Trans Misogyny

Poking around the Interweb lately I came upon a question about Trans-Misogyny and if women, even Feminist women could be trans-misogynist. Now, I'm not in Academia, I'm just a grrrl trying to make it in the big bad wrrrld. I do have my own understanding of this topic though.

Trans-Misogyny is the particular way misogyny is applied to Trans*folk. The easiest example is the double-bind trans*women are in with respect to how we present ourselves. A T-gal who wears makeup, skirts, lace, has long painted nails, and a hair-do is "trying to hard". A T-gal who has short hair, little or no makeup, a button-down shirt "may as well have remained a man". It's a take off of the Beauty Myth and "male gaze" that Feminists are familiar with - but used to discount our identity as women. The "perfect middle ground" doesn't exist for us we are either "making a mockery of womon" or we are not trying hard enough.

It also plays out in how we act. It a T-gal is demure, and soft-spoken, and likes to cook and garden, and take on a traditional woman's role in a relationship, she is reinforcing the gender binary. If a TG is loud, vocal in expressing herself, stands up for what she believes she is using her "male privilege" or has "male energy".

It isn't so much that Trans-Misogyny is worse or easier than anything. It is a term used to show how the tools of oppression are used specifically to keep transwomen in their places.