TRAs were angry when r/gendercritical existed. Now they're mad s/gendercritical exists. It's almost like banning subs doesn't delete people from existence

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-19T08:34:08+00:00

Because they know their ideology makes no sense beyond being self-serving and they know even the libfems don't believe it really. Their biggest fear is that people actually start reading GC ideas with an open mind and find they agree with them so their only solution is to just try to take away any platform GC has. This can't really work in the long run. Eventually, people enabling TRAs will move on to some other cause and other people will stop being terrified to voice agreement and investigate GC views for themselves. Remember as much as many people may say they hate "TERFs" the vast majority of those TRA supporters agree that sex is real and immutable at least and that transwomen are male.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-28T14:34:20+00:00

I hate that bad faith shit with "u don't think infertile women are women then!" - No one thinks infertile women are not female. I've literally never heard anyone say that. People think biological males aren't female because they factually are not. Also when you argue to define women as a "concept" based on gender roles you are actually excluding a lot of women from the definition who do not conform to gender roles.

(preaching to the choir here I know but that shit is so annoying).

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-10T20:50:50+00:00

Yeah, the mods privated the sub while they tried to figure out a way to actually comply with the new rules and Reddit is just like "No. Fuck you. Banned." Proof this is just about silencing people.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-27T17:54:46+00:00

The "T" in TRA increasingly seems to stand for "terrorist".

Ideology aside even so many of them are just awful people.

[Of course also just keep in mind that a "transphobe" to them is literally just anyone they don't like. Could be someone who just looks at them the wrong way.]

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T15:59:47+00:00

worse than that I think, they want an excuse to hate on feminists while being perceived on the left and they like trans ideology because they like the idea that they have the option of opting out of male privilege. I think there's a strategic element to TRAs fighting to remove all actual medical criteria of dysphoria from transness and making it totally possible to self-ID as one of the "most oppressed women"

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-22T07:45:14+00:00

The narcissists didn't really think this through. They got what they wanted - everyone on Reddit has to pretend to respect them and say they're women whether they actually believe it or not but...their whole "identity" is based around pretending they are persecuted and obsessing about and stalking "bad women" so they have no heretics left to hound and have to come over here. Pathetic. I believe I read a book a long time ago with the idea the anti-Semite defines himself in terms of his opposition to his caricature of the Jew. The same type of thing is going on here.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-25T17:52:18+00:00

Yes. When you consider he will now likely be encouraged to potentially ruin his health and get sterilized just because he likes a certain color and his parents can't accept that in a boy you really realize how horrible gender ideology is. It's even worse than the parents that just wouldn't allow a boy to do that.

and to speak out against this crazy regressive shit is considered horrible hateful bigotry. It's just so backwards.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-16T00:55:52+00:00

Lurking in GenderCynical did more to push me towards actually hating trans people than any gender critical sub ever did. I actually had to stop reading it because it really was starting to make me prejudiced against all transwomen. The ones in that sub are so awful and misogynistic.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-20T14:00:59+00:00

How the hell does someone get a job as a professor to rant and rave like a mentally ill person about deluded nonsense like this. Imagine actually paying to be educated by this person?

If you're going to make a silly conspiracy theory at least pick a group with actual power in society like, say, a group having money poured into it by an ex-military billionaire with high ties to American politics that is rapidly pushing through an unpopular legislative agenda in pretty much all western countries largely under the radar.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-04T11:54:55+00:00

Amazing how people like Shatner who probably have not been exposed to transcult ideology just naturally come to sensible mildly-GC positions on these things and now all the TRAs are just gonna peak him more if they go after him for it.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-20T01:37:35+00:00

I first checked out r/GenderCritical last year because of one of them saying that to someone else in a sub I was lurking in "Don't even read what they have to say! You may agree with it and "become a bigot!" ". Total cult behavior. So pathetic when they say things like that and don't realize it means they have no real arguments.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T14:36:10+00:00

I'm torn on this. I want to be optimistic and agree as I don't think most people actually believe transwomen are women but I think there is still a lot of misogyny out there. There is enough information about the "TERF" position out there that people could at least look into it more but many men seem happy to just hate on JK Rowling or other women while hiding behind wokeness and protecting a "vulnerable minority". I am so disgusted with how most left-wing men react to this issue.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-18T04:13:22+00:00

, can you explain why a neopenis/phalloplasty is not a penis? P

Counter-question can you explain what a penis does? What it's function is biologically? I believe that will answer your question why a neophallus is not a penis.

so that the trans man can feel things like how a non-trans man feels things through his penis.

Can they use their neo-penis to ejaculate sperm? [Disclaimer: I don't reallly care if transmen want to pretend they have a penis and call it a penis and it makes them feel good to have it but definitionally it is not a penis.]

