#did you know that some TERFs think that gender is not only a social construct but a capitalist concept

[miss-gms-and-the-rotten-womb]

Ok I am done with transphobia disguised as feminism here!

First of all: if a woman decided to present as man and alter her body into a masculine form, it is their right for their body belongs only to them! Even if there was no gender dysphoria involved, if a person decides to customize their appearance or chance the way they present to the world, WHO AM I TO QUESTION OR DENY IT??? Like, I want legal abortions, I want freedom to choose if I wanna alter my body or not thru surgery, I want freedom to present myself regardless of biological sex, WHY IN THE FUCK DO I HAVE TO FOLLOW GENDER NORMS BASED ON MY TYPE OF GENITALS? WHAT IF I CHOSE TO CHANGE THEM THRU SURGERY???

I am NOT a genitalia ok? I am biologically female, I identify as the woman gender role, but gender is a fucking social construct built around the biological sex and I am FREE to decide if I will follow it or not and I am FREE to surgically turn the vagina I have into a penis and balls even if I cant produce sperm ok?! I cannot change the genotype but whatever, I can still customize my fenotype to a more pleasant appearance for myself! Stop talking as if I can only be mental for wanting a lil change when you bitches never raise your voices to defend genital mutilation victims across the globe!

Second of all you hoes: GENDER DYSPHORIA CANNOT BE HEALED THRU THERAPY ALONE YOU ABLEISTS! Some things need more invasive treatments like hormone therapy and surgery and THAT IS FINE! If a person with gender dysphoria NEEDS more than therapy, like present as their gender identity or do hormone pills and surgery, then SHUT UP YO ASS AND LET THEM HAVE ACCESS TO IT! ARE YOU GONNA DENY MENTAL HEALTH PATIENTS THEIR MEDICINES TOO?! WTF KAREN?!

For real! If you are not a medic who can offer an insightful second opinion to help, then shut it! Do not EVER get in the way of the medical care of a person when you do not even understand their condition! That is as bullshit as when men hide women's meds because they think their depression and anxiety is just "womanly hysterics"!

Third and final call out: any hoe on this universe that thinks blaming a community of minority groups who are denied medical care and support for the crimes that sexists and patriarchal people ESPECIALLY WHITE MEN commit, are NOT feminists ok?! The ones who rape me inside and outside the bathrooms are men, the ones who outshine me disrespectfully in sports and humiliate me when I seek a man-oriented career pathway are men, the ones who harm kids and impose gender norms and even plastic surgery on them and on their wives, like demanding the husband's stitch and boob jobs, is men, I ALWAYS got persecuted by men around me, while the trans community were the ones who empowered and protected me! Trans women taught me to love and embrace femininity instead of seeing it as inferior like sexism wanted me to, trans men taught me online about proper gyn healthcare, trans nonbinaries taught me I am more than a baby machine! What did you terf ass hoes do? Oh yeah! You ableists said that trans men are just autistic girls who are confused and lost huh? Nice to know my autism is not respected around you bitches! Lemme guess, do you also defend rapists against the evil rape victims who wanna send them to jail for a lil oopsie??? For real go take a hike! You won't defend me if a rapist tries attacking me and I know it! Meanwhile the transwomen are the ones chasing off creeps from around LGBT spaces and protecting lesbians and bisexual girls as well as the ladies in general and the others!

Ok, done with the rant, now if you are a terf please go take a seat because for real, you are repeating patriarchal and sexist bullshit but targeting trans people with it, under the guise of defending women, when yall gotta give this scolding to the creepy men in your houses instead! Only come here saying nonsense about trans people AFTER you put your husband in jail for all the times he tried groping teens on the street in front of you or shared child porn of trafficked pre-teens on his phone with his coworkers ok?! Thank you!

[generalchelseamayhem]

@cromulentenough @vacuouslyfalse

You don't have to read past this paragraph if you don't want, it's just more of me thinking out loud and unguardedly about gender, but I just wanted to thank you two for being very civil and understanding in our disagreement. Either way I feel like I'm learning a lot.

HOWEVER, it all still doesn't sit right with me and I think I need to combine your posts/points to figure out why.

I suppose one of the reasons I think of gender as Not A Social Construct - why I specifically deny the interpersonal definition of gender put forward by VF here - is that I simply don't believe I would not be a man if I did not have people around me to perceive me as such, and the thought of it makes me uncomfortable in ways I can't quite articulate. It also, and this is important, makes me uncomfortable that other people might think that I wasn't a man in such a situation, or indeed any situation. I'll come back to that point.

CE, I think the article you sent me is undoubtedly a great one. It is well argued, it is clear in its points despite mixing analogies, and I am compelled to accept that it has a good point, that the borders, both figurative and literal, between definitions of things ARE pretty weird! I don't know if it was necessarily supposed to counter my argument in some way, or whether you're cautioning me to live with the consequences and implications of my definitions. Off VF's point, I very emphatically prefer to keep my conceptions of "gender" and "gender roles" separate. I would think the cis butch lesbians are women and the GNC cis men are men, because I might define gender roles by how stereotypically feminine or masculine one acts in everyday life, but not gender itself. People in the latter two categories you mentioned, I would be more likely to consider agender, since by (my) definition, their self-perception doesn't line up with the way their sexual phenotype has shaken out, nor particularly with any other typical sexual phenotype you are likely to find without being born intersex. That seems pretty self-consistent to me, and I have yet to think of an example where it would break down.

And yet. And yet. It's not enough for me. "If your definition works for you, use it" is a great sentiment, but I find it terribly unsatisfying. I would drop my current definition in a heartbeat if tomorrow I was told a more correct, true, and self-consistent definition of gender that worked for even more people. I like being right, but I like being wrong and finding out the truth even more.

It bothers me that my largely incorrect, overly simplistic, woefully incomplete definition of gender could be considered a valuable enough framework to be used even if that use is limited to myself. A lot of people have definitions of gender that are largely incorrect, overly simplistic, and woefully incomplete! TERFs are a great example. Find me a single TERF whose conception of gender extends beyond women having a vagina, making the babies and having two X chromosomes, while men do the violence, have a Y chromosome and generally exist as all that's wrong with the world. And of course that doesn't work as a framework of gender for most of the world. It works for them though, and clearly they're more than willing to deal with the consequences and implications of it. In SlateStarCodex terms, they are the King Solomons saying "well my purview is protecting all people with XX chromosomes and appropriate sexual characteristics ("women") from every other being on the planet ("m*n"). But I don't think the definition suiting their purposes is a good enough excuse for them to use it! Obviously it is right for trans people to be bothered by this, just as I am bothered that some people might think under certain circumstances that I am not a man!

Maybe I could be okay with having a hierarchy of gender definition Good-ness of Fit. But leaving it up to individuals to determine what gender means to them is not only, obviously, nightmarishly difficult to legislate, but it also is as much to imply that my definition of gender is no better than that of a TERF. I obviously don't want that to be the case! I know TERFs aren't correct, and I want to be more correct than them, but it seems like you're both saying that it's technically impossible. If there is a hierarchical goodness of fit, I'd like at least to know how it's sorted and to try and improve upon it as best I can.

I'm saying all of this because I believe that a robust and widely-held definition of what gender actually is will help trans people in the long-term and possibly even the short-term. We all know radfems don't, won't, and possibly psychologically can't take these things on faith, and their reliance on hard categories over subjective experiences will ultimately win over more neutral observers than it will lose. So if I could do one thing in my entire life for trans discourse it would be to present them with a definition of gender they cannot deny or refute with their present arguments. The very LAST thing I would want to do would be to tell them that the definition of gender is up to them and their perspectives.

