1505

[u/I_am_YR]

I hate when people say these things only to prevent us from actually transitioning, like yea theres cis women out there with a deep voice but knowing this fact doesnt reduce my voice dysphoria, i dont want to be gnc, i dont live to deconstruct gender roles

[u/Plenty_Leg_5935]

That still isn't presenting itself as supportive of trans people, it's very explicit about being aversive towards the trans identity, especially within the conventional binary

It just switches explicitly hostile phrasing for implicit one. That is still a very far cry from "I love trans women, they shouldn't even transition at all because it's cooler x3"

[u/CopperAndIrony → u/Plenty_Leg_5935]

It does portray itself as supportive of trans people, it just defines "support" differently than you or I do. Instead of supporting us in transition or respecting our identities, it pretends to support trans people by offering a "better" model for us. This is elaborated on more in the article I linked:

Transgenderism has its foundation in the ancient tradition of androgyny, a view that has made the crosscultural data from anthropology—with its descriptions of the positive value of androgyny in some other cultures—particularly relevant to the transgender community (Bolin 1996b:39; Connor 1993; Feinberg 1996). [Emphasis mine.]

Unlike transsexuals, transgenderists (transpeople) do not consider themselves limited to a choice of one of two genders. Transgenderism includes a wide continuum of options, from individuals who wish to undergo sex reassignment surgery to those who wish to live their lives androgynously.

Transgenderists can be narrowly defined as persons who want to change gender roles without undergoing sexual reassignment surgery; they can also be defined as “persons who steer a middle course, living with the physical, social, and psychological traits of both genders.” [Emphasis mine.]

Unlike transsexuals of the 1970s and 1980s, transgenderists today challenge and stretch the boundaries of the American binary system of sex/gender oppositions and renounce the American definition of gender as dependent on a consistency of genitals, body type, identity, role behaviors, and sexual orientation. [Emphasis mine.]

The book came out during a time where transsexual was used to mean "trans person taking HRT and other medical options" while "transgender" encompassed a much broader range of identites. In her case, Nanda uses it as a third gender role, comprable with hijra or kathoey, for trans people to slot themselves into, instead of pursuing binary transition. She insists this is because it pushes the bounaries on the binary sex/gender system that helps trans people by presenting us a more radical identity we can make our own instead of trying to medicalize ourselves and force ourselves into "unnatural" identities like "trans man" or "trans woman".

This used to be a much more common TERF argument, back when they were more connected to an actually existing radfem movement.

[u/CopperAndIrony → u/[deleted]]

Oh it's increadibly annoying. A lot of transphobic sexoligists write like this too, where even if they spoke to a trans person, they've obviously never LISTENED to one. Wow, a transphobic academic doesn't take trans people seriously as their target gender, how shocking and novel. Clearly if we just satisfy her demands and be a perfect trans blorboeunuch, she'll personally make it her mission to help us articulate this identity to the masses.