#Men with gender identities attacking women only spaces

[coochiequeens]

This guy is in the news again........

By Eva Kurilova. December 21, 2023

Canadian women are expressing outrage after a trans-identified male who campaigned to defund a rape crisis shelter was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal from the Governor General of Canada. Morgane Oger, a trans activist from Vancouver, was honored at a ceremony in Ottawa last week.

On December 16, Oger took to X (formerly Twitter) to boast of his receipt of the award, claiming he had been selected because of his work with “2SLGBTQ+ persons” and trans rights.

“Feeling so grateful, recieving [sic] the Meritorious Service Medal from Governor General of Canada Mary Simon last week for supporting 2SLGBTQ+ persons and furthering the legal protections of Transgender Canadians.”

In Canada, the Governor General is the federal representative of the monarch, currently King Charles III. According to the website for the Governor General of Canada, the Meritorious Service Medal is a civil award that recognizes “great Canadians for exceptional deeds” such as tackling poverty or improving educational opportunities for children.

In the list of recipients for the awards that were distributed on December 7, Oger is described as a “champion of diversity who has changed perceptions around 2SLGBTQI+ rights and has worked tirelessly to see those rights enshrined in law.”

Continuing, the office of the Governor General states that Oger has “forged alliances across party lines that propelled changes to provincial and federal legislation protecting individuals against discrimination based on gender identity or expression.” The short biography concludes by lauding Oger for his “courage, vision and perseverance have helped redefine the fundamental issue of equality and have advanced inclusiveness for gender-diverse Canadians.”

But the news of Oger’s top-level commendation did not sit well with Canadian women’s rights advocates, who noted that Oger has a long and disturbing history of actively fighting against women’s rights.

Canadian journalist and Feminist Current founder Meghan Murphy called out the Governor General, writing that Oger had once stalked her through her neighborhood in apparent retaliation for her views on gender ideology.

“Morgane Oger, whose career has involved harassing and vilifying feminists who defend women-only spaces, including fighting to defund Canada’s longest-standing rape crisis centre and transition house, @VanRapeRelief, stalked me around my neighborhood one day. Just one more reason I left Vancouver,” Murphy wrote. “Are these the ‘exceptional deeds’ bringing honor to Canada, @GGCanada? Making women feel unsafe and ensuring that when they are targeted by male violence they have nowhere safe to go?”

Murphy, like many others, was calling attention to an incident in 2019 where Oger successfully campaigned to strip Canada’s oldest rape crisis center, Vancouver Rape Relief & Women’s Shelter, of its city funding due to its female-only policy. In comments made before the city committee meeting, Oger called the shelter “non-compliant with Canadian law.

Prior to losing its city funding, Vancouver Rape Relief had been through a 12-year legal battle where its policies of only serving females and only allowing female peer rape counselors had been tested and held up in court. The Supreme Court of British Columbia and the British Columbia Court of Appeal both ruled that the facility was allowed to maintain a female-only space.

But despite the legal precedent, the City of Vancouver agreed with Oger and pulled the funding it had previously provided the shelter for its educational outreach programs despite the fact that the outreach programs were accessible to all, even transgender people.

While in the throes of defending its funding, Vancouver Rape Relief was targeted by a sickening harassment campaign from trans activists. Dead rats were nailed to the door and messages like “KILL TERFS” and “trans women are women” were written on the windows of its charity storefront.

Oger dismissed the abuse the rape shelter was receiving in a blasé statement he gave to press at the time.

“Sometimes, unfortunately, when Vancouver Rape Relief’s policies hit mainstream media and when their discriminatory conduct hits the light of day some people overreact,” he said of the vandalism and threats.

But just prior to the incident with the shelter, Oger had already attracted the ire of Canadian women’s rights advocates for his initial support of vexatious litigant Jonathan “Jessica” Yaniv.

Yaniv, a trans-identified male, made international headlines after filing a series of complaints with the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal against female aestheticians who refused to perform waxing services on his male genitals. During a lengthy proceeding, it was alleged that Yaniv had deliberately targeted salon workers who were Sikh or Muslim in an effort to force women with religious restrictions on male-female contact to serve him.

On X (then known as Twitter) Oger referred to the women’s refusal to touch genitals on demand as “prohibited discrimination” and said that there was “no entitlement in Canada to refuse the performing of a service” on the basis of gender identity.

“Estheticians should take this up with their training providers. It wasn’t that long ago some service providers ‘weren’t trained’ to work on Black women or serve foreigners, either,” he said. “The law’s changed. Move on, get the training you need.”

When asked directly about his personal involvement with Yaniv, Oger was non-committal in his comments but admitted that he had spoken to Yaniv on the phone and that he had previously encouraged “trans women” to “complain to their human rights tribunal about prohibited discrimination.”

Eventually, the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal ruled that estheticians were, in fact, able to refuse services that they were not trained to perform, such as waxing a scrotum.

This is not the first time Oger has received a Meritorious Service Medal. In 2018, he was given the award by then-Governor General Julie Payette for, according to City News, “her [sic] work advocating for LGBTQ rights.”

Speaking to Reduxx, journalist Meghan Murphy condemned the Governor General for providing Oger one of the most respected civilian awards in the country.

“Morgane Oger’s legacy is fighting against women’s rights, safety, and free speech,” she said. “Anyone who focuses so much effort on defunding one of the few rape crisis lines and transition houses in Canada is not someone who deserves to be celebrated.”

Murphy continued by noting that Oger had made her feel “unsafe” in her own home, prompting her to file a police report on him in 2020.

“This is a man who has gone out of his way to ensure that women don’t have safe places to go when escaping male violence. That the Canadian government has supported and celebrated him in these efforts is horrendous and shameful.”

[honeyblankets]

the thing that first got me somewhat radical was the fact that trans ideology/logic crumples after one argument against it.

i literally started researching gender ideology to become a better trans ally, as did most of the radical feminists i interact with. i kept seeing people say “define a woman?” and i didn’t know how to answer it in a ‘trans-friendly’ way. all the trans activists i knew answered something like “someone who identifies as female” but how can you identify as a sex which you are not? or they answer as “anyone who identifies as a woman” but then, what is a woman? “it’s a gender identity” but gender isn’t real, it’s a social construct? so identifying as a woman is simply identifying as the stereotypes and gender roles assigned to women from the patriarchy. so i thought, that can’t be it, can it?

but it is. there is literally no legitimate answer to this question which agrees with trans ideology. then i question this, and get labelled a ‘terf’. i didn’t even know what that meant, i just knew i should hate them because the people i otherwise agreed with said that they were transphobic and sexist and hated women and were conservatives.

and then i started to think critically. i started to see news story after news story of women’s spaces being destroyed while men’s were left untouched in the name of “trans inclusivity”. i started to see posts with thousands of likes saying lesbians are bigoted for not wanting to have sex with males. i started noticing that medical terms were only ever deemed exclusive if they originally applied to women like “chest feeding” or “people with vulvas”. i started seeing people attack women relentlessly for simply questioning these things. i started noticing that the only people who ever benefited from trans ideology were males.

and now i’m kinda a radical feminist! :)

and it’s not scary and it’s not evil and it’s not exclusionary and it’s not bigoted. may all the feminists refraining from questioning trans ideology because of being ‘cancelled’ and berated discover their answers and feel free enough to speak their mind. xxx

[genderqueerdykes]

hi, i love your blog ❤️ i was wondering if you could talk a little about bi lesbians? as a gnc nb genderfluid femme bi dyke(fag) i'm again and again heartbroken by the hate and exclusion we get from fellow lesbians and especially from fellow femmes and it SUCKS to always have to check someones bio in fear and to be constantly likened to terfs and fascists. thank you 💖

hello there, sure! this is a great ask

i've observed that too- specifically in the white cis femme community, there is a lot of hostility toward lesbians who are attracted to men and/or have slept with men. a lot of it stems from lesbian separatism and radfeminism- a lot of white cis femmes get wrapped up in that culture very easily, unfortunately

there's a lot of hostility toward male and transmasculine lesbians in the white cis femme community. i love cis femmes, but unfortunately many have fallen down the terf rabbit hole and believe that lesbian means woman attracted woman only, and it's unfortunate, because it's such a narrow view on lesbianism and leaves out most of the varied and complex relationships with sexuality and gender when it comes to lesbianism. unfortunately many white cis femme lesbians get wrapped up in believing that any expression of masculinity beyond androgyny or soft butch is too "aggressive" or "hostile".

