I thought The Doctor Dances was pretty good.

On the other hand, I liked the ELO episode, so my opinion is probably invalid.

@RustyRing

I think you've put your finger right on it - TERFs are indeed just conservatives of that extreme kind.

I don't really think their views have anything to do with gametes or safe spaces or any of the things they say they're about, because they make no sense in relation to those things.

What I think does explain their views is that conservatives fear any change to a status quo they're invested in - and a certain kind of (generally older) feminist is also invested - I mean intellectually and emotionally - in a neat division of the sexes. They've made that division part of their 'feminist' identity, so they mistake the emergence of cracks in that neat binary as an attack on their own way of being in the world. For them, it's personal.

@goatsarah

@christineburns
Yes. You stick to a clear statement of your position and don't allow yourself to get derailed.

If your position was highly dubious this wouldn't fly of course. But for example "people have the right to live as their true selves and it isn't within the legitimate authority of the state to say whether they are allowed to" is a good starting point.

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Anglophone feminism in general has an ideology problem. I learned this while living in France during a formative part of my life. (My twenties.) Having grown up in the 70s, battered by the angry, often hypocritical feminism that was prominent in the States during that era, I had a visceral aversion to the word "feminism".

So when I found myself in a nation of ideologically introspective feminists I had no idea such a thing could exist, and was astonished to find they actually shared some of my resentment of the American movement. I spent much of my time there listening to women and seeking conversations with overt feminists; hell, just finding myself in a place where a man _can_ talk about these things with women was exhilarating. I was completely converted. Frankly, they saved my life. I shudder to think what I might have become in the Internet Age.

So yeah. As French feminists say: "American feminists are more American than they are feminist."

It's also potentially a good idea to post a link to their reply with the hashtag # fediblock so other trans instances can pre-emptively defederate.

(Specifically, I would like to defederatethis server.)

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