Pretend You Didn't See That.

Pretend you didn't see that.

This is a level of transmisogyny that is somewhat hard to comment on because the things that one would normally point out as transmisogynistic implications are said so brazenly that there can be no pretense about any of the involved parties being unaware of it. The authors know, the readers know, everybody understands that this is pure transmisogyny. There is no plausible deniability.

It's an attempt to establish proximity between transfems and cis manhood in every way possible. Their bodies, their histories, their "socialization", the way they are treated by others, the way they treat and view others, their ways of thinking, even their self-conception. Every aspect of their being is cast as essentially male. Transfems are being called "men" in all but name - and not just any "men", they are made into embodiments of the worst aspects of hegemonic manhood. Not just male socialized but continuing to benefit from male socialization. Not just engaging in abusive behaviors stemming from male socialization but being afforded the freedom to do so because they continue to be treated as men. (Suffice it to say that this does not align with reality)

This is unadulterated sex-essentialism and it's intentionally being used to delegitimize and devalue the standpoint of transfems in feminist discourses. It's clear that the author is projecting transmisogynist ideas onto transfems and simply assumes that these ideas must be correct without considering any alternative. (The fact that transfems do not internalize "male socialization" has been reiterated many times over and should not have to be continually reasserted. This is a baseline level of understanding that we should be able to expect and demand from members of our community.)

Misogyny is framed as being contained within the realms of sexed bodies and gendered socialization in such a way that it allows for the casting of transfems as people enacting misogyny without being primary targets themselves - like cis men.

The claim that the animosity some transfems exhibit towards men comes from wanting to "prove" their womanhood serves the double purpose of casting their womanhood as inauthentic and denying the misogyny they suffer at the hands of men. One would be hard pressed to find a more cruel mischaracterization of transfems' experiences than this.

The cynical misappropriation of the standpoint of the people this screed is directed at by the use of "we" despite making it abundantly clear that the behavior that is being criticized and its supposed causes exempt people such as the author from the possibility of engaging in it should also be noted as an attempt at weaponizing a compromised version of standpoint epistemology against transfems.

The only plausible target audience for this kind of rhetoric are those who carry extreme ressentiment towards transfems and are susceptible to softened formulations of TERF ideology. These are the same kinds of ideas that TERFs have tried to push into trans spaces numerous times, e.g. under names like "sex-conscious feminsim".

A formulaic "retreat" from this post consisting entirely of platitudes has been published after the author received backlash for it but nobody is under any obligation to accept it and they absolutely should not. A person who was very obviously attempting to promote TERF ideology in trans spaces and in the same stroke accused transfems of being uniquely prone to making false accusations is not trustworthy, even if that person backs down upon realizing that the reception is more uniformly negative than anticipated.

@genderqueerdykes @gateway-2000 is a transmisogynist, beyond a shadow of a doubt. Its entire worldview is permeated by transmisogynistic assumptions, ideas and biases at a fundamental level. It has straightforwardly expressed an understanding of transfems' interiorities, their experiences and their social positions that is so incorrect that one has to wonder how someone holding these views could have navigated trans communities for a considerable amount of time without encountering the many transfeminist rebuttals to all of its demagoguery. How could someone with even a passing level of familiarity with TERF ideology or "gender critical feminism" read and espouse these ideas without recognizing them? It's completely unthinkable. It's not unreasonable to assume that it simply misjudged the consensus within its audience as being sufficiently anti-transfeminist for ideas such as these to fall upon fertile ground and it is now going back to waiting until the time is ripe to reintroduce them and to expressing them in more subtle ways until then.

But you can't un-ring a bell.

We can and should assert boundaries against reactionaries engaging in obvious subversion such as this. Refusing to do so is a deleterious error in judgement. This is very far beyond the limits of what any trans community that wants to consider transfems a part of itself can be allowed to tolerate.