Use Your Words. Name The Penis Problem.

TRIGGER WARNING: Your penis is not that impressive.

When we were kids, my brother was obsessed with becoming a ninja. He was also very clear about girls being incapable of becoming ninjas. As time went on he also wanted to be an Air Force pilot (no girls allowed) and an engineer (no girls allowed). He was backed up in these (and many other) sexist notions by our parents.

Now, my brother was not a moron - he was a normal kid. He did not have any outstanding athletic ability or sharp eyesight or hand-eye coordination or math skills. But he did have a penis, signifying strength and capability. Therefore, in my parents' eyes, his dreams -no matter how unconnected with reality- were worthy of indulgence.

I on the other hand was a gifted kid, and in my family this was not acceptable. Where my brother had a penis, signifying strength and capability, I had a vagina, signifying helplessness and servitude. So my dreams, no matter how connected to reality, were worthy only of derision.

Most importantly, my giftedness could not be allowed to make my brother feel bad about himself. Therefore, his dreams and potentialities and accomplishments needed to be raised up, and mine played down.

There was also violence, of course, which I won't get into just now. This is is NOT a pity party. My parents struggled to do the best they could given their own sexist upbringings and their own mental health problems, which were exacerbated by financial stresses. And my brother was just a kid. I'm very happy in my current life and both my parents and my brother have come a long way vis a vis "the battle of the sexes."

But I'm blogging today about penis-havers.

I may have felt like an unwanted prisoner in my own home, because of my sex. But my brother was a princeling in that same home, because of his sex. How is any boy who is raised like that supposed to feel about his genitalia, about what peeny+balls means?

---

Some trans activists and their zombie-righteous allies want to take the words girl and boy, woman and man, and even male and female, away from us. Reproductive categorization of humans is *so* old fashioned. Or silly. Or bigoted. A penis means only whatever a particular penis-haver says it means! Why would you ever not want a naked penis in your vicinity? Yadda.

Thus, as a brief thought exercise I'll use SPH and OPH (sperm-producing humans and ova-producing humans) instead.

You can attempt to derail via the tiny percentage of people born intersex, or with cries of sensitivity for the infertile—it does not matter, because this statement still stands:

SPH control the world. Not just the “global south.” Everywhere.

Politics, law, law enforcement, the military, commerce, media, medicine, science, technology, even the arts … all dominated by SPH.

Why?

Either you think SPH are naturally superior to OPH in all those fields, in which case fuck off, or you think SPH have been unfairly elevated and OPH have been oppressed, in which case kindly stop pretending that genitalia doesn't matter.

Peeny+balls =(descriptive) male =(prescriptive) privilege over females. We don't rectify male privilege by making it impossible to name.

---

This constant battle over the clear use of basic vocabulary makes me wonder – while I’m fighting for the right to name the basis of my oppression, what have the oppressors achieved – what are they effectively hiding?

---

You want to make it impossible to discuss the socio-political consequences of being born one sex or the other? Hmmm...

THEN I’MA TALK ABOUT PENISES.

I'M JUST CONTRARY LIKE THAT. 

Do world leaders use their penises to perform diplomacy? Maybe they use their penises as microphones when making important speeches? Do lawmakers sign bills with their penises? Do police and military men actually use their penises as guns? Are businessmen joining important conference calls via the Bluetooth in their penises? Maybe bankers discuss pie charts using their combination penis/laser pointers. Do doctors perform surgery with their penis-scalpels? Are artists painting with their penis-brushes? Et penis cetera?

No?

Yet all these fields are dominated by people-with-penises.

MEANINGLESS COINKYDINK?

The vast majority of people who identify themselves and are identified by others as talented in those fields just *happened* to be born with trouserworms and undernuts?

I THINK NOT.

When I worked as a paralegal and clients would try to refuse to work with a female, was that because they were looking for someone who could use their penis to hit the tab bar when toggling between all those computer form fields? It was certainly not because they wanted someone who "identified" as competent, because I did that. They simply assumed competence attached to penises, and lucky "cis" me, they could assume I did not have one of those!

People born with penises+testicles are raised by their families and encouraged via media, merchandisers, schools, workplaces and the general public to think of themselves as both superior to and entitled to the servitude of people born without penises+testicles (which is to say, with ovaries+uteruses+vaginas+clitorises, as there's not actually an endless sucking void betwixt our legs.)

