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even more notes on the reading
Aug. 12th, 2008 09:31 pmJulia Serano has been all over part of the liberal internet since some time last week. As some may recall, I have a few issues with her work. Thankfully, just as I was debating whether or not to start a topic on another site about her, someone else went ahead and did it. Because I'm surprisingly pleased with the way my bits went down, I'm reposting them here (I'm not reposting comments from anyone else, because I don't have permission and they're not my words):
Disclaimer:
I'll certainly play. I feel compelled to admit, right up front, that I have issues with Serano's work in general. I think she's rhetorically sloppy, and am probably one of the evil "genderqueers" (according to her) she demonizes, but at times I'm also a flavor of trans she seems happy to appropriate when convenient. I find her invocation of science often problematic, since she rarely cites but instead appeals to authority (her own), overgeneralizes from experience (again, her own), and dresses anecdotal evidence up as statistics.
That being said, I think she makes interesting and valid observations, even if I question her premises and her conclusions. Her Step 2 has merit.
First pass:
Having gotten my disclaimer out of the way:
I think Serano's primary point, that some (though I suspect she would say all) of the problems many have with transsexual women is a problem with valuing femininity, is spot on. This is reflected in the intense scrutiny heaped upon ts women over 'choosing' to embrace traits typically assigned to assigned-women (this is also reflected in the tension between some self-identified sex-positive feminists and some self-defined radical feminists, but there do appear to be orders of magnitude of difference in intensity between that conflict and acceptance of ts women).
I think her line of argument could benefit from a deeper power analysis, though; I'd suggest that the reason ts women are so closely examined, and targets of such deep suspicion, is because they're perceived as assigned-men, social recipients of relative assigned privilege, taking on assigned lesser privilege. There appears to be a cognitive dissonance around the concept of anyone intentionally moving from "more/better" to "less/worse" that combines with a deep structural suspicion of the positionality of that which is defined as 'feminine' that leads to the position so violently defended by MWMF, among others.
I don't think that intersectionality and queer theory are the natural enemies that Serano seems to suggest. From my perspective, there seems to be a fair amount of misunderstanding around the idea in queer theory that identity is contextual, performative, and socially created which leads many people to assume that the goal is to do away with identity. From the perspective of someone who struggles daily for the right to even begin to actualize their inner sense of self, I can see how "gender is a construct" can be (mis)construed as "gender is a lie" and then "the goal is to do away with (all) gender". But that's the problem with specious logic; if one accepts the premise, all other steps make perfect sense.
Speaking as one who partakes, often and deeply, of both queer and poststructural theory, I have always taken the motto "exploding the binary" to mean radically increasing the choices available, not reducing them. The only thing I could see that might be discarded would be the structural privilege of some positions at the expense or exclusion of others. If, however, one's sense of their own identity (in this case, gender) is dependent on power over or exclusion of others, then I'd say that part should be tossed aside, and the sooner the better.
Further elucidation:
sorry, I should have been more clear. The "exploding the binary" line of reasoning is one often assigned to queer theory/genderqueer folks by Serano (among others). Essentialism works frighteningly well with this, though it's implemented slightly differently than the biological essentialism most often mobilized against transsexual people. Instead of naturalizing the link between sex and gender, Serano (among others) essentializes the categories while making a case for membership in a different category than the biological essentialists would put her in.
For any number of reasons, it seems that ftm transsexuals have a closer, if at times problematic, relationship with the lesbian community than the virulence of essentialism and cries of betrayal might otherwise suggest; that MWMF allows ftm/ft* people illustrates this. (If asked while drinking why this is, I'd probably go on at annoying length about the butch/femme aesthetic and the permeable, overlapping categories of attractiveness accessible from within the subculture that blur the line between "butch" and "masculine")
The accusations of gaining privilege as one moves from "woman" to "man" can only be sustained if intersectionality is actively rejected; the moment modifiers are allowed, the clear, pretty lines of easy demarcation and accusation start to bend and blur. That's why essentialism is so popular; it makes life easy without the unnecessary burden of too much thought or sympathy.
