Adding my voice to the trans debate

I thought I’d go off piste and write about some of the things which have been coming up for me around the transgender debate. I’m not an avid follower of everything written on the subject but I have been around my children’s responses to some of the things that were reported about JK Rowling speaking about it and it highlighted how much history, how much nuance has been lost in the polarisation of this debate. I have never commented online about this issue as I’m too much of a wimp, I’m intimidated by the idea that I will be labelled a TERF and oppressive. The last thing I want to do is oppress other people but it makes me realise that those 2 things in tandem – not wanting to be oppressive and not wanting to be attacked for my opinions – are not unique to me and there must be a whole load of other voices we are not hearing. The transgender debate is a good example of those who shout the loudest get heard and the ability to do that is built on courage or privilege or both so in the spectrum of opinions, we only hear about those at each polarised end and other contributions are separated accordingly and squeezed into one of the two boxes by the courageous or the shouters.

My children are both teenage boys and they are growing up in interesting times, so different from when I was their age. It is cool to be non-binary, queer or trans and young people identifying as “other” seem to be generally accepted by their peer group. Any expression of “other” identity out on the street though, is likely to be met with a level of hostility and hatred by people who feel just as entitled to express their intolerance. It’s an interesting co-existence of opposing forces – in law things have become more liberal and as a lesbian, for example, I have more rights and protections than I did when I came out almost 30 years ago and although far from perfect there are more things enshrined in law to protect different groups from discrimination so there is at least a tip of the hat in that direction. But on the other hand there is also this inhibition effect enabled by online communication where people are more anonymous and less accountable and feel entitled to say whatever comes into their mind completely unfiltered. And through unaccountable expressions of hate and intolerance online people find support and know that they are not alone which gives bigots the courage to take these expressions out into the wider world. I have experienced my fair share of sexism and lesbophobia but I would hate to be a young person negotiating the “world out there” today where a significant minority think it’s ok to meet difference (from the white male ruling class) with intimidation and violence. I know that people who identify as trans are more likely than anyone to encounter such bigotry and violence which I think is completely unacceptable.

As a child growing up in a family headed by a sexist racist bigot, I felt loads of shame whilst also deep down believing that if only I had been born a boy, my dad might love me. I remember the glow I felt as a young child when a stranger would call me son or mistake me for a boy, like I could puff my chest out and stand that bit taller. The devastation of starting to menstruate in junior school was like a kick in the gut as I realised I’d been assuming myself a boy and here was the humiliating truth that I was a girl. I hated bleeding and what it meant and felt so much rage towards my body for letting me down. I was excluded from my gang of boys as my breasts got wobblier and my femaleness could no longer be denied. In a different time and different family, I have absolutely no doubt that I would have chosen to transition to male in search of a sense of self acceptance and belonging. Now though, I can see that those feelings were driven by internalised misogyny instilled throughout my childhood. These days when I meet female to male trans people I feel an affiliation, a recognition, like I get it, I understand why people do that, although of course everyone’s drivers are different. I’m glad I didn’t transition though as later I discovered feminism and butch lesbians and saw myself reflected there and started to grow some pride in my womanhood and my sisters who had walked the path before me. Reading Stone Butch Blues (as harrowing as it is) was one of many great sources of comfort and normalisation around that time.

I remember the shame and humiliation as a young adult of being told I was in the wrong toilets, “These are the ladies toilets son”. The deep breath I took on entering and leaving – the shame of being mistaken for male, the shame of people realising I was female. I would’ve loved a gender neutral toilet option to reduce the stress of that. And in these times when there are options to not have to face the uncomfortableness of mistaken gender by “becoming” male it’s totally understandable why people make that choice, to save themselves the stress, shame and harassment – to fit in. But I also see the cost of that and that’s what I was talking to my kids about – how gender has become more polarised than ever. Where are the butch dyklings now? And where are the older butch dykes for the younger ones to look up to? They seem few and far between, which is a shame as for me they were a source of power and making peace with myself and my womanhood. I am guilty of this too… Having spent most of my late teens and early 20s with either a shaved head or a mohican, I am now a pony tailed lesbian and life is much easier because of it with people assuming me straight on the street and at work.

In these queer times, reflections of male and female seem more narrow and stereotyped, and trans is seen as the route for those who don’t fit in. We have lesbians in the public eye, which is totally fantastic, but most are gender conforming and of the hundreds of images young women are bombarded with daily on social media, I’m guessing only a very small percentage fall outside of that. That’s the irony of these times – whilst the internet and social media has the potential to positively reflect so many forms of difference, it’s general effect seems to have been to homogenise the culture. As my friend pointed out the other day – where are the goths and the emos? Where are the routes to rebellion or self expression that were open to us as young people? It seems like gender identity is one of the few routes for young people who feel like they don’t fit in to express their difference. And I think there are many possible explanations for the homogenisation of culture – one is the mass consumption of porn starting in (or before) early puberty with it’s many different fall out effects, the main one being the cultural condoning of the objectification of women and girls and how that gives men and boy’s feelings of entitlement to comment, judge, humiliate and demand of girls and women with narrow views of how we “should” look and act which many apply without question, and 11 year old girls shave because it “feels nice”, etc, and loads of other stuff which I’m not going to go into here. I think there’s also something about the lack of cultural references that young people share in a way that is new and influencing their identity in a different way. Young people now are spending way more time in front of screens than previous generations and it’s like they are growing up in parallel where everyone follows their own interests and there is little cross over terms of shared references. With less shared reference points, maybe there’s less things to collectively kick against.

