Male Extinction

Intro Segment

Jangles sits down at his desk, a bottle in hand labelled “Respect for Natal Females juice”. He takes a swig, sighs contentedly, but then after a pause, frowns. Another beat, and then CritFacts rises from behind the couch, holding a NERF gun. After a pause to relish in the tactical advantage of surprise, CritFacts aims the toy gun at Jangles.

CritFacts: No sudden movements.

Jangles: What the hell are you doing? Why?

CritFacts: I’m here to neutralize a threat to females everywhere. You.

Jangles: Me? Like, me personally?

CritFacts: No, males. All males. All of them.

Jangles: But I’m not a threat to anyone! That’s what the juice is for, I never forget to drink my respect natal females juice!

CritFacts: Haven’t you heard of Male Violence?

Jangles: Yes? But I haven’t done any.

CritFacts: But you’re male, and therefore, culpable.

Jangles: How the fuck does that make sense?

CF: Male violence is violence done by males, correct?

Jangles: …. Yes?

CF: So in order to stop it, we have to end males.

Jangles: WHAT THE FUCK?!

*static*

Premise

“Male Violence” is a line that gets thrown around a lot by TERFs in particular. And it’s a very problematic misunderstanding of a very real problem.

The notion that males are inherently more violent than feeeeeemales is a very old idea. Just ask any tradfem or MRA and you’ll get a story about how Males hunted the mammoths while the females stayed home in their ancient hovels, gathering berries, raising the children, and vacuuming the dirt floors.

Throughout history, in almost every civilization, the overwhelming majority of participants in militaries have been male. And of those, it seems a pretty safe bet that the overwhelming majority of those males were cis men. Maybe a few enbies.

*shot of stylized crossbow soldier in front of a nonbinary flag background* “MY PRONOUNS ARE THEY/THEM!”

There have been a few women in military history - Mulan, Boudica, Joan of Arc, Bayonetta, the Night Witches of World War 2, Ikora Rey, Homura Akemi, and according to the 100% accurate documentary called FATE, King Arthur. But they’re very much in the minority. And why is that, exactly? Does it reflect an innate, biological influence on our predispositions as a result of our sex?

And what about other forms of violence? In 2011, the FBI published these pretty concerning statistics:

Males constituted 98.9% of those arrested for forcible rape[52]

Males constituted 87.9% of those arrested for robbery[52]

Males constituted 85.0% of those arrested for burglary[52]

Males constituted 83.0% of those arrested for arson.[52]

Males constituted 81.7% of those arrested for vandalism.[52]

Males constituted 81.5% of those arrested for motor-vehicle theft.[52]

Males constituted 79.7% of those arrested for offenses against family and children.[52]

Males constituted 77.8% of those arrested for aggravated assault[52]

Males constituted 58.7% of those arrested for fraud.[52]

Males constituted 57.3% of those arrested for larceny-theft.[52]

Males constituted 51.3% of those arrested for embezzlement.[52]

It seems pretty hard to argue that there’s nothing going on there. The p-value, otherwise known as the probability of this all happening just by chance, is pretty slim. So there’s something going on, but what exactly is it?

When it comes to behavior, most psychologists attribute to various combinations of two factors: nature, and nurture. Nature being the inherent, innate parts of a person’s psyche, and nurture being the formative experiences, the lessons learned, practice and training, and so on. So basically, nurture is the friends you made along the way and nature was inside of you the whole time.

So the question is usually framed as males having a certain male nature. They have blue brains, perhaps. Or maybe we aren’t born with pink brains and blue brains, but blank brains that get turned blue by testosterone. Or maybe, as some TERFs suggest, we don’t need to understand why, we only need to observe that it’s the case and as a response, ban any and all natal males from bathrooms, locker rooms, homes, and the general public.

