(no subject)

[maevele]

It may finaly be time for me to make a longer post about transfail. cisfail. This is sort of in response to a post that was open yesterday but has now been blocked to me, so i can't figure out the diplomatic way to address it.

Basically there was a post conflating the general "my body isn't good enough/I'm not woman enough" bullshit that the patriarchy tries to feed all women with the way trans people feel abut body and gender. And included the whole "if i woke up a guy tomorrow there'd be no problem, so it's totes the same as being in the wrong gendered body as a transperson.

I'm going to make this post all about me for a minute, not because this discussion i needs my perspective, but to counter her personal anecdote shit. I also would not be in anyway gender bothered if i woke up a guy tomorrow, because i personally have a very weak connection to my gender identity. At least part of me would say "Oh, finally' if I woke up male, actually, because i have always been slightly conflicted about my gender. But I recognize that tat is not the same for everyone. Other people have their own degree of connectedness to their gender identity, which doesn't neccessarily correlate with their physical bodies.

This is coming out all assed up.

I feel as though there is a continuum regarding gender identity, like with sexuality, and an intersecting continuum of how strongly one is connected to a gender at all. I'm fairly in the middle on both. I'm cis, in that I dont care much whether I am a man or woman, so since my body is woman it's easy enough to just go with that. But it would still be well within the realm of normal for me to feel strongly that I was gendered. I can't take the fact that I am not closely tied to my gender and use that to deny trans people's experience. Or for that matter to try to tell cis people they shouldn't strongly ID with their gender either, if that was what I was seeing people do.



crap, I feel like I'm still not making my point. I'm going to stop now and see if I've offended anyone with what I've come up with so far.


ETA, I just want to make clear to any who read this that my point is I had a big fucking problem with her using her casual disconnect with her gender to imply that basically since she can deal with not feeling woman enough as a cis woman, being trans is no big. Not that I somehow agree with whole bit that being a woman in a sexist society means she understands the subtleties o trans issues. But I couldn't say it on her journal because I don't have a dreamwidth.


Edit again. If you don't know what cisgender means by context, fucking google it. Posts picking at the language from a privileged point of view will be summarily deleted. If you really need to get a language moan off your chest, PM me, so the other readers don't have to deal with your derail. Thank you for reading.

Comments

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

You mean this post?

I admit that I am kinda bothered when cis people start saying "I wouldn't be fussed if I woke with a body of the other sex." After all, being trans isn't like suddenly waking up one day and realizing that your body is the wrong sex. And also, it's the kind of thing that people can't really know...only guess at. And as you point out, this is frequently used to deny the validity of trans experiences.

A part of me, a mad scientist part of me, would like to take people who say this, that they lack a strong sense of gender - and therefore, trans people are exaggerating our own experiences - and put them in controlled long-term situations where they are constantly misgendered and observe their reactions.

But I appreciate the point that no one can really generalize from their own experiences how other people relate to sex and gender.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

and it seems like the premise behind her post was that since she lacked a strong sense of gender, which I can relate to, that everyone else (should) have the same level of "gendersense" as she, whereas I think those of us without a strong sense of gender are in the minority, so we can't go assuming other people don't feel strongly about gender. I also think a lot of people claim that whole "no strong sense of gender" out of pure fucking privilege, in that what gender sense we have, we're lucky enough to have it match up with our body. I bet even my slight sense of connectedness to gender would be a lot stronger if I were this tiny bit connected to my female gender but born in a male body.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I take her claims of a lack of a strong sense of gender with a grain of salt, because she is - as many before her have - using her cis privilege to deny the validity of trans experiences. I mean, she may be telling the truth or may not, but her story is being used as a bludgeon to call women like me liars. It's like, a lot of people who say "I really don't feel connected to my gender" are like hypothetical fish saying, "I don't really know what it's like to live outside water, and thus cannot imagine any life outside water."

But the truthfulness of her statements aren't really even relevant as compared to how she chooses to use them.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

yeah. if she were just bringing it up to work through her gender ambiguity or lack of connection to her gender, it'd seem valid to me because i feel somewhat the same, but since she's using it to sayshw understands trans issues and can minimize the fuck out of other's experience by pretending her experience is the universal, she's doing it rong.


II was trying to get that through in my OP, that you can feel that way without conflating it into "so trans people don't have it so bad" but may have failed on that.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I got that point from you, yeah.

I mean, I'm just trying to say when it becomes an excuse to invalidate my life, I don't really care how a cis person relates to his or her gender, because at that point they're really making my gender about them.

I certainly can't say that people don't feel like that, but it's just how that narrative is applied.

[naomikritzer]

Apparently I need a Dreamwidth account to suggest to her that she'd probably find Whipping Girl by Julia Serrano to be a thought-provoking and worthwhile read. Which is a shame, because I think she would enjoy reading it, and learn a lot from the process.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

Norah Vincent subjected herself to this for 18 months...and has a psychotic break.

