Right-wingers claim Colorado shooter Robert Lewis Dear is a trans woman

Kale, who are you responding to? Who claimed that ‘all trans people are attacking “radical feminists”’? I feel like I’m missing half of this conversation….

Hey, L.G., thanks for that. I understand.

“radical feminists” whatever that label actually means.

Radical feminism is a branch of feminism that posits that the most basic structures of society are flawed and sexist, and as a result society itself must be completely restructured if the sexism is to be rooted out.

That is literally all that all radical feminists have in common. Every other point of doctrine varies between the different groups of radfems. However, it’s an important distinction between radfems and other forms of feminism. What was once called liberal feminism, for instance, thinks that the structure of society is fine, and the problem is the way it is implemented. If women are given improved access to education, jobs and job promotions, and child care, then sexism can be eliminated without completely revamping societal structures. Radical feminism says no, that isn’t enough.

Let’s say that we observe that aggressive, alpha-personality traits and a lot of time and effort dedicated toward work activities get people farther on the corporate ladder than any of the alternatives. We furthermore observe that women usually don’t exhibit these personality traits, and are often hampered by the requirements of child care and can’t dedicate the same amount of time toward work activities as men.

Liberal feminism and its successors say that the solution is to teach women to be more aggressive, and to provide them with better child care options so that they have the same time and energy to dedicate to work activities as men. This will put them onto equal footing as men and let them compete on the same grounds.

Radical feminism says hold up, why are male-coded traits the recipe for success? This is not exactly a force of nature; this is a societal choice. Instead of trying to make women more like men so that they can compete with men, we should question why traits that are coded as male are used to signal fitness in a corporate structure, and why are these specific traits coded as male in the first place when not all men display them and not all women lack them. Why is the sheer amount of time you can spend at work valued more highly than your ability to do work in a time-efficient way, and why is that a male-coded trait in the first place?

So that’s what the label means.

@nightmarelyre

Are you sure? I didn’t think comments usually get deleted here. And we’ve had some pretty vile stuff. I hope it’s not the case that it’s been completely deleted because it makes discussions difficult to follow.

Well this whole thing started because someone used the term “radical fauxminists” and then out of the woodwork came a wave of #NotAllRadfems and “if you are gonna be mean to us, we are not gonna protect you!” and other nonsense, which is why I am saying to stop with the whole trying to defend radical feminism against the “meaniepants trans people” or whatever and just get back on topic already.

Some trans people feel unsafe around radical feminists because not enough is done to try and get rid of the TERFs from the movement. Deal with it, and move on.

Seems certain others in here is happy to take over the job of trying to defend their precious TERF sisters to the death

which is why I am saying to stop with the whole trying to defend radical feminism against the “meaniepants trans people” or whatever and just get back on topic already.

Thanks for providing an example of someone equating radical feminism with TERFs, as though they are synonyms, because nothing says that I’m overreacting to a nonexistent thing like proving that the thing exists.

@dhag85 @sbel I think the comment that defended TERFs was deleted shortly after it got called out, I assume it was either them realizing they said something bad and deleted it to try and not cause any more harm or that one of the moderators got to it.

That’s not likely; you can’t delete your own comments and David or the mods would have said something.

What trans people like myself get so angry about (and so often very hurt) by TERFs is not the political/theoretical attacks on us. That can be dealt with, we can all debate and argue over those.

It is the horrble, deep personal attacks. You have no idea how bad some of them are.

There is one site that outs young trans men (as youmg as 15) trawling through personal pages then puting their names and pictures in public for their parents, schools, etc to see.

The horrible cruel things said by some about poor Leehlaj Alcorn or about Jazz Jennings. The endless attacks (again so often very cruel) on trans children, over and above adults.

Julie Burchill just did a 1,150 word ‘hit piece’ in the Spectator on the Transgender Day of Remberance recently and it was horrible.

There are very few trans people that don’t know someone else that has been attacked or (more often) committed or tried to commit suicide…or tried it themselves. So TDOR has become very important to us, familes and friends, to remember and reflect on those we have lost.

it was cruel and completely unnecessary, full of slurs, derogatory statements and personal attacks. This of course triggered off an outpouring of trans hate in the comments.

This is an intelligent, well educated, well read person who writes this sort of stuff for a national, major media outlet…and gets published. Things like:
“when Paris Lees and her mates were making makeshift tissue-paper tutus for their Action Men”
“And these caterwauling cry-bullies deserve their own flag?”
“They are vulnerable to physical attacks from stupid people and low sarcasm from smart people like me.”
“…to commemorate a sect who spend their lives looking down their knickers”

What is worng with these people? This is not some radical feminist political critique thing happening, this is downright hatred.

@Lisa

Yup. That’s fucking terrible. Nobody should be saying that stuff. If someone does it here, I sincerely hope they’ll get shut down fast by the regular commenters.

Having just googled Julie Burchill, she seems like a horrible person. 🙁

Here’s a comment and question from Cristan Williams

“I find it interesting that sex essentialists (some right wingers, TERFs, and religious folk) have latched onto the idea that the Planned Parenthood shooter was a trans woman.

From the perspective of critiquing sex essentialist ideology, do you think this serves sex essentialist narratives? Do you feel that such narratives serves patriarchy?”

My reply was, it is just a tactic.
“Do you feel that such narratives serves patriarchy?”. Yes.

The patriarchy are desperate to avoid facing the issue that there are organised, supported white male Christian terrorists in the US. Many of whom target women and coloured people.

These are the stalwarts and foot soldiers for the patriarchy and as such are untouchable.

The usual excuse is that they are all ‘mentally ill’, extending that to them being LGBTI is just another tactic.”

Oops, forgot the link for Swasey’s fund:

https://www.youcaring.com/the-family-of-officer-swasey-rachel-swasey-and-children-477034

nightmarelyre: It’s a bit tricky trying to find a shorthand term to cover everyone in the non-white spectrum. In the US and elsewhere the victims chosen are often, but not always black, they can be a Native American, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern or Asian hues as well. They are often targets as well.

The people that do this (and the bigots that support them) just go and pick any non white person as a target, their bigotry extends right across the spectrum. Similary with women, they will attack any type of woman.

I need to find something more descriptive of the range, but I am stuffed if I can find one appropriate and short. if anyone has a good idea please post.