What I'm most pleased with is that I managed to write theoretically about a subject very important to me without feeling like I have to come out swinging. As a secondary, but still important effect, I think I'm starting to worry less about being a theoretical light weight.
Disclaimer:
I'll certainly play. I feel compelled to admit, right up front, that I have issues with Serano's work in general. I think she's rhetorically sloppy, and am probably one of the evil "genderqueers" (according to her) she demonizes, but at times I'm also a flavor of trans she seems happy to appropriate when convenient. I find her invocation of science often problematic, since she rarely cites but instead appeals to authority (her own), overgeneralizes from experience (again, her own), and dresses anecdotal evidence up as statistics.
That being said, I think she makes interesting and valid observations, even if I question her premises and her conclusions. Her Step 2 has merit.
First pass:
Having gotten my disclaimer out of the way:
I think Serano's primary point, that some (though I suspect she would say all) of the problems many have with transsexual women is a problem with valuing femininity, is spot on. This is reflected in the intense scrutiny heaped upon ts women over 'choosing' to embrace traits typically assigned to assigned-women (this is also reflected in the tension between some self-identified sex-positive feminists and some self-defined radical feminists, but there do appear to be orders of magnitude of difference in intensity between that conflict and acceptance of ts women).
I think her line of argument could benefit from a deeper power analysis, though; I'd suggest that the reason ts women are so closely examined, and targets of such deep suspicion, is because they're perceived as assigned-men, social recipients of relative assigned privilege, taking on assigned lesser privilege. There appears to be a cognitive dissonance around the concept of anyone intentionally moving from "more/better" to "less/worse" that combines with a deep structural suspicion of the positionality of that which is defined as 'feminine' that leads to the position so violently defended by MWMF, among others.
I don't think that intersectionality and queer theory are the natural enemies that Serano seems to suggest. From my perspective, there seems to be a fair amount of misunderstanding around the idea in queer theory that identity is contextual, performative, and socially created which leads many people to assume that the goal is to do away with identity. From the perspective of someone who struggles daily for the right to even begin to actualize their inner sense of self, I can see how "gender is a construct" can be (mis)construed as "gender is a lie" and then "the goal is to do away with (all) gender". But that's the problem with specious logic; if one accepts the premise, all other steps make perfect sense.
Speaking as one who partakes, often and deeply, of both queer and poststructural theory, I have always taken the motto "exploding the binary" to mean radically increasing the choices available, not reducing them. The only thing I could see that might be discarded would be the structural privilege of some positions at the expense or exclusion of others. If, however, one's sense of their own identity (in this case, gender) is dependent on power over or exclusion of others, then I'd say that part should be tossed aside, and the sooner the better.
Further elucidation:
sorry, I should have been more clear. The "exploding the binary" line of reasoning is one often assigned to queer theory/genderqueer folks by Serano (among others). Essentialism works frighteningly well with this, though it's implemented slightly differently than the biological essentialism most often mobilized against transsexual people. Instead of naturalizing the link between sex and gender, Serano (among others) essentializes the categories while making a case for membership in a different category than the biological essentialists would put her in.
For any number of reasons, it seems that ftm transsexuals have a closer, if at times problematic, relationship with the lesbian community than the virulence of essentialism and cries of betrayal might otherwise suggest; that MWMF allows ftm/ft* people illustrates this. (If asked while drinking why this is, I'd probably go on at annoying length about the butch/femme aesthetic and the permeable, overlapping categories of attractiveness accessible from within the subculture that blur the line between "butch" and "masculine")
The accusations of gaining privilege as one moves from "woman" to "man" can only be sustained if intersectionality is actively rejected; the moment modifiers are allowed, the clear, pretty lines of easy demarcation and accusation start to bend and blur. That's why essentialism is so popular; it makes life easy without the unnecessary burden of too much thought or sympathy.
What I'm most pleased with is that I managed to write theoretically about a subject very important to me without feeling like I have to come out swinging. As a secondary, but still important effect, I think I'm starting to worry less about being a theoretical light weight.
