This is how the discourse is structured

Jane Clare Jones:

The most notable thing here – other than 50, 000 some ppl liking a dude saying ‘fuck those evil witches’- is how many read it as identical to an affirmation of trans rights. This is how the discourse is structured. Being pro-trans is signaled, above all, by being anti-TERF.

The tweet she is commenting on is alas by Adam Savage, the Mythbusters guy. I saw it yesterday and sighed and moved on.

TERFs are shit. https://twitter.com/charliejane/status/1195156950394097665

It’s all women’s fault, as usual. Radical feminist women “are shit.”

Comments

7 responses to “This is how the discourse is structured”

  1. Blood Knight in Sour Armor Avatar
    Blood Knight in Sour Armor

    Good thing Mythbusters is over… Jeezus

  2. Ophelia Benson Avatar

    I know. So disappointing.

  3. Holms Avatar

    The thread following Savage’s comment contains some whoppers:

    This whole “LGB without the T” thing was workshopped by religious fundamentalists […]

    TERFs are working for and funded by anti-LGBT hate groups.

    That post links to an article discussing some conservative christian which did indeed workshop that topic, but to lump all opposition to trans theory together as ‘religious fundamentalists’ and ‘anti-LGBT hate’ is an act of ignorance and/or dishonesty.

    This was a direct response to the LGBT community winning on marriage equality; the religious right switched tactics to focus on trans people instead.

    Wrong, they never dropped their anti-LGB efforts, they just added anti-T to them. Gender critical feminists on the other hand aren’t anti-LGB at all, also aren’t anti-T people per se, but are opposed to certain narrow issues where T rights are in tension with hard-won protections for the female sex. (As in, people who are actually female, rather by fiat.)

    Dark money is flowing into the pockets of anti-trans activists and hate groups that have only popped into existence in the last couple of years, and they all appear to be linked with religious fundamentalist groups from the US.

    Emphasis added. This is a declaration that all anti-trans activists are funded by religious fundies. The question then is, what did CaseyExplosion mean by ‘anti-trans activists’? If she meant ‘all people who actively despise trans people’ then the statement might be correct, as most of the animus against trans people qua trans people is religious in nature. On the other hand, if ‘anti-trans activists’ was meant to include gender critical feminism as well (which is very commonly the case with these hyperbolic types), then it is a statement so sloppy as to be irresponsible, even if it was not a deliberate lie.

    CaseyExplosion does not cover herself with glory in this salvo.

    Naturally, a thread like this attracts statements implying harm to feminists. But at least this one received replies pushing back.

    I’ve seen a couple people in the replies here saying that TERF is a slur so… reminder that TERFs are the ones who asked us to call them that :)

    Just a plain old lie.

    And when someone offers substantive, reasoned argument against Savage’s post, most of the time it is met with a silly jpg rather than engagement with the argument. The movement is comprised mostly of shouty trendy nitwits, raging arseholes, and dishonesty.

  4. Holms Avatar

    Oh and the thread he links to is about the same.

  5. KP Avatar

    Does he even have a dog in this fight? A trans family member? Not that it’s any excuse, but it would at least provide some context other than what’s really a cheap, shitty way to grab “woke” points.

  6. iknklast Avatar

    cheap, shitty way to grab “woke” points

    This seems to describe a lot of the trans allies.

  7. Acolyte of Sagan Avatar
    Acolyte of Sagan

    One would have hoped that all those years spent busting myths might have taught him something about myths.