A man is not "something with a penis" [fucking ewww at that dehumanizing definition, not sure where you got it] Men are adult human males usually with XY chromosomes and who have usually at least at one time in our lives had the ability to produce sperm. Obviously removing genitals does not make a man not a man or a woman not a woman. I really don't know anyone who believes different. Even trans people will usually talk about their social transition and not just that they're a woman because they got their penis and testicles removed.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-30T01:11:31+00:00

No. I support the Nordic model. Go after the demand and the pimps of course.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-19T06:36:22+00:00

It doesn't have a definition the way they use it. If you do anything to offend a TRA (usually just disagreeing with them even on a minor point is enough) you will get called transphobic. It's really as simple as that. The fascist and authoritarian mind is not concerned with truth or justice. If they identify you as an enemy they will invent or amplify some infraction to justify that. There's a saying how fascist countries had more laws then any other country so they could always find something to charge you with - same with "transphobia". People seriously need to stop apologizing and groveling to these people. It will never be enough.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-13T21:10:28+00:00

It definitely wouldn't work with AGPs as they fetishize womanhood so they will just demand entrance to "AFAB spaces". A woman was banned from Twitter recently for telling a non-binary female person that "only females get cervical cancer" when feminists protested this a bunch of transmen started shrieking about how they are actually male not female and hearing that only females have cervixes invalidates them so I can't even really say it's just transwomen who are unreasonable here and It's hard to believe the transmen would have magically accepted "Only AFAB people get cervical cancer". Besides, AFAB is actually terminology that is actually accurate for some intersex people. I don't think we should take it from them just because some trans people cannot handle the reality of their biological sex.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T16:36:06+00:00

Well I am a left-leaning male myself so I'm obviously not talking about all left-leaning males, just the woke TRA-supporting variety. It pisses me off so much because men who really believe in left-wing values are supposed to support women and feminism as I'm sure your friends do.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-05T00:26:56+00:00

I don't think it's really that simple. There's an old saying about how history is written by the winners and while there may be some cases where people really should have known better at the time than to support some cause usually everyone sees themselves as the heroes in their own historical narrative and how it is remembered depends on what historical narrative wins out.

Obviously, I support equal civil rights for all people and reject TRA's framing of the issue that they are an oppressed group who only wants the rights that other people have. I feel my support for gender critical activism is consistent with my lifelong support for women's rights and social justice. Of course, I have given this a lot of thought and there was a time when I first started following this issue that I wasn't too sure where I stood on it but I have heard most of the arguments from both sides and that has swayed me (in that I find only one side consistently actually makes logical and sound arguments to be honest) so even if TRA's "win" temporarily and GC is looked at even more negatively than it currently is I will have no regrets for standing by my principles.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-10T12:07:47+00:00

Such confusing and terrible language. I thought maybe they were talking about transmen at first as they are really "transgender female". Why is the media lying and saying male athletes are not just women but female? This is just pushing for legalized cheating. Most people are not even going to watch if women's sports turn into some failed male athletes dominating it. Let them compete against other males. Everything does not exist to validate them.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-27T19:46:07+00:00

That's legitimately terrifying. I'm just waiting for one of them to actually commit a massacre and then for the others to start with the "no true transwomen" shit. We've already had Rivers and other cases of serious violence like this school shooting, this is not all just LARPing with them.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-09T22:16:08+00:00

Porn is a multi-billion dollar industry. Not just something a few people do for fun. It does have huge effects on society as it continually reflects negative misogynistic attitudes about women. Also, many porn actresses are not well treated even if you can find a few that possibly are and it encourages human trafficking. There are many detailed critiques of the porn industry from feminists that you can read.

Consensual BDSM is really a separate topic. We actually had a thread about it a week or two ago. I don't think it should simply be banned. Porn for profit should be though.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-12T03:07:20+00:00

It's all male violence and projection. They assume we want to do with them what they want to do to us (giving them perhaps too much credit that they actually believe we want to do violence to them and are not just knowingly lying.)

Reddit will not do anything to them because threatening women based on sex is fine according to them. Say the same thing about TRAs and you would get banned (if this needs to be said I obviously do not support threatening violence against TRAs either)

DistantGlimmer · 2020-11-17T19:31:03+00:00

Honesty and refusal to back down gets read as "rudeness" and "transphobia". "Just be kind" actually means "don't say those things that hurt male feelings!" I certainly can't speak for women on this but I feel like it is an unfair stereotype. Maybe some will be more actually "rude" talking among themselves in GC spaces but I haven't seen a lot of interaction where GC go out of their way to be rude, insulting or mean with trans people. Usually, it is the other way around.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-17T03:24:51+00:00

Gender non-conforming people can be marginalized and discriminated against for being gender non-conforming but I don't believe transwomen are systemically oppressed as a group the way women are,, no.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-09T18:40:08+00:00

It seems "misgendering" (i.e. calling a biologically male person male) is enough for a thought crime which in his case turns into a literal crime. Insane. I always pictured Aussies as like down to earth and sensible. I don't even know what's happening with this shit anymore.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-28T10:45:21+00:00

This is really sad. I really enjoyed talking to DetransIS on the debate sub. She is a very intelligent and moderate person who I learned a lot from , certainly not a "transphobe".

