I’m not sure if you’ve seen the online discourse around Drew Afualo’s conversation she had on her podcast episode with E.R. Fightmaster. There has been a massive backlash stemming from an ‘alt right maga loving creator’ taking snippets of the conversation and sharing it online. Which triggered a tsunami of transphobia - it almost seemed like a coordinated attempt to cause a rift between trans and cis women.
TERF ideology was a huge part of this online discourse, and what constitutes a TERF. Trans women weren’t even in the room when this conversation happened and they’re getting the brunt of it. Drew since addressed this via her TikTok.
Because of that I decided to delve into what it means to be a TERF, the impacts they have on society. I also thought to myself ‘trans people are often left out of conversations about them’ so I gained perspectives from trans, cis, and non-binary people.
Acknowledgment - I want to say a big thank you to everyone who contributed to this article, it has been a privilege to share your voices with the world. I want to acknowledge Kai for collaborating with me on this project, bridging the gap and having the conversations with me when I needed guidance.
**this piece of work is similar to a thematic research methodology. Although it does not follow a strict research guideline. It has been adapted to suit this context.
I first heard the term TERF back in 2024 - I was so shocked that people like this even existed. Cause like come on how can you call yourself a feminist whilst also excluding trans people. That goes to show how sheltered I was from it, the privilege to not have them within my orbit.
According to the Cambridge dictionary - trans exclusionary radical feminists self-identify as feminist but are unwilling to include transgender women and girls in their advocacy. However, I thought ‘that’s not good enough’ so I asked trans, cis and non-binary people what TERF meant to them.
‘To me a TERF is someone who describes themselves as a feminist, but their feminism isn’t intersectional. They hold anti-trans views, particularly that the trans community are a danger to women. When I think of a TERF I think of likes of Posie Parker or J.K. Rowling, women who spend their time, energy, and money on pushing out anti-trans rhetoric and actively harm the trans community.’
Kai, non-binary
‘Someone who maliciously and wrongly defends or justifies their transphobia, specifically aimed at trans women, as being acts of “feminism”’
25, trans man
‘I don't like the term TERF - trans exclusionary radical feminist - because there is nothing either radical or feminist about what they believe. They believe that we are entirely constrained and defined by 'biology' and by the roles and norms society arbitrarily assigned based on that biology and these are ideas that feminists have fought for generations to challenge. To me their position is profoundly conservative and Victorian in its prudishness about bodies and spaces women should be allowed to inhabit and how they should inhabit them…. The people we call TERFs are better understood as extremists and fanatics. They are unfortunately very well funded - which makes them very dangerous.’
Karen Sugrue, cis-woman (founding member of Mammies for Trans Rights)
When I searched the literature I came across a study on trans people in Ireland - they found; stigma, deficiencies in mental health services, importance of peer support, and achieving self-acceptance and societal inclusion.
Which aligned with some of the perspectives given:
‘I wish people were more open, understanding and accepting towards transgender and non-binary people. Many people believe that you come out once in your life, but truthfully you spend your entire life having to come out to new/different people and you never know whether or not you’re safe to do so. In my own life, I wish that I wasn’t the “weird queer of the village” anytime I go back to my hometown, but sadly times haven’t progressed enough to move past the stigma fully yet.’
Kai, non-binary
‘as a trans man, a disabled man, a queer man, and an autistic man, I am never invisible. I can feel the looks, the glances, the whispers. I shouldn’t have to go stealth for that not to happen, but even if I did go stealth, I would still get stares from the other overlapping things that make me “abnormal”.’
Elliot, trans man binary
‘The harm caused excluding transgender people and forcing them to live as the opposite gender to how they identify - along with the dehumanising rhetoric and hate they face for something out of their own control - causes physical and mental harm. Which is inhumane and disproportionate when we are not a threat and just want to exist alongside other people of the same gender.’
33, trans woman
‘As a mother of a trans kid…. I wish we could go to our local GP and ask for advice and discuss our worries like everyone should be able to do. And I wish that politicians and journalists would stop using trans people for clickbait because every time they do it puts our kids in danger.’
Karen, cis-woman
I’ve looked up the definition so you don’t have to ‘bioessentialism overstates the importance of genetics and biological processes in determining phenotypic and behavioral characteristics, and erroneously links human social norms to supposed underlying deterministic biological causes’.
That’s just a fancy way of saying, people who are obsessed with labelling sex and gender, and expecting people to behave in a certain way, based on their genitalia.
