transphobia🚫:

beating up trans people for being trans, discriminating against people for being trans like not hiring them if they are qualified for the job or not letting them rent an apartment or buy a home only bcos they are trans, healthcare (both physical and mental) not knowing how to help and care for trans people so they mistreat them and shove pills and unmeasured hormones and surgeries onto them and hope for the best

not transphobia✅️:

It doens't mean I hate christians if I don't believe in their god and don't want their views on abortion to be written into laws.

It would mean I hated christians if I wnted them all to get beaten up, not be allowed to pray in their churches, not be allowed into homeless shelters for being christian, etc\

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"You aren't a lesbian if you're male" = not transphobia, the existence of homosexuality is not hatred.

2. "It's the only way to include ... me." The space should be abolished because you are self-selecting out of it? Nothing is stopping women with pronouns from using womens' bathrooms except themselves.

How do you define "misgender"?

If I define a woman as an adult human female, and I am an adult human female, am I being misgendered if someone calls me she or a woman?

If I define a transman as a woman who uses medical measures to appear male in society, and I am a woman who uses medical measures to appear male in society, (i.e., I want to appear male in my day-to-day life) am I being misgendered if someone calls me he? Or she? Does my desire to appear male mean someone is incorrect if they refer to me as female?

If I don't believe in innate gender nor have a gender identity nor identify as a gender, is it even possible for me to be misgendered?

How do you define detransition?

In my life, I appear a certain way, and people address me according to how they perceive me. After 2yr 7mo on testosterone and a double mastectomy, that means people address me as a male. I do not announce preferred pronouns, and I never have.

What actions would I need to take in order to detransition? If I took those actions: What would change about my life? Would my appearance change? Would my behavior change? Would the way I think about myself change? Would my happiness level change?

So, what should I call myself?

Consider these four axes for women, I could think of 2 more but I'll keep it shorter:

1. Dysphoric vs. Not dysphoric.

2. Medically transitioned vs. Not medically transitioned.

3. Says "I identify as trans" vs. says "I do not identify as trans."

4. Says "I do not identify as a woman" (ex. identifies as a man or nonbinary) vs. says "I do identify as a woman" (believes in gender identity and the concept of cisgender) vs. "I am a woman because I am female." (does not believe in gender identity)

There are many different ways to combine these categories. For example, a woman who is not dysphoric, identifies as trans, and has not medically transitioned. Or, a woman who is dysphoric, medically transitioned, but does not identify as trans / formerly identified as trans. Or a woman who is dysphoric, identifies as trans, has transitioned, and genuinely believes she's a man.

What do I have in common with women in all the possible combinations of categories? What experiences do we share? What is different between us, or what different experiences have we had? Are similarities and differences more significant when they involve physical categories (1 and 2) vs. categories that rely on verbally proclaiming something or a belief (3 and 4)? Are there patterns of experiences that arise when we split these categories into physical and verbal? How much does simply Saying something or Believing something change a person's Experiences?

very late response to this -

I’m sorry you’re feeling down! There are def detrans ppl who can give better advice than me.

Rn it's a balance between the ways transition has made me feel better vs. the things I have lost, related to community with women.

What I remind myself is that, transition has not made me less female. Women who naturally have beards or breast cancer survivors who got mastectomies, are not less female, less of a woman, and neither am I. I was born female, so I will always be a woman and that is a simple fact.

The women who matter will always see me as one of their own and I feel community with them. It is easier to do online due to people not being able to hear or see me, but there are a few examples I have in person as well. I'd say definitely create the community you need, seek out likeminded women.

And all the tools that I used to try to avoid transition I think apply w/ dealing w/ the effects of transition, since they revolve around body neutrality. Focusing on what having a body allows you to do: run, swim, dance, make art, taste food, sing, smile, build, pet animals, give hugs. Our bodies are so much more than what we look like, they allow us to interact with the world around us and the people we care about. When I was feeling bad I would also try and find a distraction, like meeting with a friend, exercising, drawing, video games.

Since transitioning I've found that whether a stranger refers to me as a woman or as a man, I always internally judge that and either way my instant response isn't happiness. And as long as I keep putting that expectation and value into how strangers view me, I won't be happy.

I like myself, that's what's important. Easy to say, but it's something to keep working at and reminding myself of it.

Me: Those aren't reasons why transwomen are Also women, they're reasons why transmen are Still women. Having a mastectomy doesn't make a cancer survivor less female, and it doesn't make a transman less female either. Growing a beard doesn't mean a woman with PCOS, cushings or CAH is less female, and it doesn't make a transman less female either, and so on.