[thechekhov]

Hi! I saw on a post that you're agender and I'm kinda questioning my gender (again) but what interested me more about that post was that you said you believe that gender is a social construct and I'm not really familiar with that theory. I was wondering if you could explain to me what the whole idea is? (bc I kinda only feel like a have a gender in social situations? In my head, my dreams and how I picture myself in the future, I'm genderless idjskahwksjejensj) Sorry for bothering you if I did.

This is a BIG topic and it opens a LOT of wormholes. 

We’re gonna do this in pie slice statements that will hopefully help explain what I mean. Please keep in mind I’m going to simplify many things for the sake of readability.

1) What is a social construct? 

Social constructs are ideas that are negotiated by social groups. Something being a social construct does not make it ‘not real’. 

For example, money is a social construct. Yes, we have cash - coins, credit cards - but these are physical props that are REPRESENTATIVE of the idea of currency. You have some form of credit to your name - the money is a socially agreed-upon idea of value being represented by bills in your hand, by numbers in your bank account. 

[Description: Two humanoid figures are standing side by side. The right-side figure is holding a rock in its hand. 

Right side figure: Let’s agree that this shiny rock is worth 2 sheep.

Left side figure: Sounds fake but ok.]

Technically, countries are also social constructs. We, as a society, negotiate what a country is, and this can be changed.

[Description: Two figures are standing on either side of a dotted line drawn on the ground. The left figure is pointing down at it while the right figure watches, its arms crossed.

Left figure: Let’s pretend that everything on this side of the imaginary line is mine.

Right figure: ...ok but my house is over there.

Left figure: ... for 3 shiny rocks you can come visit.]

Does that mean canada isn’t real? No. (I mean, obviously canada ISN’T real, but we all agree to pretend it is.) The thing that makes it real is that we are in agreement, and all follow the social rules of pretend to make it seem like the Canadian border, the idea of Canadian citizenship, etc... is an objective fact. (It’s not. These are in fact, negotiable limits and parameters. We have laws in place to define it in legal terms, but those laws can be changed, or may change in the minds of communities. That’s why it’s a construct.)

By that same token, I hold the view that gender, as we largely perceive it in modern society, is a construct. Why? Because it is not inherent; we, as a society, negotiate its meaning. 

2) What is gender? 

People will probably fight me on this and that’s fine, but here’s my (simplified) understanding of gender (from someone who personally has none)

Gender is a social category negotiated by cultures based on your assigned or desired role in your community that influences, among many other things, your physical appearance, your role in family units, your expected position in jobs, etc. 

How I think it happened:

[Description: Two figures are standing on either side of the panel, both holding children-looking figures. The one on the left is wearing purple. The one on the right is wearing green.

Green figure: Hey, I’ve got an idea. What if we separate the babies into two groups based on physical traits they have no control over?

Purple figure: Wh-- okay...?

Green figure: And then limit the jobs they can do and the community ritual involvement available to them based on that!

Purple figure: ... I feel like this is going to backfire on us someday.

Green figure: Nah, it’ll be fine.

The past panel is a dramatic closeup on the purple figure’s face - which is featureless - betraying a deeply doubtful emotion. It says nothing.]

Important points to remember: what gender looks like, what the limits are, what the expectations are... are not inherent to any human biology. We make up gender roles. This is evident in the fact that across the world, gender roles differ by culture. The positions people of a certain gender are allowed to take up are different. What is perceived to be ‘girly’ or ‘boyish’ is different across cultures. 

Simply speaking - currently the (western) model we have, dumbed down, is:

You are assigned male at birth because of physical characteristics

You are raised being told to ‘toughen up’ and ‘boys don’t cry’ and encouraged not to show emotions

You are taught to wear male-coded clothes and discouraged from female-coded fashion choices

You are given more opportunities to participate in sports, encouraged to engage in physical activity, etc

You are not expected to need time off for child-rearing 

Here’s where gender as it works in society breaks down into being not a real thing but instead something we thought up: 

Nothing about having a penis necessitates wearing pants. Nothing about having XY chromosomes means you need to keep your hair short. Nothing about your genome makes the experience of nail-polish different for any human being. 

All of these are arbitrary traits we decided were allowed or not allowed to a specific group of people based on entirely unrelated physiology. 

Even if we delve deeper, there is MORE variation among individuals of the same ‘sex’ than there are, on average, of members of the ‘opposite sex’ when compared to each other. 

Many people use the excuse ‘women are physically not as strong as men’ to say that this has an evolutionary aspect driving these cultural, historical, socially-constructed gender requirements. 

But if there was a physical reasoning behind the culturally-set gender-limited job expectations, then we actually WOULDN’T need a traditional binary gender system to sort ourselves into categories. It would simply be decided as a meritocracy - stronger individuals, regardless of gender, would be given physically-demanding jobs. (Also we know that many jobs thought to be ‘traditionally male’ are just the result of sexist bullshit, so this reasoning doesn’t fly any further than I can throw it which is, coincidentally, not very far. Politics is one such area. Doctors are another. We can go on but I think you get my drift.)

My own example of this is an anecdote when my grandparents came to visit my partner and I in Japan. While we were driving down to Tokyo, my grandmother - who has a PhD in entomology - began to say that driving is a masculine activity and women shouldn’t be driving as it was ‘un-woman-like’. My partner almost immediately fired back that in Japan, studying insects or having any interest in them whatsoever was considered a heavily masculine-coded activity. In Russia, there is no such assignment, and my grandmother was left silently blinking in confusion, unable to come up with any excuse except ‘well, all cultures are different, I suppose...’

Do either of these things inherently have a gendered aspect? Of course not! But we assign gendered ideals to them anyway.

3) If gender is made up and constructed by society, then does that mean trans people aren’t real?

No.

Even if you agree that gender is a social construct, trans people are still real. TERFs don’t get a pass. Why? 

Because gender - as a social construct - still affects our everyday lives, dictates our social position in our community. Transitioning is still a thing that has to happen. The fact that you are NOT easily able to decide your own gender and are ostracized for wanting to transition, abused for dressing the way you want to be perceived, and bullied for wanting people to refer to you with different pronouns - all those are the effects of a social construct that has very REAL impact on our lives.

This is also why I dislike defining trans-ness by dysphoria. Because transgender people are not only their suffering - the suffering is coming from the outside!! Many trans people remember not being concerned about their gender identity in their childhood, because they did not yet perceive the world as being hostile to their desire to fulfil a specific role in society. The issues and self-hatred and dysphoria begins when they express wanting to be themselves - a life which they are forbidden from pursuing based on physical characteristics they were born with.

Does this mean we should try to remove gender from society? If we constructed it, we can deconstruct it, right?

Realistically, I highly doubt this is possible. Gender is so ingrained in our daily lives that it would be difficult. Nor, I would say, would it be necessary to achieve world peace. 

Having social groups - having gender - isn’t inherently a bad thing. The bad thing is when we limit those social groups to specific basic human rights, like voting, or when we forbid them from transitioning from one to another based on things that are out of their control. 

Also, I’m not saying genitals and secondary sexual characteristics aren’t real. Please don’t bother sending me that angry message, I’ll ignore it, I promise. 

But the concept of gender IS something we thought up and maintain and negotiate with each other to this very day. It’s not granted to us by a higher power, nor is it a constant, unchanging thing. It’s a part of the human experience and like everything, it has the potential to evolve - as a concept in our communal memory, as well as on an individual level, for people who feel they want to be perceived differently. 

Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk!

[thatheathen]

Isn't it weird how you just....identify as oppressed? You make up some fake gender and then cry oppression when other people don't validate it because gender is meaningless?