And I posit we’re disallowed from discussing this fact so nakedly not because it is silly or gross or hurtful - but because naked peeny+balls is… hilariously stupid, as far as a symbol of superiority goes:

[Yes, through millennia of rape men have made the phallus a symbol of intimate violence. I do not and shall not ever denigrate any woman's negative reaction to penises. But it is only via men's lifetimes of sex-based social entitlement and women's lifetimes of sex-based social subjugation that rape can stand as a (for all intents and purposes, accepted) cultural practice. And if men insist on using their penises as weapons, it's about time we women learned to both mock and SMASH cock. This video demonstrates how we should respond to rape, AFAIC (content note: graphic violence against penises).]

Seriously? I'm supposed to *ENVY* that? Or, alternatively, as porn would have it - immediately drop to my knees to worship it?

Look, I'm heterosexual. I've been quite fond of several penises in my lifetime. But: Oh hai, you can pee standing up, so clearly you should be the boss of me...?

Seriously?

Let me share my favorite crotch-related story. I was dating this fella, and when we would rassle, he would say "Darling, do you really think you could stop me?" The first time he said this, my blood ran cold. I froze up, and warned him, "Don't ever say that to me again." The second time he said that, I responded, "Fair warning: god may have given you superior upper body strength, but he also put your genitals on the outside. Don't make me prove I can stop you." (God here is figurative, OK?) The third time he uttered that vile, threatening phrase, I brought my knee up and lightly tapped his balls. He fell to the ground and rolled around in pain. It was the most pleasure his crotch had ever given me.

I do NOT tell this story to shame any woman who was not able to utilize this technique to escape sexual assault, although I know some opportunistic victim-blamers may take it that way. I tell this story because it is important to note that this man, a self-identified Leftist who supposedly cared about me, felt such impunity in "playfully" threatening me, even after repeated warnings. It *never* seriously occurred to him that I would *ever* harm his magical, sacred male parts.

Just as patriarchists, ever experts at reversals, would have us associate shame and weakness with the female organs that CREATE HUMAN LIFE, they would also have us associate male organs - frightfully vulnerable as they are - with unassailable power. And apparently these days, indescribable power. Do not name g-d. G-d is whatever g-d says. Submit. Do not look behind the curtain/zipper. DO NOT SAY VOLDEMORT'S NAME.

I will bet you $100 these people have penises.

It should not be a shock that we end up here...

.

...OR HERE.

Whenever the person on the left, below, tells the person on the right that having been born with a penis entitles him to dominate her – whether via economic control, or threats of violence, or the emptying of her language, including her right to say "no," (just for examples) – he is being an obnoxiously entitled sexist pig. And he is entitled because he was raised and groomed to be so. Because of his genitalia. 

And that is as inescapably true as it is inescapably absurd.

Use your words. Name the penis problem.

The human penis is:

1) the MALE organ of sex & peeing.

2) Out of context, rather unimpressive (sorry not sorry).

3) In context:

     A) a lifelong lightning rod of unearned (and most often, unexamined) privilege, and

     B) a universal marker of membership in a violently oppressive class.

The good news, women, is that every time you stubbornly insist on seeing, naming and analyzing male privilege, you are metaphorically punching patriarchy right in the crotch.

In conclusion, might I suggest that every time a male brings his #unexpectedpenis into a space clearly designated as female-only, he leaves with a stump?* 

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*Many women will be uncomfortable with this statement. I do not like violence. However, if you take away the language I use to fight my oppression? I will pick up an axe.

Dear Janet Mock, I have a lot of ALL CAPS for you

http://www.queerty.com/janet-mock-turns-the-tables-asks-interviewer-invasive-questions-about-genitalia-20140430/

Hi, Janet!

You are right - I never had to tell anyone I’m “cis!” I was born, a doctor looked at my labia and told my parents “It’s a girl!” AND THE LIFELONG PERVASIVE SEXISM IN MY FAMILY, SCHOOL, WORK AND PERSONAL LIFE BEGAN! Thanks for opening my eyes to how lucky I am to have skipped the “invasive” questioning and gone STRAIGHT TO THE RELENTLESS “REDUCTION OF MY IDENTITY TO MY GENITALS."

Just exactly what do you think sexism is? Female humans are 1) visually differentiated as such starting from birth so 2) we can be groomed as second class citizens. The method and degree of grooming will vary based on other factors such as geographic location, economic class, race, religion, health, et cetera -- but in any case there is the inescapable physical reality of femaleness, the all-pervasive requirement that said femaleness be visually signaled at all times, and the immediate expectations of others in response to that visual signal, of a striving towards helpless beauty and loving servitude.

