Expect light posting from me until 2006 – I’m just too busy to spend a lot of time on “Alas.” But I wanted to point out this excellent discussion of transwomen and feminism, which took place in Feministe’s comments, mostly between three writers I respect a lot: Piny, Emma of GenderGeek, and Tekanji of Shrub.com. Tekanji, in particular, did a wonderful job of arguing that a definition of “women” that includes transwomen is compatable with, and desirable for, feminism.
From Tekanji’s final post on that thread:
But, part of what I see as a gender democracy is that it focuses on adding to existing definitions, not taking away. Just because I choose to work outside of the home and not have children does not make some other woman’s choice to become a stay-at-home mom any less valid, right? In that same regard, the ability for a transwoman to call herself, and be seen as, a woman should not invalidate the womanhood of women-born-women.
Also, on the “helping our cause” area, I disagree. I think that in order to get society* to a place where the transgendered (et, al) are accepted – be they woman-identifying, man-identifying, neither or both – is to get to a place where a person’s choice is not seen as genderdized. In that way, I see the struggle of women-born-women and the transgendered (et, al) to be one and the same: we all want the same opportunities, rights, and freedoms as men-born-men have traditionally have, as well as the ability for the traditonally “feminine” to be seen as something of equal value so that men-born-men can aspire to it, too. If “masculine” and “feminine” were seen as equal, then I am quite sure that the gender binary wouldn’t be nearly as important as it is now. […]
I don’t believe having a less strict (more mutable, more inclusive, etc) definition of “woman” necessitates the eradication of the subtleties of the current defintion. We already have a diverse set of people who fit under the word “woman”, we already need specific subsets to deal with their distinct needs, so what’s adding yet another subset onto that in order to help alleviate the oppression of some of our sisters?
That last paragraph in particular does a wonderful job of putting into words something I’ve thought about this question for years. Like Tekanji, I’ve long been disturbed by a strong streak of transphobia among some feminists; that was a major reason I grew disenchanted with the late, great Ms. Boards.
There’s more good stuff in the discussion at Feministe, so I’d recommend reading the whole thing.
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Over twenty years, I changed my opinion on transpeople considerably.
When I first became aware that transwomen and transmen existed (sometime in my teens) my view was simply that they were not (and could not be) anything but the gender they were born in. A transwoman, I thought as a teenager, was a man who had had surgery and hormone treatment.
Gradually I changed my mind: I met trans people, a close friend came out to me as trans MtF, and various other things happened. It took 20 years, I think, but I do now think that a transwoman is a woman, and a transman is a man, albeit with a rather different history and background.
But one thing I always thought: that discrimination against transwomen by feminists and lesbians, banning transwomen from women-only space, was just plain wrong. Even when I thought that a transwoman was “really” a man, I accepted that when a man has decided to live as a woman, to the extent of hormone treatment and surgery, rejecting this person from women-only space is nothing but cruelty. (Further, it is bigotry based on how people look – since it’s not possible to conduct chromosome tests at the door.) And refusing to call a transwoman “she” and “her” is just rudeness, and unacceptable.
I have a twenty-plus year history of thinking about trans issues, and if you asked me what I thought of trans people over the twenty years, I’d have given you a different answer depending when you asked. But cruelty, bigotry, and rudeness have never been acceptable to me, and I would always have opposed banning transwomen from women-only space for those reasons alone.
I’ve been thinking about this issue a lot as well and much of what I’ve read from radical fems is not transphobic, they simply don’t believe that women-born-women and mtf share the same experiences because women-born-women and mtf’s were socialized from birth differently. There is also this idea that kept popping up that some men feel so entitled that they think that they can steal women’s experiences and colonize them as their own. It was also compared to blackface. I’m still working through what I think about this matter, but I do think that it’s dishonest to call them phobic. Most of them, from what I’ve read, do not hate mtf’s, they critique what they believe is a function of male privilege.
jessant said:
There is also this idea that kept popping up that some men feel so entitled that they think that they can steal women’s experiences and colonize them as their own.
That is saying that transwomen are the same as men. They’re not. They’re women, and like other women, they have come from different places of power. Just because I once had heterosexual privilege, should I be denied access to a queer space now that I ID as bi/pan?
I haven’t read all that much from other radical feminists, but the article that Feministe linked flat out denied that transwomen were “real” women. Furthermore, on my blog one commenter denied the possibility that women could oppress the transgendered because it would turn us into the “oppressor class” (which makes me wonder what her take is on racist, homophobic, classist, etc. feminists who come from positions of power in those areas), and that transwomen are, and always will be, the “oppressor class” (ie. men).
Also, if you can’t tell, I take issue with using the term “oppressor class” because, to me, that implies active participation. I see men (and whites, and heterosexuals, and able-bodied people, etc) as privileged, because they (we) are accorded certain privileges that minority groups are not, and furthermore that can and is used to oppress those without the privilege. But not all people do it actively. Indeed, I’d argue that most privileged people (including myself) participate mostly or solely in a passive way, rather than going out to “oppress” people.
And, in terms of other writings, I don’t remember exactly who said these things (I once knew, but it wasn’t an important enough detail to keep in my brain), I’ve heard of terms like “gender traitor” and “spy for the patriarchy” be used for transmen and transwomen, respectively, by a feminist or two.
All that is pretty transphobic in my book.
I just got done reading through all the comments over at Feministe and Shrub.com, and I just wanted to offer kudos to Piny, Tekanji, and Thomas. You three were impressive and eloquent, and I’m learning quite a lot from watching this debate continue to unfold. Thank you.
—Myca
I’ve always thought that the argument that a MtF isn’t and can’t be a “real woman” because of different socialization and experiences growing up was spurious and reactive.
Whose socialization “counts” towards their being a “real woman?” There must be hundreds of ways that our socialization and experiences growing up differ, and while gender is a useful analytical lens, it is always tinted by other aspects of experience: race, class, ethnicity, location, physical ability, religion, sexual orientation, political perspective of the family, family structure, intelligence, appearance, social skill level…just to name a few.
What makes the experience of being in the wrong body growing up qualitatively different from any of those other tints to the gender lens?
IMO, nothing.
Plus, it has always seemed to me that one of the core values of feminism is the right of self-determination and the power to identify one’s self as one chooses. In the earliest stages, that may have been both as a woman and a voter or a woman and a public speaker. It evolved to woman and athlete, woman and engineer, woman and in love with another woman, woman and, woman and….
I admit, it’s hard for me to imagine how one could be so convinced that they were born into the wrong body that they would need to have that body altered in such a fundamental way.
But there are a lot of things in the world that are obviously real, even though I don’t get them. Again, trans identity is no qualitatively different.
The thing here is that so many “traditional” boundaries are now gray. We used to have straight and queer – now that queer is becoming more acceptable, many people are fessing up to really being bisexual. People used to identify as black, white, native, asian, etc – now most of my friends identify as what we all have been all along – mutts.
My sister and I are both half Native American, but neither one of us have any real knowledge about the culture. However, every time I want to go to a native gathering, I practically have to bring along a box of documents to prove my ancestry, because other than my extremely dark hair, I look like my swedish father. My sister, on the other hand, is a near identical copy of our full-blooded Iroquois great-grandmother. I understand that because of my appearance, I have a great deal of priveledge that my sister does not. But it doesn’t make me any less part of that heritage. And I would really like to be more in touch with it, but it is very difficult for me to get past that “but you don’t look native!!!” beginning.
I imagine it is much the same for transpeople, or bisexuals in a hetero-relationship, or african-americans who can pass as white, or anyone really on the borderlines between our binary definitions. Most of us NEED an identity, especially with a group of some kind, but for those of us who aren’t really in any particular camp, it can cause quite alot of needless strain and suffering.
Transwomen are women. They are women with certain priveledges, yes, but they also have their own unique oppression. For one, they could certainly be enlightening for both men-born and women-born, and especially the biological determinists camp, about the claims feminists have been making for so many centuries. The oppression of women has more roots in culture than in biology – what can prove this more than the treatment of those women who are not biologically women???
But more importantly, transwomen are women because that is how they choose to live. Most have taken drastic, mostly permanent life-impacting steps to validate this choice (they could stop taking hormones, but wouldn’t everyone still remember that they had taken them???) and this is not something that men do lightly in a culture that is so denigrating of things so ephemerally feminine as pastels and reading. Do not make light of such things – just as they cannot understand what it is to grow up female, you can not understand what it is to choose to go against everyone you may know, love or care about to do something that makes you less in everyone’s eyes.
Jessant, you don’t have to come out and say ‘transpeople are a travesty againt nature’ to be transphobic. Saying that transwomen’s behavior stems from male privilige is basically saying that transwomen are men in disguise, and deciding that transwomen are really men in disguise is quite enough to earn you that title.
Dammit, I misspelled “privilege”. I can’t *tell* you how much I hate it when I do that.
From a radical feminist perspective I do think it is important to acknowldege that some transwomen will have experienced male privilege — much in the same way that I’ve had to acknowledge the snippets of male privilege that I have had thrown my way for my previous butch appearance. My goal, as a radical feminist, is not to cordon women off into an impermeable class in an attempt to keep us safe or to let us “heal.” Most specifically I’m interested in disecting aspects of society, especially patriarchal norms and misogyny, that affect the well-being and quality of life for all women. I do not have a problem with including transwomen within the rubric of “woman”. I do however have a deep theoretical problem with how the transgender political movement frames gender. IOW, transsexuality seems natural to me; transgenderism not at all. I do not see gender as an individual act/choice or performance, if you will. It is a social structure that is imposed on an individual based on physical markers that have been ascribed social value *before* the individual is even born. Gender is one of the ultimate signs and tools of hierarchical power [i.e., patriarchy]. It is a social system, not an individual act/choice, that designates social worth to an individual, whether that worth be physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, etc. The problem that I see with transgender politics is that gender is viewed as mutable and wholly of an individual nature… which is a very creative and unique approach to gender. However, I think it is problematic from a feminist POV because it ignores the socially laden implications of being gendered in the first place. It ignores the vast majority of people who are gendered into a power structure that benefits one “half” and assigns negative values to the other “half.” IOW, I think it is important not to lose sight of who ultimately does benefit from us being gendered, and how gender is enforced — largely to the detriment of women, to include transwomen.
