Exh smurfturf
I took the ‘Understanding Gender critical Radfem and Terfs challenge’ and here is what I found (which can be used to better fight against Gender critical Radfems and TERFs in order to protect our Transgender allies)
Radical feminism has a dark bad side to it since Radical feminism is unfortunately an identitarian movement that seeks to organize people with specific biological features to seize power.
The entire ethos of Radical feminism (i.e TERFS/Gender critical feminism) is basically analogous to "nationalism for women", like how they speak about the world and the type of policies they push for (separatism == "self-rule", political lesbianism == "our kind should only date each other", anti-transgender politics == "the foreigners/mongrel peoples are invading our spaces and doing crimes and making us less pure") make that pretty much clear.
Though back to that “nationalism for women” part. This type of land would be more viable and egalitarian and less bad as a ‘nationalism for women’ than the above type of it, BUT only as a refugee for women to be protected from abuse by men.
If you want to know how I balance the intersections between nation and gender/sex dm me and I will send you a blogpost telling you how. Also see this to counter radfem/TERF anti trans zealotry effectively
Some of our interests align at times, but in the end I can't consider myself to be a full or even mostly Radfems any more than I can consider myself to be a hotep in any way shape or form
I would say that in our current day and age you basically cannot be transphobic and also feminist at the same time any more than a person would be accepted as a outright racist as a feminist.
Feminism is a movement and it absolutely should not allow people into its movement (TERFs/Radfems) who work against its goals.
Terfs/Radfems etc really are not radical, which is not to say "extreme" or "committed".
A radical activist is someone who tries to remove the root causes of inequality, and assuredly the transphobes who say they are feminists today don't do such acts
TERFs/Radfems are, though reactionary, which is at its core at odds with the notions of radical activism -
And I don't merely mean this in the realm of their political positions. TERFs/Radfems react to stuff that offends them instead of finding a way to abolish the root causes of inequality.
To be a radical feminist means destroying the gender binary, and not reinforcing it, for instance. Smashing the patriarchy instead of using the patriarchy's own talking points to push its own agenda.
I admire the fact there have been Terfs who have been associated with radical feminism in the times past, and a couples of them still exist now (Germaine Greer still blows, for example) but I would *still* say that their trans exclusionary takes are neither radical or feminist.
To deny the identity of trans people is to commit a reactionary and sexist act. It's not "radical feminism".
To TERF ,check this post out.
TERFs are good frenemies but better enemies
Some fun astroTerfing I indulge in here
I feel that while fellow TRA should be against the Transphobia espoused by GC Terfs they should balance that with not being against Feminism itself. Radfem is only one variant of a much larger, more inclusive Feminist movement itself
Gender critical Radfems and TERFs feel that biological sex is an immutable binary (that there is no such thing as a ‘woman’s brain which they see as a regressive concept), that all men are depraved and violent (which men are, one poll found a significant amount of men would be sexual abusers if they could do so without getting caught so that proves Radfems are right about men) and that women are constantly victims of men (including Transgender women who they call ‘Trans Identified Men’)
Some Gender critical Radfems and TERFs ponder questions like “what if gender expression is significantly based on biology, and that is a good thing?” Some Gender critical Radfems and TERFs even go further to muse things like “why can’t we celebrate our unique aptitudes?”
Gender critical Radfems and TERFs want people to accept what to them we cannot change (sex), and they fight for women’s interests with this caveat in mind
Gender expression as a socially constructed concept, or a product of an individual’s upbringing (nurture), is a concept going through a shift toward a more nuanced understanding of where and how the intersection of gender and biology happens.
Gender critical Radfems and TERFs are sadly developing a stubborn outlook of immutable physical sexual dimorphism, something that is shared by other Gender critical Radfems and TERFs, taken together with a view of gender expression as at least in part, based in bio-psychological urges.
The most driving reasons for all women’s liberation movements are the clear and present threats of physical and sexual violence by men and the lack of power or opportunity for women to support themselves especially if their kinships fail in their mutual duties or dies
After these problems were somewhat fixed in the Western World, there was a shift from an authentic women’s liberation movement into the mid/late 20th century liberal bourgeois feminist theory.
