#oof. being a radfem is a lot of typing and reading and sourcing

[novakidds]

can i ask what it’s like to be both a radfem and a trans person? like how are u treated in the radfem community and how does your view of yourself differ from typical non-radfem trans people? i’m sorry if this seems invasive but i’m actually also a transman and it’s rare for me to find blogs like yours. i often find myself agreeing w radfem ideas but all my friends r hardcore trans activists and it makes me scared to ever admit it

this is a good question, thank you anon. never feel the need to apologize for asking legitimate questions, this is what radfems are 100% into- open discussion :]

i ended up typing a LOT so im gonna tuck it away with a read more a little down the line. my bad bro

i completely understand how you feel, transitioning (lol) into the radfem community meant losing some trans-activist friends who formerly had rays of sunshine beaming from their rears. suddenly someone they knew had become, in their eyes, ‘dangerous’ which has never ceased to baffle me because i was... y’know, still me. still feminist, still lesbian, just focusing on women’s issues and calling out male behavior, which is what feminism was made for, right??? i was very bluntly disagreed with in that regard, due to my belief that trans women are biologically male.

that’s a pretty key difference between me and other non-radfem trans people i think. trans people are, and always will be, their biological sex. if we weren’t, what would we be transitioning from, exactly? our dysphoria is based in our sex. i’ll tally up the biggest beliefs that differ me, personally, from ‘them’:

1) you cannot change your biological sex. your biological sex and resulting primary/secondary sex characteristics are the reason you feel the need to transition. otherwise, what you are experiencing is not a desire to become the opposite sex, but distress at how others treat you due to your sex. this is why a lot of detransitioners are women due to how poorly women are treated, and the resulting regret of having changed their bodies so drastically in an attempt to escape sexism.

2) gender roles and the unfair standard for expressing gender are oppressive and should be abolished. women are attacked for being masculine, meanwhile... uh, drag queens exist. (i’m currently figuring out wanting to be perceived as a man vs hating performing gender for people hnnng)

3) medically transitioning, as it is now, is hazardous guesswork at best and a moneygrab by Big Pharma at worst. hormone blockers on minors, diagnosing gender dysphoria with precious little questioning, and ESPECIALLY the emphasis upon medical transition all serves as a lifelong detriment to the lives of gay and GNC people who simply don’t have the language to understand who and what they are before trans ideas found them first. there are also precious few trans people who have lived for great lengths of time after these surgeries and hormone treatments, and so there is next to no research on how these surgeries will affect ones life longterm. i can’t find the discussion on this as i type this, but i believe there was also concerns about elderly transgender people suffering from dementia being disoriented and in distress at their primary or secondary sex characteristics being missing. but again, we literally cannot know because this movement is so fresh, yet has such rapid traction.

4) activism for trans rights is on easy mode. the reasons being, say, rich white men are funding it, and places like iran pushing for the forced transition of gay people to make them appear heterosexual. what is truly being fought for? what is truly being fought against? this was a big thing that made me opt the hell out.

5) trans people still have many (if not all) behaviors of their assigned gender. i say gender and not sex, because although there are different hormones at work and chemicals are produced by the sexes at different quantities, this does not make shit like “lady brains.” that concept is misogynistic. hear me out: 98% of sexual crimes are committed by males, and proof of this can be found in the statistics of crime (october 2011 to september 2012) in the criminal justice system for england and wales. an easier to read chart with the gender of offenders and crimes can be seen right here. i can’t find the source as i type this, but iirc roughly 40% of transgender women who have been convicted of a crime were convicted of some form of sexual assault, but in spite of this statistic there is a push for transgender women to be put in women’s prisons. it’s a dangerous neglect of male-pattern violence. have you noticed how transgender men never push for access to things like, say, “gentleman’s clubs?” it’s because as females we’re socialized for complacency. we don’t want to take, vandalize, and take some more like males are socialized to do.

TL;DR

i refuse to view transitioning, trans activism, and the oppressive perceptions of gender that are required for trans ideology to exist without a critical lens. i also refuse to blindly trust males who want access to female spaces. this has, in one person’s eyes, warranted very violent threats.

the worst i had ever received from a (presumed) radfem was this anonymous ask. at worst it was a little condescending. (the answer i gave is probably old and not super relevant btw, no worries over not reading it.) i do sometimes fret to myself when i get caught up in thought about never finding ‘my people,’ but usually when i actually talk to other radfems mutual respect is perfectly intact and i was just overthinking it lmao

the biggest thing i can tell you is- being trans and believing in women’s rights as a radfem have one big thing in common that you need to embody: self-confidence. not necessary loving yourself to bits, i’m still on that path myself. just the belief in yourself that you know what you’re talking about, you know yourself well enough to make this decision, and with that knowing you refuse to crumble over the fear of what other people think. because using peer pressure isn’t politics, it’s outright bullying. any activism that depends on manipulating the human need to fit in is no longer activism- and once you’ve distanced yourself, you’ll see how much of that emotional bribery is occurring, and it being used against radfems with the assumption that they, like other women, will apologize and fall in line.

you can do it, brother. no longer having those old friends was the best thing for me in regards to my confidence and growth, and plenty of radfems will understand the system shock of being dubbed ‘dangerous’ and blocked by people they formerly talked to in a matter of a day. if they throw a hissy fit, just know that it isn’t you- and that at the very least, i’m here for you if you do decide to take the plunge.