Monopolising struggle

[DanaC]

Some of our recent discussions on bigotry and oppression (definitions of, and ranks/divisions of oppression) have been playing on my mind of late. Now, I really don't intend any of this as an attack on Ibs. I respect her stance and admire her passion. But the conversations we've had in here have echoed a wider discourse that interests me.

So I found a couple of recent articles about a minor spat in the twitterverse really interesting. Basically, a feminist writer penned an essay for a collection in which she referred to women being expected to conform to the body shape of 'a Brazilian transsexual'.

The response from transexual twitterers was to drive this woman off twitter entirely. Amongst the really vile stuff she was also accused of not understanding struggle, of operating from a 'priveleged white feminist' perspective and of essentially being a part of the oppressor class/patriarchy etc.

Her mentor, and Godmother to her daughters, Julie Burchill wrote a scathing piece in the Guardian. Some of the language she employs is clearly designed to offend, but I get the sense she is really angry about this.

To my mind – I have given cool-headed consideration to the matter – a gaggle of transsexuals telling Suzanne Moore how to write looks a lot like how I'd imagine the Black and White Minstrels telling Usain Bolt how to run would look. That rude and ridic.

Here's what happened. In a book of essays called Red: The Waterstones Anthology, Suzanne contributed a piece about women's anger. She wrote that, among other things, women were angry about "not having the ideal body shape – that of a Brazilian transsexual". Rather than join her in decrying the idea that every broad should aim to look like an oven-ready porn star, the very vociferous transsexual lobby and their grim groupies picked on the messenger instead.

I must say that my only experience of the trans lobby thus far was hearing about the vile way they have persecuted another of my friends, the veteran women's rights and anti-domestic violence activist Julie Bindel – picketing events where she is speaking about such minor issues as the rape of children and the trafficking of women just because she refuses to accept that their relationship with their phantom limb is the most pressing problem that women – real and imagined – are facing right now.

So, what was it that Bindell said that was so awful it warranted protests at the Stonewall awards?

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2008/11/07...newall-awards/

Campaigner Ros Kaveney said:

“Ms Bindel is advocating talking therapies for trans people in a way that almost entirely parallels the advocacy of talking therapies by the Christian right as a way of extirpating all LGBT people.

“If she does not understand that, as a lesbian, she is a turkey advocating Christmas for turkeys in an adjacent bit of the farmyard, then she is being obtuse; what she is doing is betraying not only the trans community but the entire LGBT community, and it is wrong to honour her for her other work when there is this colossal stain on her career.”

Ms Bindel has apologised over the tone of a 2004 article Gender Benders Beware but stands by her view that people should question the basis of the diagnosis of male psychiatrists, “at a time when gender polarisation and homophobia work hand-in-hand.”

“Iran carries out the highest number of sex change surgeries in the world,” she said.

“It is unnecessary mutilation – in my opinion there is nothing ‘wrong’ with those who are currently seen as candidates for transgender surgery – they just don’t fit the gender stereotype.

“Surgery is an attempt to keep gender stereotypes intact. The diagnosis of childhood GID (gender identity disorder) follows old-fashioned notions of what constitutes appropriate behaviour for those assigned to the sex classes of male and female.

“It is precisely this idea that certain distinct behaviours are appropriate for males and females that underlies feminist criticism of the phenomenon of ‘transgenderism’. This view is shared by a large number of feminists of all ages and backgrounds.”

[DanaC]

So, a differene of opinion then.

Anyway, back to Julie Birchill's Guardian piece:

Similarly, Suzanne's original piece was about the real horror of the bigger picture – how the savagery of a few old Etonians is having real, ruinous effects on the lives of the weakest members of our society, many of whom happen to be women. The reaction of the trans lobby reminded me very much of those wretched inner-city kids who shoot another inner-city kid dead in a fast-food shop for not showing them enough "respect". Ignore the real enemy – they're strong and will need real effort and organisation to fight. How much easier to lash out at those who are conveniently close to hand!

But they'd rather argue over semantics. To be fair, after having one's nuts taken off (see what I did there?) by endless decades in academia, it's all most of them are fit to do. Educated beyond all common sense and honesty, it was a hoot to see the screaming mimis accuse Suze of white feminist privilege; it may have been this that made her finally respond in the subsequent salty language she employed to answer her Twitter critics: "People can just fuck off really. Cut their dicks off and be more feminist than me. Good for them."

It is somewhat troubling when, as a working-class woman who grew up at a time when women still needed their husbands signatures in order to get a loan, buy a car, open a bank account, etc., to be dismissed as part of the oppressor class by someone who grew up male and in a priveleged income bracket.