I don't "identify" as oppressed. Never did. That's ridiculous. I'm white and not homeless, so I'm pretty privileged, but I still receive daily or weekly death threats from people online like you and worse, just for being trans. We trans folk receive systemic discrimination and hatred no matter how successful or well off we become. We exist deal with it.

I'm not crying that I'm oppressed, where is that located that I did this? I shed tears and express fears for OTHER trans people and trans youth who are living in dangerous situations or experience extreme discrimination for being trans not harming anyone. Black Queer folk are hated even more than any white LGBTQ person. And then there's the trans people in prison not being able to get the medical care they need.

Transwomen are being murdered monthly SOLEY for being trans and that of course doesn't alarm you, women being hunted down or killed by insecure lovers. I'm not selfish, I'm selfless. I have chronic depression and slowly learning to love myself more and more, but that's not a cry for help or wanting people to pity me yada-yada. I will go to literal war for transwomen and transmen. Fuck all the way off.

You have no right to deny our existence, like how I don't have a right to deny your existence. This doesn't mean you have to like us or support us. Really don't give a shit how you feel about trans people, it's your actions are what I care about and watch transphobes closely doing. You're free to be a transphobe and a bigot, just don't expect freedom from consequence. If you attack trans people in any way or help push anti-trans policies created by the GOP, then we're gonna have problems. There's no point in arguing with you people because you're always gonna find something to scream and outrage about.

Gender is a social construct to an extent, but more of a spectrum. Gender within our western civilization is strictly binary and it's forced upon people to fit in a specific (gender) role when in reality it's ALL is made up BY THAT CULTURE. So if people are imprisoned and shackled to the binary gender roles rejecting it and don't realize it's an indoctrination, they'll no doubt hate that gender construct and render it meaningless. So yeah, the basic western idea of gender is meaningless. Weird huh?

Gender (regardless of the era) is 100% constructed or fabricated by human beings like anything humans created. These are just basic understandings of life and reality we are still learning about; gender, biology, astrophysics, gravity, neurology etc. are not truisms or laws that can't be broken or improved upon. Science hasn't finished understanding our cosmos that's absurd and very arrogant to assume. We are not slaves to our biology we go against it all the time; hence our manipulation of nature to build cities and bombs - is that natural? Science isn't set in stone it's always evolving. All life evolves even the concepts of gender that get you so upset. You're obsessed with policing peoples gender expressions and that's kinda oppressive no? Or do you think oppression is only through state sanctioned violence and that if you see it you'll know it? Doubtful.

There's nothing you can do to stop LGBTQIAP+ people from expressing themselves and creating new gender concepts that don't go along with your outdated dominator culture constructs and behaviors lol! You're a slave to the old ideas you defend. Isn't that Weird?

Every civilization throughout history has had a myriad of different genders and were socially expectable. Weird huh?

Gender Critical Cults are a tiny hate group along with TERF's and other fascist hate groups who tend to ally with conservatives to hate trans people together. The size of these anti-trans hate groups is puny compared to those who are trans and those who accept all LGBTQ folks, cisgender people showing their solidarity by putting pronouns in their bio's on social media or showing up to marches, pride, or protests. There's more of us than there is of people like you.

You're just a miserable bigot who hates queer people expressing themselves freely without much fucks given. Isn't that weird?

[mithliya]

what was the thing you told your girl about TRAs, if you’re comfortable saying? i’m talking to a girl right now who’s cool in every way except in that she’s a normie who thinks kinks are exempt from criticism and buys into gender bullshit. i have no idea how to broach the topic without coming on too strong

hmmm the thing is... she already holds quite radfemmy beliefs (she didn’t think it was radical feminism at all & actually assumed radical feminism = extreme feminism, she thought her beliefs were just regular feminism) and also majored in sociology so like, she knows gender is bullshit. so maybe my situation was generally quite easy compared to yours, bc she already was politically aligned to me and thinks critically about such topics.

first mention i made to that stuff was me telling her about the “genital preferences are transphobic” debate, i told her my opinion and summarized the debate on both sides for her (mostly telling her about the TRA side tho). i then showed her Riley J Dennis and told her to watch Riley’s videos bc i may be misconstruing bc of my personal bias. she watched the videos and took issue w the arguments and said they were ridiculous. she was quite surprised bc she had never seen or heard of that stuff before. so i told her about that and about random arguments ive had with people and my stances, she didn’t disagree with any of it.

i asked her thoughts on child transition & told her about the research on it and my issues with the diagnostic criteria of childhood gender dysphoria and my opposition to puberty blockers etc and she agreed with me there.

i can’t remember all the other stuff i told showed her but the convo we had that had her going full terf on me was me showing her this:

which led to us discussing how people are calling every other thing transphobic. obviously, as a lesbian, she found this ridiculous. the same way she found genital preferences discourse ridiculous. it led to us talking about how people are now even arguing that distinguishing between the sexes is transphobic, and people arguing sex is a social construct, and the like. she found all of those things ridiculous and i was able to show her examples of this and we mostly discussed that. i briefly mentioned in a voice msg how women are now being called “menstruators” or “womb carriers” or w/e else while men still get called men & that women are being called that for the sake of “inclusivity”. i went to sleep & woke up to this from her:

so basically she read that article and completely agreed with the terf side. she started wondering why this stuff is going on in the trans rights movement and she theorised that maybe it’s bc trans women are socialised male & probably have remnants of the male entitlement they were raised with (i did not make this argument at all around her, so she 100% came up with that bit on her own). we talked about the possibility of porn addiction playing into some people’s transition and how the fetishists of which most are privileged straight white males may have taken over the movement to their own benefit. she started wondering who this would all benefit & her conclusion (right now) is that the only people who’ll benefit from it are creepy men. she still wants to read more on it and seems intrigued bc she brought it up herself while we were on a call yesterday and we discussed the weirdos that claim that saying males can’t menstruate is transphobic. i think she’ll continue looking into it and i offered to send her arguments from the TRA side of things if she struggles to find any herself.

so tbh, i didn’t really say or do much. i just informed her on this modern phenomena and she looked into it and formed her own opinion. im not sure if my situation is of any help to u since i feel like, it was pretty easy for me here. i brought up the topic by asking her beliefs and telling her mine without going too deep into it and we just kinda went from there.

[peachyteabuck]

hii!!! in one of your earlier posts you said that you did not like the phrases "womxn" or "womyn" and while I did find out that womyn or wombyn have TERF origins and are transphobic, may I ask what the problem w womxn is just trying to learn for the better 😅 -🌲

sure thang

i don’t know if anyone has been like “here’s the history of all the variations of womxn and why they’re all bullshit” so here’s my unofficial retelling of why all variations of “women” are nonsense and why you need to stop using them. 

the biggest problem is like, why everyone feels the need to spell women with the last vowel taken out. like yay points for wanting to deconstruct language, but...the last vowel? wtf does that do? congrats, you’re winning yourself liberal points, but like pussy hats and changing ur facebook profile pic to “SUPPORT WOMEN” it’s purely performative. it’s sort of like the phrase “bipoc.” cool, you’re using something a lot of people use, but do you know what it means? do you understand it’s aim? have you given .5 seconds of thought to why you’re using it? 

like, most if not all women-aligned people (e.g. nblw, lesbians who consider lesbianism their gender, etcetc) know that “women” is something closer to a political class than an exclusive club. “women’s section” is less of a strict rule and more of a social construction of what women should wear and what sizes they are and all that junk. to try and like, change a vowel so they feel more included is both useless and counterintuitive which leads into my next point 

terfs will always use some variation of “womxn” because all variations of “womxn” have the same goal: to exclude men. and, by drawing a rigid line between genders (that doesn’t exist! gender is fake and a spectrum!) you not only exclude men-aligned nb people, but terfs will ALWAYS claim that trans women are the men they’re trying to exclude. drawing rigid lines around gender always end up forcing people into boxes they don’t belong, either because of transmisogyny or nonbinary people who don’t think of gender as two rigid categories and other cultures who have non-male/female identities of which...real people are involved in. 

tl;dr:

i’m VERY pro language deconstruction, but actual deconstruction, not changing a literal single vowel and thinking that solve all the problems in the universe. 

per usual, i hope this helps! and if you have any more questions feel free to ask. adhd me sometimes has trouble with broad questions, so if i missed the mark here just send me a more narrow question to realign me lmao. 