This is just such creeping authoritarianism. A huge web site effectively being moderated by a tiny group of bullies with a political agenda who just make up whatever the hell they want to smear people who they disagree with and silence vulnerable groups at will. It just makes me sick to my stomach. I really hope Reddit burns. I've never wanted a website to fail so badly based on the way they treat people.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-26T03:35:59+00:00

Being GNC yourself but reinforcing the belief in gender roles for other people through your beliefs which I believe NBs do is extremely shitty and hypocritical behavior IMO,

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-30T10:23:28+00:00

Someone should ask her a followup question to explain what a gender-identity is in a non-circular way and provide proof that they exist.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-30T02:43:06+00:00

I have no desire to see prostituted women punished as they are largely victims of a predatory industry however I think prostitution itself is very harmful and I don't see how completely decriminalizing it will deter it.

You say the New Zealand law is a great success but I wonder from what point of view? There are always interviews with the small minority of women who sell sex voluntarily and find this "liberating" we rarely if ever hear from the true victims.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-16T20:45:58+00:00

They did not even call him male in the police warning because under Canadian law this individual is legally female and entitled to use female spaces. A girl or woman cannot complain if they feel unsafe sharing a bathroom with this "legal female" and don't forget that if he re-offends this male sex offender will be locked up with vulnerable women. It is an outrage.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-30T10:30:20+00:00

Yeah, they infantilize trans people and treat them like small fragile children who can't cope with reality. It's like that patronizing white-savior type racism. Actually far more transphobic in a "benevolent" way than typical GC attitudes towards trans people.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-11-18T03:45:21+00:00

I mean I'm sure the odd GC person has lost their temper and said something they probably regretted later but I have yet to see a TRA equivalent to: https://terfisaslur.com/

Which really goes quite far beyond "rudeness".

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-02T14:59:05+00:00

"Everything is transphobic" does not even feel like hyperbole anymore. If "women" is a transphobic term you'd think the TRAs would quite saying "transwomen are women" but we all know they won't do that.

They want so desperately to be women but they hate that women exist as a biological reality. It really does just seem like males throwing a tantrum that there is any little thing they are excluded from.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-20T02:31:51+00:00

Gender-neutral pronouns bother me because society has gotten to the point where GNC people are automatically "theyed" by others. Back on the old sub, we had a teacher who posted that she pulled aside a 14 year old GNC girl and asked her for her pronouns. This is harmful and regressive and seems to be happening far more often than not. Feminine women are never assumptively called "they," only masculine ones.

That's a very good point. Assuming people have a different pronoun than their biological sex is harmful especially for kids.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-17T19:05:02+00:00

From a feminist standpoint it is harmful because it means you can not talk about common experiences women have under patriarchy as an oppressed class. You can not make laws to protect women as a group (that excludes males), you cannot have women-only spaces or groups which exclude males. Crime statistics are not recorded properly. We have violent males committing crimes and being reported in the media as "woman violently rapes someone" because said males are trans-identified.

What exactly does it mean to saay that man and woman refer to "gender"? I am only actually familiar with "gender" as a set of roles that enforce a hierarchy? They claim they have a gender identity but what exactly are they identifying with?. They can never answer this often-used GC argument that the way they define man and woman as a gender always comes down to just being circular and meaningless or reinforcing sexist stereotypes about the way women are "supposed to act in society" and gender essentialism.

Because I feel like the next time TQs are going to steal the word sex too and say "a trans man's sex is male" and "a trans woman's sex is female" instead of using "gender". Or maybe they have already done that ...

They have

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-12T19:16:40+00:00

If transwomen are made unsafe sharing spaces with males then why exactly is there no danger with having transwomen in women's spaces? I know you at least acknowledge transwomen are male so how are transwomen different from other males in regards to danger? Most seem to just accept that transwomen do not pose the same threat of violence as other males do but no proof is ever offered that transwomen undergo different socialization than other males (remember many go through an entire childhood at least before they start transitioning so why the difference?).

As LoveSloane said above. More fact-based assertions and less suppositions based on wishful thinking would be good.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-07T12:57:14+00:00

It's a social construct dependant on culture what is considered feminine and masculine although there is also a big hierarchical and controlling aspect to how they are constructed to enforce patriarchal norms. They don't exist in nature if that is what you are asking.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-28T14:05:02+00:00

trying make sure we don’t have any rights?

