Consider, however, that the vast majority of TERF arguments against trans women are based in racism. The exclusion of trans women as women is “backed up” by their “inherently manly” characteristics, many of which are natural and beautiful and feminine but were masculinized in the past few centuries as a specific brand of racist dehumanization that allowed colonists to feel better about the genocide they committed. The presumed appearance of what Eugenicists believed women should look like (hairless, soft features, light hair, small lips) was created as a way to differentiate BIPOC from white people in order to “justify” the genocide and violence inflicted on them by the white colonists. You will find that TERF logic and eugenicist logic are almost identical. Do your research & you’ll find that TERF “logic” and that community as a whole is built almost entirely from white eugenicists’ racist “justifications” for genocide and colonialism.
here are my sources: Book Report: Women with Mustaches and Men Without Beards: Gender and Sexual Anxieties of Iranian Modernity by Dr. Afsaneh Najmabadi (University of California Press, 2005) (book report done by Alok Vaid-Menon)
Book Report: The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses by Dr. Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí (University of Minnesota Press 1997) (book report done by Alok Vaid-Menon)
Book Report: Plucked: A History of Hair Removal by Dr. Rebecca Herzig (New York University Press, 2016) (book report done by Alok Vaid-Menon)
Y’all missed the point of this entirely. Go look at the roots of your logic & understand what you’ve been perpetuating.
Terfs are a little silly goofy " having hairy legs is the radfem i like your shoelaces code " and then they call women of color men for having more body hair 😐
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-waikiki was once a taro patch that fed all the native hawaiians on that side of the island.
-oahus current population numbers were once all native hawaiians. Now they comprise less than 5% of it.
-native hawaiians comprise less than 15% of the total population of hawaii but are most of the homeless and well over half the prison populace over non-violent petty offenses.
-native hawaiians have the lowest life expectancy, lowest income and least chances for education out of damn near all ethnic groups in the u.s.
-hawaii is stolen.
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I think, in an able-bodied world, and most importantly, in a able-bodied medical system, we as physically disabled people have to stop trying to assess our impairments from the POV of our own thresholds of pain, fatigue and other dysfunctions.
I struggle with this a lot as well, but if we're trying to get accommodations and treatments in a system created by and for abled and usually healthy bodies we have to speak their language and it really is a matter of having to constantly translate back and forth.
If I want an able-bodied person to take my state seriously I can't just say "I'm a little tired today". Even if to MY chronic fatigue standards that really is just a little more tired than usual. MY "a little more tired than usual" doesn't look like what an able-bodied person understands as "a little more tired than usual" and it sure as hell doesn't require the same care as what they understand by it... But they're the ones with the power to concede or deny me the level of care or at least basic consideration I do need.
Same with pain. The things I consider to be ok regarding pain and discomfort are things an able-bodied person would call in sick for. Same too with the cognitive dysfunction when I'm flaring.
If we as individuals want to get anything from a little understanding to (God fucking forbid) tangible help for our impairments then we have to start articulating what we're going through in terms they could understand. It's why I tend to tell people to "exaggerate"; because most of the time we won't be exaggerating, we'll be more accurate than we otherwise would.
Don't articulate your impairments to able-bodied people based on the bullshit you're used to on a daily basis, articulate them in relation to what's gonna get you the help you need.
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Kate Bornstein in TransSisters: The Journal of Transsexual Feminism issue 5, volume 1.
“Let’s have lots of genders; I think the more genders the merrier. I don’t want to abolish gender; that would be boring.”
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I feel like younger folks have misconstrued "listen to rainbow community elders" as, like, their shitty dad or granddad giving that hollow "respect your elders" that they in no way earned, when it's actually nothing like that at all and more like "oh my god listen to the people who were actually around for this shit before you perpetuate misconceptions and harmful rhetoric that can and in some cases already have set our community's progress back by decades."
