Very helpful, thanks. So do we need to start saying Gender Critical or gender critical to mean different things? (The former being the political movement, the latter being critical of gender?) I guess I just see a lot of common ground between trans folks and gender critical feminists but all this seems to be being lost in some of the unhelpful shit that's happening on both 'sides'.
Is this woman a transphobe?
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hitmouse
so defeated, thinks it's funny
I think one thing that distinguishes "Gender Critical Feminism" from feminists who are critical of gender would be that I think most GCers would say that Gender Ideology is a thing, and they're against Gender Ideology, but other feminists, such as Finn McKay, would disagree that Gender Ideology is a thing any more than, say, gay ideology, is:
Engender blog | F-words: Finn McKay on gender ideology
www.engender.org.uk
Also I'm really not trying to stir things up but am still unclear about what people on here mean when they use the terms 'TERF' and 'gender critical' as they seem to mean different things to different people. (IIRC, I did ask this ages ago and there didn't seem to be a clear view/agreement on what these terms mean which makes any kind of debate using them tricky.)
I mean, on the face of it being critical of gender and the stereotypes and expectations and perceptions that go with it seems like a good thing.
And surely challenging those stereotype and expectations and perceptions should be something both trans and non-trans people can agree on? I mean if we're saying a 'woman can be like THIS and THIS and THIS and can do THAT and THAT and THAT' that's surely much better for everyone involved than saying 'a woman is like THIS and can do THAT.'
But people here seem to see it as a very negative thing. So I'm obviously really misunderstanding what it means..?
Just like there isn't a TRA central command with an official gender identity theory, there isn't a TERF central command with official gender critical theory. It's complicated. I think Dylans' posts were paint by numbers gender critical theory though not all who call themselves gender critical would agree with all of it or without the nuance. Of course being critical of how gender is used (eg. gender) roles is the part of it that a lot people who would reject the trans exclusionary side of it can get behind.
Sure, it's complicated which is why it's even more important to define (on here at least) what our terms mean?
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
It's complicated because the phrase Gender Critical is being used as a courtesy to the movement as calling people TERFS gets folks backs up. But I think many posting here have gone out of their way to explain the differences, and explain why we ourselves are using the phrase "Gender Critical". I dunno what more can be done on urban at least, on this side of things.
The caps help clarify! Further to frogwoman's point above, 'transphobe' seems more accurate than 'TERF'?
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
Kind of although some 'original' terfs are involved in 'gender critical' stuff, janice raymond Sheila jeffreys Julia long for instance. I think jeffreys has spoken at some LGB alliance events
Honestly though the word terf gets used interchangeably with transphobe anyway it's not accurate in a strict sense but it isn't going to stop people doing it lol
Honestly though the word terf gets used interchangeably with transphobe anyway it's not accurate in a strict sense but it isn't going to stop people doing it lol
bimble
floofy
Coincidence, they just a couple of minutes ago tweeted this. It’s a little thread.I think one thing that distinguishes "Gender Critical Feminism" from feminists who are critical of gender would be that I think most GCers would say that Gender Ideology is a thing, and they're against Gender Ideology, but other feminists, such as Finn McKay, would disagree that Gender Ideology is a thing any more than, say, gay ideology, is:
Engender blog | F-words: Finn McKay on gender ideology
www.engender.org.uk
It does end up with a very feeble point imo though, on something which I think deserves better as it’s where (I think) a lot of the trouble has come from, by saying that GCs might disagree but everybody has a gender identity, it’s just you might not notice yours if it’s a cis one. I don’t feel this (gender identity) is something worth fighting about now but do think that last post in the thread is a pretty flimsy way of attempting to delegitimise the question tbh.
I think this is interesting (from the twitter thread mentioned):
"Gender identity is term to describe internal sense of self as boy/girl woman/man = masculine/feminine. As we live in & are socialised into fiercly binary gendered society, be rare if ppl grew up without this sense of themselves. We are literally schooled into it from birth."
I mean I really don't have that sense of myself and wonder if that's as rare as Finn Mackay believes? I am conscious of my gender in terms of dealing with gender stereotyping etc but that's not about me, it's about other people/society.
(Of course it's important for many people especially when there's a conflict between how they feel and how they're perceived by others.)
