Is the “L” in LGBTI silent?
WHEN , I noticed that the comments were aggressively misogynistic.
Distressed by how much this excluded and insulted women in the LGBTI community, I asked commenters聽to stop using such hurtful and upsetting language in their posts. As a lesbian, I expected that my community would be a relatively safe place, and I expected a degree of solidarity.聽What resulted was hours of increased insults, ridicule and finally personal abuse.
It left me wondering why the community would attack a request for basic respect and why any woman would speak out if this is how they were treated.
Most responders were male and they used crude, aggressive and dismissively sexist language to attack first Greer, and then me, in post after post, correctly assuming that their comments would be tolerated by others.
Eventually, the Star Observer intervened and deleted the worst of the comments, but there remained a steady stream of insulting posts, eventually escalating to personal messages of abuse and lesbophobia.
Particularly upsetting were comments like this one:
I wonder how this person聽thinks women, particularly lesbians, would feel reading this. Lesbians here and elsewhere can face corrective rape and many of us have been coerced into heterosexuality at some point, with many more facing ongoing harassment. To propose rape, in essence, as a measure to bring women in line, is to show deep disregard for us, and channels centuries of misogyny and lesbophobia.
How would men in our community feel about this kind of hatred being directed at them in our community, where they should feel safe? I can鈥檛 even find an equivalent insult for men because society is so gendered and this kind of aggressive sexual threat is largely reserved for women.
This incident demonstrated what many women, online and in real life, know 鈥� that the first line of attack against women is sexist, and often sexually aggressive, abusive or threatening. When you speak up, the abuse gets worse and complaints about it are most often ridiculed, or at best ignored.
The hypocrisy of those who chose to use hate speech to condemn what they considered to be Greer鈥檚 harmful speech made me wonder how they would like to be told 鈥渟hut up faggot鈥� every time they voiced a complaint. We know such intolerable slurs to be obscene and hateful, yet I was persistently ridiculed for protesting similar abuse when it was directed at me.
Moreover, women were blamed for community disunity 鈥� the abuse of women wasn’t seen as a problem, just the act of rejecting it. Not only are we subjected to the ill-treatment itself, but we are also accused of doing harm when we speak out on our own behalf. The message is clear: “STFU.”
It is devastating that some of the most directed abuse I have received as a woman has been from our community, and that when I spoke out it intensified. This, and other experiences, suggests that there is nothing that women can say about misogyny that is mild enough to spare us from insults, threats and hatred, even from those who should have solidarity with us.
I ask 鈥� can we have a united community if women, and women alone, are seen as abusable and unimportant within the LGBTI community? What can unity mean if it requires silencing women?
Allowing anti-women hate speech and the suggestion of sexual violence against lesbian and bisexual women not only calls into question our representation within the community 鈥� whether we are valued at all 鈥撀燽ut must certainly undermine our participation. Who would want to stand up and speak for women when they see what happens to women who do?
In allowing women to be treated like this, we are told that sexism is acceptable, women鈥檚 boundaries don鈥檛 matter and that we should learn to put up with it, because to speak out is to invite more abuse. We are closeted by enforced silence 鈥� unable to speak safely about how we are treated and what it means.
This was not an isolated incident 鈥� from Gamergate to , women鈥檚 speech is punished by online abuse and a torrent of hate in response to our daring to express an opinion.聽Our community knows about facing hatred and bigotry 鈥� is it too much to ask that we do better ourselves?
If the LGBTI community truly seeks to be a community, we need to support, not silence, all of our members. What you say to and about us makes a difference. We didn’t come out of the closet as lesbians and bisexual women only to be put back in it, by our own community.
Please, don鈥檛 condemn us to the closet we have all fought so hard to escape.
Liz Waterhouse is lesbian feminist and anonymous blogger.
There have been media articles saying how the “Safe Schools” program teaches children about sex and sexuality, and right along side them, there are other articles saying how “child-on-child” sex abuse is rife….the obvious connection is that when children learn about adult-only sex issues, they are too young and immature to handle the information responsibly thereby leading the children to have “play sex” (that’s what the children call it) or doing “pretend sex” (their words) to make out that what they are doing isn’t real sex when it actually is. The result is children getting sexually active at pre-teen ages with devastating results. Connecting the dots between irresponsible child “sex talk” and irresponsible child “sex action” is very easy. And where is abstaining from sex until you get married mentioned in all of this??….it’s never mentioned!….God’s sacred use of sex within marriage is COMPLETELY ignored. The result is widespread hurt by pre-marital, unprotected, (sometimes forced) child sex just to be cool or because they have sexual concepts introduced into their unprepared minds that spark a curiosity to experiment with it. The bully kids can rape other kids and get away with it because they say it is only “play/pretend” sex. Needless to say, the sex acts are in ALL shapes and forms…..PARENTS: please beware of what can happen to your children. This is the inevitable result of sexualizing our young people.
