Poster by Favianna Rodriguez.
I do not know who wrote this. It appeared online without attribution.
Things radical feminism did not do to me, a transsexual woman (Trans women, please read!)
***trigger warning: rape, assault***
Radical Feminism:
•did not cause my father to beat me with a belt because my body language was ‘girly’
•did not cause neighborhood boys and classmates to beat me up for being ‘faggy’
•did not give me an eating disorder in high school as a reaction to my frame getting bigger during puberty
•did not create the religion that made me think when I was little that I would go to Hell for the ways I thought and behaved
•did not cause my rape by a guy who told me afterward that he thought I was role-playing when I cried and struggled, and admitted it was ‘the hottest sex he’d ever had’
•is not responsible for me and many other trans women feeling terror and hopelessness at the prospect of life as a visibly gender-nonconforming person in a society where this is punished
•did not create the unattainable beauty standards that further complicate my already complex struggle with sex dysphoria
•is not the reason I’ve been consistently mansplained to at every job I’ve held since transitioning by men who do it because they think I was born with a vagina (and thus that they need to talk to me like I’m six years old)
•is not the cause of my street harassment by men who think I was born with a vagina and thus feel entitled to proposition, frighten, or threaten me for their sexual gratification
•did not cause the culture of homophobia that makes dating men dangerous and potentially fatal for trans women
Radical feminism attacks patriarchy, which is the root cause of everything listed above. As trans women, we work against our own freedom, health, and dignity when we misdirect our anger and anguish toward the very people who are fighting the system that hurts us. We strengthen the true source of our social struggles.
Feedback is welcome and hoped-for. Trans women, please feel free to add to this list, especially.
The boys who tried to beat me up, and left threatening messages on my voicemail in school, had not been inspired by Janice Raymond.
Nor did the terms “tr*nny” or “f*g” enter their lexicon via radical feminist theory.
It was a male psychiatrist — not radical feminists — who delayed my treatment because he thought my dysphoria stemmed from the death of my father and the absence of male role models.
Radical feminists are not the reason I was flashed and masturbated at by a man as I walked home at night.
Radical feminists are not responsible for the harassment and unwanted advances I experience virtually every time I go out dancing.
And they never sent me obnoxious sexual messages or dick pics, funnily enough!
First rule of misogyny is that women are responsible for what men do.
