Trans Conversations Shouldn't Center Cis Concerns
Debi Crow, Belledame, Hoyden About Town, Caroline, Renegade Evolution, and Queen of Thorns have all posted responses to radfem concern trolling – whether it’s Polly Styrene’s tantrum that The F Word didn’t approve her usual anti-trans misogyny, Jo22′s concern that trans women like sex workers because we transition so we can be sexually empowerful prostitutes, or mAndrea’s deficient and morally bankrupt logic, the responses are pretty clear: These particular radical feminists clearly do not speak for all radical feminists, all feminists nor all women when it comes to trans hatred.
I don’t really like giving any of them direct attention, as there are real issues that trans women are dealing with right now. Issues that I wish could see more exposure. The vile things that these media personalities are saying about Isis and Angie Zapata are well beyond the pale and we really need to respond to that – especially since these jokes are exactly the same as Andrade’s dehumanizing description of Angie Zapata as he killed her.
But, to be fair, as much as I’d like radfem views to receive less oxygen, Hoyden About Town makes the point about how mAndrea and her commenters talk about trans women:
Isn’t that sort of contempt and disgust exactly what led to Allen Andrade beating Angie Zapata to death when he found out (through an act of sexual assault) that she wasn’t a born-woman?
This, right here. The radfems right now – not just Polly, mAndrea, and Jo22, but many many others – are having a collective – for lack of a better word – tantrum about trans women right now. They’re creating spurious blogs (“eatingblueberriesistransphobic.wordpress.com), organizing letter-writing campaigns to The F Word’s owner because transphobic hate speech wasn’t being approved.
But let them fulminate. Let them explode. Let them reveal their hatred in all its gory ugliness. Why? Before I started blogging, I looked back through the various trans wars that had occurred in the feminist blogosphere, and what I saw, as Emily pointed out:
I have complained numerous times that the feminist blogosphere, such as it is, has one main conversation about trans people, one that is returned to again and again and again – the political implications of our transitioning. Click here if you want yet another example of pointless bloody “analysis.”
I don’t CARE about whatever horrible thing some feminist has said anymore. I care that these discussions centre on cis concerns, even (maybe especially) allies respond mostly to the slurs, but rarely address the real issues.
But this particular outbreak feels different – part of it is, no doubt, that Angie Zapata’s death received a lot of attention from cis feminists. But part of it is also that this hasn’t really been a blog war – the vast majority of it is happening in radfem echo chambers, where they’re exposing all that aforementioned ugliness. And what if the radfems hold their own blogwar, and we don’t come, and the next person who pages through the trans wars finds this mess – finds mAndrea’s series of “why we should all hate trans women” articles, or Polly’s “Gender Delusion” blog, her “How dare the F Word not approve my insightful post!” when her own attitudes toward trans issues are plastered over half the trans conversations in blogdonia already? What if they have cis and trans bloggers talking about actual, real issues that affect trans women (whose concerns, as women, are feminism’s concerns) while the radfems pitch themselves into a fevered frenzy of bigoted, misogynist, hatred?
And there’s real issues that trans people are facing beyond America’s Next Top Model. For example:
Trannies! Send backup!
… was the call from a steward, at a gay pride parade, when transwomen got somewhat pissed off at being told they weren’t allowed to use the women’s toilets. A transwoman was later sexually assaulted because she was given no choice but to use the men’s toilets.
This still hasn’t been resolved, and it shouldn’t have happened at all. It is yet another instance of trans women’s safety sacrificed for cis women’s comfort.
So, while I’m not specifically asking that no one call out their bigoted assholishness, I am asking that this other stuff – stuff in the real world, that affects trans women, gets mentioned too.
But, since mAndrea wants this spread around to many blogs, I will link and quote a couple comments:
K. A.:
Basically, fetishist MtF collude with every other misogynist man and choose to participate in the dynamic in an alternate way. They spin it as a handicap when it’s really a male-entitled sexual fantasy that actively oppresses women just as any other pornsick man does. It’s the rape and total control over a synthetic female body, giving him and any other man he includes full access to treating women the way they both love to fetishize treating women. They then strengthen the conditioned response to female parts with their misogynist sex. That’s why you see so many misogynists patronizing MtF prostitutes, and MtF prostitutes happy to do it.
Sexist men look out for each other and will cooperate to control women’s bodies in any novel way they can think of.
mAndrea’s response:
K.A., that was a most brillant analysis, and needs a wider audience then what is available here. Hopefully other readers will carry your idea to other blogs, because it was perfect.
There is your radical feminist trans hatred. Rape apologism. Victim blaming. Slut shaming. Does anyone really need any more at this point?