[nudityandnerdery]

Please explain non-binary genders to me in a manner that isn't over simplified... Everything I find is either from a terf bigoted bullshit perspective, or just kind of a vague love is love be a decent human being that does nothing for those of us who try to be decent even when we don't understand.

Okay. So. We need to start with two facts.

Fact the first:

Gender and sex aren’t the same thing. Your biological sex is pretty much controlled by your chromosomes and the development of your body. Now, looking at these in a binary fashion, i.e., people either are one or the other, is an inaccurate oversimplification of things. But that's a bit really why we're here. We're here about gender, which brings us to9

Fact the second:

Gender is a social construct. There’s no specific universal definition for what counts as masculine or feminine or any other gender in the world. That shit varies from culture to culture and from time to time. So anyone who tells you something along the lines of “This is what a Real Man does” or “This is what makes you a Woman” or anything in a similar vein? Look, they’re full of shit, they’re either pushing conservative rhetoric or radfem bullshit, which are really not nearly as far apart as either of the aforementioned groups wants to believe they are.

So! With those two facts in mind, here’s what we get with our current gender situation. White western christian-influenced culture, in which most of us are soaked, pushes the idea that there’s two genders- masculine and feminine, whatever synonyms of the roles you want to take up. They want to take those two roles, cast them as opposing roles, and split up various traits in life by what side they think they should belong to.

This is bullshit on multiple levels.

First of all, those traits are arbitrary. According to society, where do some things fall out? Physical strength is masculine, empathy is feminine. We see confidence as masculine while tact is feminine. And they get ridiculous, too. Wearing pants? Masculine, apparently. Crying? It’s feminine to acknowledge pain of any sore, I guess. There’s whole lists of this sort of thing if you look into it, but the fact is that western society spends a lot of energy reinforcing this idea.

Did I mention this is bullshit?

They’re arbitrary. They shift as time goes on- a hundred years ago, pink was a “stronger color” that fit boys better while blue was “delicate and dainty” and thus obviously a color for girls. Pants were previously only for men.

These fucking ridiculous norms are, then, entirely entirely subjective- and they are weaponized far, far too often by people who want to attack someone who’s not appropriately manly or lady-like for their taste. It was some standard bullshit that got thrown at the Obamas- making fun of Barack for not being Clint Eastwood macho, insulting Michelle as being too manly. (There’s also a fuck ton of racial weight to this specific instance here, too, and I’ll have to admit, I’m not a person qualified to do that justice. Do some research, there’s people who have addressed that aspect of it better than I have.)

So this means that forcing people into these standardized roles isn’t about helping them find self-confidence and who they are, they’re about ensuring obedience. They’re about punishing people for stepping out of line. They’re about reinforcing the strictures that our society wants us to have to spend energy adhering to, making sure that we’re more scared of being out of compliance with society’s expectations than we want to find the truth of the life we should be living.

(Every dude out there who’s blamed feminism because he was angry that his girlfriend didn’t need him to help carry a heavy box for him? Yeah, buddy. That’s you being suckered into thinking the cultural gender “norms” are more important than acknowledging that maybe your girlfriend doesn’t need you to lift boxes and fix leaky pipes, because it’s easier to get angry at feminism for that than to consider what else you can bring to a relationship other than simple mechanical abilities.)

Another reason they’re dumb? Because very, very, very few people are strictly one side of the register or another. Especially when those registers are politicized in their own way- negative gender stereotypes would tell us that traits of femininity make them gossipy, illogical drama queens, but then traits of masculinity make them territorial, egotists who act without thinking, and is there really much of a difference, or is there just something recursive about trying to describe similar traits in different ways to fit what you’re trying to argue?

And I’m not even qualified to get into the idea that a gender binary is a pretty specific idea. There’s other cultures out there that believe in more than just the two. But White western christian-influenced culture had pushed the idea that there’s men and there’s women and that’s all.

And it’s a pretty bullshit idea, at least to me.

Which. Well. I guess finally gets us to the point of your question here. And the answer is that while there’s all that standard, strict arguments of what counts as masculine and feminine up there? There’s also… everything else. Look, I’m not going to say that I have all the answers to everything. I’m not entirely joking when I say things like my gender identity is a vague handwaving motion. It’s something I’m trying to figure out. It’s not something that’s really got a straight answer to it. All I can give you right now is this.

Yeah, my body is pretty masculine looking. Got the beard, got a dick, got all that. But when it comes to all of those traits that are supposed to be masculine and that are supposed to be feminine?

I look at the masculine side of the register. A lot of that doesn’t fit me. A lot of that isn’t things I want to aspire to. There are things that do fit, but looking at them, do I feel there’s something inherently male about them? I don’t think so.

I look at the feminine side of the register. A lot of that doesn’t fit me. A lot of that isn’t things I want to aspire to. There are things that do fit, but looking at them, do I feel there’s something inherently female about them? I don’t think so. 

And I think that means the only option I have left is to figure out what a third option is that fits me.

I don’t feel comfortable describing myself as masculine. I don’t feel comfortable describing myself as feminine. So. I have to figure out what I do feel comfortable describing myself as. For the time being, that’s genderqueer. It’s a work in progress, and it may never be something I figure out entirely, and I’m okay with that.

Acknowledging that I don’t know was, in and of itself, kind of a relief.

[oscar-mildes]

elvira you know I always see what you're hiding in the tags,, I will always read it if you answer all of them abhsjdbs

nev you asked for this and im going to go thru with it bc im an oversharing idiot like oh you asked me how’s the weather i will tell you about all my trauma instead :D 

What do you identify as and what are your pronouns? i’m cis yo i’m she/her. i’m biromantic ace. thats the label i would put on it i guess. i really just refer to myself as gay bc i like pretty boys who look like girls and pretty girls and pretty nb and queer people and basically i just like pretty people ajsfbjf

How did you discover your sexuality, tell your story? theres no story to it. no epiphany or realization. i just always was ok with thinking that girls were pretty and that gay people are cool and it wasnt until recent years that i was like oH SHIT AM I GAY

Have you experienced being misgendered? What happened and how did you overcome it? no i guess bc i’m a girl and id as a girl and have a very obvious girl body

Who was the first person you told, how did they react? i guess my best friend. we’re both very ok with gay shit and we just always made comments about pretty girls and now we’re both pretty gay. i like my big tiddie anime girls and she likes her pretty kpop girl bands

Describe what it was like coming out, what did you feel? i’ve only “come out” to some of my friends. i would NEVER in my LIFE even imagine telling my mom i like girls. shes homophobic Like That

If you’re out, how did your parents/guardians/friends react? uhh see above. my mom, stepdad, family members are all homophobic. hispanics in general are Like That rip. i think my dad would be the most ok with it but he lives in mexico and i dont talk to him often anyway. doesnt matter

What is one question you hate people asking about your sexuality? i hate when people ask me about the ace part. like they have a bigger problem about my not wanting to have sex over the liking girls part tbh. sometimes it’s difficult for me to even describe where i am on the ace spectrum. it’s honestly the more difficult part 

Describe the style of clothing that you most often wear. basic nerd. you know those fics like “she dressed in a black t-shirt, skinny jeans, and all star converse” yea that she is me

