I'm Australian, but as a feminist always find it interesting when I get the time to read about debates in other places that are pertinent.
I was a little bemused by your title - it doesn't seem to me to be a 'feminist' view on transgenderism, given I can find about a dozen different feminist views on that on any given day, but more the strange and warped world of a particular self-proclaimed feminist, Julie Bindel. Heck, I've read plenty of essentialist feminists who are far more respectful & compassionate of transgender/sex issues than this - well, sad idiot - comes to mind. and then of course there are all the other feminist views on the subject.
Just also a small question if you don't mind: In Aus at least, in my experience, a person who chooses to transition through hormone treatment & /or surgery is generally referred to as a transsexual, reflecting that they are looking to change their actual biology. As I understand it, while there's an infinitum of arguments to be had about the links between gender and sex, they are not equivalent. Hence here 'transgender' is not usually used to refer to someone altering their sex.
Is it used differently in the UK? "This can't possibly get more disturbing!" - Willow
You are correct in your definition of transexual and transgender, but I confess I had to look it up to check. Most people that I know use the word trans these days, not just as a shortcut, but simply that it avoids the semantic confusion involved in using the wrong version in the wrong place.
Personally I've always had a bit of an issue with transsexual, for the reason that this is about my gender identity, not my sexuality. Which allows our enemies to advance the idea that that we are merely failed homosexuals trying to be hetero-normative.
However I didn't invent the language and cannot remake it for my wishes. Still, I don't think I'm alone in this as a large number of people on the net seem to blur the distinction somewhat, using transgender preferentially. This could be a habit copied from the US, where otherwise a hierarchy could develop based on access to hormones/operations/legal status (not generally an issue here). Nevertheless, it's a blurring I'm happy to buy into. Trans is easiest and is global.
The only word we don't like others to use is trannie. It's an insult and we only use it ironically. keep to the Fen Causeway
(btw : I do not believe essentialism to be compatible with feminism).
However, there is so much prejudice against trans people from the feminist community in general that it is easier for me to assume prejudice than welcome from self-identified feminists. I cannot go on Reclaim the Night marches, if I were raped there are few if any rape crisis centres that would open their doors to me. I do not know of a feminist group that would welcome me (London Feminist network are notoriously transphobic / Oxford feminist netowrk attacked a trans person who tried to join a RTN march this year).
So, given that, it's kinda hard not to get a jaundiced view of feminist thinking about trans people in general. keep to the Fen Causeway
I'm not the most worldly-wise or widely read feminist by a long shot, but I must admit I hadn't seen the term 'transsexual' mixed up with sexuality before.
I must humbly admit also to being confused by you saying it was your gender you wanted to change but also took hormones etc. - but I don't want to make you feel you have to put your very personal decisions and life on a blog for all to dissect, so feel free to just let that one through to the keeper. Reading links are always welcome.
I also take your point about the last thing that's needed being some sort of bizzare heirarchy of 'trans' based on what stage people are at etc., I just know that in Aus I would get slapped down in any Queer meeting if I referred to a transsexual as a transgender, as the latter largely refers to people to change their gender expression, not their biology. Vive la difference I guess - terminology wise!
I think, just from reading your diary & comments, that brit essentialist feminists might be a bit different there. Those that I've had discussions with here are largely concerned that gender & sex have become so synonymous in patriarchal western thought, that those individuals wishing to change their sex may only be doing so because of rigidly imposed notions of gender - and of course then point to all the (I hope largely past) practices of making for eg a MtF dress & 'pass' as much as possible as a 'woman' before being granted access to surgery etc.
I've met a few nasty people in this area, but mainly I've met (luckily) compassionate people who draw the line at watching the suicide rate of trans people climb any higher while we all have a somewhat esoterical debate about sex & gender, even if they feel it's a really difficult issue that needs to be discussed, not least to look to free people from their gender/sex constrictions.
Personally, I tend to think that neither biology or social constructs explain everything /anything about humans on their own, a consideration of both is necessary.
Which is why, as a lesbian with a life sciences degree, when your quoted academic above talks about people 'clinging' to notions of biology, I think he's just as wrong as others, and it's a reductio ad absurdum argument. Some people 'choose' their sexuality, others feel completely compelled on a 'biological' level to be who they are. I'm probably a bit of both, but I don't really know or care.
Which is where perhaps I can relate a tiny amount to trans - I suspect you don't know or care either, you just want a chance to be yourself. And I'm glad you got it.
