Mastodawn

Today, I'm chewing on Kate Manne's theory of misogyny as a social force for policing the roles of "human giver" and "human being" in what it has to say about the shapes of transmisogyny. I'm not sure if others have developed it in this way, but here's the thoughts it spurred in me.

It's especially this summary of Manne's framework in Nagoski & Nagoski's "Burnout" that got me thinking:

"Kate Manne describes a system in which one class of people, the “human givers,” are expected to offer their time, attention, affection, and bodies willingly, placidly, to the other class of people, the “human beings.” The implication in these terms is that human beings have a moral obligation to be or express their humanity, while human givers have a moral obligation to give their humanity to the human beings." (Nagoski & Nagoski, p. 8)

Of course, cis women are expected to be and socialized into the role of "human giver" while cis men are expected to be and socialized into the role of "human being," and if a woman should choose to act as a human being, rather than solely a giver, she is then punished - this is how the system of misogyny is enforced.

#TransFem #TransWomen #Transmisogyny #Trans #Feminism #TransFeminism

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Mallie Sinn 1d ago

So what happens when we place trans women and transfeminine people into this framework?

We are perceived to be in the role of a "human being" before transition, since we are seen as men. When we transition, we are taking on a role as women that is expected to be that of a "giver." But here's the thing: by asserting our needs, our right to expressing ourselves, and our humanity in transitioning, we are engaging in an action that is fundamentally a contradiction within this system.

Expressing oneself, having needs worth receiving care, and taking up space are the prerogative of "human beings" and the act of transition and asserting our femininity or womanhood is just that - we are women asserting ourselves as beings. But we are supposed to be subjugating ourselves into the roles of "human givers," not taking up space or asserting needs. We see this in how originally trans women were only given access to gender-affirming care if they behaved in ways that were submissive, were seen as attractive to straight men, and our orientation solely pointed at straight men. It was unrelated to our own needs or desires, only our ability to be human givers.

This continues in how often the few roles we are consistently still allowed to exist is as sex workers and as an object for pornography.

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Mallie Sinn 1d ago

So there is a basic social contradiction in being a trans woman - asserting yourself as a human being and taking on a role expected to be a human giver. Like cis women, we are punished for daring to be women who assert we have a right to be in our full humanity and to express ourselves. The problem is that this is an essential and unremovable aspect from what it means to be a trans woman or transfeminine person in most of our cultures today. We can't be folded back solely into the role of housewife and reproductive mother for a cis, straight man to impregnate, no matter how much violence they visit upon us. Nothing we do will ever satisfy the demand for us to be solely givers and thus bigots want us to be exterminated and erased from society.

But this also highlights something for me I rarely see a developed theory around: why and how transmisogyny from cis women functions.

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Mallie Sinn

Cis women will often internalize their roles as human givers and enforce that upon themselves, other women, and girls in their lives. Think of every mother who dotes on her sons and trains her daughters to act as mothers before they are grown. Think of the girls who bully dykes and lesbians for being queer. Think of the cis women who didn't like Hilary Clinton, not for her politics, but because she was seen as a bitch. Think of the woman who is a feminist and yet struggles to allow herself to give herself permission to have needs, take up space as a person, and to not always take on caring as work.

So when trans women come out and assert that they can be women and human beings (as well be givers too in addition to beings), they are seen as a problem. I personally have been punished by cis women who were my bosses at work for demanding my needs, along with my coworkers, be equally considered. When I would be flashy, fun, and unashamed in my gender presentation, I have many times gotten side-eyes or judgmental looks and comments from cis women - and the feeling of resentment was often palpable. If I act in a confrontational way while advocating even for others, I am responded to as something less or worse than a bitch - an abomination, a monster, something that needs to be punished and removed.

This extends to how TERFs talk about us, seeing us as a threat because we assert our existence and humanity. Why would this be a problem for supposed "feminists" unless we are flagrantly violating the rules and traumas they still carry in themselves? They say we talk too much, we're too loud, and we take up too much space - how dare a (trans) woman speak up, be loud, or take up space?!

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Mallie Sinn 1d ago

This extends into how we can problematize the idea of "male socialization" of trans women. There is actually a lot more complexity and nuance to this construct that deserves discussion, but I will discuss another day.

What I see among trans women is that we are often, before transition, already taking on the role of "human giver." We minimize ourselves, subordinate our own needs to those around us, we give our emotional, physical, and intellectual labor to others and rarely ourselves. This isn't necessarily universal, but it is common. We have often internalized some idea of ourselves as being givers, likely influenced by the types of characters and narratives around women and girls we see in media.

This often shows up in our relationships, often failing to be able to take up much emotional space, struggling to voice or express our needs, and giving of ourselves to our partners. I think of my asexual transfem friends who subjected themselves to something similar to SA because they believed they owed their bodies to their partners. I think of my transfem friends whose partners, often cis straight women, became toxic or abusive when they came out, because for the first time in their lives they had needs, emotions, and took up space in the relationship. This was perceived as a threat to the cis women that were their partners - because only one person can be a human being and the other has to be a human giver...or at least that's the heteronormative narrative.

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Mallie Sinn 1d ago

I did come across this piece by Amy Marvin called "Laughing at Trans Women: A Theory of Transmisogyny" (https://philarchive.org/archive/MARLAT-15v1), which digs into this framework as it can be extended to trans women. Instead of the focus I gave above, Martin maps out how we often can't be legitimized as "human givers," leading us to being marginalized, and pushed outside of the human community. This analysis also explains how that can show up as disgust for our bodies and disregard for our wellbeing - and how we are socially constructed as dehumanized "laughable" entities.

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Mallie Sinn 1d ago

Okay, now that I've spilled all that out of my brain, I'm going to get back to working on the other things I have to do. But I will be coming back to this. I feel like these are the kind of concepts that help so many things finally cohere and something we can actually do something about.