>>The problem that I see with transgender politics is that gender is viewed as mutable and wholly of an individual nature… which is a very creative and unique approach to gender.>>
I have to think a little more about this–you know, so I can offer arguments that are better than, “Nuh uh!”–but I don’t think this is exactly how transgender politics* sees gender. Performance can be an important political act, but advocating gender autonomy isn’t exactly the same as believing that gender is free or that freedom of _gender_ expression means that you should be allowed to treat other people like shit in gendered ways.
*That is, the variety of trans and trans-interested theorists, activist, and writers who have formulated a diverse set of opinions about how transsexuals, transgender people, and gender variance fits into society at large.
magikmama,
I think you hit the nail on the head when it comes to my own feelings about the inclusion/exclusion of transwomen from feminist discussions. And having known at least two trans individuals in my life, I can say that their experiences of patriarchy and its opression are unique.
I have in impassioned dislike for the silencing of the voices of the oppressed, even within the feminist community.
I myself am a bisexual woman in a hetero marriage. I came out late in life due to my family’s religious beliefs, but my partner is totally accepting of who I am, even as that view changes.
I think there is much more “gray” in this world than “black/white” (insert binary pair of your choice), and those gray areas are causing confusion as we try to apply the historical “normative” ideologies to the variations inherent in any group.
Transwomen are as much women as those that are woman-born, but their experiences and viewpoints are no less valid. Rather than silence their voices, I would rather listen and learn from their unique and different view of patriarchal oppression.
Just my opinion.
Hey piny: I was just reading what you wrote on the other thread about rad fems and trans politics and I was hoping you would write more. Can you expand a little on what you were saying above? My exposure to transgendered politics has been from personal IRL experience, what I’ve seen on message boards, and a few books (Judith Halberstam). It is certainly not a broad exposure, so some of what you wrote above, specifically in writing “how… gender variance fits into society at large” is interesting to me. My feminist background would argue/assume that the majority of women are gender variant and that to be women, period, in this society is an act of gender variance.
Q Grrl, I think your comments about gender as performance are really interesting. Judith Butler, the feminist philosopher that many identify as one of the founding writers of queer theory has written quite a bit about her frustration with the various misreadings of her stuff on performativity and gender. Here’s a link to excerpts from an interview where she talks about it a bit:
http://www.theory.org.uk/but-int1.htm
Most trans people that I know, both IRL and online have no interest in Butler or Halberstam, but I think that is sometimes reflective of differences between people who identify as genderqueer or transgender as an umbrella term for gender variant people of all kinds, and transsexual (not like there are any hard and fast distinctions, and there are lots of people who are both transsexual and genderqueer).
Yeah, I agree about Butler being misinterpreted, specifically if one hasn’t read her essays on hegemony and universality. Halberstam I like b/c I recognized myself in her writing.
I personally don’t hold that gender is a performance; but I would say that the majority of the transgendered individuals that I meet hold this to be a basic tenant of their lives. It’s hard to argue that point without coming across as phobic.
Q,
I empathize with your suspicion of individualist politics. But I think transpolitics go well beyond your description–gender ‘performance’ is a political act that profoundly reacts to the structures of gender oppression you describe.
Such performance, on its own and even cumulatively, however, I think does little to alter the gender system we know. Of course, I recognize that a lot of what I do to fight back against gender oppression (flipping of street harassers, calling out rape-culture crap on blogs, etc) has similarly limited impact on the big picture. But that’s not a reason to condem it. Its a reason to get together and a chance to think up new political projects that might make big changes.
Feminism has always been about women–all women. But at its best it is also about more than women.
“Tenet,” Qgrrl. Not “tenant.”
Normally I wouldn’t care, but I don’t want another protracted “confuse-the-lawyer” fest like we had yesterday. Ahem. :p
[ducks to avoid flung coffee mug]
Sorry for being a bit oblique. I also wanted to argue that we should be talking about including not only transwomen but transmen and *even* biomen in conversations that can move past “feminism: good or bad?” “women: liars or whores?”
All of these folks have important things to add to conversations about the way in which gender hierarchy punish the vast majority of human things and build opression at the most intimate levels.
>>My exposure to transgendered politics has been from personal IRL experience, what I’ve seen on message boards, and a few books (Judith Halberstam). >>
Depends on which message boards. Lots of transpeople, but by no means all, have a complicated relationship with Halberstam. I think she’s brilliant, but she makes me feel used.
>>My feminist background would argue/assume that the majority of women are gender variant and that to be women, period, in this society is an act of gender variance. >>
I’m not sure this will make any sense, but:
I’m not comfortable with this elision. It’s true that our society divides people into men and not-men, i.e. women. Women are the variant gender and men the default. But I would differentiate between that and being gender variant within your proscribed role. Phyllis Schlafly is very different from Lisa Vogel.
On one level, _everyone_ is gender variant, because gender is an inhuman, inhumane abstract that doesn’t really describe any of us. The role women are expected to fill is more dehumanizing and less humane; tradition doesn’t really see them as people at all. But there are people who buck convention to various degrees, in the face of different consequences, and in markedly different ways. I would argue that to be a feminist–or a pro-feminist man by ginmar’s standards–is to be gendervariant in that sense. There’s also the issue of how gendervariance is more permissible in some contexts than in others. I mean, Ann Coulter is the antithesis of June Cleaver, but she is still rewarded by remarkably sexist people.
Transwomen are gender variant in that they, y’know, transitioned. They are the second sex as well, and they suffer from being expected to fit into an especially inhuman, inhumane position. As a transsexual, I too am gendervariant. However, I now belong to the default class and receive male privilege. _And_ some transpeople are sexist and married to traditional gender roles, while some are feminist. Some pass completely, and some are incongruent in their post-transition gender. And they benefit and suffer accordingly.
Heh.
I *knew* that didn’t look right.
Q
>>I personally don’t hold that gender is a performance; but I would say that the majority of the transgendered individuals that I meet hold this to be a basic tenant of their lives. It’s hard to argue that point without coming across as phobic. >>
I’d be curious to see how you read this argument. I’ve seen it interpreted–and, actually, refashioned for new viewpoints–in a bunch of ways. Are you including transsexual in transgendered here?
I’m not sure we’re saying vastly different things, are we? My biggest comparison is the trans scene in my town where gender variance often means an uber-role playing of butch-femme dynamics. I don’t know that many MTF’s, mostly trannie bois and FTM’s. So I don’t know that I *see* what they are doing as variant. Maybe that’s what I’m getting hung up on; the word variant. Is androgyny variant? Femme? Butch? And what is it variant in relationship to?
No, I see transsexuality and transgenderism as two separate politics and lived realities, with some crossover.
>>My feminist background would argue/assume that the majority of women are gender variant and that to be women, period, in this society is an act of gender variance. >>
There’s another thing related to this line of reasoning–not that you’re making it here or that most feminists do this–that makes me want to throw something. It goes a little something like this:
Transsexual: I was miserable for a large portion of my life because I didn’t fit into my gender. I didn’t feel comfortable in my body.
Transphobic Feminist: We understand completely. We’re women. We didn’t feel comfortable in our genders either. We wanted to be boys when we were growing up, and do boy things.
Transsexual: No, but that’s not why–
Transphobic Feminist: Everyone suffers from gender dysphoria.
Transsexual: Look, gender ROLES are different from–
Transphobic Feminist: All we need to do is create a society without sexism, and you people will cease to exist.
Transsexual: You know what? Never mind.
Maybe not.
>>My biggest comparison is the trans scene in my town where gender variance often means an uber-role playing of butch-femme dynamics. >>
We have some of that here. The problem is that queer women can get a partial picture because mtfs tend not to be welcome in practice, unfortunately, and all the queer male-oriented bois who _aren’t_ interested in a butch/femme dynamic go elsewhere. Although I and other transguys have been assumed to be masculine and/or interested in butch/femme just because we are ftm.
I would argue that a butch dyke, however sexist, is gendervariant in that she probably reads as a woman doing traditionally male stuff. I would argue that an ftm, however sexist, is gendervariant in that he’s undergone a sex change. But sexism does mean that you support an oppressive, conformist system.
>>No, I see transsexuality and transgenderism as two separate politics and lived realities, with some crossover. >>
Hm. I’m not sure I know what–or rather, who–“transgenderism” describes. “Transsexual” is a condition, but transgenderism seems a little looser. I also know a lot of transsexuals who do describe themselves as transgender. What political views besides gender as performance do you see as specifically transgender rather than transsexual?
Piny: I understand how your narrative becomes one of transphobia, but why can’t the first two instances be ones of communal understanding?
Most of the transgender politics that I see are really as I described above… a throw back in many ways to very traditional 40’s and 50’s butch/femme dynamics, with the emphasis on gender being an individual choice and that the root of gender transgression is assuming roles that a diametrically opposed to the social gender they were assigned at birth. Most of these women identify as bois. And around here, boi almost specifically means someone who has not transitioned and probably won’t. Not sure if this clarifies anything or not.
>>Piny: I understand how your narrative becomes one of transphobia, but why can’t the first two instances be ones of communal understanding?>>
Sure, as long as there’s understanding that the two situations aren’t exactly the same.
The feminist is talking about being uncomfortable because she was oppressed. She wanted to do “boy things” because they were the things that the privileged children got to do: play interesting games, have interesting adventures, receive approving attention. No one’s identity is congruent with being used, slighted, and fucked over all one’s life. Had the transwoman been allowed to grow up female, she would have likely been as pissed off and jealous as the feminist. Had the woman been treated like a human being, she probably wouldn’t have cared too much that her brother also got to climb trees.
