-9 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: Trans Women, Male Privilege, and the Intersectionality of Patriarchal Oppression
Again. I know my post has assumptions. It is also literally impossible for me to make a statement that applies to everyone at all times. Please, I acknowledge the limitations of my statements. This thread has now turned into a trans vs cis misogyny experience and an accusatory flurry of "I go through this!" and you don't!
This is not what my post intended to do. If you cannot hear trans women speak about their concerns at any capacity, then you are undermining a group of women that is very vulnerable. Us speaking about out experience doesn't negate yours at all. This is not a pie you slice out.
Comment by radical_hectic at 30/01/2025 at 11:09 UTC
10 upvotes, 0 direct replies
You are responding to the wrong user here. The above comment wasn’t demonstrating an incapability to “hear trans women speak on their concerns in any capacity”.
It is expressly and specifically asserting that your post failed to adequately account for cis women’s experiences, and instead made definitive statements and sweeping generalisations about what a group of also vulnerable people do and don’t experience. This is absolutely fine! They at no point denied your experience or undermined it.
They simply expressed that you made an inaccurate assumption about an experience that differs from your own, and explained how.
If you cannot hear cis women speak about their concerns regarding your statements claiming to accurately account for their experiences then I fear you are undermining all feminism and all women.
“Us speaking out on an experience doesn’t negate yours at all”. This is bizarrely out of context. The commenter did not say ANYTHING which negated your experience.
However, your post DID expressly negate several aspects of other women’s experiences. Pointing out your blind spots re their own experiences is not the same as negating YOURS…yours weren’t even mentioned.
This commenter and others were literally explaining exactly what you said—this is not a pie to be sliced.
I think it is concerning that you cannot see the forest for the trees here in that you are essentially projecting your own fallacies and insisting that they are being done unto you by others. When in reality, saying “hey, you spoke for my experience definitively here but I’d like to point out how my experience differs from your assumptions”….does not negate, diminish or erode your own expression of your experience at all.
What erode all of our experiences and feminism at large is the attitude you display here, where you insist that your positionality means that you can mischaracterise other people’s experience but if anyone w those experiences corrects you, they are inherently “negating” or denying your reality. THAT attitude is the definition of viewing oppression as a pie to be sliced, a scarce resource that requires hierarchical divisions that (conveniently) only you can adjudicate.
“This post has now turned into I go through this and you don’t”. That’s bc that’s exactly what YOUR post was in the first place, and when people pointed out how exclusive and limited some of your assumptions were, suddenly that’s a problem. You literally deny other’s experiences and then when other’s politely say “actually, that’s not my experience” you say “STOP DENYING MY EXPERIENCE”. Girl where???? That was you!
Again I agree w ur post in many ways and believed it was sensitive and thoughtful. But this reactionary response to anyone daring to correct what you yourself acknowledge is a limited assumption is unfair, especially when that assumption was an erasure of others’ experience, and you then accuse those who advocate for their own lived experience to correct said erasure are then accused of erasing YOUR experience….but unlike you and your post, these corrections never claimed to speak for you! If you take on the responsibility of summarising someone else’s experience you need to be accountable to its accuracy.
And just for the hell of it I’ll add that this hierarchical view of oppression that divides us all as women, trans and queer people is exactly what the far right is trying to foster w great success. Constructing cis, (usually) white women as being so inherently privileged by their cisness and whiteness that they are somehow immune to misogyny, patriarchy, denial of basic human rights etc etc. ie the far right has constructed these women as women who do not deserve advocacy, who do not face gendered oppression or violence, who may as well be men they are so privileged, who do not have needs and rights that can protect or make them vulnerable—that’s how they are winning girlfriend. They’re insisting that the most privileged women are actually the major oppressive force and holders of power over ALL OTHERS, and that they don’t need to be considered or advocated for. BUT this view of women, feminism and womanhood is mobilising a newfound level of misogyny and ignorance of said misogyny that impacts ALL WOMEN. If you take the group of women w the most rights and privileges and insist that they are inherently flawed, impossibly privileged, requiring denigration….you do not make room for other women. You ensure they too are cut out.