Being a Diva: Flaunting your oppressions?
Updated: Jun 14, 2020
Hello all, so this started as an academic interest post, for those doing anything in the field of Gender, sexuality, and equality, and morphed into a mini rant therefore I'd suggest one proceed with some caution. 🤔 and maybe a cuppa. The aim is to dispel a myth or two and promote some thinking.
Having recently attended an excellent lecture at Sunderland uni by Roxy Bourdillion, the Managing Director of DIVA magazine, I was struck at the time by the magazines very deliberate, and public, inclusion of trans women, a rare thing to find. (I did get kinda emotional - I find myself all but invisible in mainstream media narratives & this rare representation hit a nerve) So the linked post below by DIVA's Carrie Lyell stating unequivocal support for Trans people was something I thought worth a share.
I recently shared findings on my own feed about the online hate directed towards us as a community, (findings that are mentioned in this article), only to have two online friends jump on it and complain that I was "making an issue out of it" or that I "had chip on my shoulder" and "needed to get over myself"
One of whom was a trained counsellor and self identified lesbian, and proceeded to suggest by private message that "she has been through some tough times but doesn't plaster it all over social media" and was quite prepared to use her professional knowledge to "help me get over this issue"
Ok, so your oppression means you get to tell me when I'm not supposed to be "flaunting mine?" eh? talk about maintaining a hierarchy.. what's this like? Hegemonic femininity? 😂🤣😂🤣
Nah.. to be blunt.. and use a technical term F@Ck that. If anyone gets to know me they will quickly realise I will not be easily silenced. (though they may not hear the reply for a few years)
But it made me think about LGBPQIA+ Ally-ship to the T.
The Idea that LGB (or pan other other sexual identities) are being "erased" by trans ones, that "liberation feminism" is at odds with the movement for transgender rights, and that the latter is some how "homophobic", has a history.
It's a history that is embedded in the same kind of "wrong think" that promotes the "racial replacement theory" nonsense spouted by white supremacists. It is the blaming of a given minority for the "enforced" changes in world view, language, and legality, that have been "imposed" upon either the more powerful minorities or overt majorities.
"When you become accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression"
Suggestions that trans lobbies, censorship and other such "perceived injustices" somehow constitute an attack on "freedoms" is punching downward. As is an en masse denial of the narratives of trans people in principle because "they're biased" or "are not/are "really" men/women"
Recognition of "my" identity does not and will not erase that of others. Unless that is, a core part of that "other" identity is suggesting that mine cannot or does not exist.
In which case, I'm not really the issue then am I?