No one is trying to do that. Latin American immigrants locked in the border camps have no human rights. Trans people in western countries have all the human rights anyone else of their birth sex has. Why are you seemingly incapable of being honest about this?

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-18T02:20:40+00:00

Hoteronormative hegemony for those who don’t pass a

So if heteronormativity is the problem why do you reinforce it by claiming transwomen are women rather than fighting to distigmatize transness as a separate category (something I've often said I fully support)?

garden variety patriarchy for those who do.

I'd argue that patriarchy is actually at the root of the problems that all gender-nonconforming males but face but it is disrespectful to women to imply that we are oppressed by patriarchy in the same way women are even for those who sometimes can pass as women in casual contact.

Laws targeting trans people specifically have been passed recently

Which laws specifically?. Laws denying that trans people (transwomen specifically) can change sex are not targetting trans people. They are simply recognizing the sex-based rights of women which is a good thing.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-12T22:20:09+00:00

This is one study with very small sample size. I think there are issues with using a small study like that to "prove" anything either on the TRA or GC side. I am looking for an explanation of why males would be less violent just because they self-identified as transgender. Transwomen may be less physically strong than the statistically strongest men but they are still certainly physically capable of violence against women and girls.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-07T12:25:14+00:00

I sent them an angry complaint yesterday. They seem to have edited out the worst of the slander from what they had yesterday but it is still inaccurate and doesn't make it clear that it is a slur.

Totally unbelievable that a professional dictionary site would put up this crap in the first place essentially saying "beware of the witches!" and egging on violence against feminists. It's surreal how much power TRAs seem to have in the tech world.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-03T17:47:27+00:00

The way the current woke left uses that "paradox of tolerance" is just so chilling. It is actually a blueprint for authoritarianism as you are allowing those in power to define what ideas should or should not be tolerated and have a rationale for making any ideas they dislike illegal (you can pretty much say every political idea is "intolerant" of some group). . Do these self-described left-wingers not see how promoting this idea could backfire on them?

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-14T02:54:43+00:00

It's unbelievable. I've been reading Twitter more since all the shit on Reddit went down but the TRAs there are a special bunch. They say that no one denies biological sex but then call people Nazis and shit if they call a female person female and we can't even correct or argue with them about it or we get banned despite the fact that calling someone female is not misgendering. sigh.

It does feel like bratty kids have just been given control of these internet platforms.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-04T04:55:53+00:00

Their whole argument is "men are dangerous, even other transwomen are dangerous but not me!" I'm special and need to be protected and of course, I'd never be a danger to women." It's so manipulative and narcissistic.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-20T14:38:28+00:00

It's hard when I don't believe it. You want me to lie about how I see this hypothetical person..

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-17T00:04:46+00:00

Yeah, reading the shit on the old TERFIsaSlur group as one of the main things that peaked me into completely not believing that transwomen were women or that they were oppressed people.. I mean women can be vicious to other women in their own ways but there is a certain horrible way that misogynist males talk to the women they hate with very particular speech patterns and male TRAs emulate that perfectly.

You're also right that while I've had some cruel and nasty things said to me by TRAs I've never had the personal and violent threats women get from them. They have a special hatred for women who disagree with them.

They want to believe they are exactly like women just because they claim to want that but they put no work into actually fighting their male socialization. The transwomen I've talked to that do fight their male socialization are very different but they, unfortunately, seem like the minority.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-13T22:26:30+00:00

I think it's because most women (and many men as well) accept the narrative that "they just want to pee" and don't interact with TRAs online the way GC people do. Most people in general aren't going to take an extremely depressing and socially isolating position on an issue like this unless they have researched it heavily it is far easier in the current environment to just not ask too many questions especially if you are on the left of the political spectrum where being openly GC will get you ostracised. We have Biden saying this is the greatest human rights issue of our time and all kinds of medical professionals in the tank for the trans lobby for whatever reason. It's not that women are just ignorant or deliberately acting against their own interests for some reason but I think it is just an exmple of collective gaslighting.

When and if we come through this the way the TRAs operate is going to be a huge case study of incredibly effective propaganda. Basically, only a small number of people have to genuinely believe something in order to exert intense psychological pressure on a much larger group of people to go along with it.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-20T21:58:06+00:00

Gender and sex get deliberately conflated because "sex" means something concrete that excludes people without actual dysphoria while "gender identity" is just a "feeling" that can mean almost anything. They are really trying to make "sex" as a biological category as meaningless as "gender" is (see also saying that sex is a spectrum and a "white supremacist" construct)

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-11T15:43:49+00:00

Trans activists use these sort questions as some sort of gotcha to try to push the idea that "biological sex is a spectrum and can be changed". The reality is that sex is immutable and easily observible at birth 99.8% of people. For the remainig fraction who do actually need their sex assigned to them they are still clearly a subclass of the sex they belong to and it is insulting and othering to act as if people with DSDs are not "clearly' male or female.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T14:24:53+00:00

"I don't think spermatogenic organs are female" is the same sort of thing as murdering a man for using makeup.

