Serf or Terf

[smokingboot]

Last night I watched an online discussion devolve into a dogpile on an erudite and cool headed woman, who simply laid out the premis that accepted self-identification, seemingly the holy grail of transdom, is a very easy tool for predatory men to use. Jonathan Yaniv was one example cited. If someone identifies as a woman, comes into a waxing parlour and demands to have their testicles waxed, must the beautician comply in handling their genitals? https://spectator.us/yaniv-scandal-end-product-trans-activism/

There was no answer to this beyond the expectation that the beautician must surely know someone they could call upon to do it. And in the face of talking about trans rapists like Karen White,(https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/oct/11/karen-white-how-manipulative-and-controlling-offender-attacked-again-transgender-prison) who self identified as female, was put in a female prison and promptly raped inmates, one answer was startling:

I don't care.

Though only one said it, the rest might as well have done. In the clash of rights, the male or the transwoman was meant to win out over the ciswoman every time. His right to self ID mattered far more than Her right to physical safety. After all - and this argument was put forward seriously - women get raped all the time, no point destroying someone else's rights to sort out what seems to be an unsortable problem. Jaw-dropping stuff.

The answer? Basically, don't be born with a vagina, and if you are, know when to shut up and accept what the gang tells you. See that person with a dick telling you what to do and how to speak? Apparently they are different to the other people with dicks who used to tell you what to do and how to speak. Both groups will revile you in identical ways if you disobey them. It's almost as though they have something in common.

I backed the refuter cautiously, not wanting my indignation to cloud her excellent argument, her points remaining largely unanswered barring the howl of the internet lynch mob. They started to call her names. They shouted 'TERF!' As though this was some universal signal to dunk her in a pond, and they truly believe they have a right to control her vocabulary, a right to her silence. Then I backed her up more volubly, as did another, who knew some of these people on a social level. This latter lady mentioned to me that she was wondering when they would call her a TERF.I knew they wouldn't, because she was careful in crafting her point, and because within the social setting they share she has kudos. Being all together in the right group is at least as important to these people as the principle itself. They'll leave her be.

I know transwomen who lived the life, took the hormones, took their time, went through the op, found themselves, respected what Simone De Beauvoir talked about regarding the experience of womanhood. They did the work. They didn't start telling other women what they could and couldn't say, like brattish sons screaming at their mother. These are friends, women to be proud of, to these I have been an ally.

But I have no time for those acting as though womanhood is just an assimilation of body parts; it's still objectification, even if you crave to wear those parts rather than grab and fuck them. There is more to identity than that, any identity.

I understand those who flit across identities, protean characters, shape-changers. The law won't flit or change alongside their subtlety, because that cannot be the nature of the law, but in any case, I haven't met any of these trying to impose their rules on women.

Some befrocked bloke walking into a beauty parlour and demanding to have his balls fondled is just another male predator. And in their desperation to belong, to have a common foe they can all punch, to be seen as standing by the popular vulnerable and winning their group virtue badges, they uphold his rights and barely consider a woman's right not to touch him.

Were people always this weak?

Edited to add: Well, some munter had this to say on the Jonathan Yaniv scandal:

they should be legally compelled to offer the same services to men and women alike. if one wants their nether regions waxed it should be on offer regardless of the customers gender..... otherwise it is discrimination (different treatment due to gender)

So for at least one person the answer is that yes, women should be legally forced to touch men's testicles. Don't tell me misogyny's a non-issue.