a lot of people hold the belief that for whatever reason a lesbian is "tainted" once they've slept with a man, as though other lesbians will catch some type of contageous disease just by being near a lesbian who sleeps with men. it's really childish behavior- it's okay to not be attracted to men, but it's not a personal attack when another lesbian does find men attractive. it doesn't say anything about you- your partner's sexual identity doesn't have to line up 1:1 with yours in order to be legitimate

i know MANY lesbians who are attracted to men in some capacity or another and don't even consider themselves bisexual. for some people they acknowledge that attraction but don't consider it to be something that changes who they are, and this is an okay expression of this experience as well

bi lesbians have always been a part of the community, there are many photographs from events both recent and further in the past that show support for and acknowledgement of bisexual lesbians. dyke marches in particular have been very inclusive spaces for bi lesbians, and queer protests and pride meetups usually have a good number of bi lesbians among the crowd. it's a term that's been used for decades, and the example that i have readily available is a comic strip written by Alison Bechdel in 1999:

there's no reason why lesbian/sapphic/dyke attraction would be "cancelled out" by being attracted to men- one does not stop having a sapphic relationship with other people just because they find men attractive, especially considering that some men are lesbians, too. genderfluid and bigender people exist as well and it's okay for lesbians to be attracted to people with multiple genders

a lot of butches identify as both men and women and it doesn't make their partners not lesbians to be attracted to them. lesbian attraction is complex and there is a lot more to it than just being attracted to women. there's a lot of culture rooted in genderfuckery here, and even if a lesbian is attracted to a cis man, it doesn't matter. that's still okay. it doesn't 'cancel out' their lesbianism

some bi lesbians aren't even attracted to men, but rather a multitude of other genders. that doesn't make them not lesbians, either. you don't just stop being a lesbian just because you're attracted to multiple genders. it doesn't change anything about you, especially not the rest of your identity and your focus in life. for some, the people they're attracted to is very important and for others it's just a fact of life that isn't their primary focus

it doesn't make a woman or lesbian "straight" to be attracted to genders other than women

i hope that was what you were looking for! if you have any questions feel free to ask!

[mariacallous]

Rep.-elect Sarah McBride (D-Del.), soon to be the first transgender member of Congress, was targeted by multiple Republican measures to bar transgender women from using Capitol bathrooms that align with their gender identity.

Democrats have rallied to McBride’s defense, accusing Republicans of bullying McBride and attacking other LGBTQ+ people who work at and visit the Capitol.

Democrats have tried to refocus the conversation on other issues important to voters, such as healthcare and the high cost of living — taking a page from McBride’s own political playbook.

At a Democratic caucus meeting Tuesday, Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.) watched as colleagues approached and offered their support to Rep.-elect Sarah McBride (D-Del.), who will soon be sworn in as the first out transgender member of Congress.

“We have your back,” Balint recalled her fellow representatives telling McBride. “We stand with you.”

At a Thursday event where incoming House freshmen got assigned offices, McBride’s name was met with the loudest applause.

According to Balint, co-chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, many Democratic members are excited to welcome and meet McBride — not just as a queer history-maker, but as a new colleague whose reputation as an effective state legislator in Delaware preceded her to Washington.

The support has been intentionally loud, Balint said, because Democrats also want to send an unequivocal message to House Republicans who have targeted McBride with comments and actions in recent days that Democrats “are not going to retreat” on transgender rights.

“We have to absolutely recommit ourselves to this fight, for protecting everyone’s inherent dignity,” Balint said.

On Monday, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) filed a resolution that would prohibit transgender women from using Capitol bathrooms that align with their gender identity. On Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) announced a similar policy for Capitol bathrooms, locker rooms and changing rooms. The same day, Mace filed a bill that would expand such bans to federal facilities across the country.

Mace said her measures, which would require approval, are to protect women and girls, then launched a new line of merchandise to profit off her stance. She has previously espoused support for LGBTQ+ rights.

In issuing his bathroom rule, which falls under his purview as speaker, Johnson said, “Women deserve women’s-only spaces.” He also noted that all members have private bathrooms within their offices — though those can be far from the House floor.

The day prior, Johnson had responded to a question about the issue by stressing the need to “treat all persons with dignity and respect.”

Access to bathrooms has long been an issue for women at the Capitol, which originally operated on the presumption that legislators were men. Only after more and more women won seats in Congress and called out the dearth of facilities for them did the issue get resolved.

With the latest measures targeting McBride, Democrats say they are struggling to combat fresh discrimination in the same sphere — a backsliding they view as particularly cruel for its targeting of a single incoming legislator, and extra alarming for its potential to harm other queer people who visit or work in the Capitol.

“This incredibly craven and cruel attack directed at [McBride] was certainly intended to dehumanize her before she has even been sworn in, but it actually doesn’t just affect our first trans member of Congress,” Balint said. “It impacts all of the people who work on Capitol Hill who identify as trans and nonbinary. It impacts the reporters who cover the Hill that identify as trans and nonbinary. And it also impacts every single one of our constituents who come into the halls of Congress to meet with us.”

Speaking out in opposition to the measures is about supporting McBride, who is “a serious legislator” and wants to get to work on a range of tough issues without having to worry about where she can get to a toilet, Balint said. But it is also about “showing the LGBTQ community across the country that we are standing up for them and pushing back.”

The debate follows an election cycle steeped in anti-transgender rhetoric, when many Republicans — including President-elect Donald Trump — took to ridiculing Democrats over their support for transgender equality as a central campaign message, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars in collective ad spending.

“The Republican Party has laser-focused on transgender inclusion as something that it wants to roll back, and so the exciting addition of the first openly trans member of Congress has prompted a hideous response — which is [for them] to participate in an ad hominem attack that takes the form of exclusion,” said Kate Redburn, co-director of the Center for Gender and Sexuality Law at Columbia Law School.

Democrats have at times struggled to respond to the barrage of Republican attacks. However, in the last week, they seem to have landed on an approach out of McBride’s own playbook in Delaware — where she won a statewide congressional seat not by running away from her transgender identity and support for queer rights, but by contextualizing them alongside other important issues, such as the cost of living and access to healthcare.

Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) wrote on X on Tuesday that she is proud to serve alongside McBride, and that it was “disappointing to see Republicans pull stunts” attacking her.

“They should take a page out of Rep-Elect McBride’s book,” Pressley wrote, “and focus on actually governing.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) similarly questioned Republicans’ decision to start the next Congress by “bullying” McBride instead of focusing on real issues. “This is what we’re doing?” he said.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), who has a transgender grandson and has been outspoken against past anti-LGBTQ+ measures, hit a similar note in an interview Thursday, in which she called the Republican measures attacking McBride “absolutely outrageous” and “completely out of line.”

“What a ridiculous focus this is,” she said. “There are needs of many, many Americans who don’t have the healthcare that they need, seniors who can’t afford their medications. Those are the things that we should get to work on, that I’m sure Sarah would want to get to work on — and this is just off the deep end.”

In her own remarks, McBride has acknowledged what many view as the bigotry at the root of the Republican measures, but also tried to refocus the conversation on getting things done for her constituents.

“I’m not here to fight about bathrooms. I’m here to fight for Delawareans and to bring down costs facing families,” she said in a statement Wednesday. She said Johnson’s rules were an “effort to distract from the real issues facing this country,” but that she wouldn’t let them distract her — even as she follows them.