Who are your favourite lgbt+ ships? ajkfj this is a good question and canon wise i love Ash and Eiji from Banana Fish, Uenoyama and Mafuyu from Given, Nezumi and Shion from No. 6, and Simon and Baz from Carry On. Not canon i love Kurama and Hiei from Yu Yu Hakusho, Izuku and Todoroki from My Hero Academia, and Inosuke and Tanjiro from Demon Slayer. Note how most of them are anime i

What does makeup mean to you? Do you wear any? i dont really wear any bc im lazy. if you like it you do you but idrc for it? except for lipstick i LOVE lipstick i have all the colors. i wear it so it distracts people from the rest of my face

Do you experience dysphoria? If so, how does that affect you? ...no

What is the stupidest thing you’ve heard said about the lgbt+ community? i live in the south so ive heard tons of shit talk about gay people. i dont really have any that stand out. my mom just likes to say that we’re going to hell :D so let’s give em a show ay

What’s your favourite thing about the lgbt+ community? i guess i like how we find solidarity in each other just bc we’re not straight. most of the lgbt+ folks i know are pretty chill about everything

What’s your least favourite thing about the lgbt+ community? terfs but they dont count

Have you ever been to your cities pride event? Why or why not? i live in a small town and i could never sneak out of my house for that bc i still live with my mom so no

Who is your favourite lgbt+ Icon/Advocate/Celebrity? theres so many big celebrities now that id as lgbt+ but im going old school and loving my man, my tumblr url namesake mr Oscar Wilde. my man got put in jail for sodomy 

Have you been in a relationship and how did you meet? lmao never bc im mean, ugly, and terrible at talking to people irl. i had a bf in middle school? but bc i was 12 i dont count it 

What is your favourite lgbt+ book? Carry On and the sequel Wayward Son. (very anxiously waiting for book 3 Anyway the Wind Blows come on Rainbow Rowell)

Have you ever faced discrimination? What happened? for being gay? no. bc im not really out. ive faced discrimination for being a brown woman tho :)))

Your Favorite lgbt+ movie or show? yall i love gay anime: Given, Banana Fish, No. 6, Yuri on Ice yeee. i dont really watch tv with real people but i think that Brooklyn 99 does a very good job with Holt and Rosa yall im love Rosa

Who are some of your favourite lgbt+ bloggers? theres bloggers??? um idk i love u nev so you count right @why-do-you-pick-flowers

Which lgbt+ slur do you want to reclaim? for a while everyone was mad as hell about “im gay for ___” and idk im gay for everything so thats a “slur” i use for myself

Have you ever gone to a gay bar, or a drag show, how was it? ive never gone omg i’d probably be intimidated as hell like i have a lot of problems just existing so to be existing around very flamboyant and extravagant people like that makes me break into a nervous sweat

How do you self-identify your gender, and what does that mean to you? ive always felt like a girl even tho my mom always said “oh you like boy things??? you should have been born a boy” but like, your likes and dislike dont determine your gender. i like “boy” things and “dress like a boy” but i dont FEEL like a boy. ive never had any desire to become a boy or id as a boy. gender is a social construct fuck society

Are you interested in having children? Why or why not? i have a very complicated relationship with children. babies are ugly and toddlers are annoying but i feel like if i had children i would love them obviously because theyre mine. this is gonna be a weird analogy but like i dislike cats. BUT  i have cats. and i love the fuck outta them. so i feel like thatd be me with kids. but im ace so like.... who would even have kids with me. i could not. pregnancy seems like a hassle and adoption is... i have thoughts on that but thats for a different post. also i can see myself being married and not having children OR having kids without a spouse. theres just something complicated about having both??? maybe im just fucked in the head idk bro

What identity advice would you give your younger self? you dont hate girls you like them, dumbass

What do you think of gender roles in relationships? fuck gender roles. get pegged, bros. i also have a very specific dynamic if i ever got into a relationship (which you know. wont happen) but like if i dated a guy i feel like i’d be very top. a MAN telling ME what to do??? fuck that. but if i dated a pretty girl??? top me pls

Anything else you want to share about your experience with gender? i think ive already said too much oh god someone is gonna look at this and be like what the FUCK but like lmao dont be afraid to ask me i apparently have no shame

What is something you wish people know about being lgbt+? it’s scary at first because you think “im not normal” but like pray tell me what is normal. do what makes you happy. fuck society

Why are proud to be lgbt+? i’m comfortable with the people i like. i might not be very confident and i have depression, anxiety, self esteem issues, probs adhd or ocd idfk but at least i know if i see a pretty girl or smth im gonna be like wow that girl is pretty and have no bad thoughts about it. it’s just how it be. after a lot of dissecting my past behavior, ive always been this way. you cant change who you are. just accept it

[filthybonnet]

I do not know if you think I am really a trans man or not, or if they can even exist. I am not looking to trick anybody. Do you think that it is just a delusion on my part? If I was to ever ask out a partner, and they did not want to be with me, I should hope I was fine with it. I wouldn't want them to be uncomfortable at all. I'm sorry.

Trans people are real. And there’s been a lot of misunderstanding about some of what I’ve been reblogging lately and I am thankful for people like you who reach out to me about it. There’s just an instant knee jerk reaction to anything trans on the internet. Like if you don’t just only say trans lives matter you’re automatically labled a terf. You’re not allowed to have a nuanced conversation. And I know I shouldn’t expect to have nuanced conversation on the internet but it’s my blog and I will express certain things I feel.

Trans people are real, they deserve rights, they deserve not to be killed but for them to tell people who they are allowed to be attracted to and if they are not they are transphobic is too much for me. Transphobic would be if a trans person asks them out and then said cis person beats the shit out of them for it. Being turned down because a person isn’t attracted sexually or otherwise to a trans person doesn’t make them transphobic. You can’t help what you are sexually attracted to.

That specefic post hit me because it shows how gay men are being attacked the same way lesbians are. To them (and to a lot of people) sex is biology and gender is the social construct. And they are not attracted sexually to sex organs of the opposite sex. So while someone might be a trans man or trans woman they just aren’t interested in what’s going on biologically. This doesn’t automatically make them transphobic. They only become transphobic if they open their mouth and say something.

The main reason I started reblogging some of these things was the whole JR Rowling thing. I found some of her points to be valid and everyone labled her a Terf. And I knew I wasn’t a terf and if I was agreeing with what she said she couldn’t be one either. It was my moment of I can’t take this holier than thou internet knee jerk reaction no longer. Everyone on the internet thinks if they say trans lives matter or if they are trans it absorbs them of all their sins when it doesn’t. I’ve seen plenty of trans and trans supporters wish and say horribly violent things to people like me who sometimes just want a table of cis women. Feminism is a big tent and while we’re fighting for the rights of all women, sometimes cis women and trans women have different needs. And I don’t feel like being threatened with a tranny dick just because I didn’t invite you to one of our parities. To me and a lot of cis women that reads like the threat of male violence. Rape has been used to keep women oppressed for 1000s of years. Why is rape at the hands of a tranny dick any different?

And what annoyed me the most was how everyone jumped on the bandwagon to start defending trans women at the JR Rowling thing and there was barely a peep about trans men. Maybe you can speak better to this as a trans man but in my mind, she was more offensive to trans men because they are the ones who can fall under people who can menstruate. But as a bisexual cis woman it also annoyed me that women can now be attacked for just wanting to say women menstruate. Like it’s something we’ve been shamed and thought dirty about for 1000s of years and now that we want to talk about it openly we suddenly have to share it with women who won’t born with any of the organs to do so. I know trans women favorite argument is not all women bleed, even the ones biologically born women, but all of them were raised with the concept that they would when they hit puberty and if they didn’t something was wrong with them.