The transsexual isn’t talking about being uncomfortable because of oppression, although his or her story does contain transphobic constraint. Transmen don’t transition because they want to do boy things, but because they’re men. This argument tends to cast gender dysphoria as a problem of sexism, one which will be solved when sexism disappears. That doesn’t match up with my experience. I know lots of deeply feminist, deeply fuck-gender transpeople. They firmly believe that gender roles are bullshit, and they act out that politic in daily life. However, they are as interested in and as desperate for physical transition as the transsexuals who are invested in gender roles.
>>Most of the transgender politics that I see are really as I described above… a throw back in many ways to very traditional 40’s and 50’s butch/femme dynamics, with the emphasis on gender being an individual choice and that the root of gender transgression is assuming roles that a diametrically opposed to the social gender they were assigned at birth. Most of these women identify as bois. And around here, boi almost specifically means someone who has not transitioned and probably won’t. Not sure if this clarifies anything or not.>>
It does, actually. I’m about to describe something that’s one big identity clusterfuck, so apologies if this doesn’t make much sense. Where I live, transition is kind of a variable thing; physically and internally, a matter of degree. This is one of the only places where you can live liminally, so people don’t always choose sides. I don’t think I’ve heard boi used to describe an uncomplicated transguy, but I have heard it used to describe people who take hormones, have surgery, and live at least some of the time as male. Boi tends to describe people who have contact with the queer female/female-bodied community, but it doesn’t necessarily mean butch-femme. A lot of bois and transmasculine people prefer to date each other. I think, too, that butch-femme here is mutating away from the classic version, in part because bois and ftms are read in a different way than butches. I see a lot of couples who seem to almost have a mommy-boy thing going. Most of the femmes I know are also definitely not interested in being queer June Cleavers.
As far as confusing acting-out with switching sides…That’s definitely true of some people. But I don’t think that there are too many people here who have such a simplistic view of transgression.
I just want to pop in and extend my thanks to you all. I’m learning a lot here. I’m quite upfront about my ignorance regarding trans issues, and this ignorance informed my beliefs (I used to ascribe to some of the notions about trans people–for example, a MTF being a man with hormone treatments and an operation, for example). The more I learned about the issue, the less sure I was about my assertions.
And really, this thread has me thinking I’ve got a whole new subject for book collecting/reading for the next few months. (Anyone who wants to give me suggestions should feel free to share them with me via email. I’m going away for the next week and won’t be able to check the thread.)
This thread is wonderful. Thank you all very much. And now I have a lot of books to add to my reading list, too.
Piny: thanks for your answers. I have more than a shite load of work to do before the long weekend and the hints of a nasty cold. I hope this thread survives the weekend.
Can you point out some good sources for transsexual politics? Other than you? :)
Wow, I can see why Amp respects you Piny, you’ve really nailed what I find troubling about a lot of the stuff I’ve read about mtfs. There’s so many variations and experiences that its hard to ascribe a motive or an impulse to why people become mtfs of ftms or bois. Some trans-women are really invested in the gender binary but not all are, as you said. And mtfs are doing something I also think is quite brave, they’re giving up their male privilege. I wish more men would do that, the world would be a better place. I’m a genderfucker myself, I do it because I also think gender roles are bullshit, as well.
I was wondering if either of you, Piny or Q-girl have read what Levey wrote about bois and trans-men in her book Female Chauvinist Pig and how your experiences deviate or match up with it?
Q-grrl,
Sorry to hear it. I hope your health improves.
It’s hard to recommend stuff because every book that nails something contains some passage or chapter I have huge problems with. For example, Sex Changes is mostly brilliant, but Patrick Califia says some dumb things about being a woman under patriarchy. Gender Outlaw is mostly fascinating, but I agree with some of Califia’s complaints. Trans Liberation is mostly awesome, but I agree with some feminist critiques of it, etc. I loved The Empire Strikes Back, by Susan Stryker, which is an essay in response to The Transsexual Empire. transacademics.org is a sleepy board, but they have some neat discussions going on. There are transpeople communities on livejournal (I think there’s a transfeminism community), so you can do some searching. Most of them are practice and theory. I’ll ask my friends if they can’t come up with other stuff.
>>I was wondering if either of you, Piny or Q-girl have read what Levey wrote about bois and trans-men in her book Female Chauvinist Pig and how your experiences deviate or match up with it?>>
I read that chapter, and have read some of the book. I agree with her central premise–that sexualization is not sexual autonomy, and that some people seem confused on this point–and understand that ftms and bois make up a brief chapter in a book that’s about, y’know, women. Still, for fuck’s sake.
She claims that transitioning has become (I may be paraphrasing slightly) “so widespread as to be faddish.” She has a great deal of evidence to believe that people, queer women in particular, fear this and believe it to be true. It’s certainly true that transition is more common than it was when it was virtually impossible. She has no reason to believe that transition is a hot new trend, or any reason to believe that it’s _too_ common, and she doesn’t cite any numbers at all.
She also based her ideas about ftms on an interview with exactly one ftm, IIRC. That’s like using any given lesbian (possibly Susie Bright) to form opinions about all lesbians (including Sarah Hoagland). She took a very heteronormative view of bois, which was disappointing, and she accepted the lone transsexual’s statement that you can draw a thick black line between “boi” and “ftm,” which a lot of people in both groups dispute. She decided that “bois” became bois because they didn’t want to be adults. I also recall a discussion on an ftm livejournal community about her article, “Where the Bois Are,” much of which found its way into this book. Most of the commenters were extremely disappointed by her language and her limited portrayal. One commenter said that a friend of his who was interviewed in the article had done a snarky, sarcastic impression of a stereotypical boi that was then quoted as though in propria voce.
All in all, I wasn’t terribly happy with it.
I’ll just say that I know a lot of feminist ftms and bois. I know a lot of ftms and bois who don’t feel compelled to present that kind of stereotypical brittle masculinity, but I don’t think it’s fair to see that as an act of courage on their part. Basically, we’re like everyone else: when we feel safe and comfortable being gendervariant, we are. When we have role models that aren’t traditional, we feel no need to be traditional ourselves. When our community doesn’t condone woman-hating, we don’t.
Although I think that critiquing misogyny is always a good thing, I’m bothered by critiques that read sexism among bois, butches, and ftms as a special phenomenon or something especially related to transition–or a new thing, considering that butches have been around for a long time. It’s how people behave when they live under patriarchy. Their sexism isn’t much different from that of other men.
Oops. Sandy Stone was the author of The Empire Strikes Back.
Levey bothered me because the impression you get from her portrayel of bois and trans-men was that these women were fleeing from their own gender to take on male privilege, and it’s even more damning if you look at it in the context of the book, which is basically arguing that some women are trying to take on more power by stepping on the backs of other women by accepting sexism and women-hating.
Thanks for your answer Piny.
I was hesitant to post that article at all, but I’m so glad I did. When the hell are you getting your own blog, Piny?
>>Levey bothered me because the impression you get from her portrayel of bois and trans-men was that these women were fleeing from their own gender to take on male privilege, and it’s even more damning if you look at it in the context of the book, which is basically arguing that some women are trying to take on more power by stepping on the backs of other women by accepting sexism and women-hating.>>
Yes, exactly! And don’t get me wrong, ftms get male privilege by transitioning. (There was a discussion of this on livejournal some months back, and one commenter wrote, “People assume I’m competent now!”) And bois _definitely_ receive a kind of male/masculine privilege in queer circles that are sexist. But that doesn’t mean either that we understand that when we do cost/benefit analyses, or that we transition because of it.
My head hurts. In a good way. For once, a high-quality, non-trolled discussion. I admit I am low on theory, high on practical issues, and tend to pay more attention to physical/medical issues dt my medical/scientific orientation. I am still on Trans 101, trying to stretch my imagination to understand what the various trans experiences are to transpeople, since I have always accepted my female body, and what I object to are attempts to make me conform to restrictive gender expectations. In other words, I am a typical woman-born-woman feminist, and have been politically active in the usual feminist causes, mostly reproductive rights, chosen for professional and political reasons.
What I have heard from here and from transfolk IRL is that trans identity is existential. They just “know” they are the gender opposite to their birth assignment. Which calls into question how non-trans people “know” they are the gender congruent with their birth assignment. It isn’t as logical as looking down at your privates and looking at pictures labelled “male” and “female”, and deciding which one you look most like. Children form gender identity earlier than they develop rational thinking. Trans folk disprove the 100% nurture thesis that parents decide at day one and start dressing the baby in pink or blue and treating the baby as sugar and spice or puppy dog tails. Some portion of personality (or spirit, if spiritually inclined) resists the outside categorisation from early childhood. This sense of dislocation, and the resistance, seem also to be the theme of many lesbian and gay childhoods, seen in retrospect when those children grow up.
I have always felt gendervariant, in that the mental/spiritual “me” felt non-gendered or androgynous, and this mental/spiritual “me” just happened to reside in a typical female body. The body isn’t incongruent, it just doesn’t tell the whole story. I have experienced some distance from my body in that despite my intellectual affiliation with feminism and lgbt rights, familial and social pressures (and endogenous depression) kept me from exploring any sexual orientation other than heterosexual, and I have known since early teens that I can’t be sexually heterosexual, even if I could be feminine for public purposes.
Forgive my wool-gathering, which is neither political nor theoretical.
>>However, based on my experiences with those in the trans community and my (admittedly limited) reading of trans literature, there does seem to be some overwhelmingly common ideas and beliefs that go against my very core beliefs about the world and feminism.>>
Which ones have you encountered?
Kind of a link dump, but most of these address trans politics or identity in interesting and pretty accessible ways:
Emi Koyama has some interesting things to say about trans feminism, her readings are here: http://eminism.org/readings/index.html
I enjoyed Jay Prosser’s “Second Skins” a lot, although it’s very much an academic text, so although it’s fairly accessible it’s not a very good introduction.