On Thursday, she made clear that she will work to ensure Capitol Hill is safe for everyone, including her LGBTQ+ constituents, but doesn’t plan on allowing “a right wing culture war machine” to turn her identity “into the issue.”

Lisa Goodman, a longtime LGBTQ+ activist in Delaware and friend of McBride’s, said the representative-elect’s family and friends back home “are disappointed that this is how people who are going to be her colleagues are greeting her.”

But they aren’t worried, Goodman said, because they know McBride is capable of navigating such waters.

“She can handle these attacks and keep focused on what is the big picture — what is important in the big picture — like no one I have ever met,” Goodman said.

Goodman said McBride has a rare talent for winning over people, which will serve her well in the coming months, as she gets to know her new colleagues — Democrats and Republicans alike.

“She’s just a deeply good person, and my hope is that, as her Republican colleagues in Congress get to know her, they will see her as a person and not as some unknown member of the trans community who they feel it’s OK to attack,” Goodman said.

Balint said several Republican House members have told her in private that they support the LGBTQ+ community and don’t support divisive policies. She said she hopes McBride’s kindness and humanity in the face of such attacks will bring those Republicans to her side — and maybe even inspire them to take a stand for her.

“It is their time to finally show some courage,” Balint said. “I’m asking them to stand up for the basic, inherent dignity of all of us here in this building.”

[st-dionysus]

it's nobody's business too police labels and identities for other people but I will say the reason you might be getting backlash for calling yourself a dyke is because it is insensitive to lesbians who do get called that in a derogatory way so it's those people who can reclaim it, it's something that though used interchangeably with lesbian and used as a specific lesbian identity is a reclaimed slur so I think it's something that can and should be used but with grace and understanding for those who are sensitive to it.

I get called Dyke as a slur. I have been beaten and faced SA from and by people who have called me a dyke. I have been called dyke when I was a lesbian and I have been called dyke after coming out as a trans man, because to cis society I am a dirty filthy dyke, to lesbian separatists, I am a traitorous self-loathing dyke.

It is insensitive and transphobic to police the language that trans men have reclaimed. It is insensitive and transphobic to refuse to acknowledge that trans men can come from and still exist in the lesbian community. Furthermore, it is insensitive and transphobic to presume that trans men exist on a binary and that we are unable to have complex relationships with are sexuality and gender. Trans men, having been reclaiming dyke for as long as it has been used a slur. It is not a specific lesbian identity -- it has been used by ALL queer women and ALL transmasculine people, including trans men. When I go to the dyke bar, guess what? They have trans men there. When I got the dyke march, guess what? They have trans men there. There are trans men in every single dyke community space that hasn't been overrun by TERFs, Lesbian separatists, or libfems.

It is only online that I have EVER been told that I am not a dyke, that I can not reclaim that identity, that I should be understating/sensitive of the people who attack me and try and police my gender, sexuality, and identity.

Hell, even the TERFs I've dealt with in person, call me a broken deadbeat dyke, and I've reclaimed that. When someone tells me I'm a dyke while they try to misgender me, whether they're just a run-of-the-mill transphobe or a TERF. Guess what? I get to say "Yes I am, and that doesn't make me less of a man, you don't know me and you don't get to choose who or what I am." And I will tell that to anyone who decides they get to police any aspect of my identity.

I do not owe anyone Tumblr/Twitter an explanation for who not only am, but for who I am accepted as by my community.

I am sorry if the tone of this answer comes off as angry, but I am angry, and I have the right to be.

[mallloryrowinski]

u talk about trans women being violent as if they're not one of the most discriminated against groups. trans folks are over 4 times more likely than cisgender people to experience violent victimization, including rape and SA

So? Does experiencing violence make a group somehow “pure” or incapable of violence themselves? Women, as an oppressed group, also experience higher rates of violence, yet no one claims this makes women incapable of committing crimes, and no one silences those talking about female criminals. Actually, the media and public often focus on and sensationalize female-perpetrated crime. Marginalized or oppressed groups can and do contain individuals who commit violent acts—being a victim doesn’t erase that fact.

This trend of denying that men can exploit gender identity policies to harm women is exhausting. There are real cases of men hiding behind gender ideology to gain access to female-only spaces and commit abuses. This isn't hypothetical—it’s documented in cases around the world. Ignoring these risks doesn’t erase them; it just lets them go unchecked. Read the news, and you’ll see that this concern is grounded in real events.

My point has always been that gender ideology and the uncritical acceptance of it create loopholes that violent, misogynistic men exploit to victimize women. Are we supposed to ignore this out of "political correctness," because you can't say anything trans-related that isn’t overwhelmingly positive? How is silencing women’s real safety concerns politically correct? Women are being assaulted and even killed in spaces that are supposed to protect them—this should matter!!

To be clear, I don’t condone violence or discrimination against the trans community—no one deserves that, obviously. But acknowledging the reality of violence against women and advocating for safety in female-only spaces doesn’t contradict this. Anyone capable of basic critical thinking should recognize that I’m not attacking the trans community, nor am I labeling all trans women as “bad” simply by raising these issues.

[pinkyjulien]

I really, really hate the "Female V is canon" vs "Male V is canon" debate that been popping here and here in the tags those past weeks

Cyberpunk 2077 is a Role Playing Game, there is no "canon" protagonist, that's the whole point. We all have a different playstyles, different stories and headcanons, our custom V is The Canon V of Our Own playthroughs!

After Phantom Liberty dropped, I've seen a lot of players, on Tumblr or Twitter, voicing their concerne and disappointment in how much more Female V focused the official promo, videos and even in-game credits became

I was one of them too, expressing my feelings multiple times, sometimes awkwardly, frustrated that Male V players were once again brushed to the side, because that's how it feels like, right?

Well, it might feels like it, but this isn't the case AT ALL, far from it. This is only what I would call a "Fandom Phenomenon" and I want to talk more about it a bit

I had a great conversation with a friend of mine who works in the game industry and it opened my eyes on the matter, and I've since been really interested in seeing RPGs statistics!

Because it's really, really important to make the difference between the Casual Player Base (majority of players) and the Fans / Fandom Base (minority of players)

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

I always been lurking in fandoms here on Tumblr, since Mass Effect, Dragon Age, and now with Cyberpunk 2077 and Baldur's Gate 3

First I want to drop some stats- might be completly wrong, but I'm only sharing my point of view here, in an attempt to explain why some people are frustrated with Female V being the focus (and why we shouldn't be!)

I think it's not wrong to say that fandoms are mostly occupied by women and fem-identifying individuals; fandoms are a safe place for players and fans to share their passions. Women are STILL HEAVILY harassed and hated in the gaming industry as a whole, it doesn't take a lot of digging to catch a vile comment on Twitter or on Twitch for example, you cannot go far without seeing someone either attacking or sexualizing them

This is a huge problem in the industry still, every games that release with a female protagonist get trashed- just look at the bullshit surrounding GTA 6 just because players will be able to play as a woman as an option

Fandoms are also safe for non-gender conforming people, non-binaries, trans people and queer men, but I think fem individuals and women are a clear majority, at least on Tumblr (only talking about genders identity here and not about being queer or not, not talking about sexualities or attraction) (not an official stat at all and only my point of view and experience from being on Tumblr since ~2012)

Now let's talk about Cyberpunk 2077- because this is my main fandom since 2020, and what prompted me to write this post in the first place

CDPR didn't share any stats recently, but it's REALLY SAFE to assume the MAJORITY of players are playing a straight Male V romancing Panam, followed by a lesbian Female V romancing Judy, but the player pools for both options are still majoritarly cis hetero men (and they are still the focus for AAA studios to sell their games, this is sadly just how it is)

However on the fandom side, Fem V was always the focus; virtual photography, mods, ships, OCs... She was always more popular than Male V, getting more interactions and notes and why trends like "Male V monday" were created and why there is still a lack of male V focused mods (non-binaries and trans fem folks and characters are also sadly under-represented in all type of content and art)

So, being yourself as a non-fem player, playing as a Masc V, seeing CDPR officially make the switch from Male V to Female V, when the space you've been in for the past 3 years has been overwhelmingly Female V focused on all front, was a bit of a punch in the guts; like I said earlier, I was reaaally frustrated with this too!

