The Gender Dissidents SurveyI care because I don’t want to be forced to share my space with men. As a general rule I avoid them everywhere, I don’t have male friends anymore and I’m so much happier.
I don’t like my language being policed. I don’t like watching women being earased. Our culture matters. Our lives matter.
I also feel like this is a bigger issue than just trans people, this is just another tentacle of patriarchy, this is a white men’s movement who’s trying to swallow us whole and replace us.
Student
I am a woman. I am a feminist (any feminism involves a critique of “gender” or it’s not feminism). I’m also a lesbian lady who shaves her head and occasionally wear ties and I have the unsettling feeling if I were just 5 years younger I would now be either a very unhappy trans man or a detransitioner. I wouldn’t experience the joy I feel at singing really high notes (crappy amateur soprano here). And of course, I care about freedom of speech. I won’t be compelled to see others exactly as they see themselves. As Dr. Jane Clare Jones say, that’s a form of ontological totalitarianism.
I’ve spoken to friends and family and all over social media (with my name). I am currently unemployed and lockdown has been quite restrictive over here up until quite recently. But I plan on meeting with other feminists in my home town.
I lost “a friend” because she tried to shame me for being a lesbian in its archaic “terfy” definition. That was the last straw in a wider pattern in our relationship, since it’s not the first time she is emotionally manipulative.
Estela, Language teacher, studying to become a civil servant, Spain
This matters to me because it’s important to recognise women as a social/political/legal class. Without it, you can’t have an effective political movement. To erase the definition of a woman and replace it with a feeling serves to entrench sexism even further into our collective thinking which makes it harder to fight with sexist stereotypes (since they’re considered ‘identity’). Further, it serves to get rid of legal protections given to women based on their sex.
It matters to me because I can’t speak out my mind without being considered a bigot while I dedicate all my time to a fight for equality.
I have spoken to friends and family, engaged in online debates and spoken about it on my social media.
I have lost friends and felt excluded from mainstream feminist/ LGBT communities.
AK, bisexual woman, feminist, Poland
I care because the ideology sustaining a movement be logical for it to produce real change. The identitary narrative doesn’t present a realistic analysis of the world we live in, erases women’s experiences with gender and impacts the building of a serious women rights movement. I believe that it is harmful for both women and trans people as a group.
I respect and care about trans people on an individual and political level, will fight for their right to exist, be respected, protected and have rights side by side, but reserve myself the right to disagree politically on an analysis that is as central to their existence as it is to mine, and consequently disengage from actions backed up from such analysis.
Particularly on the gender conceptualisation, besides running a small blog that translates feminist readings into my native language, I have been occasionally vocal about it on the internet, mostly in discussions on forums or with a few posts in my personal social media. In real life, I discuss this matter only with people who approach me asking questions on my views, usually close friends.
I have felt the backlash online, such as being labeled as transphobic simply for asking questions such as “what is a woman?” or “what is gender?”, before even stating my position.
Mostly, I’ve felt that liberal feminists on my personal circles, who despite being extremely privileged and more than able to do so have never picked up a feminist book to read, not even on identitary politics, have been reactive to statements as simple as “I do not agree with identitary politics “, even though apparently they have no depth into this discussion, which is frankly quite sad.
minni , woman, feminist, critical thinker, Brasil
I am twenty years old, and my life so far has been defined by abuse. I endured childhood rapes, intimate partner violence, and PTSD in addition to all the abuse that typically comes from being a woman. Nonetheless, I was strong and made it to where I am today. When I was raped in my first year of college, my friend group turned its back on me.
My anger was “an overreaction,” my best friend started dating my rapist, and male friends would tell me I was “slut-shaming” her by being upset.
Already, men were using woke language to silence me. Later, the same man who accused me of slut-shaming and over-reacting came out as non-binary, and suddenly I was the privileged one, and the poor little rich boy was oppressed.
My school is incredibly liberal. Most students support “sex work”, BDSM, and gender self-ID. Those of us who’ve been affected by these institutions keep our mouths shut.
Young men are always stepping up to tell me who I should feel comfortable changing in front of, what my period means, what defines my womanhood, and how I should feel about sexual violence. I say no.
I am a woman because I have XX chromosomes and uterus. The world has treated me a certain way because of it, and that matters to me.
I am afraid. I do not have a lot of money or power in the world. I have spoken with my friends and family. But I am not open or public about my views.
The same people (former friends) who trivialized and mansplained my rape accussed me of “transphobia” and “hating non binary people” and attacked me on facebook. I was forced to come out with all the details of what happened to me to clear my name.
Mick, Woman born a woman
If we can’t defend something as basic and obvious as sex then we are in a dystopian, totalitarian scenario.
I was horrified because I knew, deep down, that I agreed with the uppity feminists, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t find any evidence that they were wrong.