The dangers and discriminations faced by transexuals, as with any gender non-conformists, is very real and very immediate. But danger and discrimination are something girls are born to and learn to live with in various ways from their earliest development to their last days in the nursing home. The proportion of women who have experienced sexual assault or violence either as children or as adults is staggeringly high even in countries with a good record on female emancipation. Most, and possibly every, woman is conscious of the dangers portrayed as inherent to our gender from a very young age. If we have not suffered sexual assault or violence ourselves, we will know someone who has. In my own circle of friends there are several survivors of rape and domestic abuse.

The anger and sense of threat that trans people feel is understandable. But there appears very little understanding on the part of some of the real and immediate sense of threat the average woman feels walking to the bus stop in the dark, or locking the door at night when they live alone. From our youth we are warned against the dangers of walking in unlit areas at night. Against the dangers of wearing too alluring an outfit, or showing too much bare flesh. Against the dangers of leaving our drinks unattended in a nightclub, or going on a blind date, or getting too drunk to say no to men who will take advantage of our vulnerability.

The female life is bounded by warnings and dangers and messages of weakness and threat from cradle to grave.

And soooo many places, professions, fields of activity might as well have a 'Gurrls Keep out' sign plastered across their fronts for all the welcome they offer to anyone of the female persuasion. Right down to keeping the computer games magazines on the 'Men's Lifestyle' shelf in the newsagents, or as has been graphically demonstrated in recent news of the BBC's longstanding organisational culture of sexual harrassment, the expectation that female bodies are up for grabs or discussion.

I'll stop now, because I'm starting to rant...


Birchill continues:

She, the other JB and I are part of the minority of women of working-class origin to make it in what used to be called Fleet Street and I think this partly contributes to the stand-off with the trannies. (I know that's a wrong word, but having recently discovered that their lot describe born women as 'Cis' – sounds like syph, cyst, cistern; all nasty stuff – they're lucky I'm not calling them shemales. Or shims.) We know that everything we have we got for ourselves. We have no family money, no safety net. And we are damned if we are going to be accused of being privileged by a bunch of bed-wetters in bad wigs.

It's been noted before that cyberspace, though supposedly all new and shiny, is plagued by the age-old boredom of men telling women not to talk and threatening them with all kinds of nastiness if they persist in saying what they feel.

The trans lobby is now saying that it wasn't so much the initial piece as Suzanne's refusal to apologise when told to that "made" them drive her from Twitter. Presumably she is meant to do this in the name of solidarity and the "struggle", though I find it very hard to imagine this mob struggling with anything apart from the English language and the concept of free speech.

To have your cock cut off and then plead special privileges as women – above natural-born women, who don't know the meaning of suffering, apparently – is a bit like the old definition of chutzpah: the boy who killed his parents and then asked the jury for clemency on the grounds he was an orphan.

Shims, shemales, whatever you're calling yourselves these days – don't threaten or bully us lowly natural-born women, I warn you. We may not have as many lovely big swinging Phds as you, but we've experienced a lifetime of PMT and sexual harassment and many of us are now staring HRT and the menopause straight in the face – and still not flinching. Trust me, you ain't seen nothing yet. You really won't like us when we're angry.

I don't necessarily agree with her choice of language. But I can understand her anger. We are fighting the wrong fucking battles people. Choosing the wrong enemies. We are being divided and thoroughly fucking conquered. As evidenced, I think by the low number of young women who now consider themselves feminists.

One of the key problems I think, is the assumption that as far as female emancipation is concerned, the battle is won, the new lines have been drawn and we can all get on with something else. I think the battle is far from won, and the lines are being redrawn again further back along the path we thought we'd done with. In Britain right now the brunt of the recession and austerity measures is falling disproportionately on women. And disproportionately on the poor and low waged. And old attitudes that place the blame for their suffering firmly onto women's own shoulders, whether in assumptions of females as sexually suspect in rape trials and childcare provision for single mums, or assumptions of rampant masochism in the case of women who stay with abusive partners, are resurfacing.

[Aliantha]

But danger and discrimination are something girls are born to and learn to live with in various ways from their earliest development to their last days in the nursing home. The proportion of women who have experienced sexual assault or violence either as children or as adults is staggeringly high even in countries with a good record on female emancipation.

You know, as a mother of teenage boys coming into their adulthood, I read this portion of your post Dana, and it just makes me think that as a parent, I'm terrified of the danger of violence to my sons when they enter the world as adults. It's just a thought, but maybe all the minority groups (women, transgender, gay etc) might have a case, but there's plenty to worry about as a parent of just about any other kid too. Even young males.

nb. I recognise that this is entirely not the topic, but it's just something that occurred to me as I read the op.

