I've been thinking a lot this week about transphobia, and the way that fear can be created & exploited for the purpose of oppression.
I recently went to the Museum of African American History and the Holocaust museum in DC. Both tell this story.
I recently went to the Museum of African American History and the Holocaust museum in DC. Both tell this story.
I think the fear is very real for many people. In the same way that many Americans were genuinely afraid that desegregation would lead to white women being raped by black men, I think many cis-women are genuinely afraid of transwomen.
That fear is built on a foundation of intentional misinformation driven by hatred, then spread through fear and ignorance. When we're afraid, we lose our capacity to be rational and all we want is to be kept safe.
We know this pattern. It lead to the Holocaust. And Apartheid.
We know this pattern. It lead to the Holocaust. And Apartheid.
Cis-women have a good reasons to be afraid. We have many centuries of experience of being violently harmed by cis-men. We've also had to fight, long and hard, for everything from spaces safe from violence to medical recognition of and respect for the way our bodies actually work.
I have no problem understanding how those experiences make some cis-women susceptible to fear transwomen. But I also believe that fear is the result of an intentional misdirection.
I don't know if I'm expressing this very well, but I think the point I want to make is that the work of undoing the harm done by hatred-fueled misinformation about transwomen may fall on cis-women who see it for what it is.
We may be the only ones who can fully understand the experiences that lead to the genuine though profoundly misplaced fears of other cis-women, and therefore the only ones who can engage empathetically with those fears to help dispel them.