Sometimes the truth hurts. Exposing “unSafe Schools” for what it is and exposing the same sex agenda is a good thing because it shows that our human desires (sin?) cannot override reality, but rather reality overrides our desires. For some people to try to undermine the family unit and create the illusion of “moral relativism” which destroys society (as my example above is just one example) is creating discussion and critical thinking. The more, the better. Is our biological sex determined by nature or nurture?….it’s obviously the former. Is our gender different to our sex?….nope!….it’s only聽 the subjective, post-modernist person of the “progressive” gay mindset who thinks that redefining words can somehow change reality. Since when is “progress” always a good thing anyhow? It’s all just tricky word-smithing and targeting the naive young children of our society (without parental approval) because they are easy pickings. Make-believe “medical” reports just facilitate the illusion. The separation of “sex” (male/female biology) and “gender” is the latest attempt to trick people – because the biological make-up of a man and a woman is SOOOOO obvious, the same sex lobby has conceded that your biology (your anatomy) has either man parts or woman parts. QED. …..but now you can have “gender” which is the male/female/other that you “feel” you want to be – this is what the “unSafe Schools” program is ultimately teaching. So you can feel like you are a “man” (gender) in a woman’s body (sex) or a “woman” (gender) in a man’s body (sex)…..or you can be both “man and woman” (fluid gender) in a man or woman body (sex)…..or a “man” in a man or woman body but dressing in a woman way or visa versa…..or a “both gender” in a body that needs added hormones and body parts snipped off…..or a tuck and nip penis/breast body adaptation in a fluid-trans-intersex-hetro/homo gender (…..did you just laugh?…..no, no, no…..this is actually what they are trying to instil in our children at a pre-puberty age). Can you imagine how totally screwed up in the head these poor children will be as they grow up through their teenage years and then have to actual “decide” what “gender” they feel like for the rest of their lives – that’s right…..once the physical anatomy has been changed in their young, immature years, their bodies cannot be reversed back when they wise up and make a mature decision to be heterosexual in a God-given way. The scars are there for life – physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually (the latter being the spirit of anti-Christ).
Really, there are so many men who just hate women, don’t even think of us as humans, we don’t have any rights to so many men. I would not support any community that hated on women like this. We do not have to put up with the hatred and abuse of men, whether they are gay, straight or bisexual. We don’t have to listen to their childish abuse, it should never be tolerated.
Those of you who are responding by continuing to heap misogynistic hate on the author are missing the point. Those of us who were born female, and who have lived our entire lives oppressed due to our reproductive biology, have a right to object to the appropriation of our identity by the trans community. Condemning our objection to this appropriation as 鈥渉ate,鈥� and refusing to recognize the very real oppression that exists against those born female, is itself hate speech. Female-born lesbians are being silenced and oppressed by the 鈥淕BT鈥� community for being homosexual (that is,attracted only to those with reproductively female bodies and an experience of being raised female) and for wishing to sometimes gather specifically with those who share our experience as females. We do not wish ill upon the transgender community, and we support their right to express themselves and be free from discrimination. However, we do not agree to the silencing and abuse of females and the erasure of female-born lesbians as as a distinct community, with distinct needs that are often not met in the wider male-focused community.
Based on the response I have had to this article, I have set up a new blog for lesbians to share their experiences of abuse and silencing, misogyny and lesbophobia inside the community and the broader community.
I think we really experience our stories in an individualised way that both belittles their importance and stops us from really understanding their broader meaning in social terms.
If you have experiences you are prepared to share, or just to see what it’s about, please come and visit my blog at listening2lesbians.com.
Liz
“The hypocrisy of those who chose to use hate speech to condemn what they considered to be Greer鈥檚 harmful speech”
Hold on. Firstly it’s not what people consider Greer’s harmful speech. Greer’s speech is clearly and unequivocally Hate Speech. Calling people things like ‘Pantomime Dames’ was hate speech pure and simple, denying Transphobia exists when 1 in 2 are assaulted and 1 in 3 assaulted with a weapon and a murder rate in many countries at extreme levels is inexcusable, that too can only be hate speech.
