Stand down
Peter is telling feminists what we’re allowed to do and think again. I’m increasingly tired of it.
Nobody’s talking about “blanket bans on trans women.” That’s a dopey, prejudicial way to put it. It’s not “banning” men to have women-only spaces. Women want and need women-only spaces and we have a right to them, end of story. Trans women continue to exist even if women have women-only spaces. No one is banned.
“Trans women are not a threat” is a ludicrous claim. He doesn’t know that – he can’t know it. It’s entirely possible that some trans women are a threat, in fact it would be odd if none of them were. In any case trans women are men, and we all know that some men are a threat to women, and we know women need to take precautions to avoid such men. Peter Tatchell’s fantasy that men are women if they say they are is not a reason to do away with precautions that women need to take.
Trans women are not “like all women” because they are not women, they’re men. They’re not victims of misogyny, because they’re men.
Peter Tatchell does not “defend all women” – he bullies and lectures us for not agreeing with him that men are women if they say they are. He’s not an ally, not a friend, not a feminist. He can take a hike.
Someone ought to send him to Graham Linehan’s blog.
https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/this-never-happens
Warning – it is a heartbreaking and horrifying list of dreadful sex crimes and murders committed by the men Tatchell doesn’t believe actually exist. Only a fraction of them, mind – but still nearly a hundred.
I think you can say they are victims of indirect misogyny, though. Why does it matter if a man puts on a dress? Because hatred of women.
Still, it isn’t really misogyny in the way women are victims of misogyny. It’s caused by misogyny but not the same thing.