This movement and its eventual third wave intersectional liberal feminism have been indifferent in stopping the growing tolerance of , and easy access to (even for kids) violent porn consumption, rape epidemics in Europe (and also in the US, which partly lead to the creation of Metoo), and women and girls being subjected to unthinkable harm as part of a changing society.
With self-id laws and some anti-woman LGBTQ activism, women have lost their right to privacy and the women’s only spaces vital for their safety.
Women’s freedom to work and support their kinships and spaces in a dire situation became changed into a growing pressure for more women to work more like in second jobs or in working in less legit jobs like sex work (all while diversifying the oppressor class at the same time instead of abolishing it for true freedom) resulting in a wage-stagnating doubling of the work pool and less time with their kinships
So this can be seen as a new understanding of the oppression that women face.
Women are torn away from their kinships due to their new economic needs , and sent then into corporate slavery, instead of spending time in kinships, spaces and having freedom to work
When woman are wrongly discouraged and denied due to who they are, they (and myself included) come to realize that our current system is risky or even a threat to the body and spirit of feminism, kinship and solidarity, and the backbone of a free and open society.
With so many women realizing that bourgeois/liberal feminism, for all of its pro-women positives and goals, has not lived up to these goals for women in preventing the above upsetting circumstances to come to fruition.
There is nothing that expresses this disconnect more than the societal risks of being wary of or even honestly discussing, and maybe even critiquing the transgender and some aspects of the sex-positive movement.
Radfem Gender critical TERFs see themselves as pariahs and TRA use the same aggressive tactics against Radfem Gender critical TERFs as Antifa blocks use against Fascists.
Radfem Gender critical TERFs have been cancelled for failing to adhere to third-wave collective morality of Transgenderism. They are also violently threatened from trans activists and feminist men alike.
These Radfem Gender critical TERFs become seen as outcasts and have already lost the social capital that they will surely risk by getting involved in their gender critical transphobic and transmisognist activism
Male violence against women is of grave concern during the debates about the alleged ‘risks’ involved in allowing Transgender women (who Radfem Gender critical TERFs see as Trans Identified men) into spaces where they believe that women are vulnerable congregate
The statistics regarding male-on-female violence is admittedly very high. Viewing this through publicly available data causes Radfem Gender critical TERFs to get the above Transphobic and reactionary fears of Transgender women (since Radfem Gender critical TERFs see them as Trans Identified men) in their spaces like bathrooms, locker rooms, etc.
Men do commit the majority of violent crime and the majority of partner violence, but there is no proof I have seen that moves me to say that those stats correlate to Transgender women being threatening to Cisgender women in their spaces like like bathrooms, locker rooms, etc
I read a few Radfem Gender critical TERFs say that Reddit power jannie bardfinn of AHS is indicative of the larger escalating behavior thats typical of abusive men (they don’t affirm bard as a Transgender gender, they wrongfully see him as a TIM)
But in the case of Radfem Gender critical TERFs, I can see why they (albeit ignorantly and naively) see it that way through their goggles.
So in this way, Radfem Gender critical TERFs are like race realists but with Transphobic paint (Sex -Gender realists i.e biological Transphobia) and are thus wrong.
This sex-gender realism by Radfem Gender critical TERFs can lead to them slippery sloping to become race realists due to how closely related Race realism is to sex-gender realism /biological Transphobia.
Though, Radfem Gender critical TERFs, have so much baggage within our feminist movement ,I say let them slippery slope down that Alt Right pipeline to race realism. No skin off my teeth
That way Radfem Gender critical TERFs will be so far gone, any remaining sense of legitimacy they have will vanish and thus Radfem Gender critical TERFs will no longer drag down our feminist movements with their exclusion and transphobia anymore.
And if Radfem Gender critical TERFs through that far right fascist grift, convert some race realists to be left wing feminists , then I guess that is an added bonus
We need to move toward a legitimate class struggle and economic analysis.
Liberal and Bourgeous Feminism widens gender divisions that don’t meaningfully address women who do have healthy relationships with men.