Not sure where this is coming from certainly all GC people and even many of more moderate trans people will agree and not call you transphobic if you say penises aren't female. Certain concessions with language (i.e. not using "TIM" ) are probably needed if we want trans people to come here and debate in good faith or at least that's how it was in the old sub.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-28T20:00:01+00:00

You have no rights to cosmetic surgery or to hide your identity. Transwomen need to learn to deal with their dysphoria in a way that doesn't require them to hide their true identity. I am not against adults transitioning and even getting that covered if it is shown to be medically necessary. but if we are talking about the US where many actually life-threatening procedures are not covered I don't see why an exception should be made for transwomen's psychological needs.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-22T06:11:19+00:00

Other than being a mild irritation reading about it online not really. It just seems so narcissistic to have a whole day dedicated to how to correctly address a special group of people (and the same group of people claims to be the most oppressed people in the world). I'm kind of glad to live in a small town where the whole custom pronouns thing hasn't taken off. We have so many actual problems as a society right now. It's so frivolous to be wasting energy on this.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-20T02:43:15+00:00

However, It is transphobic to not respect that guy and blatantly ignore his gender identity b

Why? Is it Islamophobic to ignore someone's belief in Allah if I don't share that belief? Isn't the best way to handle this in a pluralistic society to simply not discuss it rather than forcing the non-believer to bow down to the other person's beliefs in the name of "respect". I don't think I should be compelled to show a belief in anyone's gender identity as I do not believe the concept of gender identity itself is a real thing (and I think the belief is harmful to people).

Your implication here is that this is an eminently reasonable position that no one should disagree with but I don't see it that way.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-20T22:07:40+00:00

I would like for the category "transwomen" and "transmen" to come into wide use and be seen as a separate sex category. I think we should recognize the unique experience of transsexual while still recognizing the fact that actually changing sex is impossible. If transwomen could just be accepted as transwomen and be allowed to be as gender non-conforming as they want and if that becomes destigmatized by society I think it actually helps to move towards our wider goals of gender abolition. I certainly would not force or even encourage people to detransition unless it is something they really want to do. My understanding of it is that most transsexuals did not used to believe they actually changed sex and were just transitioning to try to cope with dysphoria so why can't we go back to that?

The issue of ID is a difficult one though. I realize it makes it easier for you to have your desired sex on your ID but I still consider it dishonest and wrong. Perhaps a solution would be just lessening the number of times people have to show ID with their sex on it in casual situations?

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-20T18:54:08+00:00

Gender identity ideology reinforces gender stereotypes. If you believe most people identify with a set of gender roles I think people, especially younger people want a way to express that they don't. Neither gender stereotype is attractive to most people. I think we should be pushing the message that "everybody is non-binary" which is just a rephrasing of encouraging people to reject gender roles but it's hard when the dominant ideology right now contradicts that. It's one of the things that makes the whole idea of gender identity so harmful and wrong.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-09T00:48:49+00:00

I agree with this . The issue is that they treat a failure to comply as some form of bigotry if they viewed it as a courtesy I imagine more GC-types would go along esp.if the also treated GC women with more respect in return but I doubt that will happen unless the TRAs lose a lot of steam and backing.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-29T00:58:19+00:00

I do it when arguing with TRA-types just to specify that I am talking about biology and not gender roles like 'Ok, you don't"identify as a man but you're still biologically male." and then you have to often bring up masculine socialization which is a separate thing from being biologically male even though it is something universal to the male experience.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-13T22:29:40+00:00

I feel bad for this woman as it seems that she may be concerned about being branded a "transphobe" and the ensuing shitstorm on top of dealing with her rape trauma. If she is saying what she feels she needs to to avoid that I think it is very understandable under the circumstances.

Obviously the fact that the woke Stasi has advanced to such a point where that is a legitimate fear a rape victim would have is absolutely sickening and misogynistic.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-31T05:07:06+00:00

Yeah, I joined and I like the look of the site but you're right I don't think they want TRAs/non-GC on there as they are understandably worried about hackers and other troublemakers.

A lot of my will to debate with them actual QT kind of died with the way they treated us on Reddit to be honest. I still get into it with TRAs on Twitter or Youtube sometimes but I don't find the dynamics here too bad where it is just a discussion group really. TRAs 99% of the time operate in bad faith and dealing with them gets exhausting and I don't know if we'll ever get back the lurker audience we had on Reddit that makes it sort of worthwhile to debunk their crap.