Now returning Hate Speech with Hate Speech is often a bad tactic, but it is ethical and not hypocritical by way of Reciprocal Ethics. Once someone has done something to you it is tacit permission for you to reply in kind. You are always entitled to do unto others as they have already done unto you.
Just as in self defense against physical assault it is ethical to hit back, and it is not hypocritical for someone to object to being assaulted and also to hit back to protect themselves or drive off an attacker.
Now of course it’s often a bad tactic, because a person prepared to start using hate-speech against a community, to oppress a group of people, is likely going to not realize they are just getting a taste of their own medicine. Nor someone defending their hate-speech. They won’t sit back and reflect thinking “Wow is that how it feels” because they started without empathy in the first place.
So Ethical, not Hypocritical but ineffective.
Actually, reciprocal ethics isn’t just a position to be taken for granted, as you suggest. You are not always entitled to do unto others as they have already done unto you. I’m not saying it’s necessarily wrong, but it’s one among a myriad of ethical positions, the majority of which would completely disagree with you.
Your self defence example is also flawed, as the self defence argument relates to preventing an attack, whereas responding to hate speech with hate speech is like getting beaten up, and then king hitting the person as they walk away – again, maybe justified, but the situation isn’t as you prevent it.
Just saying, there are a lot of complex issues here and everyone needs to be precise, and nuanced, in their understanding of the issues lest particular objections to a certain aspect of an issue become (or at least, sound like) blanket statements about a group which sound like hate speech, e.g. legitimate concerns about the erosion of female lesbian identity through admission of non-biologically-female trans folk becomes, when inarticulately expressed, a statement along the lines of ‘GTFO trans-women, you’re not real women’.
Spelling (2nd paragraph): ‘the situation isn’t as you *present* it’
So it is ethical to invoke misogyny against Germaine Greer, and to hell with how this effects lesbians in the LGBTI community?
This article was not a critique of Germaine Greer’s views, it was a reflection on just how tolerated misogyny and abuse of women is in the LGBTI community, as in the broader community. It would be wonderful to continue to centre women in the comments, as in the article, but that would hardly be in line with our broader social dynamics, would it?! Women’s needs are only allowed to be central once everything else is addressed, which means never.
In your comments you seem to be saying that it was acceptable to abuse women, lesbians particularly, because a single woman was saying something that was deemed objectionable.
So, when a woman is killed by male violence every three days in Australia, does this justify mass action against men, in your view? Murder is, of course, rather more concrete than hate speech, after all, and this is a persistent epidemic…
Just curious, because as far as I can tell, the right to self defence is only ever socially sanctioned when used by men. When women use it we are told to STFU and get back in our box.
Or to take another example, would you have had me respond to the abuse I fielded, as discussed in the article, with abusive invective of my own?
If we support a never ending cycle of abuse, triggered and justified by what has been done to us, we all become complicit in that abuse. Wouldn’t it be better to stop and analyse what is happening and the dynamics behind it?
Then go yell at Germaine Greer. It’s only reciprocal if you’ve done it to the person who did it to you.
By the way, “pantomime dames” is exactly what transwomen are–they aren’t actually women, they’re pretending to be women, and they’re doing a very bad job of it too. Why are they doing a bad job? Number one, they aren’t women, and no amount of putting on an act is going to change that. Number two, they associate womanhood with stereotypes about womanhood. They literally do not understand the difference between the two. It is the difference between sex and gender–sex is biology, gender is stereotype.
Basically they’re going around making fun of all the ridiculous standards to which women are held, but they think they’re being earnest. They’re already insulting us. I even run across transwoman bloggers who claim they are better women than women ourselves, implicit in that statement is that they act out the stereotypes better. This after over a hundred years of women trying to destroy those stereotypes, now we are expected to go back into the box. So you might say that when women say things like “pantomime dames” we are engaging in our own reciprocity. Don’t like it? Stop making fun of us and calling it an “identity”.
I am coming more and more to feel the same way about drag queens. I don’t care what gay men THINK drag means, it’s mockery. We in the USA have come to the general belief that it is insulting to perform in blackface. It’s high time everyone felt the same way about womanface.
(And manface, while we’re at it, but that’s about as “devastating” to men as saying “cracker” or “honkey” is to white people. Still, if what we’re after here is greater civility, acting out stereotypes is not the way to get there.)
I am appalled by the amount of transphobia in the comments, and the amount of up voting the transphobia has been received. I’m not surprised by it though, given the biphobia I’ve experienced in community.