Anti-male feminism is toxically all too real in Radfem Gender critical TERFs spaces, and the particularly vehement anti-male and anti-men’s liberation talk pushes away women who have strong, healthy bonds with their kin, sons, fathers, partners, other men, or even just other woman (in their attraction to confidence and femine masculinity) in their communities
A lot of women want us to rethink our current unjust system to create a new system with strong leadership that further protects and saves women from abusive men (like to build upon MeToo, Times Up etc), providing women more kinship all in a larger societal structure.
MGTOW wrongly and adversarially views the patriarchal societies in a reductive and historically illiterate way while third wave feminism is feminist reductive (non diverse) and historically illiterate . So Radfem Gender critical TERFs naturally reject those two movements and are in fact driven toward Transphobia in part due to those two movements
Some fake feminist allies who are cis male, are really reactionary traditionalists who wrongly seek to recreate an idealized version of gender relations that are like the 1950’s sexist advertisements than to truly understand womens history and to help them move forward
But even reactionary traditionalist movements that are pro-family/natalist need some female participation in them, and breaking the omen that is the patriarchy frame to create a paradigm shift toward a new system where men’s toxicity, fetishes, addictions and negative karma is redirected into rehabilitative outlets to fix them and where women are respected and protected for their material reality and the positive qualities of women.
More
One area where Radfem Gender critical TERFs may have a bigger point is that the causes of Transgenderism are firmly rooted in our hyper-individualist neoliberal capitalist consumer culture.
We need to move away from hyper-individualism, and to defeat neoliberal capitalism and its consumer culture, but for reasons that have nothing to do with Transgenderism or social issues per say but that have everything to do with creating a society with economic egalitarianism, freedom , inclusion and no hierarchies.
We need to abolish the Cisgender and male patriarchy and gender binary, and maybe (small maybe) move into a postgender world centuries from now
I do concede to GC Radfem Terfs their view that Gender identity is commodification of the self and they might have a point (or that might be an alternative view to keep in mind).
But unlike GC Radfem Terfs, I am glad that Transgenderism undermines collectivism since I don’t like collectivism that much if not at all
GC Radfem Terfs like me realize that identities are now comprised of products and services that are consumed (hair, clothes, plastic surgery, restaurants, bars, holidays, hobbies, etc) and which act as signifiers of who you want to be.
We agree that that consumption is like a self project (i.e redecorating the house). Capitalism has commodified the meaningful identity and cultural signifiers and turned them into purchasable tacky, superficial imitations of something that has deep personal meaning (eg native cultures, sexual orientation, feminism, wokeness, Marxism, etc).
So Tiktok and Twitter 'Marxist' is just another identity for middle class kids to buy and play with for a while.
Though gender critics and TERFs need to be scoulded and told that SRS is a highly sophisticated procedure that has only gotten better with time. Painting it as mutilation just indicates a Freudian defensiveness of the gender critics’ and TERFs’ own junk.
I just feel that calling it mutilation is unhelpful and cruel — especially seeing how gender critical people and TERFs claim they are supportive of detransitioners, who might have went through these procedures — but the unsettling reality is that it will never be the real thing. So that's a lot of hurt and expense to go through to displace a functional body part and put a non-functional facsimile body part in its place.
This article shows some unique perspectives on gender
Some TERFs claim that being a Trans rights activist is promoting misogyny and that being Transgender itself is misogynist . Even though I do not agree with this nonsense it does give me pause and make me a little less enthused about me doing trans activism since I don't want to be accused of being misogynist by radfems for being pro trans even though I am not one. I have OCD and purity paranoia when it comes to political labels and I don't want to be called misogynist by anyone, even radfems. Can some trans person/ T.R.A reading this help with me with this please
I sympathize with but agree to disagree with these quotes below by Sydney Watson:
“Anyone who denies my basic biology as a female, and a woman, is in direct opposition to my reality and existence. With these people, I cannot co-exist.” Sydney Watson
“Women have nothing left that's ours” Sydney Watson
“Anyone can appropriate our sex. We are referred to as "bleeders" and "pregnant people". Biological men beat us out of our own spaces. "Woman" doesn't have any definition or meaning. And we're expected to accept our own erasure. It's gross”. Sydney Watson
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