She was hospitalized, and released to publish her venom against trans women in the Advocate, and elsewhere in LGB communities.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Quite true, I keep forgetting about her experience.

But I wish it were observable on a wider scale. I think a lot of cis people - like Norah - would be utterly discombobulated if they were actively, continuously, misgendered.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

I estimate 30% would kill themselves.

cis ppl are weaklings.

remember Harry Benjamin? Great quote from him. Someone asked him about trans women's health concerns, and he laughed hard and said:

"Health? these people will outlive all of us!"

Seriously, trans women have a well, earned rep for being just south of bulletproof. Cis ppl are non hackers when it comes to sustained stress like many trans women deal with.

Granted, this is "anecdotal evidence" from providers and others who bring their own prejudices to the table, but...personally, my life and a few others I know back it up.

[naomikritzer]

OK, this got me curious enough I requested her book from the library, read it, and am now curious what she said about trans women in the Advocate. Can you link me?

(I'll refrain from a detailed analysis here of all the things that bothered me about Self-Made Man. It was a far creepier book than I was expecting.)

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

It's long gone...they scrubbed it thoroughly after the outcry.

You didn't hear much from Norah after that one, either

Check wayback.

Okay

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

You have the sniffles.

We have lung cancer.

Don't let the idea that we both cough fool ya.

Re: Okay

[maevele.livejournal.com]

Ex-fucking-zactly. and it's so not productive for feminists to keep comparing them.

Re: Okay

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

yes...and no


cool...you agree with me.


but it IS very very productive for cis feminists to compare them like this. That way, they can bleat about their colds, and get attention that would otherwise be diverted to the pulmonary oncology ward.

make no mistake...they do it because it benefits them.

Re: Okay

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

This.

It is so much the case that this does benefit cis feminists at trans women's expense.

Re: Okay

[maevele.livejournal.com]

yeah, you managed to make clear wat I was hoping I got across, that just because they're related in a tangenty way doesn't mean they can be compared the way she was doing. I was worried it came off wrong.

And yeah, I guess it's productive for THEM, and since they're what matters, it's productive then.

Re: Okay

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

cis ppl are the only ones that matter in this world, sweety.

also, why do you call it "transfail?" just a lil blamin in that cutesy turn of a phrase? Notice how cis, the ppl doin the failing, are removed from that very negative expression? cis ppl are the unmarked class yet again.

I did. But, then again, I'm not cis, am I?

Re: Okay

[maevele.livejournal.com]

Good point. I guess I had been thinking of it like "racefail=people failing about race issues" without it being about who was failing, so "Transfail=people failing about trans issues" but you're totally right, I should call it "CisFail" because they're technically failing over their Cis issues.

then they'll have yet another chance to derail by yelling "What's Cis mean? why you gotta use such obscure terminology?" as they've done over and over this week, and I can tell them why that's an asshole move.

Thanks for pointing out how it came across.

Re: Okay

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

racefail shares the same issue, almost

whites are a race, but cis is not trans.

genderfial doesn't work, cuz the feminists pissed all over that one by making it a loose synonym for womanhood.

put in every post that terminology derails will be bitchslapped into another spacetime continuum, and provide info links, so there are no excuses.

asking what cis means = instant ban, no questions asked. Make that policy, and post prominently.

Re: Okay

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

This.

[naomikritzer]

I keep trying to construct an analogy involving an imaginary Most Clueless Bisexual Person Ever who doesn't grasp that not everyone swings both ways. Except the analogy keeps getting too complicated. (For instance, I want to point out that this imaginary tool is entirely a theoretical bisexual, since it's not like the people saying they'd be fine if they woke up male one morning are in any danger of having this happen.)

[maevele.livejournal.com]

Also, that clueless bi person does exist. I've met her.

[naomikritzer]

I figured there was probably at least one out there somewhere. Does she use her ability to swing both ways to imply that gay marriage should be a non-issue because the so-called lesbians can just find a nice guy to settle down with? Because that was another bit I was trying to work into the analogy.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

I got my head spilt open when she tried to fuck me in a bar after I outed myself as trans.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

The systemic level of sexism in our society - the shitty double standards, the unattainable concepts of beauty - I think lead a lot of cis women to feel ambivalent about their genders.

I was raised by second wave feminists. My concept of gender was thusly kind of a confused one. Figuring out my femininity and what my woman-ness means to me is an ongoing journey. Generally it's a pretty loose concept for me, and a somewhat bendable one, too.

I would, however, never assume that my experience was similar to that of a transwoman, or even that it related to the experience of a transwoman. Because you know, my sense of my gender is consistently validated by basically everyone I've ever known. Regardless of what it means to me to be a woman, the fact remains that I am a woman who was born with a vagina and boobs and a body that means that I don't have to fight all the damn time just for the fucking privilege of being recognized as the gender I am.