Raven Kaldera has also written a number of interesting pieces, unfortunately his own listing of his writings isn’t up at the moment, but there are a set of pieces on Scarlet Letters that are good: http://www.scarletletters.com/current/nonfic.html
“The Empire strikes back” by Sandy Stone is hosted here: http://www.actlab.utexas.edu/~sandy/empire-strikes-back
And the ever useful suggested rules for non-trans people writing about trans people are here, they’re actually more interesting then they might sound initially, as there’s a bunch of discussion\information around each rule:
http://www.transfeminism.org/nontrans-rules.html
On a lighter note, Trainwreck’s spoken word stuff is moving and really very funny (at least if you’re trans or immersed in particular segments of the dyke community, perhaps less so if you’re not.) In the context of discussing bois I kind of want to suggest her piece “Estrogen made me a boy” from here: http://www.trainwreckspokenword.com/
I also wanted to echo Piny’s post about how important physical transition can be (although there are of course trans people to whom it’s less important.) I transitioned largely as a result of feelings about my body- those huge decisions were made on the basis of what were in some ways very nebulous, although very strong, beliefs that my body was wrong for me in some fundamental sense and that feminising my body would help resolve some of those feelings. Much of the discussion of trans issues (on both sides) fails to address that deep seated sense of wrongness very well, ending up with unhelpful cliches like “an a in a b’s body” or flatly disregarding the validity of trans identity in the way that much Radical feminist thought on the subject does.
Ah, for the world of Varley’s Steel Beach
Do you believe that BDSM and feminism are essentially incompatible? If so, why?
i’m a trans woman. i don’t believe that i have an “identity”. i never “knew” that i was the gender opposite to my birth assignment. i lived as a man for 40+ years, and it never worked for me, and just became worse as i grew older. for me, it was about how i feel most congruent (or really, how i imagined how i’d feel most congruent) with regard to how i interact on an intimate basis, and how i prefer to express myself on a social level.
i don’t believe in “gender identity”, at least in my own self-context. as i see it, “gender identity” involves the need to know what it “feels” like to be both male and female, such that one can say that they don’t “feel” male and instead “feel” female. since i only know what it “feels” like to be me, i can’t claim that i always “felt” female. frankly, i don’t know that i ever “felt” male either. perhaps the only feeling i do know is what it is to be transsexual.
even though i have undergone gender reassignment surgery, have been on hrt for close to 6 years, and have had well over 100 hours of electrolysis, i’m still in the same body i’ve always been in. a few things have changed for sure, but it’s not like i feel, or have ever felt, like i was “born in the wrong body”. since this is the only body i’ve had, it’s the only “feeling” i know. i don’t understand how anyone can “feel” that they’re in the “wrong” body, without ever have experienced being in another body.
while i can imagine what it might feel like to be in a different body, and wish that i’d been born into a different body, i can’t know these things. and this may seem like splitting hairs to some, but i think it speaks to the whole idea of “gender identity”, and the very language, along with the limitations therein, we use to speak of these issues.
i have to say, this has turned out to be an amazingly enlightening discussion. My head is spinning. I consider myself relatively informed about transgendered issues (well, lets say at least in comparison to the general public, and maybe in comparison to the general GLB community.. though neither is saying much really) and i’m learning a lot here.. damn i have a lot more to learn.
If this is going to be the caliber of threads without anti-feminists, I’d say bring more of them. please.
What is/are “bois”?
RonF, it’s not my impression that you’re “feminist, pro-feminist, or feminist friendly.” So please, don’t post on this thread. Thank you.
To answer your question, bois is the plural of boi. As used in this thread, I think boi means “a female-born or female-bodied person…sometimes transsexual, transgendered, or intersexed, sometimes not…who generally does not identify wholly or at all as being feminine, female, a girl, or a woman, though some bois identify as one or more of these. Bois almost always identify as lesbians, dykes, or queers; many are also genderqueer or genderfucked. Bois can prefer a range of pronouns, including ‘he,’ ‘she,’ or gender-neutral pronouns; it’s usually best to ask to avoid offence.” (Quoted from wikipedia).
What is/are “bois”?
lots of definitions here, but the one you want i think is number 2.1
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=boi&defid=377470
>>Those whose primary obsession seems to be BDSM, pornography, strippers, and eschewing gender roles (which, as far as I can tell, essentially means eschewing anything remotely connected to femininity and embracing masculinity).>>
Yeah, I would have to say that doesn’t sound either representative of transpeople as a whole, of the transpeople I’m acquainted with, or of the transpeople on this board. It also sounds as though you’re referring only to ftms and bois here, since you say that the transpeople you know take “eschewing gender roles” to be eschewing femininity. Have I read you wrong?
BDSM is the red flag, I think.
I talked about Ariel Levy’s article upthread.
It may in fact be the communities you hang out in. I’ve noticed the same dynamic here, but it’s a very small part of a very big picture. Ftms and bois who aren’t interested in that dynamic go elsewhere and drop off the radar. The ones that fuck men hang out in gay male spaces. The ones that aren’t happy with the way the queer women’s community can sometimes treat “trannybois” (like myself) find other circles to run in. Most of us just transition fully and thereafter live stealth–we date as people who are in one small way different, rather than staying in trans or trans-specific spaces. The latter can be constricting and incestuous, and you tend to run into a lot of really disgusting trannychasers.
Mtfs tend not to hang out in the trans community that bois hang out in because they tend not to be welcome. Around here, trans-friendly means ftm-friendly (and only the ones who still look cute and boyish, generally). Mtfs who date queer women are left hanging. Mtfs face more scrutiny and more shaming. Many of the ftms who stick with the queer women’s/boi’s community are coming from inside; they identified as butches prior to transition.
>>I realize that not every trans will be a part of this community, and that not every trans community is even exactly like this. But that doesn’t change the fact that this sort of thing exists … and seems to be becoming more and more prevalent.>>
Well, transpeople, and ftms in particular, are becoming more prevalent. There are many more of us, now that transition is a realistic option. There are also more of us who are able to live openly as trans and stay in the communities we come from, rather than having to relocate and go underground. I can tell you that there are definitely more of the _other_ kinds of ftms as well. Ten years ago, gay ftms were largely invisible, and ftms who dated other ftms were unheard-of. Now they’re both status quo here.
I think, too, that anyone interested in BDSM will have to run in BDSM circles; it’s a rare proclivity, and it necessitates a lot of networking. Being a queer BDSM-freak in San Francisco is like being a lesbian in Grand Rapids. That may explain the prevalence of BDSM enthusiasts in sexuality-specific communities.
Yup. Mine’s awaiting moderation, too.
I’d like to echo what piny said about the disconnect between transsexuals descriptions of transsexual and some feminists hearing of what’s being said.
I think that the disconnect comes from two different perspectives of “the woman question”. To me, transition was about social relations and peer groups, and not at all about my ability to wear dresses. But it’s the “wearing dresses” that seems to be the common perception by certain groups of feminists.
Now, having arrived in this reconstituted body of mine, yes, I do experience oppression in society as a woman. And yes, it does suck. But whether it was going to be better (as one might argue it’s better for f2m types), or worse (as one might argue it’s worse for m2f types) was irrelevant. Whatever the change in social class, I was going to change.
I think that what piny posted
Transsexual: I was miserable for a large portion of my life because I didn’t fit into my gender. I didn’t feel comfortable in my body.
Transphobic Feminist: We understand completely. We’re women. We didn’t feel comfortable in our genders either. We wanted to be boys when we were growing up, and do boy things.
is the root of the problem. Because even if I was allowed to do all sorts of super girly things (which I was, by and large growing up), I still wanted to be a woman. We have to find a way to move past that disconnect or else “transphobic” is going to be the most common modifier in front of “feminist” in situations like this.
As a feminist my problem with transsexuality is the belief that we are either male or female. I don´t believe that we are born with either female or male brains – apart from the physical differences I think that all our other differences lie in our gendered socialisation.
The very decision to claim one gender as irrevocably ones own goes against my feminist belief. Naturally we cannot escape our deeply ingrained conditioning, but for me being a feminist means constantly trying to become aware of my own gendered behavior. The goal is being human – not male or female.
Trying to change myself and my own perceptions comes first and only secondly comes trying to change society´s perceptions and sexism.
Sorry if I ramble on or seem unclear. I´ve been up a long time celebrating the new year and am still a bit drunk. I´d like to add that none of the above should ever stop us from treating a person as whatever gender they choose – that is simply curtesy.
>>As a feminist my problem with transsexuality is the belief that we are either male or female. I don´t believe that we are born with either female or male brains – apart from the physical differences I think that all our other differences lie in our gendered socialisation.>>
So…how would you explain us?
Because even if I was allowed to do all sorts of super girly things (which I was, by and large growing up), I still wanted to be a woman.>>
I had absolutely no problem doing many girly things–still don’t, really. And I grew up in a family of women who, god love ’em, never expected me to be anything more or less than I wanted to be. And I had no problem at all passing as female–there seems to be this corollary belief that transsexuals switch to the other gender because they’re terrible at being their birth gender.
Piny – I don’t understand it. I’ve been thinking about how I would feel if I woke up tomorrow as the opposite sex all other things being equal and, while it might certainly bother me, I don’t think I would ever want to go trough the effort to switch back. But that’s me.
I suppose that in a gendered world, where characteristics and activities belong to certain genders, there will allways be people who feel that the other gender is a better personal choice. This is at the bottom of my feminist belief – I want to get rid of theese gendered stereeotypes and allow us all to be whatever people we want to. For me transexualism is a strange route to go to be oneself, and maybe it depends on to what degree you have internalised the male-female dichotomy but it seems to me as accepting, rather than rejecting, society’s limits on your behaviour and who you are allowed to be.
Sex should be as irrelevant as eye-colour in my feminist utopia. And if it pleases you I’ll gladly throw in that switching between sexes should be as easy as using different colour lenses.
>>For me transexualism is a strange route to go to be oneself, and maybe it depends on to what degree you have internalised the male-female dichotomy but it seems to me as accepting, rather than rejecting, society’s limits on your behaviour and who you are allowed to be.>>
Well, but the transpeople on this thread–and most transpeople out there, as well as the therapists who treat us and the theorists who observe us–have rejected this theory that we transition because we’ve internalized sexism because it’s demonstrably false. It doesn’t work to describe us or our lives. It doesn’t match up with how we describe ourselves and our lives.
