The world of feminism is a vast one. Its defined as “The advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes” and the idea is to promote a better way of living for everyone, focusing on women and girls, when the barriers to equality are challenged and overcome. This crossover between queer women and feminism is clear, as queerness is often a barrier to equality, both socially and under the law. But this venn diagram does not necessarily mean that all queer women are on the same page when it comes to feminism.
What is a TERF?
There is one group of women in particular who have their own idea of what constitutes as feminism, or rather who should be defined as a “woman” when we talk about women’s rights in feminism: Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists (TERFs). They are usually cis individuals who believe that transgender women have no place in women’s rights or women only spaces. Trans men aren’t spared the exclusion either, with TERFs harbouring a patronising attitude towards them as little more than ultra butch women.
At the moment TERFs are a massive embarrassment to the general feminist sphere. Earlier this year at the Pride parade in London, a lesbian TERF group hijacked the parade, throwing toddler like tantrums on the floor until they were granted leeway to lead a parade partially for the very community they were trying to erase. Pride in London did respond after the event for letting the group walk ahead of the parade for a time.
They distributed leaflets with vile content, accusing transwomen of being lecherous men in disguise and disgustingly used rape culture as an excuse for the exclusion of the trans people. Had it not been for the historic efforts of the trans community, there wouldn’t even be an LGBTQI movement and that made their stunt at Pride all the more abhorrent. The choice to invade what should be a safe space for the socially marginalised was absolutely rotten. What happened that day was akin to Jayda Fransen from Britain First leading a Black Lives Matter march.
The aftermath was that terfs not only gained support amongst other transphobic women but chauvinistic men, particularly on social media. They rapidly shared a similar sentiment which is to dictate who qualifies as a woman, nullifying one of the main aspects of feminism.
Feminism is about inclusion and equality, not hate
As a feminist it is not only difficult but insulting to witness a group of people twist an inclusive ideology to fit their own hateful interests. What’s more the poor arguments, such as possessing adequate female biology, that TERFs use to justify their point is quite hurtful and just, eurgh. In their world, ‘real’ women go through annoying menstrual cycles and getting pregnant and sexual abuse is solely dependent on the form of someone’s private parts.
There are women, trans and non, who have been victims of rape and sexual harassment. There are lots of cisgendered women who don’t have periods or have not gone through the pains of childbirth. To use the sufferings and personal biology for the sake of a spiteful placard is damn insensitive, humiliating and to some levels, misogynistic. What’s more, the TERF movement is largely a white, middle class one, viewing non white sisterhood as a charity case and nothing more. What type of female empowerment are these so called gender criticals (that’s a TERF’s preferred term) trying to promote from their globally privileged high horse? Not one I’m on board with.
We stand against TERFs, the TWERPs
TERFism is a current example of dehumanising and denying the existence of individuals based on their identity. It’s a struggle that is nothing new to feminists including their people of colour, disabled people and the LGBTQI community. As feminists and queer people, it’s important that we take a stand against this language, these actions and these people. #LwiththeT did just that at Brighton Pride, which followed London Pride.
Really, it feels like applying the word Feminist to a TERF is moot. Perhaps we could give them a more accurate term like, Trans Women Exclusionary Radical Protesters, which can be abbreviated to TWERPs?
By Joy Muhammad
Joy is the author of various articles and stories covering race, faith, sexuality and gender. She also makes the occasional camera appearance particularly via Pride.
Follow Joy on Twitter @press_yellow for more inclusive topics and updates on her current works.