Don’t take my word for it (and peer reviewed research) here’s what everyone else said:
‘The obsession with genitals and testing for ‘biological purity’ has profoundly white supremist overtones. To them a woman’s body should look a certain way and she should act a certain way and she should only be in spaces with other people who look and act in the same socially approved manner. They want a socially approved performance of womanhood and they are determined to punish any woman who does not meet these requirements. It is simply a replication of social hierarchies that were put in place to justify and disguise inequalities - and that is the opposite of radical thinking.’
Karen, cis-woman
‘What I really wish would change for us is a cultural shift away from the voyeuristic obsession with our bodies on the part of the media and whether we medically transition or not. Gender affirming care is a life saver and I don’t want to dismiss how special it is for so many trans people to experience that joy of being able to call their body theirs for the first time as a result of masculinising or feminising hormone replacement therapy. But it’s not the sum total of the trans experience.’
Miranda, trans woman non-binary
‘Specifically the “social construct” framing of gender comes from what society defines to be typical male or female social attributes. It’s a classification of what it means to be that gender and is shaped by patriarchal norms, but gender as an internal lived experience is developmentally real. Medical experts say gender identity develops around the age of 3 and even though gender and assigned sex usually do correlate, this is not always the case.’
33, trans woman
‘If you ever felt rage, or even a twinge of annoyance, at being placed in a box by someone else that you didn’t fit in - be it work, school, social, friends, family, what have you - then you simply need to understand that is the exact feeling trans people have when we are told we don’t exist. Yes we do. We’re right here and we know more about our own heads than anyone outside a mind-reader could.’
Elliot, trans man binary
Much like the research recommendations for societal change; representation, education, and online activism were also suggested by the participants.
‘The erasure of poverty and the advancement and accessibility of education as an entitlement for everyone, because the evidence shows that those who have faced financial and educational struggles are much more likely to fall victim to propaganda, and ignorance fuels hatred, which is weaponised by the ruling class to target trans people.’
33, trans woman
‘My goal, always whenever I argued with a TERF, was to make sure that anyone reading the comments or around us who felt unsafe reading/hearing the TERFs words could see people weren’t just going to let it fly. It’s the same reason I comment “free Palestine” on Zionist posts - not because I think it will change their mind, but because someone more vulnerable than me might come across it and need to see that fight against hatred in that moment.’
Elliot, trans man binary
‘I would like to see much more space given to trans people to talk about something other than themselves and their transition. I want to see trans writers, trans poets, trans artists trans historians, trans scientists, trans engineers, etc. empowered to talk about what gives their lives meaning outside of their personal journey.’
Miranda, trans woman non-binary
‘as the mom of a trans kid I would love if there were more representations of trans people in the media which showed how their transness is just a tiny piece in the enormous tapestry of who they are and how they just want to live normal lives with friends and family and community and fun and holidays and a job they like and be safe and loved and valued - just like everyone.
Karen, cis-woman
But really, can we get through to people who use the guise of ‘feminism’ to harm trans people.
One person alluded to TERF being on a spectrum and others expressed that TERFs are beyond saving:
‘I think that there are different groups of people out there and I don’t think they all have the same motivation. At the extreme end, the TERFs who have enormous financial backing and the support of bad faith politicians and media outlets looking for clickbait and engaging with the rising tide of fascist rhetoric who are actively working to remove hard won rights from trans people, women, the wider LGBTQIA community & minority racial and ethnic groups. This group are not people whose minds can be changed.’
Karen, cis-woman
‘I don’t think it is possible to change many of their minds, anyone trying to use a movement designed to benefit ALL of humanity to invalidate and belittle a minority are in my opinion, beyond saving.’
25, trans man
‘There is nothing I can do to change a TERFs mind. Even as a young teen, when fighting people on Instagram or Facebook comments, my goal was never to change their mind because I quickly learned that giving them the correct information and empathy isn’t enough. They have been brainwashed and need to undo that themselves, rather than the burden being placed on trans people to educate them, because we have and they ignore us.’
Elliot, trans man binary
I learned so much from the trans community during this whole process; societal impacts; bioessentialism; need for societal change; and if we can/cannot change a TERFs mind.
As an intersectional feminist it’s clear to me that trans rights benefit everyone. Just by existing they are challenging the system. Yet they are one of the most marginalised groups in society. Which isn’t a shock when you think about it, if your very existence disrupts people who are happy with the hierarchy, with being on top of the wealth income class. Being in power of women’s bodies, then why would they allow a group of people to challenge it?
They wouldn’t.
If patriarchal norms oppress cisgender women - then why don’t TERFs embrace the trans community into their movement? After all just by existing the trans community are challenging these norms. Why is there a subset of cisgender women propping up the patriarchy and continuing on the oppression they are apparently fighting against?
The answer is - they aren’t feminists, that’s why. Because feminism is not feminism unless it’s intersectional.
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