Transpeople do not feel any more allegiance to gender roles than other people. Transpeople don’t adhere to gender roles in their post-transition gender. Transpeople do not transition so that they can do things they couldn’t do in their pre-transition gender. Transpeople do not “fit” better in terms of traditional gender roles in their post-transition gender than in their pre-transition gender. Some, yes. Enough to make this a working theory, definitely not.
Transition frequently does not make one more normal or more acceptable. It does not guarantee that you will make a passable transman or transwoman; for some people, it means becoming permanently, visibly gender-nonconforming. Furthermore, transpeople do not generally believe that transition will make them more normal or acceptable; quite the contrary, since it’s culturally defined as a kind of suicide. While transsexuality can certainly _fit into_ a binary picture of gender, it flies in the face of the one upon which _this society_ has decided.
But if you don’t believe in this division into male and female genders why decide that you are one and not the other? Is it all about body-shape?
I still believe that people in general feel it easier to relate to someone saying they are the wrong gender than someone completely disregarding all gender constructions. Still, neither position is anywhere near easy. Am reminded that in Iran sex-changes are seen as completely acceptable but homosexuality can lead to the death-penalty.
I have comments for this thread having to do with radical feminism, our view of the transgender/transsexual phenomenon, and the history of the politics between the trans movement and the feminist movement, and I may post them. But before I do, Amp, you designated this thread as being for feminists or pro-feminists only. Furrycatherder is a father’s rights person, a libertarian, a dedicated advocate of “covenant marriage” and a committed anti-feminist who has been trolling feminist venues for a long time now. I think comments from this person ought to be relegated to the threads for MRA’s, fathers’ rights, and anti-feminist people. I won’t post to this thread until the guidelines you’ve established are honored.
Heart
Here is an example of Furrycatherder’s views:
FurryCatHerder
Joined: 16 Jan 2005
Posts: 794
Location & Situation: Herder of Cats
Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 9:55 am Post subject:
——————————————————————————–
Rah, the good news is that more and more states are creating an alternate marriage vehicle known as “Covenant Marriage”. Those marriages have more teeth than the existing “’til I get tired of you do you part.”
I also think that we’ve just got to move beyond the current “best interests of the child” model where a father who worked continually to facilitate having a family is suddenly torn from the children when most of us know that Dad’s become more involved as kids grow older and the initial financial (and physical) burdens of setting up house and bearing children become less of an issue. Going from less than 50/50 to 50/50, and allowing children to have more input in their visitation situation should be more automatic, and less expensive, than it currently is.
_________________
That which does not kill us makes us stronger.
— Frederick Neitzsche (1844-1900).
http://www.dadsdivorce.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13855&highlight=covenant+marriage
The phenomena of someone who identifies as a woman and has transitioned being simultaneously a fathers’ rights person, an anti-feminist and an advocate for covenant marriage may provide some insights into the issues which exist between advocates for transitioning and trans politics in general and feminists.
!
Heart
I’m 5’2″ but as a friend once said, “I talk tall” and a 6’5″ guy once told me “I was too intimidating”. These reactions are because, I think, in my mind’s image of myself I am tall and always have been. I’ve checked with my also short sisters and neither of them feel this way.
I have no idea why I feel tall and I doubt very seriously that there is anyone out there who could explain it either. I think that many people believe things to absolutely true about themselves that may appear to be at variance with reality. I don’t see why feeling that your body is the wrong gender type is any different from my sense that I am tall nor can I see why feeling that way has to mean that the person must also believe in gender essentialism.
i think part of the problem is the mistaken belief that the motivation for going through transition is rooted in some kind of “decision”. i didn’t wake up one day and “decide” i’m a woman, arrange for surgery and hormones, and walk down to the courthouse to change my name.
that’s not to say that at some point, i *did* in fact make the decisions for surgery, hormones, and name changes. but the original premise of those actions was not based on any decision on my part – at least not that i can tell.
and unlike many trans people who seem to be quite sure of their identity, i’m not so invested in making sure everyone knows i’m a woman. i’m not sure myself. what i am sure of is that the quality of my life improved vastly after transition, despite all of the loses i’ve endured.
further, for me, gender is not an “either/or” concept. there are many other “states” besides “male” and “female”. unfortunately, our society only recognizes the two, so for legal purposes, we really must choose one in order to function at some level in day to day life.
>>But if you don’t believe in this division into male and female genders why decide that you are one and not the other? Is it all about body-shape?>>
Believing in a division into male and female genders, or believing that some people feel comfortable in one rather than the other in a way unrelated to sexism, is not the same as believing in gender roles or adhering to them. Gender is different from gender role; that’s why a transwoman can feel infinitely more comfortable as a butch dyke than as a man.
>>I still believe that people in general feel it easier to relate to someone saying they are the wrong gender than someone completely disregarding all gender constructions. Still, neither position is anywhere near easy. Am reminded that in Iran sex-changes are seen as completely acceptable but homosexuality can lead to the death-penalty.>>
Iran /= here. And transsexuals in Iran /= the officials who mediate transsexuality. And yes, absolutely–that’s true, historically, of the way transsexuals are treated by the medical profession and by society at large. It is not, however, true of transsexuals, many of whom transition _and_ disregard gender constructions.
The phenomena of someone who identifies as a woman and has transitioned being simultaneously a fathers’ rights person, an anti-feminist and an advocate for covenant marriage may provide some insights into the issues which exist between advocates for transitioning and trans politics in general and feminists.>>
A father’s rights advocate? You mean like Cathy Young? An anti-feminist? You mean like Ann Coulter? The fact that a transwoman, singular, happens to be an MRA, has sweet fuck-all to do with whether transpeople in general are anti-feminist or sexist (they’re not), or whether transition is itself anti-feminist. Your willingness to believe otherwise is your willingness to make bigoted assumptions in order to support your worldview. In this context, that is nothing but an attempt to smear all transpeople as operating from a stance of male privilege.
Furthermore, there is no such thing as “trans politics,” any more than there is one kind of feminism. Your language lumps together Leslie Feinberg, Riki Wilchins, Margaret O’Hartigan, Kate Bornstein, Patrick Califia, Max Valerio, Christine Jorgensen, Sandy Stone, Nick Kiddle, Jay Sennett, and all of the other incredibly different transpeople out there–most of whom, I’m sure, you’ve never bothered to read or investigate. That picture has nothing to do with reality.
And nothing piny has said there has anything to do with what I’ve posted Just for the record. It isn’t responsive or apropos or relevant to anything I’ve said here.
I will post some thoughts about the politics of transgender/transsexuality, but again, only if Amp’s stated intentions for this thread — that it be for feminists and pro-feminists only — are honored.
Heart
i very much hope for the opportunity to read your thoughts, especially since i am transsexual, and consider myself to be very much lacking in knowledge about “the politics of transgender/transsexuality”. to be brutally honest, other than what i’ve read on feminist message boards, i am unaware of any “politics” of “transgender/transsexuality”. perhaps i don’t understand your use of the word “politics”, but the fact that i’m transsexual had absolutely no political context that i can discern.
of course, the little i’ve read on the topic would lead me to believe otherwise, if i were not transsexual.
A father’s rights advocate? You mean like Cathy Young? An anti-feminist? You mean like Ann Coulter? The fact that a transwoman, singular, happens to be an MRA, has sweet fuck-all to do with whether transpeople in general are anti-feminist or sexist (they’re not), or whether transition is itself anti-feminist.
Cheryl is trying to import a conflict between her and I which originated on the MichFest boards onto this board. The conflict between her and I was specific to that board, so I’m not even going to go there.
Calling me a “Men’s Rights” or “Father’s Rights” activist is simply absurd. I support the civil rights of people. Some happen to be men, some even happen to be fathers. Having this constantly raised by a woman (Cheryl) who was paid to tell women to be submissive to their husbands is just bad Internet drama.
Am I the only one who has to go to a job today? Okay, probably I am.
And that’s fine. Reading through your posts on the Divorced Dads board, I think that you’re clearly a great deal smarter and more nuanced than a log of people out there supporting the civil rights of men and fathers.
Nonetheless, this thread is for feminists, which is a distinct (although non-contrary) position from supporting the civil rights of people, some of whom happen to be this or that sex. So although you’re welcome to post on “Alas,” until I say otherwise you are not welcome on this thread, or any other thread designated for feminists and pro-feminists. I hope you can see clear to respecting this decision, even if you disagree with it.
1) I am certainly well aware of Heart’s background. But it’s not relevant here. Heart’s dedication to feminism is beyond serious question.
2) I wish you had read the moderation policies more carefully. In particular, this bit: “attack arguments, rather than attacking other posters.” Bringing up Heart’s background in an attempt to discredit her views is a pure ad hom attack, and has greatly reduced the amount of sympathy I’m inclined to give your position.
(Heart, in contrast, brought up your background not to discredit your views, but to ask if you could rightfully post on a “feminist and pro-feminist” thread. Not the same thing.)
SHORT FORM – EVERYONE READ THIS BIT:
1) Furrycatherder is not to post on this or any other thread marked “feminist or pro-feminist” again. Further posts by Furrycatherder on those threads will be deleted by the moderator.
2) Since Furrycatherder cannot post on this thread, I would ask that no one use this thread to criticize Furrycatherder.
2) To avoid diverting this thread further, any further discussion related to the posting rules should be moved to this thread.
[Post deleted at author’s request]
We cross-posted. Amp, could you delete my last post?
Thanks.
Heart
With respect, Heart, I disagree. You argued that “the phenomena of someone who identifies as a woman and has transitioned being simultaneously a fathers’ rights person, an anti-feminist and an advocate for covenant marriage may provide some insights into the issues which exist between advocates for transitioning and trans politics in general and feminists.”
This is clearly arguing that the “phenomena” of one such individual can tell us something about the “issues which exist etc etc.” Piny’s argument equally clearly argued that it is incorrect to use the example of one individual to tell us about those issues. It’s hard to imagine how Piny’s argument could have been more directly responsive to the bit of your post Piny quoted.