It is also awful that on an article about lateral violence in our community, a number of people thought it was appropriate to continue that lateral violence against another part of our community.
I expect, from the down voting of comments calling out the transphobia, that my comment will also be down voted by bigots in this community. Please, just stop hating.
Trans and bi are two entirely different things. And it is not transphobic to point out that someone cannot actually change their sex and that gender is stereotype. Wanting to wear high heels does not make you a woman. It makes you a human being who likes to wear high heels.
Do you identify as a human being? I don’t, I just am one. The second you say you identify as something, that introduces doubt into the situation. There is the possibility that you might not actually be that thing. In this case they definitely aren’t.
Lots of good comments here, but Bionca, you don’t speak for all women and lesbians. Every PERSON does have the right to express their sexuality and their true gender. Your open hostility invalidates you and no one else.
Gender is a stereotype, not a biological state. If you went around acting out the stereotypes of Aborigines, you’d be roundly condemned, and you’d deserve it too.
I’m afraid that the root of the problem may lie, at least in part, with the intolerance of women themselves. Do you remember when Tamar Iveri, the opera singer, was outed as a homophobe and released from her contract by Opera Australia? A lesbian friend posted one of the first articles outing her on Facebook. The resulting comments were horrendous. Other women called her a c— and a witch, and while most demanded her immediate deportation, at least one said she should be hung. When another woman said that these comments were inappropriate, she was rounded on and given a verbal thrashing. When I supported her and pointed out the irony of using hate speech to condemn a woman who used hate speech, I was also thrashed – although in my case it was because I mistakenly typed LBGT instead of LGBT when responding, and was thus told I didn’t deserve to have an opinion.
Really, all people need to treat others the way they would wish to be treated themselves – with kindness and respect. It’s a good starting point.
Thank you for posting. It is really scare that men want to prevent lesbians from meeting publicly. The homophobia and sexualization of the lesbians by guys is just terrible and scary for gay women getting death threats for just being homosexual women not making ourselves sexually available to male bodied people demanding beyond our consent that we entertain them as sex-partners.
Of course there’s also the same to be said of the exclusionary side of things. Keeping trans lesbians out of events, labeling our non trans partners that are lesbian as not. Often with accompanying actual blacklisting them out of the lesbian community.
If you are sexually attracted to male-bodied people you are bisexual, not lesbian. You don’t get to invent your own facts, no matter how you feel about it.
A male-bodied person who is attracted to women is a heterosexual male, not a lesbian. See above.
Men are not entitled to be in woman-only events unless specifically invited because whoever holds the event has a broad and incorrect definition of “woman”. If you’re not invited, stay out. If you don’t like it, hold your own events. God knows that in some areas of the USA you literally cannot find woman-only events anymore because all the feminist events are run by queer-theory adherents and trans-friendly people. It would be nice to have a choice. And yes, we could follow our own advice and start our own events, problem is that trans and their allies would take it as a personal insult and harass and persecute us. So who is really being intolerant here?
Even the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival allowed trans to attend. Yes, they did. They did not institute crotch checks, though they did not encourage trans participation explicitly. If some so-called “female identified” (no such thing) person could attend and behave, they could stay. This is something you won’t hear from the trans crowd, because it doesn’t benefit them for you to know the facts.
“if you are sexually attracted to male-bodied people”
you = if you are female, and also attracted to female-bodied people.
Clearly I need coffee.
Wow, you know something’s wrong when you make a calm, reasonable and seemingly non-controversial statement about sexism, abuse and violent threats, and you get a load of sexism, abuse and violent threats thrown back at you.
I think that only happens when you tell the truth. :)
“When you鈥檙e a trans woman you are made to walk this very fine line, where if you act feminine you are accused of being a parody and if you act masculine, it is seen as a sign of your true male identity. And if you act sweet and demure, you鈥檙e accused of reinforcing patriarchal ideas of female passivity, but if you stand up for your own rights and make your voice heard, then you are dismissed as wielding male privilege and entitlement. We trans women are made to teeter on this tightrope, not because we are transsexuals, but because we are women. This is the same double bind that forces teenage girls to negotiate their way between virgin and whore, that forces female politicians and business women to be aggressive without being seen as a bitch, and to be feminine enough not to emasculate their alpha male colleagues, without being so girly as to undermine their own authority.”
鈥� Julia Serano, Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive, p 28-9 (via bisexual-books)
(via princesitx)
Male and female are not identities. They are states of being. Do you identify as human? I sure don’t, I just am one. I also do not identify as female, I just am female. Biology is bigger than you.
