shouldnt care about discrimination (of anyone, let alone the gender conflicted) but i am saying that it shouldnt be a feminist issue. as these are not biological women. i guess thats my line in the sand.

dammitalltohell. i mean to write

'as these are not biologically female

[muttering about there being no edit button emoticon]

jeez!!!

they. THEY are not biologically female

[hanging head in shame]

On the terminology. Even if we refer to some women as trans women and others as cis women, or some other term, a distinction is still being made, implying difference and perhaps inequality.

I spotted something about the extract from the UK Gender Recognition Act that appears on this thread. The UK Government itself does not regard trans women and cis women as equal. It is not a Gender Equality Act. It does much to enshine a third gender in law. Some trans people see that as progress over the previous position of invisibilty. Surely for equality to exist in the eyes of the law between trans women and cis women there can be no exceptions but the legislation includes at least two exceptions. And they aren?t even the exceptions being objected to by the separatists on this thread. Trans women have moved closer to equality but they still have some way to go.

To reach equality, the situation with birth certificates would also have to change. I think at the moment the UK Government provides a trans woman with a female change certificate but the original male birth certificate is kept for ever because it is seen by the State as a record of fact at the time of birth. Some people say trans women have been female since birth but the UK Government is not among them. Equality would dictate that the Government change its procedure by issuing a new birth certificate and destroying all traces of the original.

For me this raises two questions

1. What can feminists do about this lack of legal equality for trans women?
2. How does this fit in with transphobia laws?

I hope this isn?t a diversion from the main discussion. Sorry if it is.

Thanks for the welcome Sakura and Pogleswood.

Hi vesuvia,
Thanks for that info, it was interesting.

1. What can feminists do about this lack of legal equality for trans women?
2. How does this fit in with transphobia laws?

I personally don't see the above two questions as being particularly important to feminists. A lot of questions are not being answered by trans-women, so for me I would say the questions are:

1. For trans-women to achieve equality does this mean that females must step aside and become a non-gender (even more than they already are)?. How can this help the women's movement, when part of the problem for women is that they're already regarded as 'other' and dehumanized?
   Won't this merely reinforce the notion that females are 'other'. Seeing as nobody wants to be regarded as 'other' under patriarchy, why should it be females who have to step aside? Why not create a third gender and force that gender to be treated equally in society (regarding discrimination in the workplace etc).

2. I don't particularly care for transphobia laws because it seems to me that if we can get deleted on this thread for discussing what we are right now, because trans-women believe it is bigoted, then who's to say what transphobia laws could cover. Burning Greer's books?
   But I believe that laws should be put in place to protect trans-women, obviously. I'm sure the reason so many women support trans-women is because they identify with what its like to be oppressed under patriarchy. The problem is, it really is sounding like trans-women can't contemplate that females have a reality of their own, which is completely different to theirs--which smacks of patriarchy to me!

"Is that what is happening re:feminism and trans women? "

Yes

I've just realised the reason I'm so antsy about it all is because I think being a non-gender will cause problems for women. Nowadays, in Britain, a woman who has had a mastectomy may feel that she's "less of a woman", which makes me so sad, because that is only the result of an evil society that tells her she can only be a woman if she possesses certain attributes. I think if women are a non-gender, populated by XY people who are having gender surgery, such as breast implants, to become women, who knows where it could lead for women.

Interesting account by Rachael Padman, the academic whose appointment at Newnham Germaine Greer objected to.

Note this para towards the end:
'And the final point is that indeed this particular outlook has taken twenty-plus years to acquire. There doesn't seem to be any easy route to femaleness, except "walking the walk", as well as "talking the talk". In that, the essentialist feminists do have a point. No matter how empathetic one is when one transitions, no matter what trials one has had to that point, one certainly hasn't been born and brought up as a woman. Whatever the truth about "brain sex", we will always have that difference, and I think that calls for a certain realism and a certain humility. '

one thing that strikes me about this argument is the way both sides think the other side is being essentialist.

(I reckon 'essentialist!' is fighting talk on the feminist threads....)

LOL at the word "essentialist" being regarded as fighting talk.

Only on MN, eh. I wonder if they use it on Netmums. [Snobby Hyacinth Bucket Emoticon]

I think the idea of three genders with equality for all is worthy of consideration. I see it reflecting reality more closely than the two genders we recognise now because the profile of trans people is rising. No doubt there would be problems along the way. But show me perfection because I have never seen it. Other cultures have taken a stab at running a society with three genders. It's not as though the two gender model has been an overwhelming success for all concerned.

I don't understand why some pro-trans people think it is worse to have three equal genders than two unequal genders.

Sakura

• I personally don't see the above two questions as being particularly important to feminists.

I'm inclined to agree with you. From what I've read here, transfeminists tend to get offended that not all feminists are prepared to fight all their battles.

