Our disdain for Sall is only because her idea of liberating women throws trans people under the bus Women absolutely deserve safe spaces free from harassment, threats, and claims of "not all men!" Claims that trans women jeopardize that in any way whatsoever is not only bigoted, but actively reinforces patriarchal gender roles.
Disclaimer: I'm a dude
As a man, I cannot speak to the experience of women, nor will I use "as a brother, son" as the only way I can empathize with women. My view of womanhood is secondhand, by reading feminist theory and listening to women who feel comfortable enough to confide in me.
Content warning: Misogynistic slurs
Men's culture is loaded with misogynistic attempts to misgender men as women to insult them. Calling me a woman by saying "dude you're a bitch/pussy" is much less hurtful to me than to a woman, let alone trans people. The man's idea of insulting someone is just saying they're a woman. It has left me knowing that men's liberation is inextricably tied to the liberation of women & destruction of the gender expectations that leave us all feeling inadequate.
On harassment
Many of the points Sall raises are absolutely valid and affect all women. Harassment, threats, and violence against women are widespread and a scourge on our society. No doubt she faces these regularly explicitly for being a woman. We take no issue with acknowledging this & our contributions to this culture. We do take issue with not only denying that trans women experience also these hostilities, but also pretending that those very hostilities are a result of the very presence of trans women.
Content warning: Sexual violence
I will never experience living in fear of sexual violence. I know women must just to avoid the onslaught of sexual advancements of predatory men. Trans women face this constant abuse from men because they are women!
Sall, read this
Sall if you read this, please understand that when you say your app is for "females" our trans friends get an even greater feeling of inadequacy from knowing that society refuses to recognize them as the people they truly are.
When you misgender them or imply they are not real women by disguising it with not-so-clever language, you are saying that they will not find refuse anywhere, not in society and not in women's spaces. You implicitly tell them self proclaimed "feminists" will sell them out because some may see trans liberation as jeopardizing theirs.
Do you think they feel any different when you tell them that their struggles with womanhood are not valid than when a man dismisses yours? Do you not see how this is "all lives matter"ing the trans community?
Being mean to bigots is actually good
The hostility you face here is precisely because you make them feel unsafe elsewhere. WE REFUSE TO LET TRANS PEOPLE FEEL UNSAFE HERE, AND WE WILL NOT BACK DOWN! I will not feel ashamed about wishing harm to bigots that hurt my friends. If every rich, white girlboss CEO and their terf friends feel unwelcome here...good. The bullying will cease when the bigotry does. We could be allies, but you chose alienating people more marginalized than yourself to put money in your own pocket.
I'm mad
You can lie and distort my views and intentions as much as you want. Fine. I'm okay with being slandered. But don't you dare bludgeon trans people by implying that support for trans rights is just a thin veil for misogyny! We are unabashed intersectional feminists here. You can claim our opposition to bigotry is bigotry, but we welcome all women here. All we want is for you to stop antagonizing trans women.
We're not misogynistic, but anti-capitalist
Just like other capitalists, you profit off of dividing and exploiting along whatever divides you can. You'll call us misogynists, but a cursory look would show we share the same disdain for the other exploiters and bigots. Search "Bezos" or "Zuckerberg" on this site. Do you think we'd be nicer to them if they took our comments and used them to advocate for bigotry?
Capitalists are bad at feminism
When women speak about empowerment, do they imagine being spied on 24/7 to be sold products? Are your advertisers going to be selling $8 pink lavender-scented men's body wash? When your lady devs demand being paid a man's salary, how hard will you resist? What steps have you taken to guarantee your AI can recognize black women as accurately as white women? Are the VCs funding you women or are you exploiting women's labor to enrich more white dudes? It is not our community feigning support for feminism and social justice to excuse our transgressions. It is you.
Open source Lemmy alternative for women?
Maybe we should build an alternative with open source software under the direction of the women of chapo chat. Copy, paste, change some CSS, recruit some women with experience moderating communities, make some posts on feminist communities on reddit & tumblr.
Re the open source Lemmy alternative for women: I don't think we need that. We have c/womenby, it's just used so little that it was unmoderated for fourth months until I noticed and asked Cuttlefish about it lol.
For the record, we've started a monthly reading club. Our February book is by Angela Davis. Anyone interested in discussing leftist feminism, whether chapo members or random journalists scrolling through (lmao), is more than welcome to join.
I've been subbed since it's been around I think. Tbh I barely even pay attention to comms and just browse the homepage. I definitely would be interested in most feminist content here.
I don't think we need a Lemmy alternative for women, but having a non bigoted alternative would be great leverage to get Sall to drop the transphobia. Something something capitalism something something competition.
If Lemmy is going to be federated, we can copy the repo with little cost and host it on the same infra. Once federation hits upstream, we could sync c/main at ChapetteChat with a comm here? Basically just give women here the option to have their own space if they want it.
And hell yeah! Love Angela Davis! I've been meaning to revisit "Are Prisons Obsolete?" since the summer. I need an excuse to be better with my reading.
implying that support for trans rights is just a thin veil for misogyny
Honestly had to twist my mind into pretzels to get my head around this idea.
Society tells a person they're a man. The person says, "I'm a woman, actually." Society marginalizes and abuses them for having the temerity to reject the roles and behaviors assigned by practices molded over centuries of structural misogyny. Being willing to stand with this person in their struggle to affirm their right to agency over their own destiny and overcome not only systemic gendered discrimination is misogyny?
Imagine being a TERF and actually believing this type of shit.
Cannot be restated enough.