And if you think that’s an exaggeration, that’s not entirely true. Bioethicist Jonathan Glover, who hails from TERF Island, made the case as a strict consequentialist, that the greater good would be served by eliminating males from the population using cloning technology to selectively only have females be born and allow humans to be born without the need for males. With the logic that less balls, less crime. I wish I was making that up. This was relayed to me by my bioethics professor in college, and it was something he said while he was giving a talk at her graduate school. I reached out to her and we both looked, but couldn’t find any hard documentation on him publicly saying that position or writing about it, but… his bibliography literally includes a book titled “What Sort of People Should There Be?” which was coincidentally published in 1984, and as recently as 2006, he published “Choosing Children: Genes, Disability, and Design.” So I genuinely believe he’d want to eliminate my autistic ass, anyone else neurodivergent, as well as half of the rest of humanity. Y’know, for the greater good.

“The greater good”

So the logical conclusion of “males are biologically predisposed to crime and violence” and “crime and violence are bad” logically concludes “we should eliminate males and maleness to prevent crime and violence," even if those who believe it don’t want to go that far.

*cut back to Jangles & Crit*

Jangles: “You can’t kill me, I haven’t done anything!”

Crit: “I’m sorry, the data is clear. But don’t worry, I’m not here to kill you.”

Jangles: “Wait, what? Then what’s the gun for?”

Crit: “It’s estrogen. We’re turning you female. Would you like some sissy hypno porn in order to facilitate the process?”

Jangles: “That’s now how that works at all! You can’t make me stop being a man. Even if you changed out my biology completely, which you can’t-”

Crit: “You’re saying that testosterone doesn’t contribute to violence? You really want to go against such a common sense-”

Jangles: “WELL ACTUALLY!”

Jangles Segment

Until fairly recently, researchers thought that animal experiments showing that raising testosterone levels in rodents caused them to behave more aggressively would be applicable to humans, especially young men. This bled into the public mind, calling up images of steroid-pumping bodybuilders flying into fits of “roid rage” and big beefy gangsters mugging helpless victims. In fact, though, empirical research shows little if any direct, causal linkage between testosterone and physical aggressiveness.

According to Allan Mazur in his book “Biosocial Criminology: New Directions in Theory and Research”, there’s actually far more evidence of a reverse effect; that is, that situations that call for aggression can raise testosterone levels rather than the other way around.

I think a lot of people view hormone levels like they view character stats in a video game: a set number that determines your actions before they happen. But the endocrine system, a collection of glands that secrete various hormones into the bloodstream to achieve a wide variety of regulatory effects, well….regulates. Hormone secretion increases or decreases depending on what perceived threats to homeostasis are experienced, and testosterone is no different.

*Back to scene*

Crit: “So… it’s not the testosterone that makes you violent?”

Jangles, relaxing: “That’s right. So you don’t need to take away my testosterone. Which I quite like at the level it’s at. You see, healthy levels of testosterone can be very good. They can promote a healthy sex drive, they can be a source of energy and drive, both physically like for sports and working out and for-”

Crit: “I’m switching my gun from “Feminize” to kill, then.”

Jangles: “NO!”

Crit: “But the stats say males do crimes, and if it’s not testosterone, then why are all the crimes done by males?”

Jangles: “Well…”

*Old-timey Batman cartoon transition*

Bio-Fatalism

Here’s a statement from a member of the team who happens to be a cis man:

I was genuinely terrified when I was in my early teens. Everything I had seen on television, the way that guys all talked about themselves and each other, the front that everyone put on, I truly believed that as puberty would begin, I would lose myself, that my heart that valued kindness and joy above all else would be poisoned and corrupted by my own body, and that the only thing I would be able to do was watch helplessly.

What got me out of that spiral of fear was partly from going through puberty and finding out that this wasn’t the case, but also discovering the existence of trans people and that I was asexual. I regained hope that I had free will and was in control of who I could become, that the body and hormones are not mind-control.

Looking back, what saddens me most is that it wasn’t just the feminists normalizing that idea of manhood, it was also the so-called feminists. The misogynists were telling me that this was what I should become, and the cisnormative, heteronormative “feminists” were telling me that it was inevitable. They were both wrong. And it was only after realizing and accepting that fact that I was able to have a healthy relationship with my body and my masculinity.

I don’t think I would ever have been in any danger of being radicalized into being an MRA. The danger of becoming that monster against my will was never real, and I would never willfully have become it. But the fear that I would become that burdened me with so much unnecessary fear, and it was years of torment that took years more to unpack and clear out of the furthest corners of my psyche. And I do wonder about how many other people got those same messages and processed them differently.