You may not agree with Piny’s argument, but it clearly was relevant to what you said. Just saying “that’s not responsive,” without explaining why it’s not responsive, fails to refute Piny’s argument.
Amp: This is clearly arguing that the “phenomena” of one such individual can tell us something about the “issues which exist etc etc.”
Well, but look at what I said. I didn’t say it “can tell us something about the issues.” I said it offers us insights into the issues which exist. Which it does. And I think the distinction matters. I still don’t think piny’s post was responsive; in fact, I think it was over the top. I didn’t offer any refutation of the not-over-the-top parts of it because I was waiting to see whether the thread guidelines would be honored and enforced. I would like to post a few thoughts and, for sure, refutations of what has been posted here about feminists, but not where it is unsafe for me to do so, which is how it feels in here right now (though I appreciate your insisting that the thread guidelines be honored, Amp).
Well, again, we’ll see. If it keeps feeling like a shark feed waiting to happen, which is how it feels to me in here right now, I won’t be back. If it feels like productive discussion can take place, I will be back to offer a few thoughts.
Heart
Riiiight. “Offering insights” is _completely_ different from “telling us something.” No similarities between providing useful information and providing useful information. No similarity between relevant and relevant. You’re not responding to my comment because you don’t want people calling you on your willingness to extrapolate from the actions and beliefs of one member of a group to most or all members of that group. You don’t want your self-serving thinking challenged. And you don’t want to interact with any transperson who doesn’t fit into your picture of what transpeople must be. I say that the actions of one transperson, in the context of a conversation attempting to describe transpeople in general, offer no insight. It is as illogical to use FCH as a standin for all transpeople or transpeople as a group as it is to use you to form opinions about Alsis.
I disagree with you, piny, and I think it’s wrong for you to mischaracterize what I’ve posted as you have or to tell me what my motives are. I haven’t done that in your direction and won’t. But neither will I be engaging anyone demonstrating your level of hostility. It is unwarranted and it is becoming ubiquitous. I asked for a thread reserved for radical feminists a week or so ago, and the first thing you did was pop in to say if that happened, you were leaving Alas. I would not call that “civil” and “courteous” dialog of the type Amp says he values here, I’d call that throwing down. I’d call it, and your posts here, attempts to silence feminist views which oppose your own.
If and when you and some others here chill out, I’ll be back to explain and to be precise about the insights I made reference to here. Otherwise, and until then, it’s been real.
Heart
When a belief simply contradicts or ignores the experience of another group of people, how useful is it? How do you explain the existence of transpeople who are telling you that their experience of internal gender has nothing to do with feeling restricted within assigned gender roles or making a better personal choice, it has to do with something inherent?
I appreciate that you are seeking a solution to a problem, but you seem to make no distinction between gendered characteristics and gender stereotypes, seeing them all equally as socialized and automatically having a negative effect. The solution to the problem of nonconsensual gender conformity can’t be doing away with the notion that people have an internal gender, since the foundational assumption doesn’t conform to reality, i.e., other people’s lived experience.
There’s something else going on here that I hesitate to even name. I can’t help fearing that transpeople who refute the assumption underlying this particular feminist belief (not that all feminists subscribe to it, I’m not saying that) are going to be considered by some to be anti-feminist by virtue of their mere existence, and I can’t accept that.
For the record, I was a feminist before transition, and the experience has made me that much more of one because of the insights gained into what is constructed and what is not.
De-lurking after a long time reading here. As always, the quality of discussion (for the most part) is inspiring (if a little daunting). I spose as it’s a first post I should say something about me – female, 31, lesbian, Australian – I think about covers it. While not remotely a theory guru, radical feminism has probably informed me the most from what I have read.
I’m also hoping I won’t get my head bitten off, but anyway, here goes.
I have found this thread and the one Ampersand linked to particularly compelling, because at the moment another altercation is well underway in Australia between a group of radical (probably separatist, but I can’t honestly say as I’m not part of the group) lesbians, and a transsexual advocacy group. Basically the latter has advertised by invitation and word of mouth a gathering for “women born women” and trans people who have enquired have been asked respectfully (on the basis of differing life experience) to please respect the space (I have seen the emails). The result has been that the Trans group is challenging the event under Australian anti-discrimination law, claiming it is a public event because it is to be held at a venue where you pay for the use of facilities & hence qualifies as a public event (and I presume because the invite list is larger than just a bunch of friends).
This event & the challenge, like similar ones in the past, is causing a furor in some sections of the lesbian community. What has happened in the past is that Trans groups have successfully challenged the events, and they have been cancelled. I would say there is a high likelihood that this current event under scrutiny will end in a similar way – which as far as I can see is a lose/lose.
So with that prescient situation in mind, here are a few thoughts that have been percolating for a while –
1) while freely acknowledging my limited reading of queer theory and discourse, it seems to me that a lot of the problem here goes back to who decided (as it were) that transsexual mtfs were ‘women’ – and historically as I understand it, it was essentially that bastion of patriarchy, the medical establishment. What then followed in the crudest sense was people who were perceived to still appear and behave at least to some degree as men turn up at women’s gatherings and claim to be women, and wave as proof the blessing of the male medical establishment. As there is an age-old history of the patriarchy dictating the definition of women, I find it both unsurprising and fundamental that women would fiercely reject such claims. To my mind, this perceived imposition of what it is to be female/woman lies at the heart of what is now commonly deemed (and probably rightly in most instances) as transphobia. It also seems to me to be a fundamentally unresolved issue.
How do we overcome it? I’m not sure. I think reading that many transsexuals are rejecting surgery is a very positive sign, especially given the ghastly history of making transsexuals perform and conform to gender stereotypes to be deemed the opposite sex (I would be really interested again to here what the programs and approaches to assessing transsexual candidates are overseas, because here in Australia, I know that in some clinics at least, it is very “traditional”).
However, I do wonder if that will raise a further issue. There’s plenty of evidence that women are inculcated to defer to men, and it’s still prevalent today. How to address then what may happen when a mtf transsexual who still (for want of a better word) signals male in appearance (say) unwittingly causes women to defer to them and their opinions (just as in the early days of feminism, black women finally formed their own groups because they found in mixed groups they struggled not to be unwittingly silenced by white women)? This is surely something that can be overcome, but I think I don’t think we can afford to overlook it as an issue.
2) When I look at events as described above in Australia, it strikes me that as a community (and I refer here primarily to the lesbian one), we are stuck in a negative feedback loop. Transsexuals want to be acknowledged as women/female (and personal experience has been that it really varies from person to person); some lesbians are very suspicious of this, and also want to hold women-born-women events. The latter have I think a longer currency than altercations with the Trans community, but certainly I would acknowledge that forms of transphobia/feeling threatened by perceived ‘male interlopers’ means that some women try harder for such events. Trans challenge them feeling they are being discriminated against and ostracised, often leading to the event’s demise. This reinforces the notion for those women that Trans bring male privilege and oppression to women with them (and probably become even more transphobic), and ’round it goes again.
I find it unbelievably frustrating, as it seems to only drive deeper divisions. I do wonder why Trans advocacy groups challenge them – remembering that they have the legal status as women in Australian society, can marry (unless they are gay), and overall on the global scale, are getting somewhere. I would understand if it was every lesbian event in Australia, but it’s quite patently not, nor are they the largest, most influential, coolest, whatever. If the women involved are outdated and phobic, depriving them of space to be together doesn’t seem to be improving that any. Similarly, it places Trans mtfs are intense scrutiny and feeling they have to defend themselves in the lesbian community, and the results are often ugly. It seems to devolve into a fight about who is less privileged and therefore gets to ask for space, and of course, who controls the definition of a woman. In the middle are women who feel that the experience of Trans growing up and transitioning is sufficiently different lived experience from growing up female/woman that they want them both to have separate spaces to share experiences, as well (I would hope – I certainly do) collective space together with the myriad of other women in the broader tent it is these days.
If anyone has thoughts to offer on how this has been dealt with in other places, I’d be glad to hear them.
3rd and finally, I still worry about the science underlying all of this. When I see articles from scientists claiming to have found differences between “women and men’s brains”, it troubles me deeply. At first you think it’s just the journalists’ reporting, but no, you go read the original article and it’s “women and men”, not male and female. My point being that the 2 sex= 2 gender model is so rigidly hardwired in our society, just as men = big hunter and women = timid child raiser became enshrined in paleoanthropology for however long before being debunked; – I worry that the male domination, the male gaze that still underlies much of science has not been fully addressed when it comes to transsexualism et al.
For example, the issue of intersex people, a couple of whom I know, who have simply gone through hell because some form of indeterminate sex (because it equals gender) is simply not tenable in our society, so they were, and intersex people are “fixed” in most cases still. Yet nature tells us that there are plenty of species where a small percentage of hermaphroditism of similar “blurring” is quite common – humans it seems are no different, except that we still seem to be hell-bent on forcing such people to have a gender (=sex) chosen for them. I sometimes wonder if we as a society had historically allowed and embraced intersex people, whether we would have only 2 genders and a lot of this whole discussion would be rather pointless (or even impossible). I don’t know. But the historical enforcement upon and through transexuals of gender stereotypes is not comforting, andthat same thinking still seems to inform some of the science looking at sex differences.