And I'd say it's "normal"? or at least "ok" to feel this way, it makes sense considering how little attention Male V in general get in the fans community

BUT. BUT... It's REALLY important here to realize how we sound and how we look like when we voice our frustrations on the matter; we sound and look just like all the misogynistic people over on Twitter who screams about "woke games" everytime there is a female protagonist in their "non political games". We have to remember that fandoms are suuuch a small part of the game industry

Baldur's Gate 3 recently shared their stats and this interesting tweet got into my dash

▶ tweet

Astarion is nowhere to be seen in the official most romanced companions statistic, but I'm sure a lot of people will agree that he's probably the most popular one in the fandom side!

Another stat here from Mass Effect and really interesting info coming from David Gaider about how the hardcore fanbase aka fandom's choices were WILDLY different from the casual / main player pool

▶ tweet

Getting my head out of the fandom bubbles and seeing the bigger picture, how much under-represented women still are in official medias (not talking about fan content) and how insanly misoginistic the game industry still is, both on the player and devs sides, helped me handle my own frustration on the matter, accept and even celebrate Female V being the focus for the Phantom Liberty campaign

With all that said tho, we all should be able to vent about the lack of Male, Masc and Non-Binary content in the fandom side, while still being aware of the industry state, it CAN co-exist! It doesn't make anyone a bad or misogynist person!

We are all humans and can be awkward and make mistakes, especially when voicing frustration or talking while in a negative mood. Let's educate one another in good-faithed manners when we slip instead of jumping to conclusion and throw accusations

Not gonna lie I kind of lost my train of thoughts and not sure how to finish this post, but I hope this can enlight some people on why CDPR made this choice!

Repeating this as a finale note; this doesn't mean that Female V is the "main" V or "canon" V . It's simply her time to shine, and it's well deserved! The industry needs it

[cptapathy]

My takeaway for the new UK guidance on gender transitioning in schools

Please, everyone, respond to the guidance and call it out as how shit it is, don't just accept this shit.

Here is the link to respond to this attack on trans youth

https://consult.education.gov.uk/equalities-political-impartiality-anti-bullying-team/gender-questioning-children-proposed-guidance/

1. If you are under 18, are doubting/exploring your gender and wish to involve the teaching staff but not your parents, then explicitly say to them, "if my parents find out they will beat me"

This is the only way to prevent the teacher from having a legal duty to inform your parents

2. The guidance is rife with "G3nder Cri1ical" terminology, but what do you expect from the equality minister for Britain?

3. Unsupportive teachers will be able to justify their prejudice as "watchful waiting" as laid out in the guidance as step 1

Just to clarify, if a 16yo comes to ask to be referred to by a different name or pronouns step 1‽ is to not honour those requedts for an indeterminate period of time to "make sure." This will be standard across an entire country

4. A direct quote

"Does the child feel pressured to identify differently because they simply do not align with stereotypes associated with their sex? This is relevant as some people think gender identity reinforces stereotypes about men and women"

They need to spend some time on tumblr, ain't nothing about you freaks that reinforces gender stereotypes

5. Another quote

Schools "should not unilaterally adopt any changes, including using a new name or new pronouns, unless or until this has been agreed by the school or college in accordance with the proper procedures and... parental consent"

So, any time a child considers their gender identity, there must be a school meeting about accepting it. They then go on to talk about "contested views"

But if anyone has contrary views, those are protected and "must be respected," not period of denial, and informing the parent to then hold a meeting of if those views are necessary for the school to honour.

6. "Agreeing to a child’s request to have others use different pronouns about them is a significant decision."

No it fucking isn't

7. Children under the age of 11 are not allowed to have different pronouns. It's just an outright blanket ban on using gender affirming pronouns for Under 11s.

8. Over 11 well, now we have to decide if using they/them is a large enough benefit to you that it "outweighs the impact on the school community."

Idiots the lot of them

8. But if we do accept a pronoun change, you will still be referred to as "girls" or "boys" collectively, and we won't stop teachers or other students from not using your pronouns. Did you think this was to enforce your pronoun use? No, no, no, this is just to allow YOU to use those pronouns, god forbid a student decide for themselves how they want to be referred to!

9. Literally just explicit transphobia

"Schools and colleges should exhaust all other options, such as using first names, to avoid requiring other individuals having to use preferred pronouns"

10. The first and only mention of bullying, in full

"In all cases, bullying of any child must not be tolerated. No child should be sanctioned for honest mistakes when adapting to a new way of interacting with another pupil"

Why does that feel like they're defending transphobes from bullying? Oh, right, because that's what they are doing.

11. Did anyone expect anything different to this?

"Responding to a request to support any degree of social transition must not include allowing access to these spaces"

So, it will be a legal requirement for teachers in England to prevent trans people from going to a toilet or changing room designated for their gender.

12. This one is not a legal requirement but rather a "should" statement, which is trans children "should" be held to the same uniform status as other children of their AGAB.

I'm running out of commentary here

13. No one is surprised that trans people are once again banned in sports

The full doc for anyone willing to go through it

https://consult.education.gov.uk/equalities-political-impartiality-anti-bullying-team/gender-questioning-children-proposed-guidance/supporting_documents/Gender%20Questioning%20Children%20%20nonstatutory%20guidance.pdf

Boys, girls, and the genders we aren't allowed to mention, that is my summary of the UK government proposed guidance on trans students.

Please help stop them.

[a-room-of-my-own]

Maggie* could barely believe the words she was reading in her daughter’s diary. But the words were real. And they were the first to finally explain the sudden mental health crisis that had captured her formerly happy, healthy, 12-year-old daughter.

The diary entry referred back to an incident in October 2021, when her daughter Ray*, a 6th grader at ASK Academy charter school in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, was allegedly raped inside the girls’ bathroom by an older biological male student.

(…)

Maggie only discovered what happened to her daughter several months after the alleged assault, when she was reorganizing her daughter’s room and stumbled upon her journal. After confronting her daughter about what it said, Maggie reported the rape to law enforcement, took her daughter for a physical exam, and began looking into the school’s role.

Maggie now believes the main reason a male student was alone with her daughter that day, and had the opportunity to rape her, is because the school had fully embraced gender ideology. Upon reading through school documents and talking with her daughter and fellow parents, Maggie learned that, without her knowledge or consent, ASK Academy had fully embraced radical gender theory into its policies and classrooms.

Ray, who is now 13, said the school fostered an ideologically far-left culture, which left little room for dissent. She said she felt pressured by teachers and faculty to accept the presence of men in women’s spaces, to keep her mouth shut about any feelings of discomfort, and to avoid doing anything that would be construed as “judging” someone who might identify as transgender.

It was these conditions that Maggie believes disarmed her daughter and enabled a male student to take advantage of the school’s “inclusive” bathroom policies.

(…)

According to Ray, ASK Academy had a policy of affirming students who adopted “transgender” identities, and supported their use of whichever bathroom or locker room facilities they preferred. Ray said this meant she was regularly forced to use girls’ bathrooms with boys, which conditioned her to lower her guard.

“A lot of the natural instincts, those emotions, those kinds of barriers or protective like walls that I had up, that school made it feel like those were bad,” she said.

(…)

She explained that she chose not to report the alleged assault and instead suppressed her feelings out of fear of being labeled a “bigot” by her classmates for calling out the “bathroom issue,” or being served detention for “bullying.”

Though she didn’t know the reason at the time, Maggie noticed her daughter beginning to exhibit signs of deep grief, anxiety and depression. She described it as feeling as though there was a stranger in their house. About a month after the alleged attack, Maggie started her daughter in therapy, where Ray insisted she was just being bullied in school. Once her daughter started demonstrating suicidal ideations, Maggie decided to confront ASK Academy and get them involved.