A few more moderate trans people for this group would be nice.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-15T21:16:35+00:00

Thanks for dropping by. We are trying to rebuild the space here although obviously it is much smaller now . It shows exactly how intolerant transactivists are that even polite questioning of their ideas is considered hateful and it is amazing and sad to me that they have got a major site to go along with them on this (several actually since at least Twitter also bans people who disagree with TRAs for minor infractions all the time).

I also liked that people did change their minds. Trans activists and feminists both got a better idea of one another's everyday lives. There were even some video debates. I think if Reddit hadn't banned the sub, it would've reached new popularity as a rare spot where these views could interact.

I think this is a good point. I don't think many people "changed sides" like if you were GC you probably weren't going to become QT or vice-versa but we did learn a lot from the people we were debating I think. I personally grew to understand what dysphoria is a lot better and stopped thinking of trans people as the same of GNC people which I used to believe when I came to the debate sub. TRAs are always telling us to actually talk to trans people and educate ourselves and now they've taken away one of my only ways to actually do that. I do not think a sub that actually promoted hate would allow for this kind of learning about the other side or that actually hateful people would be interested in doing that or questioning their own views.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-14T20:49:53+00:00

The notion that men are all in on a devious plot to oppress women, rather than women's oppression simply having been the historical product of material forces (including biological differences)

Yes it is an attempt to explain female oppression in a way that doesn't put it down to biological differences and "nature". That doesn't make it a "conspiracy theory" It is simply a power structure within society just as racism is. I've never heard anyone say that there are a group of men conspiring to maintain patriarchy knowingly. Most of the men who benefit from it just see it as natural and the way it should be the same as any ruling class.

So them saying something like, "some women have penises, so your guide on women's health is offensive because it only mentions vaginas", is categorically the same as declaring that the word history is offensive because it (allegedly) implies history is about men and not women. The allegation here is that you started it.

No. Suggesting that any male can be a woman and thus "some women have penises" is offensive to women. As I remember it the coining of the word "herstory" was mainly an attempt to make a rhetorical point about the male focus of historical research at that time (which still exists to this day, unfortunately). It was not women literally being offended because the word history has "his" in it. It's just ironic given how male focused most history is.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T10:45:58+00:00

There was someone who posted a while ago who I liked who called themselves a "trans-exclusionary radical transwoman". That was pretty clever. When I asked them about it they said they'd been called a T*RF on multiple occasions by people who knew they were a transwoman. I think they will call anyone that who is sane and refuses to follow in lockstep with trans ideology.

I certainly get called it a lot even though men can't be radfems. Other than the fact that it's a slur used to bully women I sort of take it as a badge of honor to be called that by them.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-28T21:57:26+00:00

I have not seen an "overwhelming avalanche of evidence". The transition seems to help some but others detransition.

Hiding is not the solution. Making being opennly trans more acceptable is a better solution. You have the same rights against discrimination anyone else has. Why do people need all kinds of special privileges based on some bullshit "gender identity" which bluntly cannot be proven to exist? Being gender critical most of us are also gender non-conforming, we support the destigmatization of gender non-conforming people but not the misogynistic notion of gender identity which current trans activism is regrettably based upon.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-21T06:26:49+00:00

No one is compelling you to say you believe in Corona virus. There's an obvious difference between forcing someone to go along with safety regulations for communal benefit and forcing someone to say something they do not believe for the supposed benefit of someone else's feelings.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-17T18:53:58+00:00

Oppression is defined (in one formulation) as the prolonged cruel or unjust exercise of power

Yes but who is doing this then with regard to transwomen? What systems of power have been set up specifically to oppress transwomen? Transmen are oppressed but this is obviously on account of them being born female not being trans-identified.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-17T04:36:45+00:00

I have never heard anyone say that it has zero effect (and wouldn't agree on that) I do think or at least hope that it isn't the main factor determining it though. My own experience is that a lot of the negative aspects of male socialization can at least be worked on and improved even though it certainly is not as simple as many transwomen make out to get rid of it. There probably is a biological element with testosterone making men naturally more aggressive but when you look at transmen they don't suddenly become identically violent to men when they start taking testosterone so a lot of it is socialization.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-29T18:33:56+00:00

I think this gets to the central contradiction in gender identity: There would be 4 options. -

1 "Woman" is defined by biology but then transwomen are not women.

2 There are no differences in gendered behavior between women and men. Sex is a category but only physical and not meaningful in social interaction. Gender is very fluid and not really based on sex. I don't think anyone on either side believes this as if it were the case transwomen should be as safe in men's spaces as women's spaces.

3 Gender is a messy ill-defined blob of social stereotypes that transwomen can try to emulate to "become women". This is the only definition that is logical at all so it is what TRAs are left with. It is anti-feminist and reinforces gender roles You can make it a little less sexist by adding in physical secondary sex characteristics which transwomen can change but it still is misogynistic at the core.