Hey Janet, you know those white people who complain about affirmative action because poor white folk have a hard time of it too? Economic class is extremely important, and our discomfort in addressing commonalities of economic struggle across race is a problem. But those white people are still incorrect. They are incorrect because they do not know what it is like to grow up not-white in a white supremacist culture. To shine a constant strobing light of Otherness to the Powers That Be. 

AND YOU KNOW WHAT, JANET? MEN – no matter how difficult they find masculinity -- DO NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE TO GROW UP FEMALE IN A MALE SUPREMACIST CULTURE.

I wish you would’ve asked an articulate feminist about her experiences growing up as a “cis” female, because you and all your identity-zombie followers need a blast of some basic honest truth.

First of all, I’m not a “cis” woman, I’M A WOMAN. AN ADULT HUMAN FEMALE. I do not need to qualify my membership in a basic biological category that applies to more than half the human population because less than one percent of males experience sex dysmorphia. I grant those males the term “transwoman,” and that is all I’m granting.

I’m a woman – a white woman born to a working class American family. A less happy accident of birth might have seen me killed for simply being born female, or married off at age 12. Based on nothing but my “physicality.”

But I was born to a white working class American family – So I was lucky enough to grow up merely doing all the chores while my brother was coddled. Being punished for outdoing him in any way. Sleeping with a kitchen knife under my pillow after checking the lock on my door one-two-three-four-five times (thrice over, and this is how OCD grows) because he was armed -- I unwrapped dolls at Christmas, he unwrapped weapons -- and bound to prove the dominance of his penis.

Yes, his penis. His genitalia. That Which All Of A Sudden Is None Of Anybody’s Business Even Though We Can’t Even Talk To Or About Babies Or Dogs If We Don’t Know Their Sex. My brother and I might as well have been raised in different households. And we both knew the reason why: Penis wins over vagina.

So yes: Lucky. Lucky to be told at age eight that all any boy wanted was to get into my pants and ruin my life, and three years later to be asked what was wrong with me that I wasn’t dating. Which pretty much sums up a woman’s position, huh.

I got my period at age eleven and hid it from my mother for two years. She hit me when she found out. I was hit for any and all infractions, of course, and this was not an unusual experience in my peer group. Not all the world is an upper-class helicopter-parent preciousized playground. I bound my budding breasts with ace bandages whilst she hung newly-purchased Wonderbras from my chair at the kitchen table. 1. Sex will ruin your life! 2, Why aren’t you sexy enough? When life gives you lemons: stuff ‘em in your bra. L-O-L.

Though I was thin I’d never have the sexy body of the 25 year old beauty queens playing teens on TV. With puberty came not only the painful menstruation and cystic acne of PCOS but the intensification of ulcerative colitis and the humiliating gassy-belly and speed-waddles to the girls’ bathroom between classes. I gave in to the persistent existence of my boobs only to have the most popular DJ on the radio announce with a smile in his voice that small breasts such as mine were deformities to be cured with surgery. I had pale skin that would never tan – though I laid out under a baking sun every day for two months straight the summer before high school in a valiant effort, my only reward was burn after burn – and black leg hair that shown through my translucent epidermis even when I shaved twice a day.

Thus being female and “becoming a woman” – a process at which I felt hurtled against my will, a black hole in space or a meat grinder in a horror movie – was always bound up with feeling “trapped in the wrong body”. I felt not only hideously ugly but hilariously so, like a tiny cartoon of simultaneous (unwilling) sexual availability and greasy un-lovableness. I would lie in bed night after night dreaming of miracle cures that would smooth the constant eruptions on my face or allow me to finally achieve tan, smooth legs tucked into perfectly white Keds (I won’t get into the self-tanner misadventures). Buying a bra that fits is a dream that continues to elude me.

Looking back at photographs now, I was perfectly normal looking. Sometimes even cute. This doesn’t change the fact that for something like ten years looking in a mirror was a physically and psychically wrenching experience for me.

...

Though I didn’t have beauty (or couldn’t see it) I did have brains. My parents could downplay my accomplishments and make fun of my aspirations all day long-- my teachers always encouraged me. Until middle school, that is.

BECAUSE PUBERTY DOESN’T JUST BRING BIOLOGICAL UNPLEASANTNESS. IT’S WHEN THE SOCIAL SHIT REALLY HITS THE SOCIAL FAN.

Suddenly I was fighting teachers and administrators to take math classes or join math club. Asking boys in my classes to pose questions on my behalf, in order to receive answers rather than snickers and snide remarks. Working summer jobs in food service or office support where sexual harassment was as common as winking condescension. I gave up math and science for the humanities and social sciences and when I graduated from a top college with top honors, my parents wrote asking if I was finally ready to settle down, work as a secretary and rent a trailer until I could find a husband.

