I found this response interesting because of how very sad it is. Here is a person who accuses me of calling trans people names when in fact they are the one insulting me; and the very belief that a stranger’s opinion on the internet can, literally, hurt you? How sad is that? Heartbreaking, really.
Hello divot-longridge,
I see you have made a few erroneous assumptions here:
(a) I am not accusing anyone of anything other than what they are giving me themselves, e.g., I have not called anyone stupid; but you, on the other hand, have insulted me, so I can see why you would naturally assume I would insult you. We usually judge others by how we ourselves act.
(b) I am not trying to, nor am I harming anyone with my opinions. If a trans person can be hurt by my opinion, if my opinion can hurt their belief in themselves and what they are doing, how telling -is- that? A stranger’s opinion can, literally, hurt you? That’s unfortunate and speaks volumes about your decision to transition, doesn’t it.
(c) I actually -am- reaching people with my tags and posts. You are just not seeing them pop up here in public. Oh, and I am using “reaching” instead of “enlighten” because I am not a narcissistic personality who is arrogant enough to believe I can “enlighten” anyone. I find it interesting that you, however, would use that term.
Thanks for your quite obvious attempt at silencing me, as well as your attempt at trying to provoke an emotional response by insulting me (trolling); but you see, the neat thing about this is that I can use whatever tag(s) I wish and have whatever opinion(s) I wish.
BigBooButch 
I am just curious about this whole ‘my opinion doesn’t hurt anyone’ line. I get why you’re saying it. I don’t know if you consider yourself as radfem… but I think from a radfem perspective it really doesn’t stand up. After all, women are hurt by being exposed to misogynist opinions, aren’t they? Speech has power, does it not? Saying your opinion doesn’t hurt anyone is a lot like saying ‘if you don’t like it don’t look at it’; often an argument used to justify the existence of misogyny. Is misogyny only wrong if it’s unavoidable? Is that the real argument then, if we can avoid it then it can’t hurt us, it doesn’t matter? A man could equally say that if women say they are hurt by porn then it just shows they have a weak identity. I don’t think this is a fair argument to make (I also don’t think it’s necessary).
What’s your position on that?
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My position is that you have put a lot of words in my mouth that I didn’t say or imply in your vain attempt to make my argument FOR me instead of posing the question and waiting for my response. Your comment makes me question you and your motives and I am not going to take the bait. Have a nice weekend.
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Wow seriously? I’m not trying to make anyone’s argument for them. I’m trying to point out some possible implications of your argument (based on what you have written) which you may not have considered, and asking if you have considered them. And, given your consideration of these possibilities, what you think about it – or, alternatively, how you could possibly make the argument you are making without these troubling implications. Because, right now, I don’t really see how you could, that’s why I’m asking.
I’m curious because I often see with the trans issue that radfems make a lot of arguments that they actually argue against in other contexts and this troubles me – especially the ‘free speech’ style stuff. I mean the ease with which trans has been able to silence women with the notion of ‘hate speech’ really does call attention to the difficulties of using anything like that in the interests of women. So, I’m just interested in that issue, that’s where I’m coming from.
Look, I know you get a lot of trolls and I’m sorry if it came across that way. Really, I was just curious to know what you thought about that. But never mind I guess.
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I always find it interesting when people say things like “never mind” while expressing their views. It reads as a childish attempt to have the last word, on someone else’s blog no less; and to be honest? Based on some of the crazy mansplaining comments I have been subjected to on my own blog, your comment did come across as trollish to me. That being said, words are very important to me and I consider all the implications when writing in this blog.
I knew a guy a long while back on another site who once tried to tell another person that insults on the internet don’t matter by putting it this context: say Joe just accused you of having green hair. Now, you know you don’t have green hair and no matter how loud and long Joe proclaims that you do have green hair, the fact is that you don’t. So why be bothered by Joe telling you and everyone else that you have green hair?
My words should not be, literally, hurting people. The person to whom I responded complained that I was, literally, not metaphorically, literally hurting her and others like her simply by expressing my opinions on gender and transgenderism. I said that was not possible. Could I hurt, metaphorically, someone’s -feelings- with my opinions? Yes, of course. People get their feelings hurt by complete strangers on the internet all the time. I find that a little silly, but it is totally up to them to allow a stranger on a computer to affect them in that way. But -literally-? Absolutely not. I am not inciting violence or creating laws to discriminate against transgenders, nor am I a celebrity with hundreds of thousands of followers who believe everything I say to be true, or a business owner telling transgenders I will not serve them. If a transgender is sure of themselves, their belief in gender, and their belief in who they are, then a stranger’s opinion on the internet will make not one bit of difference to them. Ever.
But you glossed over all of that to compare me, a woman, with men using words on the internet to further misogyny and silence women. That was neither accurate or cool. I am not a man, I am not furthering misogyny, and I am silencing no one. In fact, the opposite is true: men and transgenders (and some women) keep trying to silence me. I am a member of more than one oppressed class and my voice is important. No man, woman, or trans will ever silence me, even those who misconstrue my words and compare me to the oppressive class in an attempt to silence me. Because, let’s be honest here, Rididill, your original post was an attempt to shame me and no radfem I know would have ever tried to silence another woman through shame.
Finally, I am a FIRM believer in free speech; and not just the kind of free speech that the Constitution protects (speech free of government interference or prosecution), I am talking full-on free speech in that I feel everyone who is not inciting violence should have their say. Whether we take their (or my) say seriously or not is always and entirely up to us, which is why some comments (mainly from men) are not welcomed here.
They, and you, have blogs of their (your) own, use them.
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