Take it to the bridge

“If somebody wants to prove that transgenderism is a valid medical condition, then they need to prove that it is not a fetish.” 

I don’t want to prove anything, and neither do I have to prove anything. I especially don’t want to prove “that transgenderism is a valid medical condition”, and neither do I have to prove “that transgenderism is a valid medical condition”.

See, I don’t believe that transgenderism is a medical condition at all, so whether it’s valid or invalid is entirely irrelevant.

I do believe that transgenderism is an umbrella word. It’s a useful shorthand term when discussing people who are gender variant or who otherwise don’t comply with expected societal norms regarding the gender assigned to them.

So transgenderism may include transsexual people, intersexed people, cross dressers, genderqueer – and many others who have at least – and possibly only – this one thing in common: gender variance.

It’s a collective noun. Medical conditions and fetishism simply don’t come into it; not at such a vague and undefined level.

Nothing to prove.

…*shrugs*…

Next!

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See also these posts and comments:

• Carnival of Feminists No 59 – Philobiblon (Natalie Bennett)
• Quote of the day, 6/26/08 – Fetch me my axe (Belledame)
• On Feminism and Transphobia – The Curvature (Cara)
• Appleseeds! – Monster’s Creed (Drakyn)
• Taking a breif break from porn myth debunking for this… – Renegade Evolution
• Transwars, Part 67458 – An Open Letter by a Feminist (Feminist Avatar)
• Maybe I Need To Stop Reading Blogs… – Bunny’s Hutch (Veronica)
• Carnival of Feminists – The Strangest Alchemy (Trinity)
• Transphobia FAILs – A Femanist View (SnowdropExplodes)

…And so on…

Oops! Don’t forget:

• Worthless Transphobes think logic is what they shat out their assholes yesterday – i am jack’s non-blog (J. Goff)
• Round and round and round and round and round and… – Sexual Ambiguities (Queen Emily)

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Oh, and there’s this comment by GallingGalla (in the response to Cara’s post):

“At this point, I am on the verge of jettisoning my identification as a “feminist”. I am getting very weary of this constant stream of hate, and I feel that mandrea and those like her present a real, physical danger to women, cis and trans alike. I really, really am at a loss at this point as to any reason why I should continue to identify as a feminist.”

“It’s not just the transphobia, it’s the racism and classism, too, which these radfems serve up in heaping portions. I was re-reading this post by bfp from December 2006, and in comments, bfp, Yolanda, and blackamazon point out the racialized nature of radfem transphobia – transphobic radfems are almost exclusively white. I’ve never, ever heard or read anything even close to this level of transphobic hate by radical women of color; indeed the vast majority have been very supportive of trans* folk. I just wish trans* folk (including myself) would be more supportive of rwoc.”

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©2008 Helen G