this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2024
25 points (64.0% liked)
Showerthoughts
29545 readers
1709 users here now
A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The best ones are thoughts that many people can relate to and they find something funny or interesting in regular stuff.
Rules
- All posts must be showerthoughts
- The entire showerthought must be in the title
- Posts must be original/unique
- Be good to others - no bigotry - including racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia
- Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Trans women are women and trans men are men.
As somebody who is nonbinary, I dream as some version of myself.
Also, please use “trans women” and “trans men”. Removing the space is a TERF red flag.
I'm transfemme and I've dreamed of myself as a woman for as long as I can remember.
Also what's this "trans woman" vs "transwoman?" I've for real not heard that's a problem. It's like saying "can not" or "cannot."
When you say "trans woman" you affirm that they are women, and trans is just an adjective. When you say "transwoman" it can imply that they are something different altogether, and TERFs have certainly used it as such. Like, I dunno, a carpark isn't a park? That's the first example that came to mind, anyway.
My head hurts and I have no idea what any of this means. Also what's a TERF?
Trans Exclusive Radical Feminist. The main example is J.K. Rowling, who thinks shitting on trans women is in service to feminism, instead of harming some women in order to pretend to protect others.
Basically feminist but only for cis women.
*exclusionary. Exclusive sounds like they are only feminists for trans women.
A carpark is a park, in the dictionary, one of its meanings is an area devoted to a specific use, I.e. industrial park, carpark
Guess that's fair. I'm a bit on the older side so all the terms seem to change so fast I can't keep up. I like transfemme but I do like your explanation on the space. Think I'll write it as trans femme from now on. Cheers.
I transitioned nearly 20 years ago and have been involved in online trans communities since then. This is the first time I've heard that removing the space between transmen and transwomen is a TERF thing.
It’s their way of saying that trans women aren’t women and trans men aren’t men. It’s less of a technicality thing and more of a “I’m going to be skeptical about this person’s intentions until I see more”
That doesn't make any sense. How does a space change the meaning? Especially after the words have been widely used in the trans community for decades?
it changed its meaning because bad actors decided to use that term specificlly, to imply that "trans[gender]" is a third sort of option (that is not part of the "normal" or "real" genders) and also the biggest enemy of "real [gender]" and especially "real women". The same way "transsexual" became a slur, the same way "retarded" or "special needs" became slurs/insults. If you say someone's name with enough hatred in your voice enough times it'll become an insult as well.
it's stupid i know, and we should reclaim it at one point, but for now it's a dogwhistle for transphobes, at least in online spaces
That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I'm a transman and will continue to call myself such.
alright, i'm not judging you? I'm just making you aware of the current connotations of using that term
do you have a citation for your final sentence? i had never encountered this, ever, and could find nothing in a fairly deep search.
I guarantee it's just something the Tumblr kids came up with. Don't give it any stock.
as someone who knows a lot about TERF discourse second hand (not a fan of personally engaging with them) - TERFs are more likely to say "transwoman" than "trans woman". I don't have a proper citation but I'll try to walk you through the logic of it
what "transwoman" implies is that it's not a "real woman" (never realwoman, of course). It subtly excludes trans women from the title of "women" by making the word itself seem like it's some sort of third option, not a real woman, not a man, a "transwoman".
trans inclusive communities nearly always have the space, that's because trans women are simply a sub-category of women, and not something different altogether.
though nowadays you're also likely to see more outspoken TERFs say "TIM" which stands for "trans identified male" (they mean trans women)
bottom line is, in online spheres trans friendly people and sources will almost always have the space, and trans exclusive people and sources tend to write that as one word
it's the same sort of linguistic shift that prompted the trans community to stop using "transsexual" move to "trans[gender]" and now "trans [gender]". Even though in essence they all mean the same, some of them have been used by groups that hate us much more than others. (For a similar example see "stupid" > "retarded" > "special needs" > "special" > "intellectually disabled". All the words before "intellectually disabled" are medical terms turned insults, and honestly i'm not even sure if "intellectually disabled" isn't halfway there already)
mkay thanks for the input. not sure if my understanding is swayed because it’s obvious OP was not using it as a pejorative. id much rather call out actually well-documented examples of transphobic language personally.
oh yeah absolutely, OP was just curious about something and used an ever so slightly outdated term by accident. I didn't make the first comment but I assume the comment-op wanted to simply give them a heads up on the current lingo so to say