I look at it like a feminism organisation delegating special interest issues to a transfeminism sub-committee. I see nothing wrong with that. Delegation does not mean that the umbrella organisation does not care about those issues only that it sees specialist attention with expert knowledge and experience as the most effective method of tackling the issue.

Burning Greer's books?

Oh dear me. Book burning would be the beginning of the end.

at herbeatitude

Vesuvia I like your posts.

sethstarkaddersmum. Thanks LOL.

Sakura, in terms of female and woman as terminology. The term female does conventionally refer to biological reality - female is used to describe the biological female in all species that have male and female reproductive organs.

Woman refers to a socially constructed gender role. The distinction between the two is important for any understanding of gender roles, not just those related to trans women.

I suspect that many trans women do understand this terminology and can use it to express their situation and their response to feminism. It is just that the pro-trans posters who started this debate don't seem to understand the terminology or haven't thought a lot about the importance of how we mediate the relationship between material reality and the socially constructed in so many areas of life.

I think it is difficult to get any understanding of trans issues from this thread because we don't really have anyone on here who is able to articulate how trans issues are developing right now.

That's true, MillyR. But I'm glad that this thread has got women realising that it's okay to say NO sometimes. Although remember earwicga was very clued up on all the terminology to the point where she was correcting people's hyphens, and yet she couldn't come up with a cogent argument to defend her viewpoint.

I read yesterday that "radical" (as in radical feminism) is often mistake for "extreme", when in fact it means "getting to the root".

I think the reason trans-feminism is an issue for radical feminists is not only because it may split and weaken the feminist movement, but because there may be certain aspects of it that could be negative to women, and if so, radical feminists have a duty to reject it.
What negative consequences could there be for accepting that women are a catch-all gender for anyone who digresses from the norm? SOme have been mentioned on this thread already.

I think the real issue here is that trans-women are frightened of expanding what it means to be male, because then they would really have a fight on their hands. Much easier to bully a few feminists into giving in and saying it's okay to be part of their gender. On that note feminists are more than happy to accept trans-men as women (whether they want to or not is a different issue, but the option is available for them. It is not available for trans-women--who are biologically male. This shows that radical feminists are not trans-phobic. Let's call it XY phobic, shall we )

Does anyone know of a trans-woman fathering a child?

Was thinking about this all earlier and remembered the trans-man who had a child in the last year or so.

I think that academic was confounding the issues. I am happy to call anyone 'she' or 'her', but I am defiant against the notion that a trans-woman knows what it's like to be a woman.
I think the fact she was shocked by this statement ""If you pull rank to get us to do things we don't want to, then you're not acting like a woman and we won't treat you like one" is pretty telling, especially as she then decided that this discrimination was specifically related to her being transexxual.

She goes on to say at the end:

"More recently I've realized that the crew would probably have used the same tactic with any woman in the position I was in" Well, duh . WOuld a real woman have been in that position of authority in the first place?

interesting question wasting away. I wonder. A trans-man having a child puts him firmly in the "woman" bracket to me. I really think we have to broaden the boundaries of acceptable attributes within gender as opposed to imposing certain attributes on either gender..

But steth, I'm glad she accepted the need for humility towards actual womens' experience, if you're going to claim you are one.

Sakura, that is a really interesting thing about trans women not wanting to push the defination of what man is....thathalf defined thought has been going round my head all week. What I see in this thread is how notions of 'man' are left intact and 'woman' are expected to morph and change and adapt. Now that may be a position of strength, but I am pretty sure men won't see it that way...

Pushing the definitions of what men and women are does seem to be an issue.
I don't quite get your point,Blackduck,that notions of man are being left intact and notions of woman being expected to change.This is something that is happening in both directions - why is the assumption that transsexuals alter notions of woman,but not of man?

I also don't see that "woman" is being used as a catch all gender for anyone who digresses from the norm. No one is saying that the category "men" will include only those with XY chromosomes who identify as men,and everyone one else will be "women",are they?

How to we feel about trans men? Are they pushing the definition of what women are?

The fight to expand the meaning of gender is a pretty big deal,and a fight that not everyone would want to take on.For some the fight to be able to live as they wanted might be more than enough - practically, changing the legal status of a group of people is easier than changing the whole of society.

You seem to be taking issue with Rachael Padman ,Sakura,when as far as I can see her views match yours!
She is saying,isn't she, that she realises there is a whole area of experience of being a woman that she doesn't share and saying that this call for realism and humility on the part of trans women.
The whole "well,duh" moment is one that I might well have shared - "If you pull rank to get us to do things we don't want to, then you're not acting like a woman and we won't treat you like one" is an attitude I understand now,but wouldn't have expected at all,or understood, when I was younger - so I too would have been shocked.Having said that it probably wouldn't have bothered me that I might not be treated like a woman,as the idea that men and women should be treated differently would also have been foreign to me...