As it turns out, I would need to work my (female) ass to the bone in jobs that paid me less to do more and better work than my male colleagues for several years before going that route. I married. I threw myself into wifedom, and onto the sword of step-motherhood. I thought if I proved my love through daily self-sacrifice and creative, intelligent acts of support and nurturance I’d be rewarded with affection and safety. I got condescension, resentment and poverty. After three years of misery, I left.

More underpaid, overworked jobs in blatantly sexist workplaces. My net worth? Zero. My self-worth? Less. I became a semi-famous writer’s secret lover. It wasn’t exciting, it was crushing. I was eminently fuckable but not high-status enough for public declaration. I moved away, tried to start over again, saw it over and over: no matter how hard and well I worked, the only reward was more work. (I was even told – to my face – by an HR professional – that my salary was meant to supplement a husband’s income. This was in 2006.)

I met another writer. Flirted with S&M. It brought the relief of temporary self-erasure. That was the most pleasure I experienced during that time: a few minutes of blissful non-existence via the blatant intimate hatred of a supposed “lover.” [Followed of course by an STD and unwanted pregnancy. Almost like biology matters.] This chapter drew to a close when it became clear he expected me to follow him across the country assisting with his career in return for… vagina-tearing sex and casual infidelity. Because that was all I was – a sweet, supportive sex doll. Not my own human being.

Life is not a romance novel; my writer-lover was not a tortured hero. He was just an entitled asshole taking advantage of the huge holes in my heart and my complete lack of hope in my future. He found me attractive and knew I was smart and extremely hard-working, and it made all the sense in the world to him that this qualified me to be a handy cumrag and (unpaid) personal secretary. SUCH ARE THE SPOILS OF FEMININITY.

...

It was a female friend who eventually bailed me out of debt and a married male friend who eventually set me on the path towards a decent job. My happily ever after is a 9-5er with a little house and some pets all my own. Decent health insurance and a 401k.

BUT WE’RE SEEPED IN A DIFFERENT NARRATIVE, AREN’T WE? FROM BIRTH. THE PRINCESS MYTH.

If you’re beautiful enough, pure, and sweet – birds will dress you in the morning and a prince will rescue you and all will be happily ever after. Of course, these days you need to be eager to take the prince’s cum in your face, but – details.

IT’S ALL LIES.

THERE IS NO RESCUE.

BEAUTY IS NOT ONLY IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER – IT GUARANTEES NOTHING. CERTAINLY NOT LOVE.

DESIRE IS NOT LOVE. LOVE IS NOT RESPECT. NEITHER DESIRE NOR LOVE IS SAFETY.

AND SELF-ABNEGATING LOVE BRINGS ONLY SELF-ABNEGATION.

WOMEN: BASED ON THE GENITALS WITH WHICH WE WERE BORN, WE SPEND OUR LIVES TRYING TO WIN A GAME. THE GAME IS CRUEL. THE GAME IS RIGGED. AND THE PRIZE IS: NOTHING. LIES. DISGUST.

MULTIPLE CHOICES FOR SELF ERASURE.

AND NOW WE ARE BEING TOLD THAT PrincessStripperWife IS NOT ONLY A VALID PATHWAY TOWARDS HAPPINESS FOR WOMEN, IT IS THE DEFINITION OF WOMAN. MEN’S FANTASY OF WOMANHOOD: THE DEFINITION OF WOMAN. SAY IT OR YOU’RE A BAD FEMINIST NAZI WHORE WHO SHOULD DIE.

AND I AM SO TIRED OF FIGHTING REARGUARD ACTIONS.

“Adult human female” is a biological category with important social ramifications. This statement is in no way phobic of any-fucking-thing. It is not essentialist, determinist or any other –ist word some ignoramuses choose to mis-use because hey, actual dictionary definitions are so fasc-ist, bro, pass the doob. Feminists did not invent human reproduction, we did not cause anyone to be born with one organ system or another, we did not assign sexist presumptions to those organ systems, and we are not responsible for somehow curing male dysmorphia through elaborate self-erasing games of play-pretend.