The school, Maggie said, dismissed her concerns. “They treated us like we were a problem when we tried to make them address issues our child was facing in their school,” she said, adding, “The school tried to say we must be doing something wrong at home.”

Watching her daughter become suicidal “for the first time in her life,” Maggie and her husband made the decision to pull their daughter from ASK Academy and enroll her in the local public school.

Several months later, on April 11, 2022, Maggie found her daughter’s journal, where she learned that Ray was not just being bullied in school, but had survived sexual assault.

Maggie and her husband sat down with Ray to ASK about the diary entry. When Ray finally opened up about being raped, Maggie immediately contacted Rio Rancho Police Department and their local Child Protective Services office to document and cross-report the case.

Rio Rancho Police Department began a criminal investigation, assigning a detective to the case who Maggie said was then supposed to work directly with ASK Academy. But to this day, Maggie said she isn’t confident that anyone from the police department or the school has even taken the time to review security footage from the time and location Ray thinks she was attacked.

Maggie was told by police involved in the investigation that progress on the case has been slow due to alleged staffing shortages. Recently, Maggie said the department assigned a new detective to the criminal case who she believes just began reviewing all of the previous detective's work.

It just sucks,” Maggie said. “I've been told in New Mexico, that these types of cases can take years to really come to fruition. I don't know how that's possible, but that's what we keep being told.”

IWF reached out to Captain Joel Holt of the Rio Rancho Police Department for comment, who confirmed that a criminal case is open and active. Cpt. Holt told IWF that while staffing is a factor in delays, there are other things which “potentially take time for an investigation,” but that their detectives are “working to do a thorough and complete investigation.”

In Spring 2022, by the time that Maggie started “raising hell” about her daughter’s alleged rape, she said four staffers from ASK Academy, including two top administrators, had left their positions at the school.

They're afraid of our case,” she said, adding, “They know what's coming.”

In addition to the criminal investigation, Maggie and her husband retained two private attorneys to pursue a civil case against the school, alleging ASK Academy didn’t have enough protections in place to safeguard their students, like Ray. Maggie said it took these attorneys nearly a year just to provide her family with forms to sign, however, so they are now in the process of signing a retainer with a new law firm.

The investigative and legal delays, both on the criminal and civil front, have left an alleged rapist loose at school with more than 550 students, free to strike again. To Maggie’s knowledge, ASK Academy never notified parents or students about the alleged incident or ensuing criminal investigation.

As the investigation continues to drag on, more troubling allegations have come to light.

In one instance dating back to July 2022, a 14-year-old female student at a neighboring public school was allegedly assaulted on her own campus at gunpoint. The girl identified her alleged attacker, whose name the victim’s mother shared with Maggie. After learning his identity, Maggie looked at Ray’s yearbook and discovered the male was a student at ASK Academy, and that her daughter had circled his picture with a big blue marker. When she asked about it, Ray said she recently had a “nightmare” where she remembered her perpetrator’s name.

IWF is not publishing the identity of the alleged perpetrator. However, in May 2022, the same individual’s name appeared in the subject of an email that a female student from ASK Academy sent to all fellow students years 2022 - 2026.

The email read:

"As of late we have had an issue with [REDACTED]. He has sexually harrassed, bullied, cheated off of and threatened people to get his way for his own gain. If you have experienced, witnessed or even had friends who've experienced this please, PLEASE write an incident report. The more proof we have, the better chance we can prevent this from happening to anyone ever again. Please dont hesitate to speak up. Get your parents involved as well, anything helps."

Though she had already left the school, Ray still had access to ASK Academy’s servers and was able to see the email. She and her mother heard from other parents and students that girls were taking it upon themselves to collect information about this student and personally take it to the school board, due to their perceived lack of accountability against a known offender.

Since leaving the school, Maggie and Ray said they’ve also learned of two additional survivors who were allegedly victimized by the same student, but are “too afraid” to come forward.

“We have learned that sexual harassment and assault was a commonly trending issue among the high school students at ASK Academy,” Maggie said.

“I feel extremely betrayed by them,” Ray said of the way ASK Academy responded to her allegations, along with those brought forward by other students. “For the past two years, I've had to accept that there probably won't be any justice.”

IWF reached out to ASK Academy’s Chief Executive Officer Edward Garcia for comment, as well as clarity regarding the school’s bathroom policies. Garcia said that ASK Academy is an “inclusive learning environment for all students,” and added the school does “not discriminate against any student.”

Garcia did not respond when asked to clarify whether girls’ facilities are open to biological boys.

While Garcia denied claims that sexual harassment and assault was commonly trending at ASK Academy, he also did not respond when IWF followed up by sharing a copy of the email sent out by students suggesting otherwise. He also did not respond to our inquiry about the existence of an open and active criminal case regarding an assault that allegedly occurred on ASK Academy school grounds, or offer any explanation as to why ASK Academy chose not to inform parents or students about the existence of such investigation for more than a year.

Instead, Garcia told IWF the school is “not at liberty to disclose confidential student information to a third party” and denied that any staff members left because of an open investigation.

Get Your Own Bathroom’

Today, Ray no longer feels comfortable using public restrooms and facilities by herself. At school, unless she’s with a group of girls, she uses a private bathroom in the nurse’s office, which she got special permission to do. She now needs medication to manage her anxiety and depression, keeps a knife closeby when she’s home alone, and has her family’s large, mixed-breed dog sleep next to her at night.

The entire situation has left Ray with little sympathy for efforts at the local, state and national levels to open women’s sports and private facilities to men who identify as transgender, or for the “trans” community itself.

“By them saying the only thing that matters is how they feel and not how I feel, is very selfish of them,” Ray said. “If they want their own bathroom, then gladly get your own bathroom. If you want your own sports, get your own sports. If you want to be included, be included in your own way that doesn't cause danger to everyone else.”

After a year at her local public school, Maggie and her husband decided their two daughters weren’t safe there, either. What solidified their decision was a law New Mexico passed in March that opened school bathrooms and locker rooms to individuals based on their “gender identity.” Maggie wrote to New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, a Democrat, to express her concerns about the legislation, even sharing the account of what happened to her daughter. Her inquiry, Maggie said, was “met with a complete rejection of the notion that he would support anything that goes against gender affirming legislation.”

He’s all about it, and his letter to me was so appalling,” she said, sharing the correspondence with IWF.

IWF reached out to Sen. Heinrich for comment. As of publication, Sen. Heinrich did not respond to our request.

Homeschooling, Maggie and her husband have now decided, is their only option to keep their daughters safe given the state’s current legislative landscape.

“She’s just a baby,” Maggie said. “No parent, no child, deserves this unimaginable pain and lack of justice. Instead, our legislative session wrapped up with the governor signing numerous bills that remove parents’ rights to protect their own children and allow the schools to put my daughters in danger.”

While the Biden administration ramps up attacks over what it calls “dangerous anti-transgender” legislation moving forward in more conservative-leaning states, Maggie knows first-hand what happens when lawmakers move in the opposite direction, choosing to prioritize the small group of transgender-identifying Americans at the expense of women and girls. It’s for this reason that, despite the ongoing investigations, she and her daughter decided to tell their story.

“I just want people to hear us because it feels like parents aren’t paying attention, aren’t taking action, or don’t want to open their eyes to what’s happening,” Maggie said. “We had a nearly perfect life before this trauma. We grieve the loss of her innocence, safety, and how things were before she was assaulted.”

“We will never be the same,” she added.

