This is really sad
Over in another one of those communities along the lines of queer_rage (but not actually queer_rage) that shall go unnamed in this post, a post was made about this article.
http://www.nupge.ca/news_2006/n20ja06b.htm
In a nutshell, a women's domestic violence center won a court case and is now permitted to bar transwomen from volunteering there.
This thread about it, behind the cut, is one of the saddest things I have ever read. It literally brought tears to my eyes the first time I read it.
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Person A:
I always find this stuff so.... surprising. I probably shouldn't. But I do sexual assault crisis intervention here on campus and it's not even restricted to women, so certainly not only cisgendered women.
(Reply to this)(Thread)
Person B:
I find it surprsing too and I think you and I are both right to be surprised. The feminists I have been around would not act this way and the women I've known who are advocates against domestic violence are far more concerned with protecting women from their abusers than in creating nit-picky standards of whose enough of a woman to volunteer.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person C:
Yes, because people are beating down the doors wanting to work in rape crisis centers. They have to beat off the volunteers with a stick.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person D:
When I applied to volunteer for MWAR/TRCC, I was told that I couldn't because I identified as a man. I asked then what would happen if an FTM came to them after being assaulted and they told me they would not help him for the same reason.
I can understand not wanting me to do take-in for women, and I made that explicitly clear over the phone, but I didn't think I was too male to help out behind the scene.
I also didn't bother showing up after I was assaulted. And for now, I can't picture myself going to a male rape crisis centre, if one was created. Not so long as I'm pre-bottom surgery, I don't think. But it leaves FTMs with no resources when they need them the most.
I was happy to hear that MWAR/TRCC accepts MTFs (regardless of point in transition) but I've heard that everything is far from peachy within the organization and most of them spend their time there defending their right to be there.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person E:
At the same time, FTMs are men. There is not space for men at women's shelters, and I don't think that they should make exceptions in that policy. Have you thought about starting/joining a Men Against Violence group, or something of that nature?
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person D:
I'm aware that I'm a man. Tell that to the men who have assaulted me, who didn't care how well I passed (often that's can be what causes them to flip out) and who explicitly made a point to assault my genitals because they are still female. I can't even begin to explain what a trip that does to a gender dysphoric psychy.
Until I am post-bottom-op, I can tell you I have no interest in being around cisgendered men after I have been assaulted. While my identity is intact [I realise assault makes me no less of a guy], my mind gets launched into a whole other space that is hardly able to grasp your rhetoric (however rational I conceed it is when not in a post-assault headspace). The very last thing I want is another penis near me after an assault.
But don't worry, I didn't bother showing up at the rape crisis centre last time. If there is a next time, I won't either. Until I'm invited and welcomed in I won't.
I'm sorry if this comment comes across as rude, but this isn't my privilege trying to get into women space for the sake of taking up space from a position of power. I'm talking about seeking refuge and safety in the only way I learnt how as a result of my sociolization. After an assault is not when I want my malehood pinned against my female genitals that just finished being abused. My transition didn't come with an erasure of my female sociolization. The impact of an assault on me is no different to me now that I pass, then it was before I did. (yes I was assault both before and since) And the safety and comfort I need to heal is the same. I don't know any other way of relating to my body if it's sexually abused. Once my psychy has begun to recover, I don't care to be in women space anymore and I leave on my own accord.
(Reply to this)(Parent)
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I just can't understand this. I just sit and read and reread, and I cannot get my brain around it.
Okay, yes, an FTM is a man. But an FTM is also a member of a very small minority group. How in the flying fuck can a group that claims to be about rights for the oppressed (women) just ignore this whole entire group of people just because technically they are men? Pre-op FTMs have female genitals that can be assaulted in just the same way that the female genitals of cisgendered women can be. If cisgendered women are assumed to have the privilege of not having to confront cisgendered men while recovering from an assault, why can't that privilege be extended also to FTMs?
I would expect attitudes like this from people who don't understand any of this and aren't working at all to help members of minority and/or oppresed groups get what they need. But for people who are so in tune with the idea of "feminism" to be so excluding of a group of people who literally have nowhere to go after being assaulted? If an FTM is assaulted, even if a male rape crisis center is around (which is not very likely, unfortunatly) he's not going to want to go there. I don't know how welcome he'd be, but I am sure it would feel at least awkward if not downright threatening. But he can't go to a center for women, because he is a man. What the hell does he do?