Finally, a historical note. My partner is 12 years older than me, and cut her teeth as a young lesbian feminist in SF, surrounded by all the well known second wave thinkers of that time. Despite being a very compassionate, lovely and kind human being, when I met her she had a really emotional (negative) reaction to trans issues, and talking to her about it through the years, a lot of it (& her support for works such as Raymond's) came from personal experiences with trans MtF who were by all accounts as 'nasty' as your JB above, and from my partner's telling, were also a lot of the experiences that Raymond drew upon.
IOW, it seems that some of the historical enmity between 2nd wave feminists and MtF in particular might have sprung from personal confrontations and a reaction to the medical patriarchy, that then got write large into various theories and texts.
Now I don't think that makes it right, and I've worked hard with my partner to change her views (and she has), but interestingly enough one of the things that's made that possible has been meeting MtF's here who pretty much disavow the attitudes of older MtFs like the ones my partner first met.
The reason I relate all this is not to 'excuse' anyone (my partner's views used to flat out hurt), but more it has made me meditate on just how much, particularly in relatively small academic circles, 'theories' spring from basic personal experience on a small scale getting passed off as some universal phenomenon etc.
hope this makes sense, and thanks for reading. "This can't possibly get more disturbing!" - Willow
relevant thread here "This can't possibly get more disturbing!" - Willow
It's bad enough to have to read Julie bindel every now and again without going looking to put my head in such things. Anymore than a coloured person needs to read every raving from some KKK-wingnut to know there are people who are ignorant and hateful. There's no argument to engage, no ideology to unpack, just stupidity and bigotry.
If B Dagger Lee, like Lisa Harnett over at questioning Transphobia, want to waste their time trying to engage people like Heart and others one to one on their home grounds then all power to them. But I tend to dismiss them as beyond salvage and would rather create a persuasive narrative to appeal to the middle ground. keep to the Fen Causeway
also in SF was the issue of sandy Stone and Olivia Records
Olivia Records hired Sandy Stone to help them record their performers. Olivia Records was the only record company that would produce music with explicit lesbian/women-centered content, and as such was struggling to break even financially. Protestors forced Olivia Records to fire Sandy Stone when it became known that she was a transsexual. The Olivia Collective was supportive, but in the end had to ask Sandy for her letter of resignation for fear of having Olivia Records shut down (it was the only women run record company at that time).
So when it comes down to a question of attidue, which came first, the chicken or the egg. Everything I've read regarding feminist behaviour towards trans people at that time suggests they refused to acccept them as anything other than men in drag and consequently attacked the very basis of the fragile identity these transwomen were trying to establish. If in response trans people became resentful, then I'm not surprised.
however, if some of these transwomen continued to behave in a male way and just felt entitled to be treated as a woman whilst continuing with male cultural entitlement then maybe feminist anger was justified. I dunno, but the headline stories I point to don't support that. rather I think the ideology of the time was driving the interpretation.
There remains even now a whole feminist culture of language regarding trans. If women behave aggressively towards transpeople then it's justifiable feminine outrage and thus acceptable. If transwomen react angrily then it's obviously male-power and entitlement and thereby QED, male behaviour from a man who must be resisted. Equally, if we respond quietly and with dignity, then we are adopting stereotyped feminine behaviours that no real woman would show, so we are seen as acting out rather than being. Either way we lose.
I also note the way these feminist narratives erase transmen. Feminists regard transmen as just extreme dykes, whilst transwomen are agents of patriarchy. Either way, the change of identity is not respected. keep to the Fen Causeway
When Olivia records personnel released a statement saying that Sandy was a woman they trusted, Raymond sneered that they should admit they just needed a man about the place. So, judging by the fact that the women who knew her believed in her transistion whilst those who were ideologically motivated trashed the feminist credentials of those who defended her shows it wsn't an argument about Stone herself, but ideas about feminism and transgenderism.
So if your partner bases her hatred of transwomen on Raymond's say so, I'd suggest she was was relying on hearsay and dogma rather than thought and experience. And sorry to say, that's about par for the course from the feminists I've encountered. keep to the Fen Causeway
And I have to say that I think suspicions of Twisty are unfounded. She let one thread go because she essentially wasn't paying attention, and in hindsight I'm glad she did because the sheer number of feminists arguing against the transphobes drove them off Twisty's blog, which was the best possible outcome. Twisty isn't just 'careful' implying a nefarious double agenda, she has categorically denounced transphobics, and there are several MtF who post on her blog.