AND NOW TO MY FELLOW FEMINISTS: CAN THIS BE IT? CAN WE STOP ARGUING WITH ASSHOLES AND FOOLS? BECAUSE I HONESTLY DO NOT CARE IF SOME DELUDED MISOGYNIST SCHMUCK THINKS CHASING THE PRINCESS STRIPPER DREAM WILL BRING HIM HAPPINESS. I DON’T WANT TO INDULGE THOSE ENTITLED SCHMUCKS ANY MORE. IF WE HAVE TO MARCH ON WASHINGTON FOR THE RIGHT TO DEFINE “WOMAN” AS A MATERIAL REALITY RATHER THAN A MALE FANTASIE, LET’S DO THAT AND BE DONE.

MEANWHILE:

WE NEED TO GET BUSY TELLING GIRLS THE TRUTH. PUSHING BACK AGAINST THE PHOTOSHOPPED LIES AND PORNIFIED HATE. PREPARING THEM FOR SAFE, HEALTHY, REWARDING ADULTHOODS, RATHER THAN "REDEFINING REALNESS" AS A CAREFULLY CULTIVATED, AESTHETICALLY PLEASING FEMININE FACADE OVER PAINFUL, DELICATE LIES.

Let's

Get

REAL.

Cis Privilege My Womanly Ass

Ostensibly meaning "on the same side as," "cis" is what trans activists label anyone who is "not trans." Supposedly, "cis" people have "cis privilege" over trans people. This definition necessarily hangs on the underlying definition of "trans," of course.

If "cis" means not-transsexual, that's over 99% of people. We do not need a special label for this. 

If "cis" means something more like "comfortable with how others treat you based on their assumptions about your sex" then this showcases a mind-boggling ignorance of women's lives.

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First of all, women are people, not men's fantasies.

Male fantasies of womanhood. 

Actual women may be: disabled, lesbian, poor, harried, fat, plain, old, et cetera-
Oh let's just sum up: three dimensional humans, UNSEXXXY
[P.S. even beautiful healthy financially comfortable white women experience sexism]

---

Secondly, just because it's one of the examples of supposed privilege that steams me the most, here are just two examples of my experiences with medical care as a "cis" female: 

--When I was 16 I had to go to the emergency room with abdominal pains that were so intense I truly feared I was dying. I was a virgin. There was no way I was pregnant. I know now that I was experiencing a horrible flare up of ulcerative colitis. However, because I was a 16 year old girl, none of the medical staff on duty paid any attention when I said it was my gut that was the issue. They wheeled me into an exam room, thrust my feet into some stirrups and slammed a speculum into my tiny, virginal vagina, causing me to sit up and scream in pain. When they finally did accept that I was not pregnant (I had to be held down for the gynecological exam to be completed,) I was wheeled back to a waiting area and left there for about an hour, during which time I endured several painful bowel movements, and started to feel a bit better. I was sent home with a diagnosis of “gastroenteritis” and an aspirin.

I would have to see three more specialists over the next ten years before I found a doctor (a woman, natch) who scheduled me for a colonoscopy and finally gave me a diagnosis and some medication. The two doctors I saw before that (both male) told me the pain was all in my head and that I just needed to stop stressing out so much. Because they couldn’t take me seriously as a patient, I spent years suffering needlessly and also put myself at much greater risk of colon cancer.

--About fifteen years ago I started to feel an unpleasant pressure on my bladder, becoming more painful with time. I went to several specialists who could not diagnose what the problem was. Finally a gynecologist mentioned that I had two rather large fibroids growing on my uterus. 

So much tumor, er, excuse me, privilege.

I again had to go through three doctors before I found one who would 1) confirm that one of these growths was indeed pressing on my bladder and 2) talk to me about removing the fibroids only, for purposes of my physical comfort rather than fertility, because the first two doctors were of the opinion, “Well if you aren’t going to have kids let’s just take everything out.” (Radical hysterectomy.)

That’s right, have a very painful surgery with a long recovery time, which may or may not affect your ability to ever have an orgasm again, which will definitely require you to go on hormone treatment to avoid menopause in your mid 30s, because why not, if you’re not using those body parts to fulfill your role of carrying a man’s child. I think it’s very unlikely that a man seeking treatment for a medical problem related to his reproductive system would be told "Hell, let's just take it all off, if you're not going to fulfill your role of fathering a woman's child."

Anyhoo, it took two more years to find a job that provided the kind of health insurance that would cover removal of those fuckers. Well, aside from a $1500 deductible. 

Just a few of the conditions we get to take to SEXIST DOCTORS

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I'm tired of talking at brick walls, so I'm going to to do the rest of this blogpost in jpegs.

Topics will include #cis female childhood privilege, beauty privilege, safety privilege, romance privilege, bodily autonomy privilege, and representation privilege.