This girl thinks that women cannot be hairy, looking up to their fathers, uncomfortable with the sexualization of their breasts, and masculine. This literally breaks my heart.

I grew up loving my body hair, looking up to my dad, and hating being sexualized. I felt the same way she did. I had to find that love for myself and my confidence for my body from within, and it was so hard.

Would you be interested in meeting up with other radfems around Halloween? 🎃 I was thinking it could be a costume thing. I've got my eye on some annual museum parties and could make some deals, but I want to see if anyone's into it first.

Considerations:

No men in our group, duh. Only women and good vibes. There will probably be men at whatever thing we end up at, but, baby steps.

Blogs would be scrutinized by me and the invited, and I'd be careful about delivering information. I won't consider new blogs/reblog-only blogs and if something doesn't seem right, I'll politely tell you. We can discuss it and you might have the option for trying again next year.

Why not just meet up normally? I, personally, want more IRL radfem friends, but don't want to gamble on losing my job or being ostracized from my existing friends. This is an in-between thing, where we can meet and decide later if we trust each other enough to reveal more.

trans men are physically attacked more often than trans women

trans men are sexually assaulted more often than trans women

trans men have less education than trans women

trans men are more likely to experience suicidality than trans women

trans men are less likely to have access to healthcare than trans women

trans men suffer from disordered eating more often than trans women

trans men are more likely to develop alcoholism than trans women

trans men are prostituted at the same rate as trans women

Completely funded a rape crisis center in Scotland

Personally paid to rescue Afghani women from a male supremacist regime that doesn’t allow women to talk

Created an international organization that helps orphaned children worldwide called Lumos

Served as ambassador for Gingerbread, which supports single parents (most of whom are women)

Raised millions by writing books for Comic Relief, a UK charity

Established the Anne Rowling Regenerative Neurology Clinic at the University of Edinburgh

In 2011, donated 16% of her net worth and lost billionaire status

Established the Volant Charitable Trust, which supports women and children in poverty

Gives to Maggie’s centers, which provide support to people with cancer

She talks about these causes, supports them (and others not listed here). Is it that she “only talks about trans people” or that the only things you see of her are screenshots where she discusses these issues? Did you do exactly what she is pointing out here, and decide a woman was a terrible shrew you hate because she disagrees with you on this issue—while always maintaining that she supports gay people, gender non conformance, the right to expression, and believes that trans people are often victimized and oppressed?

There are people at my workplace - who don't know I'm trans - who think trans people are gross. Do I care about their approval? No. Do you think they are pro-gay? No. Do you think they're pro-abortion? No. Do you think they'd love it if I were presenting as a masculine woman instead? No.

Am I trying to get these peoples' approval by affirming homosexuality as natural and beautiful, and supporting female separatism and gender nonconformity? You do the math.

I don't even care if there are radfems out there that think negatively of me for transitioning. The purpose of feminism is female liberation. I'm not going to throw women (or gay people) under the bus so that I can surround myself with unquestioning validation, grow a spine. I believe homosexuality exists, I believe sexism exists, and I have found the mainstream trans community is incompatible with that.

but transitioning wasnt the answer. maybe transitioning is the answer for some people, but i think its the answer for a lot fewer people than we think.

i was a young girl with an ED. i was a young autistic girl who was inadvertantly emotionally neglected because no one understood what i needed, nor did i know how to connect to other girls. i was gnc. all i knew was ”i am not enough, i want to have a community. but i dont want to be like those girls. im nothing like them”.

i was under the impression that the way women presented were all ways women wanted to present. i thought it was like a natural instinct to them. all the makeup, the dresses, the jewelry. i thought i was the only one who hated it.

i didnt get crushes like the other girls. i didnt want the attention of the boys. i developed breasts and got my period younger than most. i hated every minute of it, i hated having breasts, but i thought other girls were excited about it as a mark of ”womanhood”

what i needed as a young girl was feminism. i needed to know that there was nothing wrong with me. that these are ways to be a woman; that everything i thought womanhood was was artificial and forced on us. i needed a community of women that wasnt built around those artificial constructs. maybe then i wouldntve come to the conclusion, in the lowest point in my life, that maybe i just wasnt a woman. and coming to that conclusion felt freeing. it felt like id found a space to be myself without all the bullshit i thought i ”had” to be. i didnt have to be a woman anymore. but dysphoria eats you. its never satisfied. it wants change after change after change. more surgery, more hormones, lose some weight, gain some muscle. i got tired and burnt out.