same male chauvinists, different clothes (trigger warning: cissexist, transmisogynistic feminist bullshit)

smirkingbenevolence:

strangerthanheartbreak:

For every lesbian you bully into sex - a radical feminist is born.
For every woman you threaten with violence - a radical feminist is born.
For every woman who gets silenced in a feminist space for talking about women’s biology - a radical feminist is born.
For every woman who is intimidated into silence by the trans borg descending upon her valid criticisms - a radical feminist is born
For every woman who is told abortion is “not a women’s issue” - a radical feminist is born
For every man who tags pictures of his penis on tumblr as #lesbian - a radical feminist is born
For every woman hating flyer passed out at michigan womyns music festival that says “real women have cocks” - a radical feminist is born
For every man who says that he also gets a period - a radical feminist is born
For every penis flashed at women in private spaces - a radical feminist is born
For every “cotton ceiling” workshop you host in LGBT spaces - 5 radical feminists are born
For every woman you mansplain to about what it is to be a *woman on the inside* - a radical feminist is born 

For every stupid message you send to a radical feminist who is far more clever than you - another woman sees your illogical shit for what it is &

- a radical feminist is born. 

Whatever happened to ‘biology is not destiny’ ? Yeah, I suppose that just doesn’t apply to us.

For every trans woman who is told ‘you’ll never be a real woman’ - a radical trans queer is born

For every trans woman who is chased out of a ‘woman’ only event - a radical trans queer is born

For every trans person who is misgendered by the police and put in with the wrong population - a radical trans queer is born

For every trans person who is bullied by someone who they expect would understand their perspective - a radical trans queer is born

Attitudes like what you present are why ‘die cis scum’ has swept the trans community. Attitudes like what you present are the root cause of our distrust of cis people.

Beliefs like the ones you hold have led to the deaths of thousands of trans people. This is not some intellectual exercise in a gender studies class. This is our lived experience. This is a genocide of my people.

You’re in your late teens to early 20’s and white, right? ‘Cause it’s either that or you’re my mother’s generation and think you are owed respect. Respect is earned.

I love and support my cis allies. Those that are true allies love and support me. But those cis people that hate me, I welcome their hate. They are hateful scum. Those are who we speak of when we say ‘Die Cis Scum’. Only cis scum have anything to fear from that statement.

God, shit like this makes me really wary of identifying as a radical feminist (as in “roots” - as in, hey OP, misogyny is one of the “roots” of transphobia). 

Also, can I just point out that the OP genders trans women incorrectly (“man who tags pictures of his penis…”) but seems to do fine with trans men (“For every man who says that he also gets a period…”)? I wonder if that’s significant. 

(via strawberryfaerie)

Book recs?

Yo, does anyone have any encouraging books/other media they’d recommend for someone questioning their gender (trans* guy and/or transmasculine genderqueer -oriented)? I gave my best friend Stone Butch Blues a while ago and she*, in her words, “related way too well.” (and she was ridiculously happy when I showed her the Genderqueer wiki page). I want to get her something for Christmas that’s accessible (ie minimal if any gender studies jargon) and reminds her she’s not alone and such.

Any ideas? Bonus points if there’s discussion of bikes or the military.


* best friend uses female pronouns at this time

Tobi Hill-Meyer talking about the t-word

This deserved its own post. 

Also this comment (also from her):

“Yeah, I came out in a group of trans guys who would use the term. So of course, I followed suite and did the same. It wasn’t until I found trans women’s community that I realized the impact of it myself.

I remember, after being more aware of the history and actually understood how it can be hurtful, I was at a mixed gender group of trans people. A trans guy was saying something, I don’t even remember what, and peppering his language with “tranny.” I looked around and half the women cringed when he said it. He was completely unaware of the responses around him — as I would have been a year earlier.

I’m not going to say he doesn’t have a right to use the word, but at the very least he should be aware of how it’s impacting the folks around him. That’s a big part of what inspired this piece.”

As long as we’re talking about trans* students and women’s colleges

Where are the trans* women? And why don’t they get talked about as much as trans* guy students?

Every year, Wellesley admin gets the question “what’s the policy on admitting trans* women?” and every year they say that it’s not an issue because they’ll look at any application that has “female” marked as the gender. Which might be okay if they made any indication that trans* women were welcome or allowed to apply.

I kinda think it might be an issue if the student body’s putting pressure on you about it, no? Unfortunately I think they’ll only pay attention if it becomes an immediate thing to deal with.

So if any prospective trans* women students are reading this and are gutsy enough to apply to Wellesley, remember you are just as entitled to the women’s college experience as any cis woman and there is a significant student contingent that will raise hell if administration or anyone else gives you a hard time about it. <3

(… I have a lot of feelings about this.)

Question

misohead:

airellia:

lizardwalk:

airellia:

No, this totally makes sense, and it really bothers me too. Like we just think we’re that gender instead of really being it. And it doing that implies cis people don’t self-identify, they just are.