I don't think that's something us cisfolk can entirely comprehend.

Like, coming to terms with a defining what it means to be a woman for ourselves is something I think all women have to do on some level. But the level at which transwomen are aware of and deal with that is so much greater than that of most cis women that comparing the two experiences of womanhood is kind of a minefield.

No.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

But the level at which transwomen are aware of and deal with that is so much greater than that of most cis women that comparing the two experiences of womanhood is kind of a minefield.

It is a guaranteed fail.

Re: No.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was purposefully understating.

Sometimes I forget that vocal inflection does not carry over the internet. Sorry about that. Yes, it is a guaranteed fail.

Re: No.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the correction, and no, I am not so stupid to believe that any tone will change what was meant.

No biggie, now that you get it. But, your understanding of us falls into the category of a lil knowledge is a dangerous thing.

Never ever make that fail again. Ever. You are on public record as being informed.

Re: No.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

I didn't say you were stupid. I did not mean it as it came across - not that it matters since it takes a lack of thought to phrase something that badly and that was my fuck up and good intentions only take one so far without basic fucking sense and there ain't no excuse for me not realizing that. And you're right to call me on a mistake like that. But I don't think you're stupid. Just for the record.

Re: No.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

you're trying to save face, and it's not working out as planned.

Re: No.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

I'm willing to take responsibility for my screw up.

I'm not willing to take responsibility for your assumptions about what I think of you.

I'm sorry I fucked up. I won't do that again. I tried to clarify. That's all. Maybe trying to clarify was taking that too far. Maybe clarification doesn't matter - it certainly doesn't matter if you don't want to hear it, and I understand if you don't.

Right now I don't think there's anything more I can really say on the subject. So. Yeah. Sorry again.

[voz-latina.livejournal.com]

I'm willing to take responsibility for my screw up.

That's mighty cis of you, thanks.

I'm not willing to take responsibility for your assumptions about what I think of you.

Because your cis privilege blind you to the effects of your words, and allows you to save face by blaming me. You are doing this freely, and by choice.

I'm sorry I fucked up. I won't do that again. I tried to clarify.

Good.

That's all.

Absolutely untrue. You backpedaled, after realizing that the effects of your words was Not the Right Thing, and added a pile of face saving to it, and I refused to let you get away with it. This is the heart of the matter. Yet Anothe Cis Person Saying a Transperson Is Too Sensitive. Yet Another Cis person Trumpeting Intentions over Measured Effects.
and that, is cis supremacy in action.

Refusal to acknowledge privilege does not make it untrue.

Maybe trying to clarify was taking that too far.

Nope. see above. Clarification is fine. Defensiveness is not.

Maybe clarification doesn't matter - it certainly doesn't matter if you don't want to hear it, and I understand if you don't.

It does matter, as I have demonstrated by my actions here, and by engaging you at some cost to me. I really do have a life outside of educating cis folks with issues.
The correct attitude is "This trans woman of color is stopping her life to do me a favor at significant cost to herself."

Right now I don't think there's anything more I can really say on the subject. So. Yeah. Sorry again.

Withdrawal, and Getting the Last Word In. Another tactic of privilege.

Re: No.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

lemur, I'mma ask you to drop this, if you haven't already. It's not a situation where your understatement was appropriate, you seem to understand that.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

At the same time,

I don't think that's something us cisfolk can entirely comprehend.

This is used to avoid accountability. Or like, to a lot of cis people, it's true that they don't comprehend it, but they think they have a right to comprehend it or it must not be true - therefore, the lack of comprehension must be trans people's fault (not being able to explain sufficiently, etc) but there's also generally a resistance to understanding it as well.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

right, there's a whole bunch of "if i can't understand it, it must not be real" that gets thrown in, along with kinda a giving up once they are told they can't comprehend it. like they just can't take someone else's word for their own damn experience. And i don't get what's so hard about that. I can believe someone is in pain without having felt the same pain.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

I didn't say cisfolk can't be supportive or be allies. Nor did I mean to imply that. I simply meant that cisfolk should not try to speak for transfolk on the subject of the experience of transfolk.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I agree with you, I just took something you said and added some of my own context to it. My comment wasn't about you, but about hostility I've encountered before.

[angrylemur.livejournal.com]

Totes. I just had a moment re-reading that comment and going "Fuck I could have phrased that so much better GOD DAMNIT I'M NOT A TOTAL DOUCHEBAG I SWEAR!"

It is super-shitty when privileged people use "I can't understand it therefor I don't have to think about it" and other fucking oblivious assholery to avoid dealing with issues that are part of the everyday reality of transpeople. Super, super shitty.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I've been there too, from the privileged end.