Radical Feminism and the Transgendered, or, how to write a post that will infuriate everyone
The content of this post removed because I have been silenced by transgender activists who ignore everything else I write in order to take what I have written here, twist it out of context and proportion, and make me out to be some horrible transphobe who dehumanizes all transpersons everywhere and abuses my supposed privilege over transpersons. In fact, the only links my blog gets anymore is from angry transactivists vilifying me. Everything I write about women’s rights? Completely ignored. The irony seems to escape you all.
May 15, 2006 at 4:45 pm
The animosity between transgender advocates and radical feminists goes back 30 years. There was an outpouring of rage over the fact that Olivia Records, a company established to sell feminist music, had hired a transwoman. Then there was Janice Raymond’s widely influential book which argued that transsexualism was an attempt to infiltrate and weaken feminism.
Trans activists have not exactly conducted themselves spotlessly, as you noted. I agree with you that the people who operate the MWMF have the right to include or exclude whoever they want, and that it does not constitute transphobia in nearly the same way as housing and job discrimination or violence and harassment.
It is of course to the benefit of those with privilege that feminists and trans-activists should waste so much energy arguing with each other rather than addressing the primary source of their mutual grief.
This animosity seems to be sort of fizzling out on its own, and i think the biggest factor in this is simply that society at large is becoming much more accepting and understanding of transgenderism. Most of the feminists i encounter these days are allies of transgendered folks, and understand that transphobia is a direct result of sexism.
May 15, 2006 at 4:50 pm
That’s my point exactly – that sexism, the strict gender dichotomy set up by the patriarchy, is the real enemy of both feminists and transpersons. This ongoing battle is far more to the benefit of the patriarchy than it is of either feminism or trans-activism.
June 1, 2006 at 2:03 pm
I just wanted to toss my two cents into this debate. What if it isn’t about gender presentation but about somethign more akin to phantom limb syndrome. Having parts which aren’t there. The human brain si wired at birth to acomidate a certian set up for the body. What if the person just doesn’t have genitals that make sense in their head.
What if, they had no privalge growing up due to abused by men and being androgynous their whole lives?
Personaly, as a young transgal, I don’t get along with most other trasnwomen. I am not girly. I don’t feel that I need to wear frilly clothes to be female. I do feel that I was born with an inbuilt chasity belt. My hormone levels and phantom female anatomy are what make me trans.
I know I can’t be accepted into some places. There will always be places a person can’t be accepted into, doesn’t matter who or waht they are. Thats just life. I can’t expect to go to african american only spaces either!
However, I have very few shared experiances with men or women. Except, maybe, for my love of anime and gaming. Grew up androgynous nad probaly will continue to be that way. MY gender is andro but my sex is well screwy. I”m a genetic fuck up. IT happens.
All in all, I think waht I am trying to say is I agree with you for the most part. I never heard of that penis in the shower thing. That would freak the living shit out of me. After I get everything fixed up I should be just fine and don’t intend to let anyone know. My past really should not matter to anyone. But man, I really transgals who give transgals a bad name. I mean wtf mate. I still can’t beleive anyone would do that. I don’t feel comfortable around men and someone coming to a space where I could be raped. Thats just wrong. Just totaly wrong.
December 25, 2006 at 7:31 pm
Hello Amananta,
I hope this finds you well. This is my first time commenting here. I want to thank you so much for writing this essay on the transgender-radical feminism question. You’ve put into words what I’ve struggled to make sense of myself.
From what I’ve seen, there’s a ton of horizontal hostility from both sides, and a LOT of internalized misogyny and homophobia. Rad fems have done ourselves no favors by employing the basest transphobic rhetoric, while arguing from an unexamined white privileged standpoint (from this Black woman’s vantage point, women and transpeople of color seem to be beneath notice). Instead of aiming our critique at the problematic assumptions of (white male-dominated) trans politics, we attack all transgendered people personally. You’d think that if anyone would, we’d know the difference. But therein lies the problem. Too many so-called rad fems are ill-informed about radical feminist practice and theory. If one understands gender as a system of (heteropatriarchal) power, attacking transpeople makes no sense.
You may think you’ve infuriated everyone, but I say that your essay here needs to be read and discussed by every feminist and queer activist. I would like to link your post, if that is okay with you. Let me know.
Happy Holidays!
December 25, 2006 at 8:15 pm
Thanks – yes you can link to this. It is good to know somebody is listening – I get attacked by people on both sides about this.
December 31, 2006 at 8:04 pm
Hey all,
This looks like a great discussion. I just wanted to toss in my two cents – but the whole ’someone with a penis sneaking into the showers at the women’s festival and letting it all hang out’ is an urban legend. Anytime someone tries to track down what year the ‘incident’ happened in, and get any more details on it, the story collapses like a house of cards.
So. Not that women-born-women shouldn’t be able to have a space of their own to discuss their experiences, but this particular vicious little story seems to be propagated more because it ‘feels’ right to a particular side in this debate, rather than, you know, actually happening.
January 2, 2007 at 5:41 pm
Best post I have ever read on the topic. I will be sharing this with as many people as will listen.
January 3, 2007 at 4:54 am
[...] brain is confused, but if you are awake and not sleep like shannon, maybe you have ideas. Another lady has thoughts about transgender people. Hey, spotted elephant is saying stuff. She’s my favorite radical feminist. Cept me. Like [...]
January 10, 2007 at 5:44 am
[...] Radical Feminism and the Transgendered, or, how to write a post that will infuriate everyone 8 [...]
January 10, 2007 at 10:05 am
There are some distinctions I’d like to point out. I’ve seriously listened and I’m not angry, ATM. You do a very good job of comparing and contrasting… but the people on the T side that your comparing are what I would call “baby T’s”. I think most transfolk, at some time in their transition question what a woman or a man is, and how they fit into that. You have to realize that I came from the privileged to the not. Hell, I don’t think I read “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” till 2004. But the radfems that buy into this anti-transgender rhetoric seem to be well established.
January 10, 2007 at 11:57 am
“the people on the T side that your comparing are what I would call “baby T’s”
That is entirely posssible. It could also be, simply because of the nature of things, that those are the ones who cry out loudest since they are just coming from a time of having had to repress their true selves. It’s also true, now that I think about it, since many of my friends are young, that that is the main personal experience I have had. You probably know, most trans people are not able to come out until their late 20s or 30s for economic and other reasons.
I see a trend (at least I hope it is a trend) for parents and doctors to be more accepting of allowing thier trans children to live in the way that is most comfortable for them at a much younger age. I think this would clear up a lot of problems.
“But the radfems that buy into this anti-transgender rhetoric seem to be well established.”
I don’t think they are as established as you think. I resist all attempts to treat feminism, even radical feminism, as a monolith, because it is an illusion.
At any rate I hadn’t realized comments are still enabled on this post so I am turning them off, not because of you, but because the thanks I have gotten for trying to see both sides and be a bridge builder is to have half the blogosphere call me transphobic and half to call me a deluded pawn, and I am vomitously sick of it. Everyone is misrepresenting everything I have said to fit their own agenda. I should have known better than to try.