So eventually I accepted myself as one of the difficult women. I want women to be able to name ourselves. I want us to centre ourselves in our own movement. I want us protected in our own spaces. I want language to have meaning and for scientific concepts to stay coherent & reflect reality.
I started by working up the courage to send something to my MP. Then post on Mumsnet. I then wrote longer think-pieces. Talked to my friends & family in real life.
My friends have taken it negatively. I don’t think they see me in the same way. They don’t understand, so we don’t talk about it anymore.
S
My ex had autogynophilic tendencies and used this as part of decades of domestic abuse including sexual. After being told that he was most likely a malignant narcissist with psychopathic tendencies i started to see parallels with TRA attacks that I’d started to see happen.
He had enforced language changed etc from very early on in the relationship. and I was loving and accommodating and realised how easy it would have been for me.to be a trans widow.
Additionally I saw 2 young women transition after bullying/sexual assault and they seemed like classic ROGD and the thought of them probaby desisting after being blithely transed and irreparably altered horrified me.
I have spoken to.people irl (in real life) , started speaking up online, gone to a demo, started being more active in feminist circles.
I’ve been considered hateful. I’ve feared being too visible as I am still.a cptsd sufferer dealing with years of traumatic sexual and other abuse but I’ve been more brave since jk Rowling’s first tweets. I’ve started liking things. and today I have been retweeting and liking loads of things. Before the abuse I was a whistle blower and stood up for others and now I’m going to try and be as strong again.
Marina, I stand with JK Rowling
I care because as a woman I am seeing all of the hard-earned rights feminists have worked tirelessly for be diminished before our eyes. I care because as a lesbian, I am seeing the existence of my sexuality be denied and the definition of it “extended” to include males by people from within the LGBT community.
I care because I have read the statistics and seen first hand the amount of young girls go through social/medical transition due to homophobia, misogyny and peer pressure.
As a student I witnessed struggling young bisexual and lesbian girls change their name and pronouns to fit in with the “queer” crowd.
I care because I’ve been called vanilla for not wanting to partake in BDSM. I’ve been called a prude for criticizing the porn and sex industries. I care because I care about the rights of lesbians and the rights of all women!
I try to speak up about the injustices I’m seeing as much as possible, online and in real life. Unfortunately I live in an area with no radical feminist groups, and a huge queer community so I only know a small close circle of radfems.
I have been shunned from the LGBT community. People I don’t even know know me and by name and it’s worrying. When I am out and about and I see someone look at me funny I wonder if it’s because they know I am a “TERF”. Socialising in gay venues has become anxiety-inducing, but I still go because I have every right to be there as a homosexual female. I have been excluded from university groups and people are warned about me.
Rosie, 21 year old lesbian and student
I find transgenderism borderline cultural appropriation. Men with no idea about any issues women face pretending to be a parody of women. The invasion of women’s sports diminishes any illusion of fairness. The invasion of women’s privacy is an attempt to role back decades of fighting for male-free safe spaces (no concern for female trauma victims or women who just want privacy). The policing of language is dehumanising. All of the above I find offensive and distasteful and a regression of women’s rights.
I’m now a gender crit in Twitter and a member of r/gendercritical. Planning a slogan campaign for next year at uni.
All my accounts are anon.
TS, U.K. uni student observing the changes in women’s rights with concern
I care about the issue because things escalated very rapidly under my nose. I have been active in feminist spaces for years but I have never seen such brutal silencing of women’s voices, just for stating basic scientific facts.
I am not from the UK – I live in the US, but I came from another country and I’m still very active in social media in my native language (sorry about my English BTW – it’s not my first language). A few months ago a huge fight broke in my Facebook group – one of the triggers was you and your tribunal hearing but there were others. Some of us decided to finally speak up. All hell broke loose. I lost many friends and became a much hated figure but it only made me care about the issue more.
I mostly fear for the future of children who may be pushed to undergo irreversible, profound medical procedure before they’re old enough to know better because doctors and parents are afraid to speak up – transitioning children should become illegal. I fear for girls and women whose spaces are taken away from them, and I fear about us losing the ability to have a peaceful, logical discussion about the issue. I care about the language to describe ourselves being taken away from us.
I have set up a website in my native language (the only one that I know of) where I collect materials, make facts and stories accessible and write about the issue freely.
I also continue to be active on Facebook and Twitter (although I had to start using a pseudo-name on Twitter). Some friends and I are preparing to start lobbying with politicians to make underage transition illegal and to preserve sex base rights in my home country.
My friends and I are also in touch with organizations in Canada and the UK hoping to make our voices heard.
I have lost friends, but so far that is it. I have a secure job and my employers and co-workers don’t speak my native language and are not aware of my “extracurricular activities”.
The Trash Patrol/Sayeret Zevel, Academic, immigrant, radical feminist who’s sick of crap, USA
The Gender Dissidents Survey