Valdyr
11th June 2012, 22:48
Recently I've noticed a lot of extreme transphobia among Radical feminists. I use the capital R to denote that I mean the self-described Radical feminists rather than any feminist who is lower-case-r-radical in their feminism, like any Marxist I believe should be.
Basically, they treat being trans as "reactionary" (reminds one of the claims that homosexuality is "reactionary," no?) for two main reasons:
1. Transgenderism and transsexuality reinforce the notion of gender when their goal is to do away with the notion completely
2. It allows trans-women ("men") to infiltrate "women's spaces," in efforts to break down the gender binary of social organization.
In doing so, they seem to toss all varieties of trans-activism together as if they were the same, ironic considering they are often so adamant about the way people conflate all types of feminism together. Essentially, their goal is to point out the tensions of liberal trans-activism and consider that a conclusive proof that "transphobia" is a nebulous and analytically useless category. The way they see if there are two options:
1. Be a liberal who criticizes essentialism when applied to women (woman = female-bodied) but utilizes essentialism to defend trans people ("trans people have female brains"). Note that I agree that this approach is wrong for the same reason that essentialist approaches to queer liberation are wrong.
2. Be a Radical feminist.
Now, the way I see it, there are actually three broad approaches to trans-politics:
1. The confused quasi-essentialism of liberal trans-activism
2. Postmodern approaches/identity politics, where oppression is located in discourse, so that by changing discourse (or, more broadly, by revolting in the symbolic realm) we can destroy oppression
3. Materialist/broadly Marxist approaches which reject the essentialism of 1 and the idealism of 2
I think the basic problem that Radical feminists have with trans-politics is that they see it as hindering attempts to "abolish" gender, but that they then take a wildly wrong turn by being transphobic. Since they don't locate the root of oppression in class, they by extension do not have a working theory of how other forms of oppression at least partly emerge from the dominant form. They basically do not see how to get from here to the "there" of a genderless world, because they do not see how the domination of women arises in the first place, or at least the broader process of which it is a part. They don't see how there can be seeds of the next society in the current, such as queered social spaces.
What are some more of the materialist responses to big-R-Radical feminism, and criticisms of it? I know there are a lot of Radical feminist critiques of Marxism, which I've read, but for reasons of either obscurity or non-existence I can't seem to find much in the way of in-depth Marxist critiques of Radical feminism.
Also, what are some of your thoughts?
Basically, they treat being trans as "reactionary" (reminds one of the claims that homosexuality is "reactionary," no?) for two main reasons:
1. Transgenderism and transsexuality reinforce the notion of gender when their goal is to do away with the notion completely
2. It allows trans-women ("men") to infiltrate "women's spaces," in efforts to break down the gender binary of social organization.
In doing so, they seem to toss all varieties of trans-activism together as if they were the same, ironic considering they are often so adamant about the way people conflate all types of feminism together. Essentially, their goal is to point out the tensions of liberal trans-activism and consider that a conclusive proof that "transphobia" is a nebulous and analytically useless category. The way they see if there are two options:
1. Be a liberal who criticizes essentialism when applied to women (woman = female-bodied) but utilizes essentialism to defend trans people ("trans people have female brains"). Note that I agree that this approach is wrong for the same reason that essentialist approaches to queer liberation are wrong.
2. Be a Radical feminist.
Now, the way I see it, there are actually three broad approaches to trans-politics:
1. The confused quasi-essentialism of liberal trans-activism
2. Postmodern approaches/identity politics, where oppression is located in discourse, so that by changing discourse (or, more broadly, by revolting in the symbolic realm) we can destroy oppression
3. Materialist/broadly Marxist approaches which reject the essentialism of 1 and the idealism of 2
I think the basic problem that Radical feminists have with trans-politics is that they see it as hindering attempts to "abolish" gender, but that they then take a wildly wrong turn by being transphobic. Since they don't locate the root of oppression in class, they by extension do not have a working theory of how other forms of oppression at least partly emerge from the dominant form. They basically do not see how to get from here to the "there" of a genderless world, because they do not see how the domination of women arises in the first place, or at least the broader process of which it is a part. They don't see how there can be seeds of the next society in the current, such as queered social spaces.
What are some more of the materialist responses to big-R-Radical feminism, and criticisms of it? I know there are a lot of Radical feminist critiques of Marxism, which I've read, but for reasons of either obscurity or non-existence I can't seem to find much in the way of in-depth Marxist critiques of Radical feminism.
Also, what are some of your thoughts?