Its saddens me to see some anti trans (transphobic) Trans misogynistic behaviour in these comments and nothings being flagged.
There’s a double standard here. On one hand some cis queer women are asking for real equality within the queer microsphere however at the same time maintaining trans woman aren’t women there for anything we say is sited as male arrogance. Nice of you to unpack your own sad bigotry for us and you straw “man” argument. You are behaving just like the misogynists and excursionists you say you detest.
The authoress of the article is “gender critical ” and as such has those from that community posting here. I have seen this posted on several anti trans pages.
So comments and calling Trans Women pretenders is fine? Commenting on parts one may or may not have is fine? Your entire comment and it’s tone is sadly what we’re seeing out of radical feminists these days.
Hi Liz, thanks for your article. I agree with you completely that personal attacks and sexist/misogynistic language are completely unacceptable and we can do decidedly better as a community. It would seem that internet comments section tend to bring out the worst in people, nothing like completely anonminity and sense of power (or powerlessness?) to encourage people to fire off hurtful missiles at each other :(
I’m not sure what your opinions of Germaine Greer’s comments are – as a woman who transitioned a few years ago I happily find her to be out of sync with the inclusion and intersectionality of much of feminism today so her comments don’t hurt as deeply as they once might. Let me, however, apologize on behalf of any transwomen that verbally attacked you in the comments section, whatever your views on people like me.
I believe the LGBTIQ community does gain it’s strength from its togetherness, despite the different experiences and needs of the various groups within. I noted your comments on splitting off but believe as a community, disparate as we often are, that we can achieve more together – even more so when we are respectful of all contained within. It was my great joy last weekend to march for the 3rd time in the Auckland Pride parade with my colleagues in the New Zealand Defence Force, gay, lesbian, bi and straight allies. I know there’s nothing like a parade to bring out a sense of solidarity and unity but it does speak of what is possible once the marching has finished
kindest regards, lucy :)
Wow! For an article that appealed to people everywhere to stop using offensive language and, more importantly, treat others with the same respect we would wished to be treated with, you sure made the most of your opportunity to vent your spleen against trans people everywhere.
Can i quietly ask if you have ever genuinely engaged with any transman or trans woman (angrily flaming people on forums does not count as genuine engagement!) or are your views a consequence of what others have encouraged or told you to believe?
Kind regards, lucy :)
Interesting & tragic
I’ve always believed OUR community is very divided and very cruel! It saddens me…. But doesn’t shock me!
As a trans woman, I do agree with Liz Waterhouse’s assessment……up to a point. The core issue of misogyny (of any kind) and disparagement of a large segment of or global population is a crime against humanity. Period.
Greer has a point and does have a right to hold, and even advocate, her opinions. She is dead on that women have given a short shrift in about every aspect of society. But her solution, to find a target for the anger of women in trans women or anyone else is misguided and certainly diminishes the potency of any legitimate solution to the original problem; a patriarchy that often appears insensitive, indifferent, and at times hostile.
I don’t even have the right to deny women the right to be angry about the nature of things but in the great problem solving exercise, not focusing on the real problem and instead dealing with ‘gender interlopers’ sets aside the possibility of reaching a righteous reckoning on how to truly level the filed.
YES, misogynistic verbal attacks and treatment are dreadful. It’s a pity Germaine Greer, who was the subject of the article under which these commments were made, plays a role herself in the perpetuation of trans misogyny. All that does is just open the door even wider for men to feel fine about abusing women. No it’s not OK, but Greer’s own misogyny is also vile.
That is incredibly poor behaviour to read about. Pretty shocked and disappointed that you had to deal with that, Liz. The age of anonymous Internet trolls.
Jain Moralee
Try being a trans lesbian.. Everyone hates you then..
Or say you don’t exist, call you a rapist, assign our sexuality and our sexual performances and then of course labeling our partners.
Firstly, misogynistic behaviour is abhorrent in this day and age, regardless of where it comes from; and I don’t put up with it online or in public.
That said, whilst not familiar with the article in question, I’d be careful to label all the posters as members of our LGBTI community – many of the people who follow these articles online are “straight” and not active members of the community (there’s often homophobic abuse from them).
But I agree that there are some misogynists within our community, and they seriously should no better!
I still find how misogynistic many gay men are, particularly towards lesbians. Strange as these are the women who most understand our experience of discrimination and the coming out experience. Shame on them.