[drowfag]

Every time i go through the astarion tag either on tumblr or ao3, I just make myself fucking miserable from the disparity between him shipped with f!tav vs m!tav & nb!tav. It's not even an issue if there was just more content that got more attention than f/m, especially since it's even worse for halsin/m!tav. i'm just tired of constantly getting the short end of the stick in fandom spaces, especially since I came out and transitioned and realized my attraction towards men. That wealth of fan content that was there when my egg hadn't cracked isn't there anymore, and only coming to realize it kinda sucks shit. On Astarion fan servers, I'm only one of the few gay men on the server and feel weird when I don't have Astarion settle down with my Tav and get married and have kids. I went from feeling like I belonged in fandom spaces when I still identify as a cis bi girl into an outsider who can't relate to the gender I once belonged to.

i forget how heteronormative the rest of the fanbase is outside of tumblr to the point that people create mods to remove queer content or refer to Astarion's lover with only she/her pronouns. it's incredibly isolating to be a queer man in fandom, especially as a trans man. i'm not targeting bi people by saying he almost feels fetishizied by straight women because of his queerness which is a real issue that bi men face in f/m relationships like I was with my last partner. it doesn't help terfs will occasionally post in the tag mocking gay trans men and calling us straight women.

vague about me all you want, but at least a majority of fandom caters to you and the lifestyle you live, and you aren’t attacked for your gender identity and sexuality by transphobes in a game with literally no mentions or representative of transmasc people or AFAB enbies. it's even worse when you dare to headcanon him as asexual and people come out of the woodwork to accuse you of taking away his agency despite being a survivor yourself. the casual queerphobia of the fandom is not lost on me as someone with multiple intersecting identities that spend time on servers outside of Tumblr. i don't even feel safe going on larger general bg3 discord servers because of rampant transphobia and homophobia.

i'm tired of not being able to express my frustration with the wider fandom without being accused of misogyny and biphobia by people who literally have tons of representation in literally every aspect of life from a game that didn't even bother to remember people like me even exist except for a small inclusion to give my male character a vagina as an afterthought. jesus fucking christ people created a mod to remove what little lgbt content is in the game, what the fuck.

[thegirlmirage]

Part of rebuilding from the damage that TERFs and Fascists have deliberately wrought to us and our solidarity is going to come from the simple recognition that different gender identities and presentations are going to experience different (but often very similar) forms of transphobia and exclusion. And that it's real.

Trans women and other expressions of transfeminity do experience a particular brand of transphobia that treats us speaking out as a threat and attempts to tar us as sexual predators because it's something the construction of systemic transphobia makes easy to stick. Our femininity is often only acknowledged as something to be abused misogonistically (I was a woman who it was "okay" for a man to hit) and taken away, to be treated with all negative stereotypes about men. I have experienced this a lot without even necessarily having that much of an understanding of until recently (thanks to my cool, beautiful, academic boyfriend)

Trans men and other expressions of transmasculinity do experience a particular brand of transphobia that treats them as automatically being a threat by being a man, typically denies they even exist, and presumes all to be misogonystic by default and incapable of doing better. Again, branding as being sexually unsafe predators is a common accusation because the presumption of being patriarchical, but whilst also suffering from the patriarchy's hard bioessentialist line that a man can only be one thing and never change. Often they are treated through misgendering as "lost women" or "traitors" who can't think for themselves. I can't speak so much from my own experience other than learning from the men in my life and the many stories I've read from transmasc people on reblogs and notes from my posts about solidarity.

Nonbinary, gender non-conforming and other expressions of other or no genders do experience a particular brand of transphobia that, again, tries to frame them as sexual predators, tries to force them to behave in hard binaries and bioessentialist lines, treats their gender expression or lack thereof as lesser than the binary or just a temporary situation. My gender has fluidity but mostly rests on fairly binary expression, so while I do experience some of the things others face, there's less not-privilege for me when I conform to a binary and I often find I do not have the space to express the full range of my gender without losing something else.

Cisgender, or other people who conform or otherwise do not understand expression outside of their assigned gender, do experience particular brands of transphobia and this might surprise some of the more polarised thinkers on this, but there is incredible pressure even for cis people to ruthlessly conform and any slight deviation is seen as sexual predatory behavior and is met with often quite severe violence. Cisgender partners of trans people often receive homophobic attacks and violence and social isolation. Many cis people I speak to commonly feel they cannot date or interact with trans people simply because they are afraid of the very real consequences that could occur for doing so. There is a presumption I think, that because of the hierarchies that exist in our world that Cis and Cis-adjacent (language is imperfect) people do not have any pressure on them under this patriarchical, transphobic and racist systems.

People of colour and particularly Black people do experience a particular brand of transphobia that is especially violent, frames them as sexual predators and utilises both the constructions of systemic transphobia, and systemic racism to create an absolute clusterfuck of opresion. While I might do my best to be informed on this, the depth and complexity of the cruelty on these issues is far broader than I could effectively describe in a single post and I strongly encourage you to seek out these voices and listen intently because there is so much to be expressed that I simply couldn't give it justice in a single post, there is so much about racism that is transphobic and so much about transphobia that is racist.

Disabled people do experience a particular brand of transphobia that very much seeks to strip them of any agency regarding their gender, yet again treats them both as sexual predators and also somehow helpless victims of trans ideology (as with trans men). There does appear to be a high crossover of disabilities with trans people both due to the commonality of endocrine system faults and the violence we receive. I personally have PTSD and C-PTSD along with a whole host of anxieties and depression and other conditions as a direct result of transphobia, as well as perhaps even some physical conditions as a result

I'm an imperfect source and there's doubtless many things that could be included in this post, but my broad point is that while transphobia doesn't affect everyone to same way, it does affect everyone negatively, as does any system of oppression.

It's important to recognise the often unique ways that transphobia can hurt people, especially for giving a recognition to pain that so often goes completely unheard. And we have to be able to have nuanced conversations that reflect both the complexity of the world and the sometimes undefinable nature of being Queer.

We have to recognise that dialogues that seek to take advantage of our pain and our need to be heard, that warp us into fighting each other and denying that we experience what we know in real-time that we are experiencing, are happening simultaneously in all directions with the agenda of denying that we exist at all. We cannot be drawn into factionalising when our solidarity, not just with each other, but with all other oppressed peoples, is so terrifying to our oppressors because they know fully in their hearts that when we stand together we will defeat them. And I've seen it happen. I've even been part of it.

We are stronger together!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[starwarssapphicweek]

Hello! First of all thank you for hosting a sapphic SW event and promoting a community and content, I've been excited about the upcoming Sapphic SW week event--but I do have some concerns about the "genderbending" day. I want to preface by saying this is not an attack on the event or anyone running the event, I understand this is a lot of work and time and in the end it's all just for fun. But I would be remiss if I did not voice my concerns on who we are excluding from sapphic spaces and who we are prioritizing with the inclusion of this prompt. While at first I took this as a day as "genderbending" canonic men into women to make a mlm or m/f ship into a wlw ship so that it would shift focus to the value and exploration of relationships between women or imagining characters as trans women, I have found the explanation of this day increasingly worrying in the context of a sapphic and women centered event and space. First of all with the term and practice of "genderbending," while it can be fun it is also steeped in gender binary thinking and stereotypes and often inconsiderate of trans people and how the complexities of gender and gender nonconformity play out. I think celebrating and exploring masculinity in women and sapphics is fantastic and can be done through butch, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming identities, we can celebrate those who are not only part of the community but often excluded from it without prioritizing men and relationships between men. Perhaps the "genderbending" prompt can be shifted in some way to reflect that? While I'm thrilled about the butch4butch and femme4femme prompt, I feel it is a bit reductive to use that prompt as the only avenue and placeholder for masculinity in women and sapphics and also still ignores the issue that by shifting binary women to binary men the focus is shifted away from women/sapphics and relationships between women/sapphics, which is vastly undervalued in not only fandom spaces--Star Wars fandom spaces specifically--but society at large. It's just disappointing to see some of the small space we have carved out to make more room for men and relationships between men.

There is no one being excluded by asking for a prompt that asks to explore the possibility of women being men. If anything the prompt can be amended to include nonbinary headcanons. If the prompt was cisswap as has been a suggested term instead of genderbending, the concern about trans identities being excluded would make more sense. But this is asking that women be men, if someone were to use a character that is already established as trans or non binary we aren't asking that those identities be erased, the non binary character doesn't even need anything to be changed about them. It is simply, if there is a woman in the relationship what would be the wider impacts on the story and universe of Star Wars at large if she were a man this time.

