Read on Twitter
1/Never fun being called out, even very gently, but it can be an important factor in doing better. Have been thinking a lot about this over the past few days. Backstory is @jennifurret had a discussion with someone else I follow about trans issues over a period of several days. https://twitter.com/jennifurret/status/1288125993933185024">https://twitter.com/jennifurr...
2/Since I follow them both I saw snippets of this conversation from time to time but didn& #39;t get involved. Dude was clearly saying some stuff that was at least borderline but I didn& #39;t want to spend the time and energy to read and consider the whole conversation and join it.
3/One has to pick one& #39;s battles and I didn& #39;t want to pick this one. There& #39;s a door and behind it may be some bigoted stuff and much of the time I& #39;m not going to want to go through that door to look for more problems.
I now realize this is not the right approach.
I now realize this is not the right approach.
4/It& #39;s possible to support trans people in a discussion without having to come to a decision on whether someone else is *really* saying something transphobic. And that& #39;s what I should have done. And what I& #39;ll do now.
5/Trans women are women. Trans men are men. Nonbinary folks are nonbinary. Listen to trans and nonbinary people.
6/They will tell you about the hate they have experienced, the violence they have endured or credibly feared, the anguish they& #39;ve felt. It is gross to use trans folks as a topic for abstract, philosophical debate disconnected from the reality of their lives and their experiences.
7/If you act like various abstract hypotheticals should have equal weight to the literally life-or-death difficulties experienced by trans people, I think less of you.
8/This pattern often arises from a fundamental lack of empathy—really I do not think the same people doing this would treat other groups of people in the same way. And an ignorance of what trans people experience.
9/But this ignorance is not benign. High-minded public discussions that do not include the fundamental assumption of trans dignity and self-determination, no matter how temperate, contribute to the hate trans people experience for others. You cannot wish away this context.
