• exocrinous
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    6 months ago

    At this point in time I tend to take terms like “intersectional feminist” to mean someone is probably an ally, but if someone just calls themself a feminist without any adjectives, that gives me absolutely zero information as to whether they’re interested in gender equality for all gender identities. I know they support cis women, but I have no idea whether they support any kind of trans person.

    • spaduf@slrpnk.netOPM
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      6 months ago

      Throwing out feminism because it does not essentialise trans and NB rights feels like very poor praxis. From the perspective of one individual assessing the views of another, I don’t disagree with your metric, but I disagree with your application of the ideas to the broader movement. Particularly in so far as it grants to right wingers that feminism is a sexist term.

      • exocrinous
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        6 months ago

        Well this is a debate about prescriptivism vs descriptivism, right? I’m saying the complexities of the ways the word is used no longer make its meaning clear unless certain adjectives are applied. You’re arguing we should stick to the “intended” meaning. But at what point does denying the evolution of language to become more transphobic deny the genuine harms suffered by trans people? Surely there’s a point where that’s the case, right? How do you know we haven’t reached that point?

        • spaduf@slrpnk.netOPM
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          6 months ago

          Well this is a debate about prescriptivism vs descriptivism, right?

          No I don’t think so.

          You’re arguing we should stick to the “intended” meaning. But at what point does denying the evolution of language to become more transphobic deny the genuine harms suffered by trans people?

          I’m arguing that your particular claimed usage of feminism as a transphobic term (that is, the general inclusion of NBs as a class for whom feminism benefits is tantamount to gendering them female) simply doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. This is distinct from the issue of women’s spaces explicitly including NBs feels like misgendering (which is valid).

          The premise of this community is fundamentally dependent on the idea that being a beneficiary of feminism MUST be entirely seperate from being gendered female.

          • exocrinous
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            6 months ago

            Ah, no, I meant to say that feminism losing its implication of progress for all gender identities (if it had such an implication in the past), is evidenced by the fact that if someone says they’re a feminist, that doesn’t tell you whether they support equality for enbies.

            • spaduf@slrpnk.netOPM
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              6 months ago

              Many people who have a problem with the name feminism are nonbinary people, who want equality but have been excluded from the movement by enbyphobic women, AKA TERFs.

              I assert that the quantity of nbs who hold this opinion is so small as to be negligable and that ceding a major right wing talking point for gender equity for nbs (a group in which I, and the majority of my social circle are a part of) is mostly just ceding a right wing talking point.

              Put another way, the idea that “feminism” is an insufficient term is tantamount to “all lives matter”.