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IN CONCLUSION

WOMEN ARE NOT PRIVILEGED FOR KNOWING AND ACCEPTING THAT THEY ARE ADULT HUMAN FEMALES

PLEASE STOP THIS NONSENSE

IT'S GIVING ME A MOST UNWOMANLY EYE TWITCH

Progressive Causes Should Not Require the Abandonment of Critical Thought

Several years ago, I needed an abortion. The only "women's clinic" in my town was a stealth-religious organization that advised abortion was a mortal sin. I had to drive four hours round-trip to the nearest Planned Parenthood to watch the state-approved video and sign the state-approved form to start the clock on my 24 hour waiting period, and later that week drive six hours round-trip to the nearest Planned Parenthood with a doctor still brave and caring enough to perform abortions.

I was pregnant, by the way, because the only gynecologist in my tiny middle-of-nowhere town who was taking new patients was a semi-retired 80 year old man who wouldn’t prescribe the pill because he didn’t believe in hormonal birth control, my insurance would not cover an IUD, and the combination of my 37 years, fertility-complicating medical conditions, condom and sponge was no match for my then-lover's supersperm.

This was a very trying time for me - not just because of the combination of onerous government requirements and funding cuts that led to clinic closures, or the boss who was working me to death and grilling me about any time off, or the salary that was so low that paying for the gas for those trips meant I had to do without groceries for a week, or because I was in love with the dope who’d impregnated me and the feeling wasn’t mutual - but because I would have very much liked to have a baby if there was any way I could afford to be a mom. 

All that said, when the lovely lone staffer of the first Planned Parenthood clinic told me I wasn't "required" to look at the fetus photographs included in the state-approved "information packet," my response was "I know the reality of what I'm doing." I looked at the photographs and said, "Yes. That is what I need removed from my uterus."

The abortion was an all-day affair of tense, crowded waiting rooms, repetitive paperwork and social-work-type interviews, and the procedure itself was five minutes of breathtaking pain – it felt like my insides were being vacuumed out through my uterus – but as I walked to the recovery room on shaky legs, the sense of relief was what overwhelmed me.

I don't have to skirt around or gloss over the reality of abortion to demand it as my human right, because the realities of pregnancy - that fetuses require a human host and that growing and birthing one is hard, dangerous work that entails workplace discrimination and incredibly high medical costs - and, after delivery, day care costs - are just as important. My defense of abortion access is 100% clear-eyed and reality-based because it takes in the full context of women's lives.

My support of anti-racism efforts is also 100% clear-eyed and reality-based. I don't feel any need to censor discussions of race because I know that people of color are in no way inferior to white people, and that any theses/data to the contrary can be factually dismantled by looking at historical and socio-economic realities in an honest and in-depth way. The same goes for anti-poverty efforts and any conception of poor people as inherently lazy.

The answer is never to deny demographic realities nor to spend all our time railing at those who use inequality to justify prejudice but to dig in and figure out how to solve problems. Analyze contexts, build coalitions, make individual and structural changes.

As for gay rights, my support is deeply grounded in my feminism. Homosexuality is in no way harmful - it does not require any unwilling participation, after all - but in addition, arguments against gay rights are always steeped in ideas of traditional gender roles. They're not, at base, about homosexuality but about male dominance. Dig deeper. More analysis, not less.

---

My support for progressive causes is not based on a belief that people born into oppressed classes are innately "better" than those who are born into oppressor classes, or because I feel sorry for anyone, or because to idealize and/or pity others would make me feel morally superior to anyone.

I support progressive causes because, very simply, I think all women and [men who are gay, black, brown, disabled, economically disadvantaged, et cetera] are just as human as the most privileged of males, and that the rights they (we) demand are perfectly reasonable and justifiable.

---

Which brings us to the latest fad in Leftist circles: If a person born with a fully functioning male reproductive system, socialized male throughout his childhood and adolescence, educated as a male, and promoted within his chosen profession as a male, declares he now "feels like a woman" then *TADA* SHE IS NOW BIOLOGICALLY FEMALE. IF YOU OBJECT IN ANY WAY YOU ARE A BIGOT WHO MUST BE SILENCED. 

THIS IS ABSURD. It also seems like a perfect parody of reactionary conservatives' view of progressive politics -- but given the traction this sentiment has found, not just with youth on Twitter and Tumblr but with mainstream leftist and feminist publications and in the law - I do believe the Right Wing Nut Jobs have a point regarding how many Lefties have no interest in applying critical analysis to their causes but instead simply vie for most non-judgmental (or in practice, most knee-jerkingly sanctimonious).