TL;DR: Trans people are real but sex is biology, gender is a social construct, being trans or supporting trans people doesn’t excuse you from being an asshole and if any of these things make you think I’m a terf then you probably aren’t nuanced enough to be following my blog or be friends with me.

[whitehotharlots]

TERF war

I took feminist lit and theory courses as an undergraduate, in 2003 and 04. For the time, the courses were incredibly trans inclusive (bear in mind this was a year before Jon Stewart would dismiss Dennis Kucinich’s suggestion of appointing a trans SCOTUS justice, referring to the hypothetic appointee as “the honorable chick with dick”). A good 20% of the course was dedicated to reading books by and about trans people. We even got a visit from Leslie Feinberg—the person who literally coined the term transgender, and one of the kindest souls I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting.

The foundational, explicit understanding I was taught in these classes was that biological sex is innate, a fixed fact of a person’s bodily being, whereas gender is a fluid and malleable social construct. No one could have gotten through these classes thinking the opposite.

The utility of this understanding is easy to grasp: by denying the fixity of gender, feminists were able to undermine social and interpersonal structures that had traditionally denied women freedom, choice, dignity, and agency. A woman was not biologically destined to a life of domestic servitude; nor was she naturally inclined to be more submissive or deferential. Most germane to this discussion, this understanding validated the existence and experience of gender non-conforming lesbians: just because they were not traditionally feminine didn’t mean they weren’t women, or that they were in need of any fixing.

Very recently—within the last 5 or 6 years, as the abstract language of feminism has permeated the wider culture and gotten watered down for sake of digestibility—the poles have shifted. Now, we are told, it is actually gender which is fixed and innate, a metaphysical force lurking within us, suppressed by social pressures, unleashed gloriously with the aid of surgery and supplemental hormones. Biological sex, meanwhile, is a construct that doesn’t exist and shouldn’t even factor in to one’s analysis of gender relations. Sex is hereby an utter fabrication, a projection of the sick evils of normalized (cis male) consciousness engrained upon people’s erstwhile blank bodies.  Taken to extreme, we are told this therefore means trans women can get periods and that there is “literally zero” difference between trans and cis women. Ergo, having a uterus doesn’t make you a woman, biological or otherwise—it simply makes you a “uterus haver.”

The utility of this shift comes from the fact that trans self-actualization relies not just on social positioning but on bodily experience. Trans peoples’ mental wellbeing often hinges on their having access to the medical interventions required to get their body to conform to their innate sense of gender. Since we live in a country where few people have access to basic healthcare, trans people have had to medicalize their position—assert a fundamental and harmful mind/body disconnect—in order to have these interventions regarded as essential, rather than elective.  

So while it’s perfectly understandable and useful, this shift nonetheless represents a profound upending of decades of feminist thought, and I’m shocked that it doesn’t appear to have even been deliberated upon. It was asserted through tumblrs and tweets and everydayfeminism dot com posts, everyone kind of nodded their heads in agreement, and that has been that. For the most part.

Now, we might able to say that the reversal is simply academic: trans people and cis women each need to advance their respective theories of gender and sex to serve as the basis of political programs that might afford safety and respect to each group. There’s no need, necessarily, to concern ourselves too exclusively with the details. Consider a parallel: anyone who was actually involved in theoretical side of gay rights in the 70’s-90’s knows that saying gay people were “born gay” was not a universally agreed upon assertion. Many argued that this was essentially a reactionary frame which stigmatized homosexuality, making it seem like gays would have chosen to be straight if only their brains or genes hadn’t screwed things up. Eventually however, the “born this way” line prevailed, became mainstream, and was the basis of most of the gay rights campaigns of this century. Most of the people who disagreed with it on academic grounds still supported it, at least publicly, once they became aware of its political utility. Why can’t we do the same with today’s split conceptualizations of gender and sex?

Seriously, why can’t we?

The sex/gender-fluid/innate reversal came around the time when trans people started receiving their first regular, non-dismissive appearances in US media. This was the first time most people had been bothered to think seriously about gender, and the first time that the existence of trans people was admitted to as something that wasn’t freakish or a punchline. That’s a huge positive, obviously. And it happened with surprisingly little mainstream pushback (compare the responses to Laverne Cox’s appearance in Orange is the New Black with the intense outrage that accompanied Ellen Degeneres coming out just 15 years earlier—the difference is astounding).

This is where things get troublesome. Many established feminists, especially second wavers, were upset to see their life’s work upended in such a way. Some reacted horribly dismissively. Others wrote thoughtful, seemingly even-handed pieces that nonetheless seemed calculated to subtly dismiss the experiences of trans people, like by repeatedly misgendering trans authors. And still others respectfully expressed objections to or concerns with mainstream trans rights assertions. These writers tended to operate in either academic or upper-middlebrow spaces, and their prose is consequently calm, erudite, and often super dense. The rebuttals to these pieces came from places like jezebel, loveisarainbow dot com, or geocities.com/sunsetstrip/3765/madtransbitch. These pieces are easily digestible, frequently angry or even violent, and hyperbolic without exception, accusing the cis feminists of fomenting or even committing violence against trans people. In the court of woke public opinion, the second wavers did not stand a chance. They were accused—sometimes rightly, sometimes wrongly—of abject hatred of trans people, blamed for suicides and murders, and grouped in with the racists and homophobes of yore. Within a very short period of time, those who haven’t learned to be quiet have been shunted away to the darkest academic backwaters (or they live in the UK, where university cultural studies is dominated by second wavers).

But, again, why not just be quiet? Honestly, that’s my preferred approach. Maybe it would be different if I had based an academic career on one assertion over another. But overall it seems like both groups should still be able to pursue their own political agendas on their own terms, so why bother discussing this contradiction? And just on a personal (that is, cowardly) note, I might not agree that biological sex is a construct, and I certainly don’t think gender is innate, but I also think trans people should have easy access to medical intervention, so why not let the inversion stand? 

But herein lies the problem: politically, the two groups are not separate. One of the most frequently levied criticisms against certain feminist authors and movements is a lack of trans-inclusivity. Pink pussy hats were verboten within hours of their debut. Colleges have cancelled productions of The Vagina Monologues (not because it’s overwrought treacle, but because it talks about vaginas, which makes it de facto transphobic). These incidents may seem trifling by themselves, but they serve as avatars of a very real and important conflict: cis feminists are being demanded to center their feminism in an understanding of sex and gender that directly contradicts the base of their ideology. Because of this, actions and symbols that were recently taken as signs of love and solidarity are now being cast as hate speech. Cis women are being told, literally, that they have no right to call themselves women (trans women are “women,” cis women are “menstruaters”). Cis lesbians are called homophobic for not being attracted to people with penises. In short, a trans movement that purports to dedicate itself to ensuring that its purveyors be given the right to be recognized by own their self-understanding is doing so by denying that same right to others.

The only possible result here is a complete collapse anything resembling a unified feminist movement. Meaning, I guess, that it fits in perfectly with the atomized understandings of social justice that stem from internet-based discourse. I suppose I could end with a plea for decency and understanding, perhaps even outline a alignment that would allow for trans advocates and cis feminists to recognize tactical points of departure from one another without fear of committing literal assault or denying the existence of one another. But we’re past that point, I think. There’s no more space for humane liberalism. Everything’s a knock-down, drag-out these days. We don’t even pretend to want to help one another.

Addendum:

People are raising the fair point that a vast majority of trans people don’t subscribe to the sort of wrecker beliefs I outline here. That is absolutely true and part of what makes the shittiness of online gender discourse so tragic. I did not mean to suggest that these beliefs are at all common among trans people. I intended to criticize only the shitty woke media apparatus (everydayfeminism et al) that occludes any attempt at effectively theorizing gender because it prioritizes hyperbolic victim mongering over achieving political goals.