Anyway, my partner's early experiences are what got me meditating on the whole personal -experience-becomes -academic-niche-market thing. It seems to have been particularly par for the course in second wave feminism where 'the personal is political' got IMHO taken by some authors far too far, not least because they ignored the fact that the experiences of largely middle class white women wasn't exactly representative. Thankfully feminism has evolved.
I guess I have to say, as a feminist, that I find your statements about feminists pretty anger-fuelled and quite personally confronting / hurtful. We're not the borg, and I'm not & don't hang out with transphobic people. My partner, who's had misgivings and displayed prejudice in private conversations with me, joined wholeheartedly in supporting a local MtF activist, Martine, who has a claim up with the anti-discrimination board about hate speech the conservative party put out about trans people during the last state election. Whatever her personal doubts on one level, she treats everyone with the dignity and respect they deserve, and fights for it.
so please be careful not to cling too hard to people like Heart & Julie B whatsoface and miss the fact that they aren't remotely representative of most feminists, nor are they supported by them. People change, even the older feminists, and we leave behind the ones who won't.
all the best. "This can't possibly get more disturbing!" - Willow
When a radical feminist female uses insulting words in the direction of transwomen, she understand this to be no different from using insulting words in the direction of males. It might be rude, crude, and socially unacceptable, it might be insulting, but it isn't hate speech. It's not discriminatory. Because given power differentials as they exist between males and females, females aren't situated socially so as to be able to discriminate against males, or to be bigoted towards males or to be phobic against males. To the contrary, our experience as females is that males are to be feared because they hurt females and to say so, and behave accordingly, is not "phobic," it is based on female reality
Trans women are men in her book, no debate, no shade of grey. Okay, she wrote that last year, but short of a very public change of mind and a deep apology, let's just say we're not counting her as an ally just yet. {snigger}
As for other feminists, it's difficult to say. Elsewhere I have mentioned that the feminists I knew and associated with (I'm 50) are all 2nd wave greenham common wimminists and, although they have "accepted" my change as being beneficial to me, I'm not convinced it's shaken their core belief that the transwomen are somehow misguided and aren't really women (and that transmen aren't really men) and shouldn't even hope for, let alone expect, sisterhood.
This somewhat colours my ideas of feminism. And seeing as I'm not allowed to participate in feminist discussion or go on RTN marches because I am trans, it's difficult to get any other viewpoint (especially when these prohibitions kinda confirm the idea they're all anti-trans).
So you feel I am anger-fuelled and confrontational towards feminists. I am not angry at you individually but, given that trans people didn't start this fight and there remains a significant number of feminists who continue to be hateful towards us, I think I'm entitled to a little exasperation at least. After all, it's been going on for so many years that transphobia seem woven into the very fabric of many assumptions underlying certain schools of feminism. These happen to be the dominant feminist narratives in the UK media right now. After all, it isn't just bindel, there has been a persistent trickle of articles from feminists that are hostile to trans people and precious few that are even neutral, let alone supportive. If, as you say, people change, then it's taking a lot longer than it ought.
By recently publicising our disgust at bindel's transphobia and the media's and feminist hypocrisy in supporting her we seem to have stirred up a hornets nest and I'm reading a lot of nasty stuff right now. And whilst I see individuals, I don't see feminist groups or prominent feminists complaining. So, paranoia may cause me to draw my brush too broadly, but it's hard to avoid the fact that some feminists are out to get us. We have never forgotten (or fogiven) what real actual damage Raymond's hatred achieved in the US when she succesfully campaigned to close John Hopkins GRU and we always fear a repeat from certain well-placed feminists here.
As poemless says;-
a belief in human equality regardless of gender seems, I don't know, a fundamental pillar of feminism
It sums up what I understand to be 3rd wave feminism. but here in the UK, feminists with a public pulpit aren't yet with the programme. Or if they are, equality doesn't seem to be extended to a bunch of self-mutilating weirdo men who want to be accepted as women; that, it would seem, is a step too far.
I regret sounding angry, but I have much to be angry about. keep to the Fen Causeway
females aren't situated socially so as to be able to discriminate against males, or to be bigoted towards males or to be phobic against males
That world sounds like an interesting place.
I'm not sure it's one that many Western men will have spent much time on, however.
so, you're right, no western man has ever visited that world. keep to the Fen Causeway
My friend, a long time transwoman, wrote a review of Raymond's hate-fest keep to the Fen Causeway
