Excluding Trans women is not feminist. It’s the opposite.

This happened:

ladygaga

A post shared by @ladygaga

Lady Gaga posted this picture on International Women’s Day and a bunch of people freaked the hell out. So she wrote about it (click the link) because she’s Gaga, and she’s an ally.

Like the impulsive mess social media researcher I am, I read deep into the comments, and past the first strata of supportive comments, it was all TERF bullshit, deadnaming, gaslighting, and gatekeeping.

Most feminists believe gender is constructed. That means that what we associate with femininity is stuff that we have made up or has been engineered for us by society and people with more power. If you are an intersectional feminist, you recognize that all marginalized identities affect one another, and your experience as a woman (particularly if you are white) is NOT emblematic of or central to all women’s experiences. Intersectionality means consciously and repeatedly de-centering white women and re-centering Black, trans, disabled, non-western, non-white, and other femmes, nonbinary people, and women.

Feminism is also about upending hierarchies and recognizing that systems of oppression like patriarchy and colonialism are engineered to put a specific group on top (usually white dudes) while creating an illusion of scarcity and competition for everyone else. That illusion keeps the oppressed groups competing with and oppressing each other instead of doing away with the shitty system.

So when I see women gatekeeping their identified gender from other women based on their sex at birth, or ability to lactate or gestate, my first thought is, WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK.

TRANS WOMEN ARE NOT TRYING TO TAKE ANYTHING AWAY FROM US. They are not a threat. They are more likely to be murdered based on their identities than we are, and that’s saying something. Trans women are women if they say they are because that’s how gender works. It’s an identity, not your biological makeup.

But seeing womanhood as somehow tied to your reproductive ability or period or some shit and using that as an excuse to exclude trans women? Really? In this economy?

I’ve had an IUD for about 15 years. So, for about half of my soon-to-be-over reproductive cycle, I’ve had very little period and been unable to get pregnant. Does that mean I’m not a woman? I know some tradwives who would say yes. My fucking hot flashes say otherwise. But you know what actually makes me a woman? Me calling myself one. That’s it. I’m a femme person who identifies as a woman. My biological sex is female, as far as I know, but I haven’t tested all the things that could be intersex.

Gender is not sex, and gender is not sexual orientation. It is a bunch of internal, subjective things and externally constructed, subjective things. Femininity and masculinity are flavors that you may identify with or be attracted to—or not. And femininity and masculinity are constantly changing across time and culture. They are fluid, not static. So the doctor who identified my genitals at birth did not determine 1) how and if I identify with a gender, 2) whether or not I can or will reproduce, and 3) who I’m attracted to.

And just to beat this dead horse one more time, HUMANS ARE A LOW DIMORPHISM SPECIES, AND INDIVIDUALS ARE OFTEN MORE GENETICALLY DIFFERENT THAN SEXES.

I identify as a woman because that’s how I feel. I’m on the brink of menopause, so you know what? That might change!

My point is gatekeeping gender away from trans people (or lesbians as in the second-wave movement) is just doing patriarchy for patriarchy. It’s doing colonialism for colonialism. Divide and conquer is the entire MO of systems of oppression, and when you freak out because Gaga likes Dylan and includes her in womanhood, you’re just Andrew Tate-ing the work of all the women who fought for us to have the rights we are now losing. Devaluing the femininity of women you don’t like is not it. Scrabbling for a piece of the lower-status pie is not it. Recognizing that our androcentric (male-centered) society devalues anything it associates with femininity and DISRUPTING THAT is feminism. Dylan’s femininity is not inferior or superior to mine; we are all uniquely us. Why would I want to participate in a system that ranks us? And more importantly, why do you?