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Hey check out the Incarcerated Workers’ Organizing Committee
Just point your browser to https://incarceratedworkers.org/
About
We, the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC), are a prisoner-led section of the Industrial Workers of the World. We struggle to end prison slavery along with allies and supporters on the outside. On September 9, 2016 we were part of a coalition of inside and outside groups that launched the largest prison strike in US history. Resistance to prison slavery continues with work stoppages, hunger strikes and other acts of resistance to business as usual.
But it will take a mass movement - inside and out - to abolish prison slavery. We have hundreds of members in over 15 prisons and our membership continues to grow. We invite all those who agree with our statement of purpose to join us and to start a local group in their prison, city, or trailer park. IWW membership is free to those incarcerated, and is based on income for those on the outside. We ask supporters to sponsor a prisoner’s membership for just $5 a month.
Prison Slavery
Incarcerated people are legally slaves as per the 13th Amendment which abolished “slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime”. We are legally slaves. If you’ve been to prison you’d know we are treated like slaves.
Billions are made annually off our backs. Outrageously priced or grossly inadequate privatized ‘services’ like health care, food, phone calls, assault our humanity - they feed us like animals, suck our families dry, and when sick leave us to die. The government spends as much as an elite college tuition per person to keep each of us incarcerated, but this money does not develop us as human beings, reduce crime or make our communities safer.
They also profit from our labor. At least half of the nation’s 1.5 million of us imprisoned in the United States have jobs yet are paid pennies an hour, or even nothing at all. Many of us perform the essential work needed to run the prisons themselves - mopping cellblock floors, preparing and serving food, filing papers and other prison duties. Others of us work in “correction industries” programs performing work in areas such as clothing and textile, computer aided design, electronics, and recycling activities. Some of us even sub-contract with private corporations such as Sprint, Starbucks, Victoria’s Secret, and many more.
As incarcerated workers, we are some of the most exploited workers in the country. There is no minimum wage for prison labor. The average wage is 20 cents an hour, with some states not paying a wage at all. Up to 80% of wages can be withheld by prison officials. There are very few safety regulations and no worker’s compensation for injury on the job. While in prison, we try to earn money to support our families, ourselves, and pay victim restitution yet these wages prevent us from that. We believe that as workers we are guaranteed the same protections and wages as other workers.
We are working to abolish prison slavery and this system that does not correct anyone or make our communities safer.
Industrial Workers of the World
In addition to abolishing prison slavery, we are also fighting to end the criminalization, exploitation, and enslavement of working class people in general. We are part of the larger
Industrial Workers of the World
(IWW), a revolutionary union that has been fighting oppressive systems for over one hundred years.
When first founded, the IWW was the only union open to all- regardless of race, gender or nationality. Fierce campaigns waged by miners, dock workers and agricultural workers led to signficant gains in wages and workplace conditions.
Our revolutionary politics and refusal to sell out led to massive and widespread crackdowns by the US government as part of the Red Scare, and beyond.
Despite this, the union persisted and to this day continues to organize for a new world. Like, IWOC, the IWW is seeing a resurgence, with membership steadily growing since 2000.
IWOC’s Statement of Purpose
1. To further the revolutionary goals of incarcerated people and the IWW through mutual organizing of a worldwide union for emancipation from the prison system.
2. To build class solidarity amongst members of the working class by connecting the struggle of people in prison, jails, and immigrant and juvenile detention centers to workers struggles locally and worldwide.
3. To strategically and tactically support prisoners locally and worldwide, incorporating an analysis of white supremacy, patriarchy, prison culture, and capitalism.
4. To actively struggle to end the criminalization, exploitation, and enslavement of working class people, which disproportionately targets people of color, immigrants, people with low income, LGBTQ people, young people, dissidents, and those with mental illness.
5. To amplify the voices of working class people in prison, especially those engaging in collective action or who put their own lives at risk to improve the conditions of all.
https://incarceratedworkers.org/
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