A New Low, Even For the Transadvocate

First off, I want to apologize for being away for a while.  Real life intervened, and I have been very busy...in a good way.  Also, to be honest, there has been little worth writing about.  After a while, it gets tiresome writing about the same old silliness from the radical TG crowd.  There just hasn't been much new stuff...until now.

In an article by Fallon Fox, a pseudo-transsexual man who likes to beat up on other women, we are informed that the "TERFs" (i.e. Trans Exclusive Radical Feminists) are "the new Westboro Baptist Church."    Of course, this is the same bunch that has repeatedly tried to get the Southern Poverty Law Center to declare TERFs to be a certified hate group.  I guess since that hasn't worked, they have decided to take on a new approach.

The whole idea is ludicrous.  Worse, Mr. Fox comes up with some rather strained (to say the  very least) reasons for his claim.

Who in the hell would go through years of hormone replacement therapy, electrolysis, doctor’s appointments, psychological therapy, loss of thousands and thousands of dollars, loss of family and friends, possible loss of one’s job, put themselves in harm’s way by being a prime target for physical violence at the hands of men? And most importantly, why would some so called “men” elect to have an operation on their genitals that would remove their ability to use their sexual organ in penetrating fashion in the act of rape? Most rational adults are not ignoramuses to the degree that they would believe such rhetoric especially after hearing the counter argument.

Uh, sorry fellow, but we are constantly told how one does not need SRS to be a woman, how women have penises, how "most transgender people don't have surgery," etc.  So, don't come along and try to use claims about having SRS to argue a transgender position.  It's a bit disingenuous to say the least.

And really, why would someone who claims to be a "woman" spend so much time insuring that everyone, and anyone is fully aware that they were born a man, and expose their self to endless rounds of publicity, seeking out the spotlight?

Sorry, what you try to describe are transsexuals, who are not, automatically, transgender.  

And let's look at what the transgender extremists have pushed.  A lot of the controversy has arose because:

1. Transgender males generally refuse to respect reasonable boundaries.  They demand to be allowed to invade women's spaces, no matter how personal and private they are.
2. Transgender males introduced the idea of the "cotton ceiling" in an attempt to shame lesbians into accepting sex with them.
3. An increasing number of transgender males demand the right to be in place where nudity is inevitable, even though they have no had corrective surgery.  And they adamantly defend men who have been caught in such situations.
4. These men, Mr. Fox being a particular example, belittle the very real concerns that women have about men committing aggressive acts.

I don't agree with everything the Radical Feminists say, but I also do not believe they remotely deserve the crap spewed by kooks like Mr. Fox.

Transphobia? Or Just Common Sense?

Way back in the earliest days of this blog, I wrong a post about what I call "club words," the sort of words that people, especially extremist activists, use to beat people into submission.  And of course, the favorite of the transgender kooks is "transphobia."  

The most common definition of "transphobia" is:

An irrational fear of, and/or hostility towards, people who are transgender or who otherwise transgress traditional gender norms.

This rather silly term was made up by the transgender kooks as a sort of parallel for "homophobia."  Now, the term homophobia started out as a bit of a slam against men who had issues with homosexuality, based on the suggestion that such men were actually frightened of their own "latent homosexuality."  Over time, as it became more widely applied, it tended to lose this original meaning, and now stands as a sort of bizarre term that has a root meaning that is largely unrelated to how it is actually used.  Few would now suggest that people actually fear homosexuals as much as they simply dislike their behavior which some see as immoral.

But, as more and more transgender activists decided that they wanted to align themselves with the LGBT community, even though they actually share little in common (especially given the idea that sexual orientation is inherent, while much of what defines transgender is clearly chosen behavior, they decided to plagiarize the term homophobia and modify it into "transphobia."  