[DanaC]

Oh I don't for a moment suggest that boys have danger free lives, or are not subject to threats. But the messages we tend, as a society, to give to boys and girls about danger are very different. And the nature of the threat is also different. For boys the message is that there are dangers in the world and they need to have ways of tackling those dangers. Girls are taught that their gender makes them peculiarly and inherently endangered. And the way to try and avoid danger is often to minimise displays of femininity.

[DanaC]

I'm not suggesting, incidentally, that women are the only or prime sufferers of oppression, violence and discrimination. Patriarchy is often wheeled out as female suffering under male oppression, but the reality is that under a patriarchal system, most people male and female, live under a form of oppression. Gender, class and race all work together to produce variable experiences and identities.

Female and male emancipation and equality are two parts of the same basic equation. As is the not yet fully understood territory between male and female.

[ZenGum]

Speaking as a feminist myself, I think I should say ....



... uhh, what do you want on that sandwich?

[xoxoxoBruce]

The big picture in today's world... it's all about MEEEEEE.

[Pico and ME]

What an interesting perspective, Dana. I never knew this was happening, but I'm not at all surprised about it, especially considering your statement...

It is somewhat troubling when, as a working-class woman who grew up at a time when women still needed their husbands signatures in order to get a loan, buy a car, open a bank account, etc., to be dismissed as part of the oppressor class by someone who grew up male and in a priveleged income bracket.

But, of course they are threatened by smart femininists and its a shame, because of all people, they should be 100% more understanding of the struggle women face.

I grew up being a feminist, but only because I never ever had to count on a man to help me. Everything I did and got for myself was all due to my own efforts. At 50, I refuse to suffer stupidly backwards men, but I am not totally free from their prejudices against women and sometimes still have to take a few steps to get around them.

[Undertoad]

When I enter the ghetto every day, I must steel myself and start a kind of paranoia against the many dangers. I am a hated minority there.

A month ago I had to call for a jumpstart of my car... and later found out there was an armed robbery that happened at the same time, same block, while I waited in the dark for assistance.

But if I was a woman, I wouldn't even go.

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by DanaC

It is somewhat troubling when, as a working-class woman who grew up at a time when women still needed their husbands signatures in order to get a loan, buy a car, open a bank account, etc., to be dismissed as part of the oppressor class by someone who grew up male and in a priveleged income bracket.

Yes. I find it more than somewhat troubling to be assigned a label (especially 'cis', which refers to covalent bonds and has no relevance to gender), defined, and dismissed as an oppressor in what comes down to yet another exercise of upper socioeconomic class male privilege.

[Sundae]

I have an inherent dislike for Julie Burchill.
But way back when I used to buy the Independent on Saturday it ended up mainly to read her op ed. Sometimes she even changed my mind. Other times she allowed me to question my opinions and strengthened them.

If all that kicked this off was a comment about the pressure for women to look like Brazilian transsexuals, I have no idea where to respondants' vitriol comes from. I wish I had a tenner for every time I read that haute couture is designed for boys with tiny perky tits (the further opinion that this is because fashion is dominated by gay men also follows). There seems to be reasonable circumstantial evidence for this.

Birchill writes in her usual "fuck you if you don't want to hear it" style, but she does have a point on the validity of suffering. I do believe that some transsexuals are made not born, by the world and the culture they live in. The same way that some gay men live straight (or straightened) lives because of the culture and times they are born in.

Psychology is in its infancy.
Roll on the advent of Iain Banks' The Culture.

[Aliantha]

As an observation, I have an opinion that the more marginalised a person feels, the more bigoted they become against other marginalised groups, even their own. It's no joke that most of the gay men I've known (and there have been many for one reason or another) are the most bitchy people I've ever known.

[Clodfobble]

I'd absolutely agree with that, Ali. Just like bullies are usually abused at home, and in extremely patriarchal societies it is often the women who push harder for the boundaries on their daughters than the men do.

[DanaC]

Some interesting responses to that article (which was pulled from the website and an apology given by the editor), including this one:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...rans-community

[Happy Monkey]

Moore's statement uses transexuals as an example of a parody of women that it is offensive to expect real women to live up to.

Bindel seems to be accusing gender reassignment surgery - a core desire of many transexuals - of being a sexist plot to prevent woment from acting like men.

Burchill continues the subtext of transexuals being pretend women, by calling them a sort of female minstrel show.