I have some but less personal experience with male to female trans. From the early 90s in my activist days, I saw how the issue divided feminists. I remember taking it in turns to read out loud Gender Outlaw with a lover in my bender at a women’s peace camp and the exploratory discussions which followed, whilst around us there were women who felt really passionately that male to female trans posed a great threat to women and feminists everywhere. I remember hearing of all sorts of women’s organisations that women had fought for years to establish and get funding for being threatened with loss of funding if they did not include trans women. For me, as a survivor of a myriad of childhood abuses perpetuated by men, I know that women only spaces have at times been a haven for my recovery, rare places where I have been able to let my guard down and be more fully myself. It may sound discriminatory to some, but I would have felt less at ease alongside people at the beginning of their transition journey who were clearly male, my sense of unselfconscious ease would’ve been lost. I’m not saying women only spaces are these havens of utopia, they are far from it at times in my experience and there have always been divisions and passionate differences of opinion. But I think the idea that all spaces need to be all things to all people misses the unique gifts these spaces have to offer to those who have been especially injured by white male supremacy. We need more spaces offering unique havens, not a few spaces trying to cater to everyone. As an angry young feminist waking up to the root cause of my decimated childhood being the patriarchy, I identified as a seperatist feminist for a few years but the deeper I got into it’s values, and also in the process of understanding myself more, the less it aligned with my own sense of fairness and justice and it was so weighed down by judgement that some women felt entitled to cast, like a reworking of the hierarchy in a different form. It was the first time in my life that I encountered politics being more important than relationships which was shocking to experience. I remember someone I had previously considered a friend’s disdain at my decision to get pregnant and my jaw dropping as she confidently asked, “How do you feel about bringing a potential rapist into the world?” and any shared ground seemed to drop away beneath our feet.

I talked to my kids, as I have done before, about the history of feminism and how hard women before us fought for women only spaces, for equality and how far we still have to go. How most feminist’s opposition to the Gender Recognition Act has got nothing to do with trans women but about the opportunity it will give paedophiles a right to enter women and girl’s spaces and not be questioned, and what nonsense it seems to me that everyone should have the right to decide their own gender, what a mockery that makes of the battles hard fought up until now. I do however think that people who are committed to transitioning should be recognised and protected in law as the gender they feel most describes them at some point in their journey. I agree that trans women should feel as welcome as anyone at our local women’s disco and other social spaces and know that the overt abuse and micro aggressions such people encounter as part of daily life can be life threatening and that women’s social spaces may offer a haven from that for some. I also see that it’s women having to do the accommodating in the provision of those havens when it is men (mostly) who are doing the violence and intimidation. I’ve been part of discussions and ruptures of Red Tent circles where women meet monthly to discuss and share experiences of womanhood, to be heard and witnessed and for me it doesn’t feel appropriate for trans women to be included in that. We are not a spectator sport in the exploration of our own identity and the issues and challenges brought by trans women would be different in nature and the drive to be inclusive would change the focus. And that’s what I mean about one space not needing to be everything – lets have a whole load of spaces and create our own if what we’re looking for doesn’t already exist so that we can feel seen and heard and have more energy and resources when we come back together.

It feels to me like misogyny is rife in the loudest voices in this debate, with any woman who dares to question the Gender Recognition Act being shouted down as a TERF and threatened and intimidated with potentially massive repercussions in their personal and work lives. It’s difficult to not see male privilege underlying that, that those trans women who shout the loudest wield a massive sense of entitlement in demanding they should be admitted into all women’s spaces with no regard for what the consequences for women and girls might be and I don’t think that’s fair or reasoned. I know there are loads of other trans women’s voices which don’t get heard because of how polarised the debate has become and loads of women like me who don’t speak out because of fear and not wanting to be put in one box or the other. And a lot of young people, my sons included, just hear the headlines and feel the disappointment that “JK Rowling is transphobic”, for example, or that anyone who doesn’t support the Gender Recognition Act must also be transphobic and they understandably and rightly don’t want to be part of oppressing their peers. Their gut reaction to anyone described publicly as oppressive is to defend their peers and dismiss the oppressor and it’s difficult for them to see past those headlines and be curious and open to the issues being discussed. I really feel for parents of children and young people who want to transition, how angsty that must be to negotiate, but I think it’s important we talk with them about patriarchy, society and feminism to set their feelings and search for belonging and identity in context.