What is a TERF? And why are people mad about it? In short, it's about who controls women's legal rights.
TERF stands for “trans exclusionary radical feminist.”
“Trans” refers to trans women, or male bodied people. TERFs advocate for trans men, with female bodies, and their needs.
“Exclusionary” is because movements must remain focused to achieve their goals.
“Radical” comes from Latin word for root – let's get to the root of things.
“Feminist” is someone who believes women are disadvantaged both now and for thousands of years back. Women have been denied education, told they were less than, had their genitals cut off and sewn together, had their feet broken and bound, been burned in suttee when their husbands died, been denied the vote, not been allowed to own property or run businesses, been treated with drugs tested only on male bodies, been legally raped in marriage, been forcefully married as children, been raped and had the resulting children stolen from them, been committed to insane asylums or killed for being raped, been forced to give birth and forced to have abortions, been told their medical conditions are just in their head, had their breasts “ironed,” been jailed for life for miscarriages, been made to sleep in menstruation huts where they get eaten by wild animals or killed by fire or due to exposure, been raped to “correct” lesbianism, and more.
TERFs (also known as second wave feminists) believe this is because men want to control our reproductive abilities and since they are stronger than us, they often do.
We realize it is impossible to LITERALLY change one's birth sex (too bad, or else our foremothers would have happily done so to escape such persecution), and we acknowledge that women deserve some spaces that are private just for them – like public bathrooms, domestic violence shelters, rape crisis centers, prisons, feminist groups – and that the development of these groups has greatly expanded the ability of women to participate in public life (see “urinary leash”).
TERFs want everyone to be free of gender role expectations and free to dress and act as they please (within the bounds of polite society, of course, not displaying porn to children or anything like that).
We sympathize with men who experience gender dysphoria and wish to transition to be as female as possible. We understand that they also feel at risk from male violence and we are happy to support them in seeking their own DV shelters, crisis counseling, prison wings, trans advocacy groups, and gender neutral bathrooms. We do not consider them to have a right to take away ours, and we realize that redefining the word “woman” to mean “anyone who says they feel like a woman,” women lose:
Removing the legal right of women to organize politically against sex-based oppression by males
Removing the legal right of women to assemble outside of the presence of men
Removing the legal right of women to educational programs created for women outside the presence of men
Eliminating data collection of sex based inequalities in areas where females are underrepresented
Elimination of sex-based crime statistics
Eliminating athletic programs and sports competition for women and girls
Removing the legal right of women to be free from the presence of men in areas of public accommodation where nudity occurs
Elimination of grants, scholarships, board and trustee designations, representative positions, and affirmative programs for women
Removing the legal right of women to create reproductive clinics, rape crisis services, support groups, or any organizations for females
Eliminating media and all public discourse specific to females
Removal of the right of journalists to report the sex, and history, of subjects
Eliminating the legal right of lesbians to congregate publicly
Elimination of lesbian specific organizations and advocacy groups
Removing the legal right of women to free speech related to sex roles and gender
Elimination of the legal right of women to protection from state-enforced sex-roles (appearance/behavior/thought)
Elimination of the legal right of girls to protection from state-enforced sex roles in education
Elimination of the patient right of dependent females to hospital/facility bed assignments separate from males
Elimination of the right of dependent females to prefer female providers for their intimate personal care requirements
Elimination of the human right of female prisoners under state confinement to be house separately from male prisoners
Unlike any other social justice movement in history, the contemporary push for "transgender rights" (as it is currently being played out*) are unique in that they are based on eliminating sex-based rights and protections of women and girls." - Gallus Mag
Women have said no, we want to keep our rights. This has made an extreme element of the trans movement quite angry. They refuse to recognize boundaries and behave in obscene and threatening ways both off- and online in order to try to intimidate women into giving up their rights. This element of the trans movement – which is very different from the old transsexual movement, which recognized they were still their birth sex and were respectful of women's boundaries – was founded by John Money, a sadistic pedophile who performed experiments on children's genitals.
They like to claim that trans people are a vulnerable part of society that will commit suicide if not allowed to transition and is often murdered after they do. Both statements have been debunked, and are also a manipulative tactic that should not be the basis for removing rights from a different group.
This part of the trans movement, also called TRA for “trans rights activist,” insists that children should be allowed to take chemotherapy drugs like Lupron, which they say are “safe puberty blockers that give kids more time to decide.” The truth is Lupron destroys bones, stunts mental as well as physical growth, damages internal organs, and has a very long list of side effects for which the maker has been sued many times. 80% to 90% of children with gender dysphoria will grow out of it if allowed to.
Many gender nonconforming children grow up to be gay or lesbian – the dangers of this new “conversion therapy,” which also sterilizes those kids, is skyrocketing to the point where multiple original founders of gay, lesbian and bi organizations (like Fred Sargeant, one of the two gay men who helped found the FIRST Pride Parade) have been speaking out against this new form of homophobia and founding new organizations like LGB Alliance.
This extremist movement is also insisting on laws allowing males to cheat by self identifying into female sports, with no gatekeeping, and stealing prizes and scholarships meant for girls and women.
They also talk about the “cotton ceiling,” that is the concept that lesbians are evil for not wanting to have sex with men who claim to be lesbians. This is just another form of corrective rape.
As more and more people wake up to the evil these extremists are promoting, they are getting more and more violent and threatening. TERF is now used a slur that basically means someone is fair game, just like witch used to mean. It is often used to However, the more of us wake up and push back against their plans, the stronger we are.
If someone calls you a TERF, be proud. It means you have at least a little bit of backbone and critical thinking. If you hear someone being called a TERF, go investigate both people and see who is actually being a bully.
Just a few links if you want to know more:
https://saidit.net/s/GenderCritical/
https://www.feministcurrent.com/2016/10/04/this-is-how-they-broke-our-grandmothers/
https://theconversation.com/why-self-identification-should-not-legally-make-you-a-woman-103372
https://www.facebook.com/RadFemCollective/posts/14-rules-of-misogyny1st-rule-of-misogyny-women-are-responsible-for-what-men-do2n/1610688362390104/
http://boysvswomen.com
https://vimeo.com/263005351
https://wlrnmedia.wordpress.com/2020/06/19/trans-rights-are-mens-rights-no-wonder-they-clash-with-feminists/
https://victimfocusblog.com/2020/06/18/to-my-radical-feminist-sisters/
https://twitter.com/radicalhag/status/1259463954662854657
archive.is/gIz5d
https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2020/01/59422/ https://twitter.com/TwisterFilm/status/1222662654277365760
https://thefederalist.com/2018/02/20/rich-white-men-institutionalizing-transgender-ideology/
https://medium.com/@sue.donym1984/inauthentic-selves-the-modern-lgbtq-movement-is-run-by-philanthropic-astroturf-and-based-on-junk-d08eb6aa1a4b
https://issydickinson.com/2019/12/28/trans-identified-males-and-womens-single-sex-spaces/
https://twitter.com/LilyLilyMaynard/status/1218184415211401218
https://www.womenarehuman.com/transparadoxes-self-contradictions-of-the-gender-identity-movement/
https://medium.com/@meanwhileipaint/ladies-rooms-i-have-loved-before-61334fe2603e
*I'm making this to refer people to when I see them asking this question on social media.
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