Material reality cannot be cut loose from feminism in order to appeal to a wider demographic. Men are not women. The vast majority of women missing from the world's current population 125 million according to WHO figures, are missing due to SEX selective abortion. The root of women's oppression is from male SEX based supremacy. Women and trans people have common concerns about patriarchy but you cannot ignore that patriarchy is based on sex based supremacy, of which gender is a tool but not a root cause. Most trans identifying men are autogynophiles - they have a sexual fetish about being seen as women. As such, they are not part of a movement to end women's sex based oppression.
I admire the work you do for women as a family barrister and campaigner, and I expect we agree on most of our feminism. You're right there are really important things for us to be dealing with (reproductive rights, as you say, and the terrible state of UK justice system as it treats women in both family and crime). But I think we really have to see gender ideology for what it is, and discard it because it IS wasting our time and dividing us: it's the privileging of other groups over women and helping other groups at the expense of women. My radical feminism includes trans men, because however they identify, they are still female and will still be mostly treated as such by a sexist and misogynist society. Abortion bans have no effect on trans women: trans men, on the other hand, will be affected as much as any woman.
The core tenet of radical feminism is that women should be liberated from the patriarchy. (Not everyone, or all marginalised groups, but women). Radical feminism has always been tethered to material reality. Women are oppressed because they are female, i.e. because they have female biology. Femicide, child marriage, FGM, prostitution, rape, forced birth - these are done to women because we have the kind of bodies that can be exploited by men to force us to give them sex or children, and from there they force us into a gender role. Then come things like bride burning, so-called honour killing, suttee, maternity discrimination - all tied to our biology, but which can be separated from it and ended if we break down gender roles.
You say obliquely that trans people are "marginalised" and juxtapose them with "cis" women, which suggests you mean trans women. I would be interested to know what you mean by "marginalised"? It's true that there is lots of stigma, prejudice and discrimination against them (and possibly violence, but I don't have data on that). However, we know that men murder women at a rate of 2-3 a week in the UK, and that men rape hundreds of thousands of women and girls every year - plus, male sexual assault of women and girls is so common that almost all (or all) of us have experienced it. Women are underrepresented in all positions of power, the pay gap endures, and maternity discrimination has skyrocketed during Covid. Those are tangible issues, not a vague label of "marginalisation".
Obviously, dismantling the patriarchy will free everyone from restrictive gender norms, and I want that, just like I want an end to binary gender roles and sexism, so that everyone can live and look however they want. But male people aren't female, and we don't share the things with them that we share with each other, i.e. the potential to be exploited for our female bodies, which causes us to be forced into a class and a gender role. So I don't see why we would try to include people who aren't in the oppressed sex class within it and fight for their different needs, because they don't suffer the same oppression or want the same things (except in the broadest terms: while you can say everyone wants human rights, only women need the human right to abortion).
Women's resources are finite, and radical feminists fight for women. Men suffer under patriarchy, and the US prison system is horrific for men, so I support its reform - but helping male people in prison just isn't a radical feminist fight. The fact that dismantling the patriarchy will help men too is a welcome side effect of liberating women - but the liberation of women from oppression is the goal.
Material reality cannot be cut loose from feminism in order to appeal to a wider demographic. Men are not women. The vast majority of women missing from the world's current population 125 million according to WHO figures, are missing due to SEX selective abortion. The root of women's oppression is from male SEX based supremacy. Women and trans people have common concerns about patriarchy but you cannot ignore that patriarchy is based on sex based supremacy, of which gender is a tool but not a root cause. Most trans identifying men are autogynophiles - they have a sexual fetish about being seen as women. As such, they are not part of a movement to end women's sex based oppression.
All lists of marginalizing factors need to include women with all kinds of disabilities.
I admire the work you do for women as a family barrister and campaigner, and I expect we agree on most of our feminism. You're right there are really important things for us to be dealing with (reproductive rights, as you say, and the terrible state of UK justice system as it treats women in both family and crime). But I think we really have to see gender ideology for what it is, and discard it because it IS wasting our time and dividing us: it's the privileging of other groups over women and helping other groups at the expense of women. My radical feminism includes trans men, because however they identify, they are still female and will still be mostly treated as such by a sexist and misogynist society. Abortion bans have no effect on trans women: trans men, on the other hand, will be affected as much as any woman.
The core tenet of radical feminism is that women should be liberated from the patriarchy. (Not everyone, or all marginalised groups, but women). Radical feminism has always been tethered to material reality. Women are oppressed because they are female, i.e. because they have female biology. Femicide, child marriage, FGM, prostitution, rape, forced birth - these are done to women because we have the kind of bodies that can be exploited by men to force us to give them sex or children, and from there they force us into a gender role. Then come things like bride burning, so-called honour killing, suttee, maternity discrimination - all tied to our biology, but which can be separated from it and ended if we break down gender roles.
You say obliquely that trans people are "marginalised" and juxtapose them with "cis" women, which suggests you mean trans women. I would be interested to know what you mean by "marginalised"? It's true that there is lots of stigma, prejudice and discrimination against them (and possibly violence, but I don't have data on that). However, we know that men murder women at a rate of 2-3 a week in the UK, and that men rape hundreds of thousands of women and girls every year - plus, male sexual assault of women and girls is so common that almost all (or all) of us have experienced it. Women are underrepresented in all positions of power, the pay gap endures, and maternity discrimination has skyrocketed during Covid. Those are tangible issues, not a vague label of "marginalisation".
Obviously, dismantling the patriarchy will free everyone from restrictive gender norms, and I want that, just like I want an end to binary gender roles and sexism, so that everyone can live and look however they want. But male people aren't female, and we don't share the things with them that we share with each other, i.e. the potential to be exploited for our female bodies, which causes us to be forced into a class and a gender role. So I don't see why we would try to include people who aren't in the oppressed sex class within it and fight for their different needs, because they don't suffer the same oppression or want the same things (except in the broadest terms: while you can say everyone wants human rights, only women need the human right to abortion).
Women's resources are finite, and radical feminists fight for women. Men suffer under patriarchy, and the US prison system is horrific for men, so I support its reform - but helping male people in prison just isn't a radical feminist fight. The fact that dismantling the patriarchy will help men too is a welcome side effect of liberating women - but the liberation of women from oppression is the goal.