4 "Anyone who says they are a woman is a woman". I don't think this should even be a proper definition as it makes the term woman completely meaningless.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-12T16:09:01+00:00

Yeah no matter how feminine a transwoman presents it is hard to see how they could ever share a complete female experience "being treated as a woman by most of society" is not the same as being an adult human female. It's like what Peaking was saying in their comment a sex vs. gender distinction.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-21T17:17:13+00:00

Yes it shows an extreme lack of regard for the context GNC women would operate under in these societies to reduce this to a lifestyle choice.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-21T17:04:57+00:00

This is an excellent point. There is a tremendously ugly and misogynist element to saying that strong female role models are actually men quite apart from the historical inaccuracy of it.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-13T22:36:39+00:00

As long as you have gendered socialization I don't think it would ever be possible for adults to change sex even if they could theoretically in all physical ways. I suppose theoretically you could take a baby in some future world and change their chromosomes and biology to make them the other sex but that ability seems like something that would have nothing to do with trans people and would be highly abused if sexism still existed in that world the way it does in ours (note that the belief that this would ever even be possible is actually contrary to gender identity ideology as it assumes that no "gender essence" exists and gender is completely socially constructed).

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-10T02:52:36+00:00

I think it's degrading and harmful even when not explicitly violent but I am sure laws would have to be made and it would be quite complicated where the line would be drawn.

I've heard people criticize BDSM but never anyone talk about banning it either. Don't know how you even could. Obviously we don't want the government policing sexual practices of consenting adults in private.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-20T19:56:29+00:00

They are more comparable to Pol Pot and other extreme Maoists. They do not view ideological enemies as worthy of "saving" simply as impediments to "progress" who must be silenced as part of the permanent revolution. Yes, most of them haven't literally killed anyone but I have no doubt that your average TRA would if they thought they could get away with it. It's a horrid ideology and yes, while religions have plenty of misogynistic parts only trans ideology is entirely predicated on misogynistic ideas. Especially autogynephilia.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-20T00:39:32+00:00

Speculating I'd think it has to do with the general individualism in neoliberalism and the discrediting of any collectivist ideologies and the idea, enthusiastically pushed by neoliberal elites, that we can't really change neoliberal society in any radical way ("the end of history" was an actual phrase which cropped up in certain academic circles in the early 90s) and then we have various economic changes that make people feel even more powerless Now we also have this pandemic that no one can do anything about - that just makes it worse. So people look at self-empowerment, I can see how QT seduces people even though it doesn't make sense. "You can be whatever you feel you are. The mind is what is important." "If you're a woman, you don't have to be oppressed. We can solve female oppression just by identifying as something else ." It's silly but like other cults I think they do have a message that if you take it at face value comforts people and gives them the illusion they have more control over their own lives. The same with all the sex-positive "sex work is work and empowering!" nonsense. It is framed as just people making choices and expressing their desires even though that is usually patently deceptive,

There's a whole fear I have about how this is actually about pushing transhumanism and the gender shit is just the first step in that. I really think transhumanism will be terrible for anyone in the world who isn't extremely wealthy but I imagine the same sort of rhetoric will be used to justify it and this is probably a test-run for what the public will swallow.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-13T01:07:01+00:00

I'm another refugee. It was a unique and very interesting space Actually ended up convincing me more of GC beliefs to learn how empty and illogical the opposing ideology actually is. I really do feel like someone living in a religiously conservative country who doesn't accept the state religion but questioning it is not allowed. We had a great group of super-intelligent people in the debate sub. I enjoyed talking to them about things that weren't even part of the main topic.

Hope our alternative here gets more of the old crowd to trickle over. It's pretty quiet right now.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T17:39:38+00:00

OK...I mean personally I do believe in free speech (within reason) and probably more so now because I agree with you that what has happened to us shows that the concept of "fighting bigotry" can be abused. but this is still a group where people are supposed to agree on the basic principles of feminism and many of us are quite left-leaning. That being said, a lot of the TRAs in the old sub were quite misogynistic so I can't imagine you'd be worse than that. If you stay on topic I don't think you should be banned just for an unpopular opinion (of course it depends on what kind of opinion we're talking about though - like MRA talking points for example are specifically not going to be welcome here.).

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-11T11:19:04+00:00

They were talking in the GC forum about how we shouldn't even use Reddit and give them a small amount of support with our clicks and content. Personally I think I'll just delete my account. Fuck that site.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-26T05:22:28+00:00

I don't know I just saw a post by a trans person saying "trans people who make no attempt to pass are still trans and just don't care about conforming to their gender."

So i t really seems like they have no coherent definition, not even one based on gender stereotypes. Reminds me of the old "who's on first?" routine.