I also agree with lizardwalk that it’s probably done intentionally in some cases :/

I agree with what Asher Bauer had to say about it:

“The language of self-identification is often used to describe trans people. “George identifies as a man.” “I respect Judy’s identification as a woman.” “Chris just told me that ze identifies as ‘genderqueer.’ Oh dear, that pronoun is going to take some getting used to.” An organization I know, in an effort to be trans friendly, as posted little signs on their bathroom doors, underneath the “MENS” and “WOMENS” signs that we know so well, saying “Self-identified men welcome” and “Self-identified women welcome” and “please be respectful of diversity.”

This co-opting of the language of self-identification is not only condescending, it completely missed the point.

Cis people seem to think that self-identification is only for trans folks. They don’t have to “identify” as men and women– they just ARE! Their gender isn’t “self-identified,” it’s “self-evident!”

What they fail to understand is that self identification is the only meaningful way to determine gender. Any other method is wholly dependent upon what that doctor said way back when we were still wrinkly, writhing, screaming newborn messes, completely unformed as individuals and without any identity at all to speak of, too bloody and scrunchy-faced to even be called cute. The fact is that cis people self-identify too– they just happen to agree with what the doctor said all those years ago. Anybody who answers the question of “are you a man?” or “are you a woman?” with “yes” has just self-identified.”

That sums it up pretty nicely, I think (sorry if you’ve seen it before).

I hadn’t seen that. Thanks, Toby!

Source: airellia

Question

lizardwalk:

airellia:

Why do some people say “man” or “woman” when they talk about cis folks but use terms like “male-identified” or “female-identified” when they talk about trans folks? That makes it sound like trans folks’ genders are less legitimate. If someone’s a dude, they’re a dude, and if someone’s a chick, they’re a chick. Either that or say whatever-identified for everyone. 

I dunno. I’m kind of tips so I don’t know if that makes any sense or it’s all in my head. Words are hard.

IME that is exactly *why* they use it. :S

Yeah, I can see that :-(. I think a lot of cis people genuinely think it’s a more “PC” way of referring to someone’s gender if they’re trans, though. Which doesn’t make sense if you think about it for two seconds. I’m just not sure where people are getting that impression o_O.

(via indigoferarchived)

Source: airellia

Question

Why do some people say “man” or “woman” when they talk about cis folks but use terms like “male-identified” or “female-identified” when they talk about trans folks? That makes it sound like trans folks’ genders are less legitimate. If someone’s a dude, they’re a dude, and if someone’s a chick, they’re a chick. Either that or say whatever-identified for everyone. 

I dunno. I’m kind of tips so I don’t know if that makes any sense or it’s all in my head. Words are hard.

hopelessly-romantic-cynic:

criticalfeministcorgi:

Critical Feminist Corgi image. Top text: Say you're acknowledging trans people. Bottom text: Call them uterus bearers.

Hi. I’m a trans person who is capable of getting pregnant.

Stop calling women, trans men, and FAAB non-binaries “uterus bearers” as though there’s nothing more to us than our anatomy.

Trans inclusion is important. I know that well. It’s also important to acknowledge that the anti-choice movement is explicitly an attack on women’s rights — anti-choicers think the rest of us are women, after all. Call them out on their cissexism; don’t call pro-choice activists out on “erasing” us when they rightly call the anti-choice movement what it is.

In the meantime, try slightly more humanizing terms. “Women and other people who can get pregnant” is nice; it points out that anti-choice is anti-woman, while also pointing out that trans people exist. “Pregnant people” is a nice alternative to “fetus bearers”. And so forth.

If you really want to be trans-inclusive, don’t act like trans people are just walking uteruses. (You shouldn’t act like cis women are just walking uteruses either, though.)

I usually saying “uterus-bearing people” or “people who can get pregnant”, but I have used the term “uterus-bearers” before. I never thought of it as dehumanizing, but I suppose it is in a way. I don’t like “women and other people who can get pregnant” because 1) it’s slightly othering and tokenizing (it sounds kinda like an afterthought, “Women… oh, yeah, and those other people who can get pregnant, too”) 2) not all women can get pregnant.

But don’t put erasing in scare quotes. Pro-choice folks don’t get a free pass on erasure just because they’re dealing with people who don’t recognize my identity. People who erase my identity in abortion debates are not helping me, even if they are on the pro-choice side. Not all pro-choice folks are trans*-positive, and I’d like to be able to distinguish who is and who isn’t by whether or not they use inclusive language in debates, regardless of whether or not the person on the other side does.

Uterus-bearers also irks me for the reason the OP stated. “People seeking abortions,” “pregnant people,” and “people who need reproductive care” are all terms I try to use and can be applied to anyone they need to regardless of gender or genitalia. Just because the pro-life movement treats pregnant folks as conception factories who are only as useful as our anatomy (which, honestly, is what uterus-bearer implies to me), doesn’t mean we should too.

(via trans-terrific-deactivated20121)

Source: criticalfeministcorgi