I supported ditching Terf and adopting Gender Critical partly because I think calling people what they want to be called is generally fair enough and polite and also because radical feminists only make up a very small part of the Gender Critical movement now though. In retrospect though I think it might have been a mistake because it's become a pathway of radicalisation - someone sees an angry annoying queer kid ranting about Gender Criticals on twitter and thinks I'm critical of gender I wonder what they've got to say. So they end up on mumsnet and being bombarded with misinformation and basically the results of a half decade long campaign to scour the internet looking for anything that presents trans people in a bad light and before they know where they are they're dancing about in the street singing about penises and have lost all their friends because they never shut up about the upcoming trans apocalypse.
Well here's my attempt. It encompasses the following beliefs:
1) Gender is a (patriarchal) social construct
1a) Ergo there is no such thing as an innate gender identity
2) Sex is real and immutable
2a) Sex/gender transition is meaningless
2b) The terms "man" and "woman" are clear cut biological terms (with the caveat that there is no difference between "male" and "female" brains)
3) Sex based rights are either central to feminism or a crucial component
3a) Trans rights activists are trying to undermine 1) and 2) and therefore 3)
3aa) The definition of "man" and crucially "woman" are under threat
4) Children should be educated to understand 1) and 2)
4a) Trans rights activists are miseducating our children leading to many of them identifying as trans
4aa) Lesbians are being erased by the trans agenda as it effects female children
I think that's the structure of it. Much of it is not particularly contentious but it gets more contentious as you get into the supposed corollaries and not everyone who calls themselves gender critical will agree with all of that.
Yes, I agree. (Although I'm not sure that dancing in the street singing about penises is always a negative thing...?
)
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
I agree and it is obviously causing confusion on here as well, I'm stuck as to what labels would be more useful though. I would call the GC movement transphobes but I don't want to start a riot every 2 seconds
The concept of gender identity came about because of John Money's awful bodged experiment trying to raise someone born physically male as a girl after they had genital surgery due to an accident (it didn't work and they ended up committing suicide) and early research into intersex kids. Basically a lot of children with DSDs, where physical sex may not be clear, express a gender identity - as in articulating themselves as a boy or girl, or articulating a desire to be a boy or girl - which is not always inline with chromosonal sex, usually at about 2/3 years old and it tends to remain stable after that.
So I think it's really difficult to quantify in people whose physical sex is unambiguous and who were raised in the gender that is congruent with their physical sex. You can't really know how you would feel if someone had unknowingly to you carried out surgery on you when you were a baby and then decided raised you as a boy - which is what still happens to some intersex kids. And it's likely, as with most things involving humans, that people experience gender identity to a greater and lesser extent and that it's mediated by the society and culture they live in. But the fact there's millions of trans people in the world, often determined to live that way despite hardship and even criminalisation, I think really provides objective evidence that something is going on. And also, given how many trans people opt to change their bodies through either surgery or hormones that perhaps it should have become known as a sex identity, rather than it becoming enmeshed with gender stereotypes which are a very different thing.
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
To add: i should have said "calling them TERFS or Transphobes gets peoples backs up" as that's what I meant really.
Thanks to everyone for their replies btw, they're really helpful. I know you must be sick to the back teeth of explaining this so I do really appreciate it and I'm sorry I'm being so thick. I guess I just find it really depressing how polarised and toxic the debate -- in general -- has got. I just wish we could concentrate on the things we can all agree on and go from there -- like the 'no-one should be subjected to physical or sexual violence and, if they are, should have somewhere safe to go' principle mentioned upthread and then look at how that can be achieved.
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
Here would you reckon if someone kept telling you you were a man, would you get any sort of sense that you were being told something that clashed with your sense of self? Not a dig, genuine question as I'm really unsure about this. I think we do internalise this schooling a lot IFYSWIM.
I think that I would do, anyway.
As I type this I have 3 crazy boys banging on my window posing with sweetie cigarettes, or something, my wording probs all to pot lol
I guess the thing is I don't really have that sense of self. I'm a women and I've been working in a very male-dominated field for the last 30 years and most of my friends are male. I don't really do any of the things women are 'meant' to do/like and the only time I really think about my gender is when I get some shit because of it. I don't perceive it as positive or negative but if i had to perceive something, it would be more neutral verging on a bit negative I guess. But that's more a societal expectation/stereotyping thing.
(And if someone kept telling me I was a man, I'd really be
. I just don't think it's very important which is maybe a luxury I have that many others don't.)Sweetie cigarettes! Who knew they were even still a thing!
