You've posted a lot about this, Benny. Rather than deal with your posts one by one, I'll collate them all here...
Sorry for the delay, I've finally found a bit of time to reply properly.
Trans "theory" isn't really a thing. Trans is generally about people's real lives.
Sorry, but this seems a pretty meaningless statement to me really. People do plenty of theorizing about trans, so I think trans theory is a ”thing”, though perhaps not a very coherent thing. It is possible to theorise about people's real lives.
And feminism as such doesn't have a problem with trans people – some feminists have a problem, some radical feminists – and not all radfems, some radfems.
Yes, I tend to just say ‘feminism’ to mean radical feminism (as I made clear earlier I think). I don’t generally agree with what liberal feminists have to say on gender, porn, prostitution, empowerment etc etc, and the ‘radical’ term gets hijacked by a lot of libfems (again, identity politics allows anyone to ‘identify’ with being radical without having to be actually, you know, radical).
Anyway, I think we all know by now who I’m referring to when I say radical feminists.
Basically they take a monolithic view of gender: that gender is a social construct (of the patriarchy) and is the primary device through which women are oppressed – and that gender is nothing but that.
Yes, i agree with this (though i’m guessing you’re using the Word ‘monolithic’ as a negative here). Isn't that enough?
Trans feminists mostly agree with radical feminists about the oppressive nature of gender, but also use the word "gender" in another way, relating to "gender identity", which refers to a sense of self as being a particular "gender" (e.g. male, female, non-binary) contrary to that assigned at birth
When radfems want to talk about identity, then funnily enough they use the word ‘identity’ – someone’s self perception regarding a particular feature of themselves. Of course, someone identifying as something does not necessarily really make them that thing.
“Sex” (male and female) refers to biological traits, through which we can identify bodies without culture/socialisation. In other words, it is not constructed.
“Gender” is placed onto physical traits by culture and socialization. It is a construction.
The term ‘non-binary’ is pretty meaningless. Queer/trans ideology often refers to gender as a ‘spectrum’, but surely that means that everyone is non-binary by definition? The reality is that hardly anyone fits perfectly into binary masculine/feminine stereotypes. And many feminist women who do not refer to themselves as non-binary understandably take offence at this label, implying as it does that they themselves must be 'binary' women who supposedly align with gender stereotypes and are perfectly comfortable with the patriarchal concept of womanhood placed upon them - which is obviously bullshit.
Assigning gender to people at birth is something that radfems generally would like to do away with of course.
This notion of "gender identity" is pretty much accepted scientifically now – and more and more politically and culturally – even though no one really knows what causes it.
A person can choose to identify as whatever they want, I don’t think science disputes that – doesn’t necessarily mean that person
is that thing, and if that thing they are identifying as being relies on external circumstances for its existence then what what they 'identify' with has no real bearing on reality. This is the problem with identity politics in general. For example, Vanessa Beecroft ( a visual artist who works with kanye west) recently identified herself as black. An extreme example maybe, in relation to race rather than gender, but the logic is the same.
I've actually used the word "gender" in three ways in that paragraph, which is somewhat problematic. But they only really conflict if you insist that words can only have one meaning.
Semantic games confuse the issue and conflate very different things. You can talk about biological ‘sex’, ‘gender’ as socially constructed norms, and ‘identity’ as someone’s self perception of themselves. Problem solved.
That's because what they say doesn't affect you personally, so it all seems "reasonable" and a valid subject for "debate". Analogies are quite easy to find there.
What about the women who it does affect personally? Are they allowed to debate it? (if you're willing to mount a defence of non-platforming tactics against feminists then maybe you think they're not). I was talking specifically in reference to the people at dgr, many of whom are women, and of course radical feminist women who have been saying the same thing for decades.
Gender is an issue that affects everybody and should concern everybody.
Because of their monolithic view of gender, these particular radfems regard trans people as gender collaborators, defenders, infiltrators, whatever - certainly the "enemy of women". Whether you want to call that "hate" is up to you, but their words and actions don't tend to differ much from any other kind of bigot.
Nah, its not hate or bigotry. The ‘enemy’ is patriarchy, pure and simple. I call it having the courage to speak the truth.
Originally Posted by Benny B
Another good article on this to look for is sarah ditum's 'what is gender anyway'.
No, it really isn't. Here's a riposte to that:
https://feministchallengingtransphob...itical-enough/
Yes I read this. It makes the same conflation of sex and gender as discussed above. Also defends the extremely worrying and ethically unsound medicalised approach to gender reassignment for young children, many of whom would grow up to comfortable with their bodies. Like I said before, I strongly disagree that we should be telling children that there is something wrong with their bodies just because thay don't conform to gender norms.
Originally Posted by Benny B
Really this idea that these nasty radical feminists go out of their to insult and oppress trans people is complete bollocks. They are against patriarchy, misogyny and socially constructed gender norms that oppress women. No wonder people feel uncomfortable with the gender norms they are socialized into. Feminists are not the problem here and neither are trans people...unless they start with the misogyny themselves.
These radical feminists actually do go out of their way to do that.
No, they are critical of the ideology and have have every right to raise questions about issues that affect them. I think many who agree with the feminist critique are afraid to speak out for fear of being mean, but that just implies that they don't think trans people would be emotionally equipped to discuss their assertions and ideology. Again, disagreement and open debate does not equal 'transphobia'.
No-platforming is a controversial tactic, but in this context it's basically just a way of saying "fuck off out of here with that shit". The people who tend to be no-platformed usually have many other platforms they can use anyway. Indeed, the only reason someone like you even knows about it is because of their massive platforms.
Nah, you can’t defend no-platforming like this. Aggressively closing down debate is always out of order, and I think you probably know this.
Anyway, I see just as many if not more articles in major online publications that support transgender ideology than radical feminist/trans-critical ones, so I can't agree with your point.
'Someone like me' has an awareness of these issues from blogs and very small, privately funded websites (like feminist current for example, which scrapes by on reader donations and writers who volunteer their work for free). They are not 'massive platforms'. They deserve to have a voice.