Rational judgment is good. And to equate the reasonableness of these first four statements with the reasonableness of the fifth one is offensive:

• Women do not exist to serve men.
• People of color are in no way inferior to white people.
• Poor people do not deserve to be poor.
• Homosexuality is not morally wrong.
• Biological sex is all in your head.

This inanity calls into question both the intelligence and the sincerity of self-declared "transgender allies." 

Human beings are a sexually dimorphic species. That is a fact. "Transwomen are women" is a thought-terminating cliche that empties the word woman of its meaning - adult human female. On the other hand, "transwomen are men who suffer from sex dysmorphia, pursue medical and social transition, and are then addressed as transwomen -prefix included, and as a specific subset of men-might not fit into a tweet but also doesn't require anyone to deny reality.

And you know what? I find it extremely condescending to transsexual people when I'm exhorted to deny biological reality so as not to harm them. Many trans-identified men and women have made lovely lives for themselves. Careers, hobbies, homes, pets, friends, significant others. They are not only capable of accepting biological reality but of sincerely engaging with feminist analysis. They are grown people fully capable of human happiness and awesomeness and no one needs to treat them like they are made of glass. For heaven's sake. 

We can offer the concession of "transwoman" without giving up either our knowledge of how babies are made (my ex-boyfriend did not impregnate me with his manly gaze!) or our analyses of how female humans are subjugated (e.g. restricting abortion access!) We can befriend and support transwomen who embrace both reality & feminist analysis and still avoid the hell out of autogynephilic asshats. For crying out loud, they aren't hard to spot. WHAT WITH THE PENISES AND RAGING MISOGYNY AND ALL.

Progressive causes should not require us to relinquish our critical thinking skills or tell polite lies or walk on eggshells. Empathy and honest analysis can and should co-exist on the Left. Let's get it together.

Moving my post on intersectionality and radical feminism here-

[Please see previous post on white privilege if you would like more personal background/context for your anonymous blogger.] 

I only came across the term “intersectionality,” a term first coined by Kimberle Crenshaw to describe the multiple, interrelated axes of oppression experienced by women of color, when I joined Twitter earlier this year.

However, here is a summary of the house course I co-taught (with another 22 year old white woman) as a college senior in 1997:

"Ain't I a Woman?": Multiple Perspectives on Feminism”
Week 1: Introduction
Week 2: Background and History
Week 3: Anthropology and Language
Week 4: Race and Ethnicity
Week 5: Class and Privilege
Week 6: Religion and Spirituality
Week 7: Sexuality and the Body Politic
Week 8: Marriage, Motherhood & Family
Week 9: Work and Education
Week 10: Media
Week 11: Writing and Voice
Week 12: Future/Conclusion

I’m not sharing this in hopes of proving how special I am; I’m not really interested in the Speshulness Olympics as my self-esteem is doing just fine without the approval of strangers on the internet, TYVM. What I want to suggest is that anyone who is interested in intellectual honesty and who can listen to the experiences of others can get on board with the idea of multiple, intersecting and interrelating axes of oppression.

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As I stated earlier, I support the right of people of color to draw whatever boundaries they want, and would not ever force myself into discussions about either race or feminism or anything else between women of color who do not wish to engage with me because I’m white. That’s perfectly understandable. Women of color don't owe me any of their time. Of course, there are many women of color who are happy to talk with me about feminism and other concerns, and I’m glad and very grateful for that.

What I take issue with are the “trans activists” trying to equate radical feminism with white supremacy, in order to silence radical feminists. This is nonsensical. The idea that one’s reproductive system should neither elevate (male) nor limit (not-male) one’s social standing (but currently does) is 100% compatible with the idea that one’s race should neither elevate (white) nor limit (not-white) one’s social standing (but currently does). This nonsense also erases women of color who are radical feminists.

Some white feminists have been/are racist, obviously. Many (some would say all) white people are racist, and every single political group on Earth contains some assholes whose political analysis is limited and selfish. Should “white feminists” be exempt from criticism? Of course not. Feminist theory, like any other vital and evolving theory, requires constant, vigorous critique.

However:

1) “Not inclusive enough of anyone who was born and raised male but says they are female” is not a valid criticism, any more than “not inclusive enough of anyone who was born and raised white but says they are a person of color” would be;

2) Ill-informed pile-ons are not critiques; and

3) Actually nobody’s analysis should be exempt from criticism. That’s not how analysis works.

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Just as all white people grow up with white privilege, all males grow up with male privilege. Even males who transition and live as women still benefit from their previously accumulated years of male privilege.