Ps – I meant to say with regard to my point (1), with all due respect to Ampersand who I think is unquestioningly a feminist, it still galls me to see a man basically tell/argue call it what you will that women should accept xx definition of women. By all means recommend the thread Ampersand, but I’m not sure it was/is the right topic for you to be opining on.
for what it’s worth myriad, i fully support gatherings of wbw that exclude trans women. i belong to a local transgender (as opposed to transsexual) support group, and very much value that space. while we don’t exclude wbw, i don’t see those who do attend to diminish the safety of that space as far as i’m concerned. there have been times when men, who in my opinion had no business being there, have effected my feelings of safety (and i believe we use that term in the same way), and i suppose if our little group were larger, it might be decided to exclude both women and men, of the “born” type, simply to avoid those types of situations. personally, i’d support that decision. unfortunately, when one draws lines, those lines tend to cut right through some individuals, and it’s also unfortunate that i don’t see any other way.
i can see how wbw might perceive that “the trans community” is against the idea of separate space for wbw, because some trans women (and trans men for that matter) are quite vocal about their beliefs on this issue. but there are many of us who are not so vocal, mostly because by being vocal, we bring attention to ourselves, which as i’m sure you can imagine, can be unsafe in our society. many of us do support separate space however.
i can’t count the number of times that i’ve wanted to withdraw from “the trans community”, because so much of what’s perceived as “trans culture” and “community politics”, is not at all representative of what i believe, or part of my culture as a trans woman. for the record, there’s a lot about “trans advocacy groups” that i don’t agree with or approve of.
i don’t care if you believe that i’m a woman or not. i’m not looking for validation as a woman by anyone other than myself. well, i will admit that it’s nice that my husband sees me as a woman, though to be perfectly honest, it would be ok if he didn’t, as long as he respected me as a human being.
it’s important that i’m legally female however, simply because of the need for me (and anyone for that matter) to function in society. i could not function as male, for the same reasons you couldn’t.
regarding the troubling science, i totally agree with you. i don’t believe that men’s and women’s brains are different in any meaningful way, and i believe that any differences between men and women, besides the obvious reproductive aspects, are social in nature. i also agree with the idea that the polarized view of gender does a lot more harm than good.
i found the medical community to be quite cooperative by the time i transitioned. i never had to misrepresent any of my history, feelings or beliefs, never had to conform to any gender stereotypes, and was easily able to access medications and surgery. there’s no doubt that i was privileged – i had great medical insurance which covered much of the cost of hormones and therapy, and had the resources to finance my surgery and electrolysis. it’s my understanding that our respective countries both adhere to the same medical standards of care for trans people, though in america, there very well may be more therapists who see the standards of care more as guidelines – which it is pretty clearly stated they are – as opposed to rigid step-by-step procedures.
I have recently made the decision not to plan to travel from Australia to Michigan for the women-born-women music festival (and left the michfest discussion forum) because I don’t wish to, even indirectly, support the feminist politics of some attendees that I believe de-humanise transeccsual (can’t get my ‘eccs’ to work again) women. I don’t thereby judge women who choose to go, who also don’t support those politics, (which I understand to be most of them). This is just my personal decision, and partially takes into account the degree of difficulty in logistics to my getting there. I’d need to feel 100% enthusiastic and have none of the ambivalence I do genuinely feel.
I am in the awkward position of feeling supportive of WBW space at times, (I am a WBW lesbian), while simulataneously being unable to accept the cost of such space to transeccual women, in the form of politics in defence of it that debate their political ‘right’ to even eggsist. I have seen some very nasty eccschanges at a deeply personal level in the course of this debate. In all honesty, after many years of division, I see no light at the end of this tunnel yet. Something has to give. I don’t know what that will be. I can only say that I am personally willing and happy to include transeccual women and men – any person who has ever or does now live as a woman or a girl – in any space I am in. I don’t feel this as any kind of sacrifice at all. I guess I’m not yet prepared to argue ‘against’ WBW space for other WBW who feel the need for it though, if this is not on the political grounds that transeccuality shouldn’t eggsist…or based on any form of transphobia, whatever its source.
I truly do wish that more feminists would be more willing to listen , and to validate the understanding of the transeccual eccsperience as stated by the people who are actually living it. It seems to me that they have to repeat themselves rather a lot, and often to the same people, who just never seem to hear them.I guess this is not so unusual about lots of issues, but still… ‘I don’t get it, so there must be something wrong with what you’re saying or claiming…I’m just not sure what it is…’ seems stubbornly meaningless and, even if uintentional, kind of self-serving to me.
>>I disagree with you, piny, and I think it’s wrong for you to mischaracterize what I’ve posted as you have or to tell me what my motives are. I haven’t done that in your direction and won’t. But neither will I be engaging anyone demonstrating your level of hostility. It is unwarranted and it is becoming ubiquitous. I asked for a thread reserved for radical feminists a week or so ago, and the first thing you did was pop in to say if that happened, you were leaving Alas. >>
First of all, that’s not true, and Amp and the posts I’ve made here can back me up. I have no problem whatsoever with radical-feminist-only threads, and am in fact happy to see them becoming a reality here. I said as much to Amp. I have a problem with establishing anti-trans space that transpeople can read but not respond to, where people can post hateful rhetoric and baldfaced lies about transpeople without any accountability to actual transpeople. That’s how you run The Margins, and that is what any space mediated by you would become. I did not tell Amp that I was leaving merely as an act of protest, either; I recognized that I would not be able to remain silent in the face of that dynamic and that it would be better to simply depart altogether. And all I said on that thread was, “See ya.” I didn’t come back to comment until I was sure I would be having constructive conversations with other people.
Nor is my hostility unwarranted. I know you and know what your viewpoints are, but even your conduct here on this board has been disrespectful. “I never said that! I said this [technically, trivially different thing],” is fake civility. Make some comment. When people respond to it, twist out of their entirely reasonable reads on some slight technicality. Do this over, and over, and over again. Never own anything you say. When people complain that trying to confirm your views on (for example) transpeople is like trying to knot smoke, when they complain about being told that their reasonable comments are so much word salad (which is faux-civil speak for, “LA LA LA! I CAN’T HEAR YOU! LA LA LA!”), then you’re being attacked, then it’s a feeding frenzy.
You don’t want to engage hostility? Don’t be transphobic. Don’t argue transphobic viewpoints. Don’t make lazy generalizations about transpeople. Don’t take umbrage at assertions that you know are true. You insisted that Amp had a moral duty to engage and respect feminist hostility, and to ignore complaints from anti-feminists that the language was a little too rough and the tone a little too acid. My first response to you was more respectful than you deserve. You were the one who responded with a passive-aggressive dodge.
Thanks Nexy joe for such an informative reply. I deliberately didn’t start my post with “I believe / support blah blah blah” – because in my experience it as often signals disingenuity to people as opposed to sincerity.
Your comments on the “trans community” echoes my experience – I’ve met everything from a trans woman who used to lecture lesbians on how frumpily they dressed and why didn’t they want to look more feminine like her, to those like yourself. It’s also a good example of the difficulties with these discussions – an awful lot of what we are talking about comes down to individual, human interpretation and behaviour. On that basis, I apologise for making the trans community sound like such a monolithic bloc, because I know it isn’t anymore than there is a truly cohesive or collective lesbian community.
My honest answer to you I think, is that I really don’t know if you’re a woman/female or not, but I’m more than happy to take your word for it. It’s the honouring of separate experiences, and as you acutely pinpointed, the need to be able to function in society and basic recognition as a human being that I think is critical. FWIW I belong to a political party that wants to and works to grant full legal status, rights and healthcare to trans people, and I fully believe in and support that.
With regard to medical care & guidelines, thanks for that information. It’s pleasing to hear that at least some aspects of the system are much more reality-based.
PS Nexy joe – I forgot to say that I really like that you don’t care what I think. If you know what I mean. :-)
to be perfectly honest, i really don’t know if i’m a woman/female or not either. when someone comes up with the absolute definition of “woman” or “female”, perhaps i’ll be able to figure it out. until then, i’m pretty comfortable with just being “me”.
i suppose for me, it has a lot to do with context. from a biological standpoint, i’ve never produced eggs, and in fact, used to produce sperm, one of which resulted in another human life. i don’t think there can be any arguement about what that means with regard to what i am, or was.
on the other hand, i’m married, and my marriage license lists me as the “bride”. and all my other i.d. lists me as female. people call me “ma’am”. so from a social perspective, people seem to see me as female.
from inside my head, i like myself a lot better now, after transition, than i did before transition. though i don’t know how that fits in with who or what i am.
in a daily-life perspective, i’m a lot more invested in improving the quality of my life, and the lives of those with whom i share this planet, than i am trying to define my sex. or gender.
and yeah, i believe i do know what you mean :)
You know, that’s enough, piny. That is more than enough. I do not appreciate being attacked here, called names, or lied about by you. I also find what you’ve posted scary and threatening. It is an open attempt to intimidate and silence me here. You “know” me? No, you most certainly do not. I have no idea who you are. I don’t know you, and you don’t know me. I have never engaged you at all, to my knowledge, in real life or online, ever, until this thread. And you can be sure I will not be engaging you again, beyond this post.
I would invite anyone here who has any question at all about my politics or what I stand for, or who is tempted to take any of piny’s attacks seriously, to take a look for yourself:
Website: http://www.WomensSpace.org
Boards: http://www.gentlespirit.com/cgi-bin/margins/dcboard.cgi
You are also free to e-mail me at CherylLindseySeelhoff@gmail.com.
And I really hope, Amp, that you do not plan to stand by and allow what appears to be the beginning of open season here on radical feminists and our work. I have not attacked anyone here or anywhere, and I do not deserve to be attacked here. By anybody.
Cheryl Lindsey Seelhoff (Heart)
http://www.WomensSpace.org (The Margins)
the beginning?
I find it really shocking that what piny wrote could be characterized by anyone as scary or threatening. I don’t see any name-calling, attacking, or lying about Cheryl or her politics. I read, but do not post, on the Margins and the michfest boards, and have seen Cheryl/Heart use this tactic of shutting down discussion or debate before. As feminists, we’re supposed to respect and protect women’s need to feel safe in political discussions and spaces, but as many women of colour and others have pointed out, this need for safety has been used by privileged women to shut down discussions when they have been challenged on their privilege because it makes them feel uncomfortable or unsafe. That’s what I see happening here, and I’m curious if others see it happening as well.
