TERF opinion leader

By Emma Allen of Radical Women

The majority of feminists are accepting of transpeople. But entrenched bigotry crops up even within the movement for women’s rights. Transphobia and other forms of discrimination alienate feminists from their natural allies in the fight for liberation. It is important to be aware of and speak out against these poisonous prejudices.

Transphobia in the feminist community

In January 2013, the New Statesman published an article by the British journalist and feminist writer Susan Moore that received criticism for gratuitously using the word transgender in a derogatory way. In “Seeing Red: The Power of Female Anger,” Moore wrote, “[Women] are angry with ourselves for not being happier, not being loved properly and not having the ideal body shape — that of a Brazilian transsexual.” Instead of apologizing, Moore chose to lash out with a hate-filled defense on Twitter, stating, “People can just fuck off really. Cut their dicks off and be more feminist than me. Good for them.” She went on to say, “I use the word transsexual. I use a lot of ‘offensive’ words. If you want to be offended it’s your prerogative.” The following the day she tweeted, “I am not going to apologise. Get it?” To other critics she wrote, “Read my essay. It is NOT about trans anything. Are you utterly thick? Don’t bother answering that.”

A day later her friend and feminist writer, Julie Burchill, wrote an article in Moore’s defense for the British Observer titled “Transsexuals should cut it out.” The article was soon removed for being too offensive and riddled with misconceptions. She heaps on even more hate speech with such statements as: “To have your cock cut off and then plead special privileges as women — above natural-born women, who don’t know the meaning of suffering, apparently…” She manufactures a contrived class analysis against transgender people who supposedly have “many lovely big swinging PhDs” and states:

[Moore] and I are part of the minority of women of working-class origin to make it in what used to be called Fleet Street and I think this partly contributes to the stand off with the tranni…We know that everything we have, we got for ourselves. We have no family money, no safety net. And we are damned if we are going to be accused of being privileged by a bunch of bed-wetters in bad wigs.

The accusation of upper-class privilege is at odds with the reality that transgender people experience unemployment at twice the rate of the general population. Burchill’s false assumption is that transgender people don’t know the suffering of biologically born women ignores the fact that transpeople are especially vulnerable to violence including sexual violence.