Standing up to Transphobia

Categories: trans

Date: 13 January 2013 21:53:51

I learnt my lesson with the whole Radfem debate earlier in the year.....don't go there unless you have no choice. This week for various reasons I have made my choice and decided that it was going to be a week of celebration, hence no comment thus far on the Suzanne Moore furore which had broken out. I had left intelligent response to people like Stella Duffy (see this post).

Today things within the whole debate changed with an article by Julie Burchill. I read the article and can only say I was distressed by it. Both in my work and personal life I am in contact with many amazing trans people and I admire their courage greatly, they don't need stuff like this. However, I am also aware having followed something of the debate on Twitter the highly charged atmosphere on both sides at the moment. I didn't want to add to it and I didn't want to write something ill informed.

I was glad then when Karl decided that he would respond. The Burchill article and the comments surrounding it relating to both education and trans issues pushed him to that point where a passive guy got angry. The response he put together is something I think is deeply moving as well as important. Please read it as much to understand more about the trans issue from the perspective of a trans person as much as anything else.