The implication that we are only thinking in binary thinking by putting a caveat of asking that women be men for this prompt, to let people who genderbend their mxm ships know that this is still not the space for their content, feels as if it ignores the ways that this event has been run in the past. Sure, trans headcanons have never been ask for specifically, there has never been a community submission for that prompt in the past, that doesn't mean that they haven't been allowed in the past. It is open ended and welcome to everyone to do at any point if that is what they feel like making.

This blog has always been about centering the female characters, we have a rule that allows for mxf ships to be genderbent to fit into the fxf cetegory because sometimes it's fun to imagine what if the mxf ship were sapphic. Because of the amount of content that is made where some of the most popular mxm ships are now fxf we have been adamant about keeping that content off of the blog due to the fact that the women of Star Wars by and large do not get nearly as much content or attention as the men do. We simply do not want to open the floodgates of having the most popular mxm ships become the center of sapphic week even if it's for a day.

This prompt is one day of the week, one prompt of 14 that have been put out this year. It isn't required to be used by anyone. It was simply a prompt to explore a thought experiment. If people want to explore deep and wide explorations of gender and the wider narrative through this prompt that is great! But if they just want to explore how aesthetics might change in a visual piece where Padme and Sabe are now men, that is fine too. It is an open ended prompt that is not telling anyone that they have to adhere to any gender constructs aside from what would it be like if this woman were now a man.

If anything genderbending has for a long time now been men being bent to be women. It was a tongue in cheek ask of the community to do the opposite of what the common trends are. It's a subversion of expectations and a space to queer the narrative in ways that may not have been considered before.

This will be the final post on this topic. If you feel like this isn't the space for you that is fine, we just ask that we all move on peacefully. This just isn't the space for having these kinds of conversations. This is a blog for hosting events around sapphic ships, not a blog about gender and sexuality.

[genderqueerdykes]

on the topic of febfems... if anyone id'ed as febmasc (bi man/masc who excessively dates women/fems), they'd probably lose their shit. terf rot binary double standard stikes again 😒

(disclaimer: I may be misinterpreting the "fem" part of female-exclusive-bisexual fem)

i do believe that's what it's supposed to stand for, i think the full term is female attracted bisexual female. it's either female, femme or feminist; regardless of what it is, they all suck. apparently all they do is self flagellate for "talking over lesbians" and pride themselves on being "Good Bisexuals" because they don't date men or associate with lesbians or bisexuals who date men. like they go from bitching about "not wanting to talk over lesbians" and then attack and shit on all lesbians who are not white cis perisex gender conforming femme lesbians. like get outta here you don't give 1 singular fuck about lesbians and you never will

and yeah, literally if a "febmale/masc" or whatever was a thing, they'd just get called sexual predators and get screamed at and chased out of everywhere. like if men/mascs started identifying that way they would just straight up get called rapists and predators. they'd get called straight men and a danger to queer people. they would never be allowed into queer spaces. like these terfs would literally shit themselves and cry and scream if men/mascs did this, but somehow it's okay for women, because they're just so defenseless! they're not hurting anyone, they can't hurt anyone, they're women! women are allowed to discriminate because they're just so pathetic and defenseless!!!! they're soooo traumatized it's okay for them to attack and hurt people and perpetuate the cycle of abuse!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

like it's such a joke for them to pretend they care about women and lesbians. like a real ass joke. nobody hates women more than terfs. nobody. and it's an even bigger joke that they pretend to care about bisexuals. bisexuals will never be "speaking over lesbians" because it's an entirely separate conversation. we can have multiple queer conversations at once. bisexuals shouldn't be forced to choose one part of their sexuality and experience that only because otherwise they'd be a "Danger". the entire point of bisexuality is having multiple modes of attraction- why are you calling yourself a bisexual in the first place if you choose to self flagellate over one part of the identity and hate yourself for it? bisexuals are not a threat to lesbians. many bisexuals are lesbians. like political lesbianism, rad feminism and terfism will literally just never work because they do not give a singular fuck about any queer person, ever, period.

[redditreceipts]

I am new to feminism and I am trying to figure out a theoretical way women's spaces and services can be protected in law. I would like other feminists to respond to know what they think.

I was thinking that transgender women should not be able to change the sex on any of their identification until they have gotten a sex change. They cannot change it to female, though, they can only change it to "male-to-female" or "mtf."

Transgender women who have already changed their identity to female would be grandfathered in, but once their identification expires, they will have to change their sex to reflect reality.

This way, males cannot have access to women's services, but they wouldn't be able to rape women either. Since they would not have a penis anymore, though, men could be more of a danger to them.

The only problems I see with my reasoning are that

I. Transgender women are still male socialized, and could still be a danger to women even though they could not rape and impregnate women, and

II. They could still never pass as female, but have had a sex change, which would be uncomfortable for women.

The same identification laws would apply to transgender men, that way they can still have access to women's services. They are not a danger to men, so they would be entering men's spaces at their own risk.

What do you think?

Hello!

Well first of all I'll say that I myself am not super sure about my own take on this, but well, it's interesting to discuss

First of all, I think that there is a difference between women's spaces and women's services. I don't know whether there are any women's services that a trans women would need. But there should be more facilities to look after people who are gender non-conforming or homosexual, or transsexual, so there is no transferrence of the responsability to care for trans women onto the providers of services for women.

Secondly, I think that there are two types of women's spaces:

there are those spaces that you don't have to go into, like a lesbian club or a "women in stem" conference or women's sports. there is no reason for any male (however he identifies) to go into those spaces, so I don't really see why he should go in there under any circumstances

there are spaces that you "have" to go into, like prison or changing rooms. I think that we should seriously consider the possibility of male-on-male crime without making women pay for it. That would include policies like

making parts of male prisons where homosexual or transsexual men can be so they are not attacked by other inmates

make single-cubicle-changing rooms and single-stall toilets that are not for any particular sex

teach boys that there is nothing shameful about wearing dresses as a boy

punishing men who attack other men because they don't fit their image of masculinity.

I actually think that the "mtf"-thing on a passport is a really good idea. This would have to go hand in hand with really severe punishment for anyone who discriminates against a person for their transitioning status (i.e. a policeman who sees the "mtf" label on a man's documents and starts insulting him would have to be immediately fired).

Also, I would not make anything of that dependant on bottom surgery because it is a very valid concern of many trans people that they don't want to get that risky surgery. I also don't think that other men are really more of a danger to trans women just because they have had bottom surgery. Men rape other men all the time, things like forcing oral on someone or other forms of sexual assault can happen with or without bottom surgery. Just like that, I also don't think that a trans woman is less of a threat just because he has gotten bottom surgery. He could still assault a woman by touching her inappropriately, taking videos or making comments. So I would not make things dependant on bottom surgery.

And yes, for transgender men entering men's spaces - I think that some spaces like men's bathrooms or changing rooms should be accessible to them if they pass, but there are still events like a convention for gay men or a self-help group for male survivors of sexual assault, where trans men shouldn't be present.

But that's just my 2 cents, I generally like your ideas and if you disagree with anything, just tell me! :)

[coochiequeens]

Another violent man trying to worm his way into spaces with vulnerable women. Did he feel like a woman when he attacked a women’s health center?

By Anna Slatz March 20, 2024

A trans-identified male serving a 53-year sentence for multiple domestic terrorism charges is suing the Bureau of Prisons, demanding transfer to a women’s prison. Emily Claire Hari, formerly known as Michael Hari, led a ragtag right-wing militia called Patriot Freedom Fighters, later re-named to the White Rabbits.

Hari, along with the small group, began engaging in criminal activity in 2017 with the intention of carrying out acts of domestic terrorism. In August of that year, Hari’s group set an improvised incendiary device near the Imam’s office of the Dar-al Farooq Islamic Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota. One of Hari’s associates, Micheal McWhorter, would later confirm the purpose of the attack was to “scare Muslims out of the United States.” No one was injured in the attack.