[discyours]

Hi, I just wanted to let you know that as a transmed, I really like your blog (tho I might not always agree 100% with everything but that’s ok). But since you seem to be v against transmeds lately I was wondering if u are still ok with transmeds reblogging your posts? I was also wondering why you are more against it now? I see that some (?) transmeds are more like ‘gender isnt a social construct’ (which i dont agree with), but is that the only reason for ‘leaving’ or?

Anyway, I am just in a weird mood, I should actually be studying but this is a good way to procrastinate shit.:’) Enjoy your day/night tho! (Also wanted to add that I don’t follow a lot of transmed blogs, i usually make my own posts or I randomly look through the tags. But i’m not that active anymore and I don’t know the opinion(s) of most transmeds in ‘general’, so I was kinda looking for an ‘explanation’ for that.)

Anyone can interact with my posts. I don’t see the point in having a discourse blog if I wasn’t gonna allow people I disagree with to interact.

The reason I initially “left” the transmed community was actually unrelated to any beliefs about gender (I don’t think I was even looking into radical feminism at that point), the shitstorm that came from the world health organisation’s decision to reclassify transsexualism was what did it for me. It took a solid week or two for transmeds to stop posting about it being demedicalised, about it all being tucutes’ fault, “we warned you etc etc now our lives are ruined”. The lack of reading comprehension/the fact that nobody even bothered to read (they were posting screenshots of article headlines when the articles themselves stated very clearly that it was being reclassified) just killed me. This did happen to coincide with me questioning transmed ideology for the first time by making a post asking about neuroplasticity, which one person then replied to with a bunch of links that didn’t even slightly answer my question and the entire transmed community jacked each other off about how science has the answer yet again. They just shut any critical thought up with studies that are hard to interpret and are bound to be reblogged without being read (a ton of people reblog them specifically to read them later, so they get spread around a lot without anyone fact checking), making it look like they always have the answer. 

Obviously that’s old news, and I have become progressively more annoyed with transmeds. That’s not particularly about whether gender is a social construct or not though, and a lot of transmeds simply define gender as your internal sense of which sex you should be, which I really don’t take issue with. It’s more about the incredibly sexist stereotypes some of them do spread, the hate I got for trying to get more understanding between transmeds and radfems (particularly annoying because transmeds always boast about how open they are to hearing other people’s points of views).

Transmeds also gave me a ton of shit for even calling myself female or homosexual (1 2 3 4 5), the anons I’m linking are several months old too but I’m still seeing things on my dash about how radfem trans men just hate themselves, just have internalised transphobia, or just can’t bear being straight men. I’m still in some transmed servers I haven’t gotten around to leaving yet and occasionally I see people talk about how creepy trans men who would date lesbians are, how they’re just predatory straight men, etc etc. 

It’s just becoming increasingly clear to me how intolerant transmeds actually are towards everyone who doesn’t fit their mold. Becoming a radfem actually made me a lot more sympathetic towards tucutes (one thing transmeds are right about is that tucutes are honestly closer to terfs than they are), because I can see that a lot of them are just understandably upset about gender [roles], they just happened to take the (to me) wrong approach in fixing that. 

Sorry for the long response, I get heated when I think about it lmao. Good luck with your studying and I hope you enjoy your day too!

[korrasera]

Pardon me while I get really angry for a moment.

When people don't know that you're transgender, they will fall all over themselves to apologize for misgendering you. Hell, they'll fall all over themselves apologizing for misgendering pets, let alone people! This alone should tell you that gender is a core aspect of identity and not just a social construct.

Because people can, bereft of their unconscious biases, understand that misgendering someone can be very harmful. Not in a 'I have misstepped in this social hierarchy way' but in a 'holy shit I'm sorry I didn't mean to knock you down' way. I don't buy for an instant that this is some sort of universal learned patriarchal gender structure that we're talking about here, because there is no way that a social construct can so easily produce such repeatable effects across such a wide range of cultures and social structures.

If you ever want to understand why I holler so loudly about how gender is not a social construct, which specifically means that gender is an innate sense of identity likely described by a biological trait in the brain that's laid down during fetal development and also has a vast amount of social construction built atop it, know this:

Gender is a very important part of my identity. It took me a long time to realize what it was and when I did it was like a gift to finally understand this core aspect of who and what I am. It's always been with me. I didn't get it by watching people or by being told to be a girl or any other kind of bullshit like that.

Also, although discussion of gender in regards to social constructionism can have some benefit as we use it to discuss the best ways to pull apart patriarchal gender dynamics that lead to things like misogyny and generalized sexism, the argument that gender is a social construct and only a social construct is the same sort of gender essentialism espoused by TERFs, which argues that true freedom from sexism is freedom from gender itself. I've  listened to TERFs who literally believe that gender, the very concept of being a woman, a man, or a non-binary person, is something that we can get rid of and that it will then let us define the difference between people in terms of sex traits the way TERFs think it should be defined, primarily by the shape of the genitals you were born with.

Just in case you're new to that idea, stop for a second and just consider what that means. TERFs believe that someone's genitals are the most important thing about their identity and have wrapped their entire ideology around that concept. That's fundamentally why they call trans women male and the way they justify their bigotry and hatred.

Gender is complex. It's identity, it's sense of self, it's a bunch of social constructs that we build up around it like what is considered conformant or non-conformant for any given gender or how we've distributed social roles to people. But it's not just a social construct and the way people act in general proves that out constantly.

Someone who calls me a male isn't being accidentally woke to the evils of the patriarchy, they're just being a transmisogynistic asshole.

[wintertidewater]

Since @basicallycoke is one of the drop misogynistic bombs then block you so they don't have to hear reason type people...

The post: https://basicallycoke.tumblr.com/post/184727856034/terfs-learn-basic-fucking-respect-challenge-you

My response:

Does your head hurt from the lack of oxygen to your brain?

After deleting half of the nonsense here we go:

"You think we’re the only community with rapists? Like I’m fairly certain every community has rapists in it- but I’m not trying to hold you accountable for female rapists, nor would I hold a black person responsible for black rapists. So why do I have to apologize for trans rapists?"

The amount of rapists and pedophiles in your community is insane. It's beyond rampant. The large majority of trans identified people call themselves trans because they fetishize women's oppression. I can think of ten examples of trans rapists and pedophiles off the top of my head. Can you name one radfem one? Do you Really want me to count the hundreds of trans sexual predators?

As if race is comparable to a fucking delusion. First of all race is a social construct. You found other people who have similar mental health issues then try to claim nothing ties you all together... over 70% of your cult has been found to be narcissists.

"whenever we do things outside of the expectations of our gender your lot shoot us down. There are plenty of masculine trans women and feminine trans men. "

You're literally so dense, radfems are against gender and almost all of us are gender nonconforming. What you smoking sis? You know that thing you call yourself? "Transgender"? Dissecting that word, it means to play the other sex's gender role. Y'all are the most sexist people. "Trans" to change. Gender "gender". Lol

"I wonder if it’d actually be better to just suicide bait you. "

But, no, you're the victim...right? Poor baby

"My life is hard enough without people in my own community constantly ostracizing me for being bisexual and being transgender."

As if any trans identified person would ever. Y'all straight up think sexuality is uwu fluid. & you can't be ostracized for "being" something that doesn't exist sis.

