Opinion of Memphis

[Kitteh]

He's not a Todd Akin type, he's a bro who thinks that being politically liberal excuses him from having to develop a personal understanding of people who aren't like him.

^

I still remember that the first time I got into a gender argument with him he had a picture making fun of Romney's "binders full of women" comment in his sig. lol...the irony

[Kitteh]

FF

at this forum

You feel that this forum cares too much about misogyny and sexism?

[Kitteh]

The fact that he has any FF votes at all shows how unbelievably male this forum is.

Chill out, RandomNewbie.  Memphis is otherwise fine.

FWIW, I don't see how the "chill out" response is warranted, your post sounds much angrier than Wyodon's. Besides, his point was entirely valid, I highly doubt on a forum where the gender ratio was skewed the other way or even closer to 50/50 he would have so many defenders.

[Kitteh]

Crazy people on tumblr who believe they're "transracial" or some other bs != the vast majority of people who use the term cisgender. I don't do it out of malice or because I have a chip on my shoulder, just because its a lot less awkward to say than "non-transgender" or something.

[Kitteh]

sometimes I think for a second he's talking about himself in the third person

Memphis is just the right size

Glad I wasn't the only one who thought that xD

[Kitteh]

I'm actually fairly popular with women who don't have penises. They're a much friendlier and relaxed bunch than the ones that do. Most of them don't needlessly view their lives through the constant prism of oppression.

Hey, Memphis, here's an idea. Maybe trans* women are more likely to point out the challenges inherent in being a women because they have experienced the difference first-hand.

This is not true at all. They know what it is like to be a trans person, and that probably is a difficult thing. Projecting that experience onto actually being a woman is not accurate. They have no more experience being a woman than I do.

For me, personally, I came out and transitioned in between high school and college, which means that everyone I know except family never knew me when I was living as male. I present female now and the way I look nobody guesses that I'm trans. I do tell my close friends, but other than that nobody. Point being that people in the world treat me the same way they would treat any other woman. So when I say "society tells women x", I'm certain I have more credibility than you do, given that you have probably never been perceived or treated as female in your life.

[Kitteh]

SawxDem's pics are what makes this thread worthwhile.

[Kitteh]

I understand where BK's post is coming from. I am familiar with the stereotype of  trans people being very abrasive and assholish (for lack of a better word) when dealing with anti-trans people. I'm not sure to what extent I embody this stereotype, tbh I'm fairly shy and not confrontational IRL so I don't think I do. But at the same time, I think this is very understandable if you put yourself in the shoes of the average trans person. None of what memphis has said is anything anyone who is trans has not heard dozens of times in their life, including, often especially, from very close people, family, etc (fwiw, the most negative reaction to me being trans of anyone I know IRL was from my parents, my IRL friends have all been very accepting, but I guess that's because you choose your friends, not your family). So a lot of the hostility towards memphis is not really about him, it's just hearing the same old arguments and attacks yet again from a different place. The personal effects of hearing this kind of thing over and over again from all different angles including society as a whole should be easy to see. If the reaction against him seems disproportionate to what he said, I think that's a lot of why. For example, when people bring up the issue of trans people committing suicide, it's not implying that memphis wants people to kill themselves, it's that constantly being bombarded with transphobic arguments virtually identical to the ones memphis has used here does lead to that endpoint for all too many people, sadly. I hope that anyone can understand that; it really doesn't take a lot of difficult empathy or anything.

I guess I have very complicated feelings about telling people to respond less hostilely to comments like the ones memphis has been making. One the one hand, it is probably true that there are some otherwise supportive people who are turned off by such attitudes. OTOH, I really can't in good conscience tell people who are deeply hurt and legitimately angry that they should be less angry in order to make their cause more politically viable.

[Kitteh]

Also, great post BK. I am also trying to understand better what would cause someone to think they are of the wrong gender. Is it based totally on expectations society places on the different genders (and if so, don't the same people say all differences between the genders are made up by society...meaning they are still men?)? Or does it go deeper than that. And if it does, how do they know what it is like to be a woman or a man, if that makes any sense. How do they know they are women if they don't know how a woman thinks like. I probably don't make any sense, but whatever. It seems like just asking questions might get you labeled a bigot by some....

I'm perfectly fine with people asking questions like this, sbane. In fact I'm happy when they do so, because it shows trying to understand something you don't which is really very difficult and admirable.

Problem is, I don't really have a good answer for you. All of these questions are things I've asked myself throughout my life, and while I've come up with a number of answers, none of them are really satisfying to me. I guess eventually I've just come to realize that even if I can't really understand why or how or what this is, I do know that I am happier and more comfortable with myself living now as a woman than I was as a man, and that is all that really matters in the end. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Kitteh]

What's "sjw"?

social justice (keyboard) warrior.

So fighting for social justice is now a bad thing?

I think it's a term that developed on tumblr, and so it's commonly used now to characterize the extremely strange fringe people you find on tumblr who identify as "transracial" or "transspecies" or stuff like that and claim themselves as fighting for social justice.

[Kitteh]

What's "sjw"?

social justice (keyboard) warrior.

So fighting for social justice is now a bad thing?

I think it's a term that developed on tumblr, and so it's commonly used now to characterize the extremely strange fringe people you find on tumblr who identify as "transracial" or "transspecies" or stuff like that and claim themselves as fighting for social justice.

Transspecies?

You can find pretty much anything on the internet.

[Kitteh]

w/r/t tumblr and "otherkin" and such, I don't really understand why people...idk, care so much. Like I see whole blogs dedicated to attacking them, and I think "does this person really have nothing better to do with their life?". They're just some strange people on the internet saying crazy stuff, no need to pay any more attention to them than the flat earth movement. They're definitely not representative of any larger ideology, and caricaturing everyone who ever uses the term "transphobia" as someone who says stuff like "OMG check ur cisspecies privilege" or "i'm a fat butch queer disabled panracial trigendered otherkin" (as I've often seen done) is a ridiculous strawman. 

[Kitteh]

FWIW, I think the last page or two of this thread has been much better than all the pages that preceded that.

[Kitteh]

The term 'armchair philosopher' really confuses me. I mean, 'armchair general' obviously makes sense, but what, outside of certain subdivisions like political philosophy and such, would the alternative to an 'armchair' philosopher be, exactly?

http://super.abril.com.br/multimidia/filosofighters-english-633303.shtml

[Kitteh]

Oh come on, 5 infraction points for calling Mint an asshole (in the wake of a post which was clearly nasty and offensive)? Are you trying to become our next Inks, Badger?

They are both fighting for the state as oppressors, one as a prosecutor the other as a judge... What do you expect?

[Kitteh]

It's interesting how this thread has become "opinion of Gustaf".

[Kitteh]

Te esconjuro pé-de-pato mangalô três vezes.
[/quote

Google translates that as "I exorcise foot duck-Mangalô three times."

...xD hahahahahahahahhaahahhahahaha