While I do think that society tends to gloss over the remaining oppression of women, I think that saying an essential part of being women is experiencing sexism is uhm, rather buying into the oppressors' crap. The whole point is that just because we are women does not mean we should have to suffer! Maybe transgendered people cannot know what it feels like for non-transgendered women to be women, but it's not like 50% of the population is having some homogeneous life experience either. Most women will suffer at some point and that can become a way of identifying with each other. That doesn't mean women who have not suffered are not real women. That's as sexist as anything.
Ok, can I open a can of worms? Do you think it is fair to say that transgendered people's experiences are comparable to multi-racial peoples'? I had a friend growing up whose mother was white and father was black. Her black friends and family accused of her of not really being black, and visa versa. In her mind, I think she identified more as a black girl, but she had life experiences that her black cousins could not have, and same with her white friends. So she occupied this middle territory where she had insight into both worlds, but was not truly accepted as legitimate by either. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
Or rather, I think cathegories are important to peoples identities. Cathegories like "white", "black", "man", "woman". And transgressing the boundaries of those cathegories is a threat to the identity. Now, while most feminists I know cheer when lines are crossed, I know that there are those that do not.
There are a number of reasons:
The whole seperatist movement is somewhere dependent on the cathegories and can therefore have problems with transgendered people.
The biologistic feminists generally accepts gender as given by sex (while wanting to raise the status of females) and therefore can have problems with transgendered people.
Social-constructivist feminists can have problem with anyone choosing female gender of their own free will, without being programmed to it.
Queerfeminists can actually (though I think this is rare) also have problems with transgendered people or rather their argumentation. That transgendered people sometimes (or often) argue that they were a wo/man stuck in a wo/mans body is the problem, as it ties neetly into the model they are fighting with male and female being opposite and mutually exclusive cathegories. Even though it on the argument on the surface contradicts this, it reaffirms it on a basic level. All souls are gendered, though sometimes they end up wrong. Thanks to modern surgery it can be corrected.
Just to name a few groups and various possible issues with transgenderism. (If you have no idea what groups I am talking about, try wikipedia. It is probably faster.)
I do not know Julie Bindel, nor her work. Therefore I have no idea why she has problems with transgenderism, but I bet the cathegories has something to do with it. A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!
While I do think that society tends to gloss over the remaining oppression of women, I think that saying an essential part of being women is experiencing sexism is uhm, rather buying into the oppressors' crap. The whole point is that just because we are women does not mean we should have to suffer!
But Bindel is not a progressive feminist really, her's is a very conservative form of women's politics called Essentialism (tho' she denies it)
(Essentialism is)..The idea that women and men are essentially fundamentally different and that the only way for women to find their own unique expression is to withdraw from male society as much as possible. Now it is easy to criticise essentialism, its basic premise of what makes certain groups of people the way they are (for example, women, blacks, Jews), are the political-philosophical constructs of conservatism. The history of essentialist argument is one of oppressors telling the oppressed to accept their lot in life because "that's just the way it is." By buying into the idea that women are the only non-aggressive, nurturing and life giving gender they were actually supporting patriarchal assumptions that kept women oppressed. Ironically, essentialism is becomes a specifically anti-feminist philosophy
Now it is easy to criticise essentialism, its basic premise of what makes certain groups of people the way they are (for example, women, blacks, Jews), are the political-philosophical constructs of conservatism. The history of essentialist argument is one of oppressors telling the oppressed to accept their lot in life because "that's just the way it is." By buying into the idea that women are the only non-aggressive, nurturing and life giving gender they were actually supporting patriarchal assumptions that kept women oppressed. Ironically, essentialism is becomes a specifically anti-feminist philosophy
Which is exactly what you're saying. This isn't new thinking at all, Germaine Greer has been saying much the same since the early 70s. keep to the Fen Causeway