In November of 2017, Hari and his “soldiers” targeted the Women’s Health Practice in Champaign, Illinois, where they threw a pipe bomb into the building. The bomb did not detonate and was found by a receptionist of the clinic who called police to safely extract the device from the facility. 

Hari in Sherburne County Jail in 2021.

Hari and his militia would go on to engage in a series of petty crimes in an attempt to gather the funds to continue their operations, including robbing a Hispanic man and holding up two local Walmarts in Clarence, Illinois in December of 2017.

In early 2018, Hari and his ‘militia’ attempted to sabotage railroad tracks near Effingham, Illinois with a bomb. After the attack, the group sent ransom emails demanding $190,000 in cryptocurrency under threat they would damage the railway further. 

Shortly after, Hari tried to frame another individual for the crimes, but the effort would only lead to Federal Investigators more easily tracking him and the members of his militia down.

Hari and his colleagues were ultimately arrested, and, in 2021, Hari was sentenced to 53 years for his role in the Dar al-Farooq bombing. He later received an additional 14 years in 2022 on a number of other charges related to his domestic terrorist activity and the attempted bombing of the women’s clinic. The 14 years is to be served concurrently with the 53-year sentence.

During his trial, it was revealed that Hari identified as a transgender “woman.” While leading the White Rabbit militia, he had been searching terms such as ‘sex change,’ ‘transgender surgery,’ and ‘post-op transgender’ on the internet. Hari allegedly planned on fleeing to Thailand to get ‘gender affirming’ surgeries.

Hari had asked the court to take his gender dysphoria into consideration, and made a request for an amended federal prison placement based on his identity. The details of his request were placed under a seal and the presiding judge stated he would defer to the Bureau of Prisons to make the final call.

But Reduxx has now learned that the judge in the case recommended Hari be placed at FMC Carswell, a female institution, but that Bureau of Prisons instead sent him to a men’s facility. As a result, Hari launched a lawsuit agains the Bureau of Prisons in late 2022 in a case that has been quietly making its way through the US District Court in the Central District of Illinois.

Hari is seeking transfer to a women’s prison under the Bureau of Prison’s transgender policy, which was amended in February of 2022 to make a transgender inmate’s “personal safety” and gender identity a priority when determining housing.

In his complaint, which was hand-written, Hari claims he has been subjected to sexual harassment by “dangerous tranny chasers,” and made fun of for his gender identity. He has since filed over two dozen “exhibits,” attempting to show the court he does not belong in a men’s prison. Among these exhibits include photos of himself wearing a dress-like inmate uniform.

Hari formally applied for transfer to a women’s prison in October of 2023, attempting to exhaust his internal remedies.

In an email exchange dated January 10, 2024, the Transgender Executive Council, which makes housing decisions, re-affirmed his placement at the men’s facility and told Hari his case would be re-reviewed in November — something Hari had been told repeatedly in the past.

In a Motion for Miscellaneous Relief, Hari claimed that if he were not transferred to a women’s prison in November, he would go on a hunger strike and slice off his own penis.

“The hunger strike is a political protest against both the conditions that I have been held under, and the conditions that my transgender sisters have been held under in BOP custody,” Hari wrote. “If I am not given some reasonable assurance that I am to be moved to a gender affirming housing by November 5, I will initiate a hunger strike and auto-castration on that date.”

From the motion for miscellaneous relief filed on November 13, 2023.

Hari is currently housed at Allenwood USP, a high-security facility in Pennsylvania for male offenders. While he is classified as a “male” inmate, his name in the BOP system has been changed from “Michael” to “Emily.”

If Hari is moved to FMC Carswell, he will be one of several dangerous trans-identified males held at the facility.

As previously broken by Reduxx in December, a trans-identified male convicted of rape and child sexual abuse was transferred FMC Carswell after launching a lawsuit against the Bureau of Prisons claiming “discrimination.” July Justine Shelby, born William McClain, was convicted on multiple counts of child pornography trafficking after being caught distributing photos of infants being sexually abused.

According to Keep Prisons Single Sex USA, there are approximately 1,980 transgender offenders in the federal system, of which 1,295 are trans-identified males. Of them, almost 50% are in custody for sex offenses. This is compared to just 12% of the general federal inmate population, meaning that trans-identified males are incarcerated for sex offenses at a rate of almost four times that of non-transgender inmates.

Between 2022 and 2023, there was an almost 23% increase of federal inmates who identified as transgender.

[hero-israel]

What do you think of Reform Jews? I don’t have a problem with it necessarily, but I have noticed it has been the movement of choice for many anti-Zionists to convert into and it’s been making me feel iffy about reform Jews I meet lately bc I don’t know if they’re just a Jew who have been burned by Orthodoxy for their sexuality for example and just want a safe(r) space for them to be both Jewish and Gay, or if they’re a Jew who just converted to legitimize their antiZionism and antisemitism shdjdk which I know is my problem bc I shouldn’t make assumptions about ppl just bc they’re reform

You shouldn't make assumptions about Reform Jews. Or about converts either.

Converts are Jews - full stop - and must always be welcomed, as their souls were welcomed at Sinai. I find it next to impossible to believe that there is any significant trend of people converting to Judaism in order to be anti-Zionist troublemakers. Given how long and involved conversion is (and Reform conversions are just as valid), "haters coming in to attack us" probably happens about as much as razorblades in Halloween candy.

When it comes to anti-Zionist Jews, the call is coming from inside the house. To an overwhelming extent they were born Jewish along one of two paths:

Ultra-Orthodox haredi Judaism (Neturei Karta, Satmar, "True Torah Judaism," etc), who hate Israel both because it was formed by mortal men with smelly armpits instead of by Moshiach with a red heifer, and because Israel is much too tolerant and liberal with too many rights for minorities instead of being a theocratic kingdom where all non-Jewish faiths have been totally eliminated. They "support Palestine" only because it isn't time to wipe out the Palestinians yet, and are every bit as cynical and apocalyptic as the Christian Zionists who want Israel to persist until it is destroyed in the Rapture.

Raised lapsed and unobservant, with Jewish identity totally irrelevant to their lives, to the point that even antisemitism meant nothing to them, so from either the "push" or the "pull" aspects a Jewish state was senseless to them. Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky, Eli Valley, Norman Finkelstein, Alan Rickman, Jackie Walker, Arthur Hays Sulzberger.

It is very hard to convert to Judaism, and we should want more people to persevere through that. It is very easy to throw away a culture and history that seems totally irrelevant to oneself, and we should want those conditions to stop entirely. The latter is a much more real cause of anti-Zionism. It is totally backwards to presume converts must be bringing weakness and subversion with them. I always expect they have joined us out of love and I have never met a case otherwise. The way we slow down the growth of anti-Zionism within the Jewish community is by helping to build dialogue and warmth among people who were born Jewish but for whatever reason feel disconnected and apathetic about Judaism. Show them the community they can still have with us; when we don't, they enter college with a gnawing void of meaning inside them and are easy prey for "Jews for Jesus in Palestine" groups (i.e. If Not Now, formed and led by evangelical Christians).

And since I am Reform, my family is Reform, my children are Reform, "what I think of Reform Jews" is that we're just fine, thanks. The basic "point" of Reform Judaism is to attempt to realize equal treatment for women, LGBT Jews (with gender-neutral ceremonies if requested), and children of interfaith parents, with clergy roles available for all of the above (rabbis, cantors, mohels, etc.), and girls reading from the Torah at their bat mitzvahs; this used to be really distinctive but with overall social trends it no longer is. In terms of social politics, inclusion, and Hebrew-to-English ratio during services, a Conservative shul in 2023 is pretty much a Reform shul in 1993. Where Reform congregations do still stand out is in their full embrace of patrilineal Jews, and in my opinion other congregations should follow that lead as well. I expect they will.

I deliberately left out Jews of color from that list as I think all denominations have been poor at welcoming them. Anyone who wants to give it a go first, please feel free.