Open season ? Because you and piny disagree ? Odd, since piny and Qgrrl seem to be talking things out in an interesting and enlightening way, and Qgrrl is also a radical feminist. Maybe the problem isn’t radical feminism, Cheryl. Maybe the problem is your approach. Others here are struggling to speak in specifics, at least a little. You seem to be hell-bent on speaking solely in generalities and frankly, I don’t blame Piny for being annoyed at that. (“Attacked” seems more than a little overblown to me. Mere disagreement with you does not = An attack.) Most of us prefer to be adressed as individuals in these things and not as part of some (in your eyes) unsavory monolith.
Frankly, a lot of gender talk goes way over my head no matter what the person is advocating. I have to concentrate more intensely on these discussions than I do on some others, but I’m enjoying this round and see no reason why the whole thing should come grind to a halt because of one radical feminist’s thin skin.
Also, maybe there’s someone who can clear something up for me. As I understand, the primary objection of a great many radical feminists to MTF’s is that we each have a “core” gender, or nature, that no amount of surgery or time lived as somebody else can change. So MTFs, no matter how well-behaved, cannot participate in all-woman spaces because they can never, at the core, be women. If that’s the case, why wouldn’t this same concept serve to welcom FTM’s into all-woman space ? If our born-sex is also our essential gender, and immutable, than an FTM is a woman. How many hormones s/he has taken and how many years s/he has lived as a man shouldn’t matter.
Should it ?
dorktastic wrote:
I wrote while you were still posting. My answer would be “yes.” I’ve dealt with, shall we say, some difficult FTMs in such discussions before, but I don’t think that’s the case here. I think that Cheryl wants to conduct discussion here exactly as she would on the Margins, and that hasn’t happened. But there’s already a Margins. This space shouldn’t have to be an exact duplicate of it.
Sorry. I meant “MTF.” Really, writing both would have worked just as well. :o Need coffee now.
Heart and Piny, with all due respect – and I hope you both know I respect you each a lot – you both need to chill.
Piny, I think you’re right to say that Heart’s argument was a distinction without a difference (at the very least, if there is a difference, Heart has declined to explain what it is and why it matters).
Nonetheless, many of your comments addresseed Heart’s argumentive style (and doing so in a belligerant way, not a “constructive criticism” or “fair debate tactic” way), rather than Heart’s specific arguments made in this specific thread. Please, focus on specific arguments, not on the person you’re arguing with.
Heart, some of your comments have addressed Piny’s alleged motives (i.e., arguing that his intent is to silence feminists who disagree), rather than his arguments. Again, focus on the argument, not the person.
For both of you (in fact, for everyone here), please, no more discussion of Piny’s comment that he was leaving “Alas,” or of Heart’s moderation style on The Margins, or what either of them have written on the Mitchfest boards. Piny has every right to leave “Alas” if he decides that he can’t stand a proposed moderation change – and to let me know that in a comment. Heart has every right to run “The Margins” any way she wants.
This is a really, realy good thread so far. Please, let’s not blow it.
If either of you (or anyone else!) wants to discuss these matters further with me, please take it to email rather than further derailing this thread. Thanks.
Also, maybe there’s someone who can clear something up for me. As I understand, the primary objection of a great many radical feminists to MTF’s is that we each have a “core” gender, or nature, that no amount of surgery or time lived as somebody else can change. So MTFs, no matter how well-behaved, cannot participate in all-woman spaces because they can never, at the core, be women
i haven’t particpated in feminist boards enough to know that this is or isn’t the mindset of a great many radical feminists, but frankly this does seem very ignorant of biology and mtf experience. Has much thought been given to the idea that if there is such a ‘core identity’ at birth, these women were born with it and thus are, at core, women?
Take two examples (I’m taking extreme examples to show the point, but it holds for the continuum of conditions). Kleinfelter’s and Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome. The former is the karyotype XXy, the latter is Xy, and yet something large portion of the former (much larger than the general population) and almost all (something over 90%) of complete AIS individuals are raised and ‘feel’ female in spite of their male karyotype (i had a very fascinating discussion with an AIS individual raised in a small Mormon Utah town when I was 24, changed my perceptions forever), and a large portion of partial AIS individuals often ‘feel’ female though they were ‘assigned’ male at birth.
My point I guess is that to ask how do these feminists propose to determine what makes a ‘core’ woman, the superficial chromosomal makeup (superficial because mutations or changes can make the make up ‘moot’)? or something else like ‘appearance’, because I can tell you, they would never know a complete AIS woman was not a woman except for a chromosome test (in fact, they themselves often do not till later).
Sorry, it seems such a black and white view in a very grey world.
hmm, my comments go to moderation a lot :).. wonder what word I’m using :)
Piny hon,
I just wanted to write and support your positions here. You have not only eloquantly, but also intelligently, argued and displaced considerable restraint. I’ve been up to my eyeballs in doctoral and post-doctoral discussions of queer and/or trans identities and I wish they could have been so well done. I only hope that Qgrrl comes back (healthy too!) so that you might continue that talk.
I identify as strongly feminist, and lesbian. I’ve been engaged in both feminist and queer theory and activism for a long time. And included within that is that I refuse to attend or patronise ANY women’s organisation or feminist group that excludes trans women. I refuse not just because it is against my personal feelings, but as it is also HIGHLY (and simply) un-feminist. There is such a diversity of women in terms of gender presentations and experiences that to exclude trans women feminists on the basis of an imagined ‘fundamental’ difference between them and women that have been born female cuts to the core of what feminism isn’t. I will not attend MWMF and some feminist spaces here in Chicago, etc, specifically for these reasons.
Myself being mildly intersex I always see such constructions as insane, given my own experiences with my biology and how it plays with gender. There are trans women I look at and think are a touch insane in terms of their gender presentations, just as I similarly feel about the Concerned Women of America *grin* But there are some trans women/girls I get along famously with. I have one friend who is almost completely stealth, and she mountain-bikes, gets covered in dirt, loves her muscles and is just as bad about shaving her legs during the winter-time as I am *smile* If someone gave her a doll she’d think they were disturbed, and has done so since she transitioned as a youth (the only reason I know that she is trans, though she doesn’t id as such). She’s not remotely butch, but very much a femme tomboy, and she rocks :)
You can see why we get along *grin*
I talk about her not because I think she is someone that we can extrapolate from, but rather merely as evidence that there is just as much variation of gender performance and identity in the trans community as there is outside of it. My friend doesn’t need to prove that she is a woman, nor did she transition in order to do things she supposedly couldn’t beforehand. She’s a chick, just like me, and transitioned in order to simply be who she is, that I got by birth, and to exclude her from events because of stereotyped and ignorant perceptions of how she ‘is’ is just beneath contempt in my opinion.
But, I am not really contributing anything constructive in terms of intellectual or theoretical discussion. I just wanted to pop on and give you my support and thanks Piny for rocking articulations. I am not back, because simply I cannot exist in a space where homophobic bigots are given just as much of a right to spread their hate as I am discourses of respect as though we are merely two sides of a coin. I experience enough homophobic hate as part of my everyday life that as much as I like and respect Amp that to have that in a space where I should feel safe to participate in discussion, is not something I am going to waste energy on. Hence why I haven’t been here in a long while.
But, just for this moment to say well done Piny, I’ll pop in for a sec :)
lol, that should read “_displayed_ considerable restraint” in the first paragraph … ouch :)
cicely, unfortunately that’s how I feel about MWMF as well. (Okay, that and the people who got their knickers in a wad after Tribe 8’s concert.)
Sure, Amp. And you’re right: I don’t want to see this discussion get derailed either. And before I shut up on the subject for good, I would like to second Heart’s suggestion that everyone go read the Margins boards and judge for themselves. My say-so shouldn’t be worth much.
And thanks, Sarah. I wondered why I hadn’t seen you around; I’m sorry you don’t feel comfortable commenting here yourself.
>>Also, maybe there’s someone who can clear something up for me. As I understand, the primary objection of a great many radical feminists to MTF’s is that we each have a “core” gender, or nature, that no amount of surgery or time lived as somebody else can change. So MTFs, no matter how well-behaved, cannot participate in all-woman spaces because they can never, at the core, be women. If that’s the case, why wouldn’t this same concept serve to welcom FTM’s into all-woman space ? If our born-sex is also our essential gender, and immutable, than an FTM is a woman. How many hormones s/he has taken and how many years s/he has lived as a man shouldn’t matter.>>
Many queer women’s spaces _are_ actually much more accepting of ftms than mtfs, and some anti-mtf-inclusion people have much less animus and towards ftms. This ticks a lot of ftms off, since it’s based on the belief, articulated or not, that ftms are really just women. Butch dykes with a little extra somethin’ special, IOW. I think the argument against including ftms into women’s spaces is that it’s WOMEN-born-women, that is, people who’ve been women, and only women, their entire lives. While ftms were brought up girls, they now live as men and experience male privilege. Being born into girlhood is necessary, but not sufficient.
I admit that it puzzles me – not on an intellectual level, you understand, but on the feeling level – that so many people are so invested as identifying as either male or female. I don’t quite see the point.
>>I admit that it puzzles me – not on an intellectual level, you understand, but on the feeling level – that so many people are so invested as identifying as either male or female. I don’t quite see the point.>>
Had I been born in a male body, I doubt I would have given it much thought either.
Interesting question, that, Piny. Do you think that people whose bodies are congruent with their gender identification never think about it? It certainly seems important to a lot of people – I’ve run into women, for instance, who can’t comprehend even the possibility of being male – it doesn’t make sense to them that they, whatever it is that makes them who they are, could exist in a male body. As for me I don’t care one way or the other – if I woke up tomorrow male, it might be socially and legally difficult, but I can’t imagine it would make a difference to who I am.
I really can’t say, but I very much doubt it’s true that all cisgendered people never think about gender identity, or hypothesize about being in another body. I also don’t think it makes sense to split humanity into “congruent” and “incongruent.” I think that comfort within one’s gendered body is much more of a spectrum than a dichotomy. I know many people who’ve struggled with some feelings of discomfort but decided that transition did not interest them. Judging from my experience, however, most transpeople would not have needed to think about their gender identity in such a conscious, personal way had they not been born in bodies that didn’t work for them. Personal comfort would not have been conducive to asking questions.