"What is a woman?" "Anyone who identifies as a woman" "Who can identify as a woman?" "An adult of either sex with a female gender identity." "You mean to say all self-identified women can identify as women?" "Yes." :)

Thanks for the source though.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-07-16T01:34:43+00:00

did they ban anti-porn on Reddit as well? That is unbelievable. TY for creating it.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-31T23:02:03+00:00

Is a prosthetic leg a real leg? What if medical technology is good enough to make it look and functions like a real leg? I assume you'd probably say no so you have your answer.

Also, I agree with the others, stop spamming ffs.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-04T21:44:18+00:00

There was someone on the old sub who claimed to have dysphoria for both sexes and be non-binary because of this. Hard to understand but I guess it is a thing with some people.

Quite sure with the vast majority of them it is just a fashion trendy thing though and a way for males to claim they opt-out of privilege.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-10-03T03:17:12+00:00

"GC: What are your counter-arguments to these TRAs saying sex is not binary because of hermaphrodites and intersex"

Intersex people are considered part of the binary. It is incorrect and insulting to them to say they are not part of the binary of sex just because they have physical disorders.

"that binary sexes are "flawed human made taxonomies"

I mean everything that is part of language is technically "human-made" but words for sexes still describe the observable fact of sexual dimorphism. I've never heard any TRA actually prove sexual dimorphism wrong. Just because they don't like that dimorphic sex is an observable fact doesn't make it "flawed".

"you can't see someone's chromosomes and genitals so sex does not matter" and that "you can't see someone's chromosomes and genitals so sex does not matter"

This one is extremely silly. You can't "see" someone's cells or genes (at least with the naked eye) either but they are still extremely important in making us what we are.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-26T04:29:52+00:00

I worry there may be a backlash against LGB people in fact because the groups are lumped together with the T by people who do not follow the issue closely.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-23T06:45:24+00:00

If you were going to compare anything to "original sin" from a GC feminist perspective I think it would be male socialization but it's a bit of a stretch still

On the original subject, I find the idea of "gender identity" very similar to the idea that people have souls where their real personality resides and the physical body can be a prison stopping the soul from expressing itself the way it wants to.

TRAs love mantras and many all use the same phrases almost like they are little prayers that they learn.

"knowing" that you are on the "right side of history" is similar to "knowing" that you are "with God" or whatever.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-22T02:24:16+00:00

If anything I identify more with the opposite gender femininity than by birth sex gender but I do think all gender roles are harmful and we definitely should not define ourselves by them. I do kind of gravitate towards quite a few things like aesthetics that are usually considered feminine though as well as relating better in general to women than men.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-20T21:54:21+00:00

Completely agree and we were making moves in that direction before this ideology took over which was probably even a better alternative from the point of view from transsexuals with sex dysphoria. It almost seems like some people in powerful positions kind of like gender roles (or just want to look socially progressive without doing much of anything to address economic inequality).

DistantGlimmer · 2020-09-10T18:42:21+00:00

I see it as similar to religious people saying "I just don't follow that part of the holy book." The whole stupid thing relies on the premise that anyone who accepts TWAW/TMAM is "valid" so of course, it ends up incoherent

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-20T13:18:01+00:00

But I thought " BiOloGiCaL SeX Is a WhItE EuRocEntRic ConStruict!!!!11" Make up your mind TRAs. Blatant racism though. Not a good look.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-13T22:17:40+00:00

Could we take sex off a lot of identification documents or make it only visible to people who really needed it (medical people, law enforcement if a crime has been committed)? I feel like maybe GC could support that even if you weren’t okay with legal sex change.

I don't see a problem with this and think I support it.

I don't think GC is unanimous on this but I personally feel that there can be very little other compromise on this point as transwomen are male and sex is immutable. Allowing some transwomen to identify themselves as female on official ID vastly undermines this argument and makes sex terms meaningless. I suppose the closest thing I could think of to a compromise would be allowing some kind of distinction like MTF or "transsexual male". I don't really see a problem with that but know it is not going to be satisfactory for transwomen who are intent on trying to pass.

What would be ideal is if transwomen could just accept their status as transwomen rather than trying to pass as women and in return, we could make society a lot more accepting of people who are trans and GNC and de-stigmatize those things. I honestly see that as a big part of the end goal of de-emphsizing and eventually abolishing gender.

Possibly there is a compromise I'm missing though, someone like you obviously has way more experience dealing with these issues on a practical level than I do but I can't think of anything that would make me end my opposition to actually being able to change sex markers on ID and distinguishing between legal and biological sex.

DistantGlimmer · 2020-08-04T20:06:35+00:00

Poe's Law applies to every single TRA. I literally can't tell when any of them are trolling/taking the piss vs what they really believe because their real beliefs are so damned insane.

DistantGlimmer