The story of "person D" earlier in the post just breaks my heart. He's apologizing from the depths of his soul for not being born into a male body or having a female gender idendity that matches the body he does have. He's up there saying that yes, he has no right to seek help after being assaulted, just because of the mismatch. Isn't life hard enough for transpeople? I suppose I should be glad that these "feminists" are so comfortable with the idea of transpeople that they are so automatic with the response that a man, no matter what body he has, does not belong in a female space. But how, how in the hell, can they look a transman in the face and say "you are not welcome here, you MAN" when he's just been raped? Because obviously they do, if they say straight out that they don't help transmen.
And this is not even mentioning how absurd the response is of "person E" that "person D" should just start his own group. Yes, that's SUCH a practical thing for a lone transman to do while still recovering from trauma. Thank you Pollyanna. Or how absurd the ruling in the original article is, about something that, unless the volunteer wants to parade around naked for some reason, nobody will even know about.
I'm upset again. I have to stop. But I just wanted to get that out and see what you all had to say.
ETA: I forgot to put this one in. A transwoman stopping just short of apologizing for being trans. In a community about "feminism". Pardon me while I introduce my head to the desk in new and exciting ways.
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Person F:
I'm conflicted. On the one hand the reaction to Ms. Nixon was based purely on her trans status. If there were concerns about her manner or her behavior, that is if she acted with a sense of male privilege or in inappropriate ways they could have rejected her on those grounds. Instead, she was rejected purely for who she was. Moreover, a lot of the arguments used were inately transphobic.
Additionally, as Ms. Nixon would surely not have been the only volunteer, a woman who feels uncomfortable talking to her for any reason, including her being trans, could be referred to somebody else. At the same time, as wrong as I think the prejudice was I question whether a lawsuit was really the best use of resources here. A lawsuit was unlikely to make the center change its policies or attitudes and its derivative effect is probably to hurt more rape survivors who need help than to end discrimination against transwomen.
Still, what else can transwomen do? As a transwoman I know full well that I cannot go into most DV centers and programs, and I wonder if anything short of a lawsuit is really going to change that. And it is not just DV centers. I pass fine, but my ID still says "male" on it so I've been turned away from the emergency room because "we don't treat freaks."
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http://www.nupge.ca/news_2006/n20ja06b.htm
In a nutshell, a women's domestic violence center won a court case and is now permitted to bar transwomen from volunteering there.
This thread about it, behind the cut, is one of the saddest things I have ever read. It literally brought tears to my eyes the first time I read it.
------------------------------------
--------------------------------------
Person A:
I always find this stuff so.... surprising. I probably shouldn't. But I do sexual assault crisis intervention here on campus and it's not even restricted to women, so certainly not only cisgendered women.
(Reply to this)(Thread)
Person B:
I find it surprsing too and I think you and I are both right to be surprised. The feminists I have been around would not act this way and the women I've known who are advocates against domestic violence are far more concerned with protecting women from their abusers than in creating nit-picky standards of whose enough of a woman to volunteer.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person C:
Yes, because people are beating down the doors wanting to work in rape crisis centers. They have to beat off the volunteers with a stick.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person D:
When I applied to volunteer for MWAR/TRCC, I was told that I couldn't because I identified as a man. I asked then what would happen if an FTM came to them after being assaulted and they told me they would not help him for the same reason.
I can understand not wanting me to do take-in for women, and I made that explicitly clear over the phone, but I didn't think I was too male to help out behind the scene.
I also didn't bother showing up after I was assaulted. And for now, I can't picture myself going to a male rape crisis centre, if one was created. Not so long as I'm pre-bottom surgery, I don't think. But it leaves FTMs with no resources when they need them the most.
I was happy to hear that MWAR/TRCC accepts MTFs (regardless of point in transition) but I've heard that everything is far from peachy within the organization and most of them spend their time there defending their right to be there.
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person E:
At the same time, FTMs are men. There is not space for men at women's shelters, and I don't think that they should make exceptions in that policy. Have you thought about starting/joining a Men Against Violence group, or something of that nature?
(Reply to this)(Parent) (Thread)
Person D:
I'm aware that I'm a man. Tell that to the men who have assaulted me, who didn't care how well I passed (often that's can be what causes them to flip out) and who explicitly made a point to assault my genitals because they are still female. I can't even begin to explain what a trip that does to a gender dysphoric psychy.