I’ll add to this by saying that these particular self-styled “radical feminists” do not speak for all radical feminists. They aren’t “the radfems”, they’re a tiny, loud, hateful gang.
lauredhel
17 Aug 08 at 8:43 am
Sorry, my own sense of outrage made me careless.
I’ll edit that in.
And…fixed.
I do that more than I’d like, and I apologize for overgeneralizing.
Lisa Harney
17 Aug 08 at 8:45 am
Wow, you’re quick!
lauredhel
17 Aug 08 at 8:47 am
Yep. Two minute turnaround!
Lisa Harney
17 Aug 08 at 8:48 am
[...] and Lisa, as usual, has much, much [...]
season of the bitch » oh, you binary things
17 Aug 08 at 10:40 am
“I’ll add to this by saying that these particular self-styled “radical feminists” do not speak for all radical feminists. They aren’t “the radfems”, they’re a tiny, loud, hateful gang.”
I was going to say exactly this.
Anji
17 Aug 08 at 12:49 pm
[...] a new round of discussions on OMIGOD trans!!! If you want more context, please read this righteous post by Lisa [...]
Angie Zapata and white-hot hatred « Natalia Antonova
18 Aug 08 at 12:43 am
The argument K.A. presents has never made sense to me. I mean, imagine the convo between a pair of these hypothetical “pornsick mysogynistic fetishists” (PMF 1 and PMF 2), slavering for that total-control access:
PMF 1: Where can we get a woman we can have total access to?
PMF 2: How ’bout we kidnap and rape one?
PMF 1: Nah, too difficult, expensive, and time-consuming. Why don’t you just transition, since that’s really easy?
PMF 2: What a completely hot idea, totally worth no longer having a penis! I’ll do it!
… Wait, what?
The only way I can reconcile the inconsistencies in the argument is to suppose that K.A. gets her (or his or its or whatever, but I’m pretty sure K.A. is a her) notions of what trans bodies and trans identities are like solely from the “shemale” phone-sex ads in Canyon Publishing’s magazines. Odd (to say the least) choice of reading material for someone who uses the derogatory neologism “pornsick”.
(I’ve used some possibly-offensive tropes and locutions to make my point; my apologies if I’ve misjudged the “context” factor – edit, delete, and/or call me on my shit as needed, Lisa.)
Sunflower
Sunflower
19 Aug 08 at 6:21 pm
Well, I do think that stereotypes about trans women in porn are pretty offensive, and pointing out that KA probably got her stereotypes from those stereotypes is probably accurate.
Of course, it shows no sense of actually knowing any trans women who have done porn, or why.
And your hypothetical conversation made me laugh.
Lisa Harney
19 Aug 08 at 6:28 pm
Okay, good – I came across the way I intended. Using offensive stuff to take jabs at those who use it offensively is a delicate art. I’m glad I made you laugh!
Sunflower
Sunflower
19 Aug 08 at 9:55 pm
I always thought feminism stood for equality and inclusiveness. I’ve found out I’m wrong, apparently. Trans-women, sex-workers. liberal feminists (ooops, that’s me!) aren’t allowed in the in-crowd. My mistake.
I’m not sure I do sarcasm well. That was my best shot.
rachelcervantes
22 Aug 08 at 9:30 pm
As I’ve been told many times, equality isn’t a feminist concern, which to a point, I agree with. It’s just the way that statement is used to dismiss women whose concerns don’t fit into the central view of white, cissexual, middle-class women. When I think that equality isn’t the primary concern, I assume that’s because the necessity for social justice requires laws to cover people who lack privilege in various ways.
Lisa Harney
22 Aug 08 at 9:47 pm
Why isn’t equality a feminist concern? What else are we fighting for? THAT I don’t’ get.
rachelcervantes
22 Aug 08 at 9:50 pm
It’s a sleight of hand. The point of social justice is to guarantee equality. It just requires unequal laws to account for the fact that society does not treat everyone equally.
So, my point was muddled – when I’ve seen some feminists say it’s not about equality, they’re shifting where they’re saying the equality should or should not be. It’s not always a dishonest point, but it is often also used to say that some people are less deserving of social justice than others.
Lisa Harney
22 Aug 08 at 9:55 pm
Ah. Well, then, fuck ‘em if they can’t take a joke.
It IS about equality. For me, anyway.
rachelcervantes
22 Aug 08 at 10:01 pm
[...] come up before, and will come up again – Queen Emily has brought it up, Cedar has brought it up, I have brought it up. No one of conscience should welcome this hatred on their blogs. It shouldn’t be allowed to [...]
Strong Enough, Pt 2 « Questioning Transphobia
23 Mar 09 at 5:41 pm