Increasingly, the term is used to attack anything that the transgender kooks dislike, even if it is actually quite reasonable, and totally rational.  For example, in the article that inspired this column, Mr. "Cristan" Williams calls the idea that a person who was a male for the majority of his life, but who has in relatively recent time, undergone sex reassignment surgery, should not be allowed to beat up women in mixed martial arts competitions, transphobia.  He cites a claim by "Marci" Bowers, the infamous transgender surgeon who took over Biber's practice in Trinidad, CO before bolting to San Mateo, CA as stating:

Most measures of physical strength minimize, muscle mass decreases, bone density decreases, and they become fairly comparable to women in their musculature. After as much time as has passed in her case, if tested, she would probably end up in the same muscle mass category as her biologically born female counterpart.

 Now, this is the standard set of arguments made whenever the issue of a post-op transsexual who desires to enter women's sports comes up.  Even if one sets aside questions about why they would even want to do such a thing (If they do win, it will be attributed to their having been born a male, and if they don't win, well...one wonders why they even bother?) I find it interesting that Bowers uses a lot of "weasel" words...like "most," "fairly,"and "probably."  Nothing definite, just a bunch of dancing around the facts.  In another words, this person "might" not have an advantage, but Bowers is not going to make a definitive statement.

Another doctor that Mr. Williams cites takes a similar "weaselly" approach:

She’s been doing that [HRT] for so many years, that she probably does not have a significant advantage, if any at all. Especially because she wasn’t a big man when she lived as a male. She’s 5’7 and slight of build, and basically the size of an average female.

She "probably" doesn't have "significant" advantage.  Hmm, based on his statements, I guess a 5'7" man with a "slight build" could fairly fight a woman as well...

The bottom line is, no one really knows.  Personally, I have questions about anyone who has a history as a male engaging in women's sports. and I find it hard to justify such.  Being a transsexual involves trade-offs.  But some, in a classically male manner, want to have their care and eat it too.  Again, if they prevail, they will be seen as having done so because they were born male, and if they don't, well...if one is not in it, to win, why bother?  And in should be noted, in the case of the person being discussed, they have two wins, and no losses, so the question of an unfair advantage remains legitimate.

In the case of a person who was born a man, who is going to actually be engaged in a sport that involves actually trying to beat up a woman, the sane and rational thing would be to err on the side of caution.  But that does not set well with the transgender kooks, who think that a person's right to claim to be a woman trumps all.  Now, even allowing that the person in question might actually be a transsexual woman, which I find a bit difficult to accept when someone decides to out their self (that, at least to me, raises serious questions as to their motivations, should women be subjected to such a situation?  Isn't it funny who women who were born female always seem to come out on the short end of the stick where the TG crowd is concerned?

Likewise, we have a store in Idaho taking the quite reasonable step of telling someone, who is not a woman, and who quite clearly was not really even trying to act like a woman, who was in the women's room, to no longer come into their store.  This person was creating an uncomfortable situation for people who had every right to be there, specifically by standing to pee.  This is not a transsexual woman, who is concerned about fitting in with other women.  This was a man, who just didn't care.  And let's be honest, this person is not even really attempting to look like a woman, but instead is a typical TG parody of a woman.  I was very cautious until I was quite certain that I would not cause a scene in the women's room.  But the TG crowd could care less about women, even though that is what they claim to be.

And the list of such examples could go on, and on...like the response of the TG crowd to the case of "Colleen" Francis, the pervert who was exposing himself to young girls in the women's dressing room at a college.  Or how they think that first grade girls should be forced to share the bathroom with a male child, simply because he says he is a girl, no matter how uncomfortable they are.  Don't like the idea of seeing some man's naked body in the women's shower at your spa Then you are transphobic.  Do you think women have a right to gather together without  men who claim to be women invading?  Well,  you are not only transphobic, but they will call you are TERF as well. Even if you are not a radical feminist, but just think people have a right to decide who to associate with at a private event.  Don't want some guy in the ladies room, just because he put on a dress?  Yes, they would say you are definitely transphobic.  Don't want some boy being assigned to share a dorm room with your daughter...at an women's college?  Transphobic?  Have common sense?  Yeah, you're probably a transphobe.

You know, I think perhaps we should start pointing out instances of "cisphobia," which would be defined as:

An irrational fear of, and/or hostility towards, people who are not transgender or who otherwise fail to transgress traditional gender norms. 

I mean seriously, that seems a reasonable and sane response to some of the silliness engaged in by the TG crowd.