Pro tip: When you allow white males to co-opt intersectionality to get away with hand-waving their male privilege and in fact brazenly pointing to their male bodies as a sign of oppression rather than privilege, and female ("cis") bodies as privileged rather than oppressed, they won’t stop there:

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Male humans should analyze *perceived gender conformity* as an axis of oppression – masculinity is toxic and needs much deconstruction! However, that analysis should 1) be shouldered by males, not demanded of female feminists, and 2) always keep in mind that no amount of gender conformity protects female humans of any color.

Because just as all males grow up with male privilege, all females grow up as second class citizens. In fact yes, there are experiences of sex-based oppression shared by females worldwide. Do those experiences vary based on other factors such as race, religion, economic class, geographic area, physical disability and et cetera? Of course. Do the experiences of an upper class black male living in a major metropolitan area of the United States differ from the experiences of a poor black woman living in a rural village in Kenya? Of course they do; however racism is still an axis of oppression, just as sexism is still an axis of oppression.

The idea (pushed by AFTAs) that white women don’t experience any real oppression elevates white men’s facile portrayal of white womanhood, as Catherine MacKinnon talks about in her prescient article, From Practice to Theory, or What is a White Woman, Anyway?: "Beneath the trivialization of the white woman’s subordination implicit in the dismissive sneer 'straight white economically privileged women' (a phrase which has become one word, the accuracy of some of its terms being rarely documented even in law journals) lies the notion that there is no such thing as the oppression of women as such... "

Furthermore, oppression is not a zero sum game (it is not a game at all.) Some white women are more Dorothy Allison than Gloria Steinem. Some white women are poor, disabled, lesbian and still work towards racial justice in their communities, like Victoria Brownworth. Furthermore, some white women partner with men or women of color and have bi- or multiracial children. Some women may be perceived as white but endure prejudice nonetheless, and I'm hoping a Jewish friend of mine will write her own blog about that. None of these factors cancel out our white privilege, but neither does our white privilege cancel out other struggles. Much as a black man working a highly-paid job and living in a sweet Manhattan penthouse will still experience daily racism, which is not canceled out by his male privilege or economic fortune. The very term "intersectionality" doesn't imply either/or, it implies AND.

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And it would be really great, in fact, for anyone living in a temperature-controlled domicile in a neighborhood safe from bullets and bombs, with clean water, indoor plumbing and electricity -- not to mention access to food stores provided by migrant workers, consumer goods built by factory workers in the 2/3 world, and petroleum products secured through imperialist wars -- to check all that privilege before preemptively judging anyone else based on their privilege, whether obvious (white) or assumed (economically secure, able-bodied, etc.) I sometimes imagine telling my Nairobi homestay mom about the Twitter knuckleheads tweeting their intense distress over their *identities* or *pronouns* from their $500 phones and want to “ROFL” at the mental image of the most sigh-heaving, eye-rolling “SMH” of all time.

Furthermore, being asked to check your “first world” privilege is only going to feel rude or threatening if you think privilege-checking is about SILENCING others. ("First world" is a problematic term; Jonathon Kozol describes schools in the United States that are nightmares compared to the three room schoolhouses I visited in Kenya. Therefore I use the term to refer to resources, not location.) I'm not interested in silencing anyone, but I am interested in seeing some perspective brought to the endless Oppression Olympics on Twitter. There are literally millions of human beings who were born into realities that did not allow them to take for granted that their basic human needs for survival would be met, much less that strangers on social media would kow-tow to whatever seven-adjective identity they woke up feeling like tweeting about today. Many of them picked your food or assembled your iPhone or sewed your clothes or died in the war that filled your gas tank. You didn't ask to be born to the group of humans who benefit from this situation, but nevertheless there you (there we) are.

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So here’s a question for anyone obsessed with cataloging their own individual oppressions and the (real & perceived) privileges of others: what do you hope to win? If all women eschew all privilege and remain poor and underrepresented in positions of power, will that defeat white supremacist patriarchy? Or maybe does white supremacist patriarchy benefit hugely from this fetishization of oppression by the oppressed, not to mention the isolation of the oppressed from the privileged?

Could we instead think of privilege-checking not as a tool of silencing others & elevating our analysis above critique, but instead as a way to situate our own analysis and to approach the analyses of others? Might this better help us find shared experiences of oppression (not all experiences will be shared by males or white women!), practice class analysis, and from those analyses work to deconstruct and dismantle systems of oppression?

Because here is what I wish for each and every one of you: Less oppression, not more.