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
I dunno where they got them from!I guess the thing is I don't really have that sense of self. I'm a women and I've been working in a very male-dominated field for the last 30 years and most of my friends are male. I don't really do any of the things women are 'meant' to do/like and the only time I really think about my gender is when I get some shit because of it. I don't perceive it as positive or negative but if i had to perceive something, it would be more neutral verging on a bit negative I guess. But that's more a societal expectation/stereotyping thing.
(And if someone kept telling me I was a man, I'd really be
Sweetie cigarettes! Who knew they were even still a thing!
hitmouse
so defeated, thinks it's funny
On the "does everyone have a gender identity" thing, it is the case that some people nowadays are describing themselves as agender:
Whether being agender counts as having a gender identity or the lack of one is... tricky question, I suppose, a bit like trying to say whether black and white are colours.
On the working together on stuff we can, or should, all be able to agree on, bit, Sisters Uncut have done some really good positive work, like the campaign to save Doncaster Women's Aid is a story that should be better known:
www.sistersuncut.org
On the working together on stuff we can, or should, all be able to agree on, bit, Sisters Uncut have done some really good positive work, like the campaign to save Doncaster Women's Aid is a story that should be better known:
Sisters Uncut: This is how we know we can win
Last Thursday, sisters in Doncaster celebrated the opening of a new domestic violence service. Well, not so much a new service, but the revival of a service that had been forced to close - and that they fought to bring back. This didn't happen overnight, and it didn't happen without a whole...
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
I don't fit comfortably into these roles either, never have, and often feel a bit of an outsider when in a large group of women. So I'm not trying to place any sort of importance on it if you see what I mean, but I do think if someone kept telling me I was man, it would be really jarring.I guess the thing is I don't really have that sense of self. I'm a women and I've been working in a very male-dominated field for the last 30 years and most of my friends are male. I don't really do any of the things women are 'meant' to do/like and the only time I really think about my gender is when I get some shit because of it. I don't perceive it as positive or negative but if i had to perceive something, it would be more neutral verging on a bit negative I guess. But that's more a societal expectation/stereotyping thing.
(And if someone kept telling me I was a man, I'd really be
Sweetie cigarettes! Who knew they were even still a thing!
I'm not sure what I said about gender identity would necessarily be supported by the non-binary zoomers btw, who seem to have almost embraced gender to destroy it. I can understand why people would ridicule the idea of hundreds of different genders, or people being one gender one day and a different one the next, but I think another way of looking at it is that this is gender being turned into the parody it deserves to become - and I suspect there's some awareness of that amongst the younger generation of Queers and Feminists. The gender binary cannot survive such a transition, gender just becomes a shorthand word for a personal style, or expression, which can be cast off and altered at will (and of course marketed to). I think we are seeing the dismantling of gender as a system of political control in favour of a marketable personal identity/brand - it's happening within capitalism after all - but I don't think that necessarily means it's not progress or something that can't be built on for more radical ends.
Or is it just saying 'fuck gender stereotypes'? Because I'm all for that! (And hey, I'm such a hipster I was doing it before it was even a word...)On the "does everyone have a gender identity" thing, it is the case that some people nowadays are describing themselves as agender:
Whether being agender counts as having a gender identity or the lack of one is... tricky question, I suppose, a bit like trying to say whether black and white are colours.
Great stuff!On the working together on stuff we can, or should, all be able to agree on, bit, Sisters Uncut have done some really good positive work, like the campaign to save Doncaster Women's Aid is a story that should be better known:
Sisters Uncut: This is how we know we can win
Last Thursday, sisters in Doncaster celebrated the opening of a new domestic violence service. Well, not so much a new service, but the revival of a service that had been forced to close - and that they fought to bring back. This didn't happen overnight, and it didn't happen without a whole...
Personally I think rather than having all these genders, we should just get rid off them. That makes more sense to me than the emboldened bit above.
You can order them online I think. They're great IMO. They don't have the little red "burning" bit at the end anymore - they're just candy sticks now.
HoratioCuthbert
Deep seated inconsequence
"I think"
I used to love them a a kid, just surprised you can still get them. (I'm tempted to get some for my nephew but my sister would have my guts for garters. And probably rightly so.)
"I think"
I occasionally get given them as a present. You can also get them in traditional sweet shops as well.
bimble
floofy
This has sort of blown my mind.
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