If you or someone you know is struggling with the subtleties of debates around trans equality, I encourage you to briefly step aside from science and definitions for a moment and think/talk about it this way: [thread]
Misunderstandings like this are often rooted in fear. In this particular case, the fear is that trans equality could inadvertently dilute the women’s rights movement by allowing anyone to claim womanhood at any time, essentially rendering gender meaningless or trivial.
It’s totally natural and okay to perceive fear and threat. Healthy in a lot of cases, to keep us safe from harm. But it’s really important to evaluate our fears and understand where they’re coming from as fear can also lead to toxic feelings and behaviors.
In this case, let’s look at the main sources spreading information around. You have a wealthy fantasy author, who for some reason chose the height of pandemic, BLM protests, and pride month to drop a diatribe against a marginalized community. Timing is questionable there.
Then you have orgs like Women’s Liberation Front, who claim to focus on creating safe spaces for women but in reality have solely fought to dismantle and discredit trans rights. Ironic that they’re actually called a “front”.
Ignoring whatever scientific explanations and definitions you’ve chosen to believe in, think about the basic fact that these people are punching down on an oppressed community, citing their own oppression as the reason why. Then think about who the oppressor is.
The oppressors are the people in power. They’re the ones being abusive. They weaponize fear and remind their victims of how much more pain they can inflict if they don’t comply. They deflect blame and trick victims into thinking it’s their own fault or someone else’s.
Think about how that relates to the current BLM movement. You want to protest police brutality? You’ll get beat up, gassed, or shot. It’s the looters’ and thugs’ faults. You want to defund the police? Fine, but nobody will be there to save you from murderers and rapists.
Police brutality has never been about public safety, and trans exclusion will never be about women’s safety. Is it reasonable to fear that our rights could get taken away at any moment? Totally. Do trans people have the power and/or desire to do that? NO.
Oh and you know what else our oppressors would love us to think? That we’re nothing more than a vagina with a head. Yes, let’s definitely reduce women to their genitalia and make it okay for reproductive organs to be our trademark qualifier. Nothing could ever go wrong with that.
This is a human rights issue, plain and simple. You can either focus your energy on keeping a marginalized community away from basic civil rights, or you can redirect your blasters to the actual people doing the actual harm. Hashtag silence is violence.