:flag-trans-pride: :feminism:
Sall's feminism is contradictory
Our disdain for Sall is only because her idea of liberating women throws trans people under the bus Women absolutely deserve safe spaces free from harassment, threats, and claims of "not all men!" Claims that trans women jeopardize that in any way whatsoever is not only bigoted, but actively reinforces patriarchal gender roles.
Disclaimer: I'm a dude
As a man, I cannot speak to the experience of women, nor will I use "as a brother, son" as the only way I can empathize with women. My view of womanhood is secondhand, by reading feminist theory and listening to women who feel comfortable enough to confide in me.
Content warning: Misogynistic slurs
Men's culture is loaded with misogynistic attempts to misgender men as women to insult them. Calling me a woman by saying "dude you're a bitch/pussy" is much less hurtful to me than to a woman, let alone trans people. The man's idea of insulting someone is just saying they're a woman. It has left me knowing that men's liberation is inextricably tied to the liberation of women & destruction of the gender expectations that leave us all feeling inadequate.
On harassment
Many of the points Sall raises are absolutely valid and affect all women. Harassment, threats, and violence against women are widespread and a scourge on our society. No doubt she faces these regularly explicitly for being a woman. We take no issue with acknowledging this & our contributions to this culture. We do take issue with not only denying that trans women experience also these hostilities, but also pretending that those very hostilities are a result of the very presence of trans women.
Content warning: Sexual violence
I will never experience living in fear of sexual violence. I know women must just to avoid the onslaught of sexual advancements of predatory men. Trans women face this constant abuse from men because they are women!
Sall, read this
Sall if you read this, please understand that when you say your app is for "females" our trans friends get an even greater feeling of inadequacy from knowing that society refuses to recognize them as the people they truly are.
When you misgender them or imply they are not real women by disguising it with not-so-clever language, you are saying that they will not find refuse anywhere, not in society and not in women's spaces. You implicitly tell them self proclaimed "feminists" will sell them out because some may see trans liberation as jeopardizing theirs.
Do you think they feel any different when you tell them that their struggles with womanhood are not valid than when a man dismisses yours? Do you not see how this is "all lives matter"ing the trans community?
Being mean to bigots is actually good
The hostility you face here is precisely because you make them feel unsafe elsewhere. WE REFUSE TO LET TRANS PEOPLE FEEL UNSAFE HERE, AND WE WILL NOT BACK DOWN! I will not feel ashamed about wishing harm to bigots that hurt my friends. If every rich, white girlboss CEO and their terf friends feel unwelcome here...good. The bullying will cease when the bigotry does. We could be allies, but you chose alienating people more marginalized than yourself to put money in your own pocket.
I'm mad
You can lie and distort my views and intentions as much as you want. Fine. I'm okay with being slandered. But don't you dare bludgeon trans people by implying that support for trans rights is just a thin veil for misogyny! We are unabashed intersectional feminists here. You can claim our opposition to bigotry is bigotry, but we welcome all women here. All we want is for you to stop antagonizing trans women.
We're not misogynistic, but anti-capitalist
Just like other capitalists, you profit off of dividing and exploiting along whatever divides you can. You'll call us misogynists, but a cursory look would show we share the same disdain for the other exploiters and bigots. Search "Bezos" or "Zuckerberg" on this site. Do you think we'd be nicer to them if they took our comments and used them to advocate for bigotry?
Capitalists are bad at feminism
When women speak about empowerment, do they imagine being spied on 24/7 to be sold products? Are your advertisers going to be selling $8 pink lavender-scented men's body wash? When your lady devs demand being paid a man's salary, how hard will you resist? What steps have you taken to guarantee your AI can recognize black women as accurately as white women? Are the VCs funding you women or are you exploiting women's labor to enrich more white dudes? It is not our community feigning support for feminism and social justice to excuse our transgressions. It is you.
Open source Lemmy alternative for women?
Maybe we should build an alternative with open source software under the direction of the women of chapo chat. Copy, paste, change some CSS, recruit some women with experience moderating communities, make some posts on feminist communities on reddit & tumblr.
/rant
Re the open source Lemmy alternative for women: I don't think we need that. We have c/womenby, it's just used so little that it was unmoderated for fourth months until I noticed and asked Cuttlefish about it lol.
For the record, we've started a monthly reading club. Our February book is by Angela Davis. Anyone interested in discussing leftist feminism, whether chapo members or random journalists scrolling through (lmao), is more than welcome to join.
I've been subbed since it's been around I think. Tbh I barely even pay attention to comms and just browse the homepage. I definitely would be interested in most feminist content here.
I don't think we need a Lemmy alternative for women, but having a non bigoted alternative would be great leverage to get Sall to drop the transphobia. Something something capitalism something something competition.
If Lemmy is going to be federated, we can copy the repo with little cost and host it on the same infra. Once federation hits upstream, we could sync c/main at ChapetteChat with a comm here? Basically just give women here the option to have their own space if they want it.
And hell yeah! Love Angela Davis! I've been meaning to revisit "Are Prisons Obsolete?" since the summer. I need an excuse to be better with my reading.
Honestly had to twist my mind into pretzels to get my head around this idea.
Society tells a person they're a man. The person says, "I'm a woman, actually." Society marginalizes and abuses them for having the temerity to reject the roles and behaviors assigned by practices molded over centuries of structural misogyny. Being willing to stand with this person in their struggle to affirm their right to agency over their own destiny and overcome not only systemic gendered discrimination is misogyny?
Imagine being a TERF and actually believing this type of shit.