"You guys make our suicide rates into a fucking joke" Ah yes, remember that one time lesbians wouldn't suck dick?? Yeah we practically shot someone. Why don't you provide some statistics? And are you going to ignore the amount of women you murder or...? What about femicide in Brazil? It's caused by extreme misogyny, the same thing you promote. Will you take responsibility for those deaths? Because I can actually link you all to that. Where as "trans" people are kicked out of church shit. As if radfems did that lol. What about the stoning to death of gay people? Since you lot are rampantly homophobic more so than conservatives. (Jk ur the same people)

"a radfem was one of the main sources cited for why the government decided to pull funding for trans healthcare" She really trying to tell me that women used our immense power and representation in the government and with that oppressed men lol. Trans-identified females are covered because females are covered. Trans-identified males are covered because males are. Or are you just trying to hide the fact you think the public owes you money to mutilate yourselves?

"what about the many times your kind bullied young trans girls (literal fucking teenagers)?" Oh you mean like all the rape and death threats and suicide baiting you send young feminists? In this same post you stated you had no empathy for young girls who are suicide baited and entertained the idea of suicide baiting me (a 16 year old) and now you want me to feel bad for boys who say they are girls because someone notices their Adam's apple? Not gonna happen.

"Keep our words out of your mouth, keep the term “gender” out of your mouth."

Anyone else remember the time trannies created the English language? Gender is used to oppress women. I am a female. I will not be silenced about women's issues. Take your misogyny elsewhere ~sis~.

[nb-jesus]

this post is in regards to this post. it isnt letting me reblog the post from OP so im either blocked or my computer is funky. so, ive made my own post. @nondysphoric-enby here is my response :D

1) what does my age have to do with anything?

2) youre making me out to be condescending when i never was.

3) *cracks knuckles* here we go

this is what i presume to be an editorial on the credibility of the DSM 5 and the ICD-10. it features both pros and cons. its own sources are listed on the bottom of the page.

this is an opinion piece on the credibility of the DSM 5. its written by a man with a doctorate. if you look at the right side of this page, you can see he was the chair of the DSM 4 task force and is a professor at Duke.

this is a scientific study on the credibility of ICD-10 diagnoses. as mentioned in the editorial i linked, the ICD-10 is not a mental health diagnostic manual in itself, but features a chapter for mental health disorders instead. its used by more professionals than just psychiatrists and therapists, so it has to be general with its wording so that other professionals can understand it and are able to use it to diagnose mental disorders, which the editorial also brings up is a thing that happens.

it is true that Lamba legal says not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria, but the rest of the questions on the FAQ concern gender dysphoria and transitioning. Lambda legal, as far as i can tell, is a nonprofit organization that provides legal counsel for LGBT individuals. this being so, they can only really provide legal counsel to dysphoric individuals seeking healthcare (such as HRT and surgeries) because nondysphoric transgender people probably wont transition. to be gender nondysphoric means to not experience distress because of ones sex, right? is a nondysphoric trans person transitions, what is the point? if them transitioning “makes them more comfortable” then i would think they probably had dysphoria, but just didnt know so. transitioning exists to make ones body reflect ones gender, right? but if a nondysphoric trans person transitions while still comfortable with their natal sex, does that not mean they would develop dysphoria over this? there are a lot of cases of detransitioners who thought they were trans, and tried to transition, but ended up having to stop because they ultimately developed gender dysphoria. if you look at some radfem blogs on here, you can see they do indeed exist. my point is, why is a legal firm credible if they only provide services (which i would assume means only legal counseling a.k.a lawyers) to dysphoric trans people? correct me if im wrong, but legal counseling means “ A counsel or a counsellor at law is a person who gives advice and deals with various issues, particularly in legal matters. It is a title often used interchangeably with the title of lawyer.” according to google. let me reiterate the point of the definition, “a person who gives advice and deals with various issues, particularly in legal matters.” if theyre a credible source, would they not provide services to all transgender people? that question leads back to the question of why would nondysphoric transgender people transition if they are not distressed by their sex. do you see my point?

this is a report on the APA’s involvement in CIA torture after 9/11. this is an article about five (5) APA psychologists and their involvement in forced feeding tube feedings on prisoners in Guantanamo Bay. this is the APA’s code of ethics. it says in the general principles that “ Psychologists strive to benefit those with whom they work and take care to do no harm.” there were revisions to this code in 2010 and 2016 as stated on the page itself. however, does this mean they did not believe this statement--and the others in the rest of the sections--before? to me, it appears not, because of the aforementioned links in this paragraph.

it is true transequality.org says that “ Not all transgender people have gender dysphoria. On its own, being transgender is not considered a medical condition. Many transgender people do not experience serious anxiety or stress associated with the difference between their gender identity and their gender of birth, and so may not have gender dysphoria.” i agree with the fact that transgenderism in itself isnt a medical condition. its gender dysphoria that is; more specifically, its a neurological condition. transgenderism is the symptom of gender dysphoria. that being said, my points in the paragraph about Lambda legal stand even more starkly.

it is also true the NHS gender clinics say “not all gender diverse people experience gender dysphoria”, but in the next paragraph, they list “androgynous” as a diverse identity they experience in their clinics. androgynous is a presentation descriptor label. cisgender people can be androgynous. they also list “gender neutral” as a diverse identity people experience in their clinics. gender neutral is very vague in meaning. do they mean agender people? androgynous people? cisgender people who just dont care what people call them? and so on and so forth. they use the Interim Gender Dysphoria Protocol and Service Guideline 2013/14 and the The Royal College of Psychiatry Good Practice Guidelines for the Assessment and Treatment of Adults with Gender Dysphoria 201 to help care for their patients. the Interim Gender Dysphoria protocol has a graphic early in the many pages that shows if someone does not get a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, they are discharged or sent elsewhere for other treatment. it also shows that if a diagnosis couldnt be made, then more observation is done, and if no diagnosis is made, they are again discharged or sent elsewhere for other treatment (the graphic is on page 7). the Royal College of Psychiatry does indeed say not all “gender variant” people or gender-non-conforming people experience gender dysphoria (they say this on page 14). they never explicitly say transgender or transsexual in that paragraph, only stuff about diversity. “gender variant” doesnt make sense to me, personally, because transgender/transsexual are not dirty words. that is my personal opinion, so i dont know how others feel about it. in terms of counting gender-non-conforming people, that doesnt make sense either. cisgender people can be gender-non-conforming, and they dont need services from a gender identity clinic.

the WHO revised their definition of gender dysphoria and moved it from a mental health condition to a sexual health condition back in 2018, if i can recall correctly. i cant find the exact page where ive seen them say gender dysphoria isnt needed to be transgender, but i did find this. on that page, they say gender is the socially constructed characteristics of men and women. if gender is a social construct, which is what theyre saying but in simpler terms, then why is it so important for people to transition and alleviate gender dysphoria? if its to make them more comfortable in their bodies, why do the terms transgender/transsexual and gender dysphoria even exist, if gender is a social construct? would treatments for the discomfort transgender people experience with their bodies just be something else? or would there even be treatments at all? i know some of the questions ive asked in this whole thing can seem like reaches, but i really just want to stress the ideas that some people may think of if they hear of these things. to my knowledge, the WHO also listed gender-non-conforming people in their definition of transgender. though ive also heard they later say on that page that not all gender-non-conforming people are transgender, its weird they would even include it in the first place.

side note: terfs say gender is a social construct, too.

taking sources at face value (”why medical professionals shouldnt be trusted and how they dont actually mean what they said”) isnt really... the greatest thing to do. a common point yall tucutes make is that only you know your gender. if thats true, then why do yall take what medical professionals say about being transgender as 100% fact?

calling transmeds the “anti-vaxxers and flat earthers of the trans community” is gross. transmeds havent killed people because we havent gotten vaccinated.

if you respond, id appreciate it if you could be civil <3 thank you! i look forward to getting your response :D