Got lost on a few of the logic strings, that may be just take more read-overs. There were a few points at which I felt like the author was writing for a crowd with prior knowledge, or at least more intimate knowledge of the material. Esp. when it comes to terminology. A few portions that stand out: This means wholly rejecting the biological-essentialist “brain sex” framework that liberal feminists cosy up to, but radical feminists rightly oppose. Incredibly dense paragraph, and every portion of it kind of requires prior knowledge of all relevant philosophies/identities/worldviews what have you. No idea what they're talking about w/ "brain sex," but maybe it was addressed earlier on. I suspect it's way less an awesome term than it sounds like. Oh, and before that: I have to take the "prevailing notion" at face value if I don't have any prior knowledge of modern liberal feminism. Also, not entirely sure what they mean in the first place. Still getting through the rest of it- I've had to re-read a few of the paragraphs a few times. Overall though, I get the impression that without some close experience with/in either camp- "transness," or liberal feminism or radfem- the reader must have some pretty extensive (or even I don't know basic?) academic knowledge to really get the relationships at play here (trans versus non; feminism versus trans; transwoman versus patriarchy; transperson versus him or herself, etc.) and thus connect with the message as a whole. So like I said, seems like a level 200 text whereas I should be starting at 101.This means staunchly combating the reactionary subsections of the trans population overtly influenced by gender roles in their decision to transition as this only serves to reinforce gender roles and provide a smaller space in which womanhood or manhood can reside. Radical feminists rightly criticise this to some degree but draw the wrong conclusions, and liberal feminists fail to engage with this at all. We must be very careful in our own criticisms, however, as some people take any trans woman’s display of femininity as automatically illegitimate, as a sign that they’re “faking” or “appropriating” womanhood, or that they’re some sort of drag queen.
The prevailing notion – at least in liberal feminism – that dysphoria causes transness is wholly wrong. An equally wrong idea, popular for radical feminists, is the view that transness causes dysphoria. There’s no one-way causal relationship; instead, they co-emerge. They’re in a feedback loop, forever remaking, reforging, and reshaping each other. Utterly inseparable, yet distinct at the same time. The spiral metaphor applies very aptly here as well.