Until I am post-bottom-op, I can tell you I have no interest in being around cisgendered men after I have been assaulted. While my identity is intact [I realise assault makes me no less of a guy], my mind gets launched into a whole other space that is hardly able to grasp your rhetoric (however rational I conceed it is when not in a post-assault headspace). The very last thing I want is another penis near me after an assault.
But don't worry, I didn't bother showing up at the rape crisis centre last time. If there is a next time, I won't either. Until I'm invited and welcomed in I won't.
I'm sorry if this comment comes across as rude, but this isn't my privilege trying to get into women space for the sake of taking up space from a position of power. I'm talking about seeking refuge and safety in the only way I learnt how as a result of my sociolization. After an assault is not when I want my malehood pinned against my female genitals that just finished being abused. My transition didn't come with an erasure of my female sociolization. The impact of an assault on me is no different to me now that I pass, then it was before I did. (yes I was assault both before and since) And the safety and comfort I need to heal is the same. I don't know any other way of relating to my body if it's sexually abused. Once my psychy has begun to recover, I don't care to be in women space anymore and I leave on my own accord.
(Reply to this)(Parent)
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I just can't understand this. I just sit and read and reread, and I cannot get my brain around it.
Okay, yes, an FTM is a man. But an FTM is also a member of a very small minority group. How in the flying fuck can a group that claims to be about rights for the oppressed (women) just ignore this whole entire group of people just because technically they are men? Pre-op FTMs have female genitals that can be assaulted in just the same way that the female genitals of cisgendered women can be. If cisgendered women are assumed to have the privilege of not having to confront cisgendered men while recovering from an assault, why can't that privilege be extended also to FTMs?
I would expect attitudes like this from people who don't understand any of this and aren't working at all to help members of minority and/or oppresed groups get what they need. But for people who are so in tune with the idea of "feminism" to be so excluding of a group of people who literally have nowhere to go after being assaulted? If an FTM is assaulted, even if a male rape crisis center is around (which is not very likely, unfortunatly) he's not going to want to go there. I don't know how welcome he'd be, but I am sure it would feel at least awkward if not downright threatening. But he can't go to a center for women, because he is a man. What the hell does he do?
The story of "person D" earlier in the post just breaks my heart. He's apologizing from the depths of his soul for not being born into a male body or having a female gender idendity that matches the body he does have. He's up there saying that yes, he has no right to seek help after being assaulted, just because of the mismatch. Isn't life hard enough for transpeople? I suppose I should be glad that these "feminists" are so comfortable with the idea of transpeople that they are so automatic with the response that a man, no matter what body he has, does not belong in a female space. But how, how in the hell, can they look a transman in the face and say "you are not welcome here, you MAN" when he's just been raped? Because obviously they do, if they say straight out that they don't help transmen.
And this is not even mentioning how absurd the response is of "person E" that "person D" should just start his own group. Yes, that's SUCH a practical thing for a lone transman to do while still recovering from trauma. Thank you Pollyanna. Or how absurd the ruling in the original article is, about something that, unless the volunteer wants to parade around naked for some reason, nobody will even know about.
I'm upset again. I have to stop. But I just wanted to get that out and see what you all had to say.
ETA: I forgot to put this one in. A transwoman stopping just short of apologizing for being trans. In a community about "feminism". Pardon me while I introduce my head to the desk in new and exciting ways.
----------------------------------
Person F:
I'm conflicted. On the one hand the reaction to Ms. Nixon was based purely on her trans status. If there were concerns about her manner or her behavior, that is if she acted with a sense of male privilege or in inappropriate ways they could have rejected her on those grounds. Instead, she was rejected purely for who she was. Moreover, a lot of the arguments used were inately transphobic.
Additionally, as Ms. Nixon would surely not have been the only volunteer, a woman who feels uncomfortable talking to her for any reason, including her being trans, could be referred to somebody else. At the same time, as wrong as I think the prejudice was I question whether a lawsuit was really the best use of resources here. A lawsuit was unlikely to make the center change its policies or attitudes and its derivative effect is probably to hurt more rape survivors who need help than to end discrimination against transwomen.
Still, what else can transwomen do? As a transwoman I know full well that I cannot go into most DV centers and programs, and I wonder if anything short of a lawsuit is really going to change that. And it is not just DV centers. I pass fine, but my ID still says "male" on it so I've been turned away from the emergency room because "we don't treat freaks."
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