Damn. TERFs seem to believe that the explanation of trans men is that women want to escape womanhood, but if I was in my friend’s position - I’d be trying desperately to get on androgen blockers and get feminizing HRT. Maybe if you think that people become trans because of ideological reasons, then it would make sense that you stop portraying “male puberty” or “male socialization” as a one-way werewolf transformation. All because of testosterone.

Testosterone isn’t the only aspect of our biologies that influence behavior, or even sex hormones altogether. And even if it were, we’d have to apply that same standard to everyone, not just people born with the gonads that usually produce that specific hormone.

The range considered typical for testosterone in a cis male is 270 nanograms per deciliter to 1000ish nanograms per deciliter, and for cis women, it’s 15 to 70 nanograms per deciliter, according to a very lazy google search. But as with all distributions on measured in nature, there’s very often outliers from what is typical, and there are some cisgender women with more testosterone in them than some cisgender men have. So even if we did decide that limiting testosterone was the right way to go about preventing violent tendencies, we’d have to determine what the optimal amount of testosterone is in any one person and then make sure that everyone was within that “safe” range, which would mean we’d have to test everyone just in case. And everyone within that safe range would have to be considered safe, whether they were in that range naturally or thanks to HRT. This - something that gender critical types reject, saying that even after hormone replacement therapy, trans women “still retain male pattern violence” and trans men with HRT are still perfect little angels, tiny adorable beans whomst could never hurt a fly, much less erase women.

But the reality is that cis women - sorry, NAATAAAAL FEEEEMAAAALES - can also be violent and act maliciously, even abusively. The narrative that “natal males” and only “natal males” are abusive, and never the abused, results in a major disparity as to what cases are taken seriously by officers. The average person, were they asked to describe the first mental image conjured by the phrase “domestic abuse” would probably be a drunken chud and a bruised and battered wife. But close to 40% of domestic abuse survivors are men. In 2010, England and Wales had 7500 beds for women-only shelters, and SIXTY reserved for men. “Males Batter Females” is a gross oversimplification that leads us to respond to our complex reality in misguided ways. Like, unless 40% of domestic partnerships are between men and ALL of those partnerships are abusive… then we have to face the reality that a significant percentage of abusers are, in fact, women.

The stereotype that women are incapable of malice and violence is so prevalent that even when you google search, “violence by women”, Google itself asks you, “Did you mean violence TO women?” as if only one of those questions deserves to be asked in the first place.

And even when people do ask - there’s immense social pressure for men not to come forward or to even protect themselves in any way, not even by leaving unhealthy or abusive relationships and certainly not by talking to authorities.

Of the few kinda-sorta sources I could find doing research, the Zur Institute, a source for continuing and supplemental education for therapists and clinical psychologists, has a thing about female batterers. Whatever the fuck a “clinical update” is. Like, it hints that there’s a whole-ass course on the subject… all I’m seeing is this little fact sheet,

And this doesn’t even specify how many of those men who are survivors of domestic abuse are in mixed-sex relationships when it happens and how many are in same-sex relationships. Much less how many of those reported as men are cisgender, trans men, or trans women lumped in there with men.

So we see a failure of the most obvious culprit if violence is biological, both in terms of it not actually having such a clear-cut link to violence, but also would require EVERYONE having their bodily autonomy compromised in order to have the “safeguards” that transphobes think are reasonable. And shifting goalposts make this worse - if males are biologically dangerous because of a specific factor, then once that factor is accounted for and mitigated, then the risk should go away, and yet transphobes insist that it does not.

“Male bodies and male criminal patterns…. hormones and SRS do NOT lower MTF patterns to match natal women patterns of violence and crime”

They’re literally saying that you can take the manliness out of the man, but you can’t take the man out of the man, and therefore, trans women are dangerous.

*Jangles cuts in* Is that the Sweden study?

Crit: “Jangles!!!!!! how did you get here? We’re behind the fourth wall!”

Jangles: “This is MY video too!”

Jangles: TERFs love to bring this study up for a wide variety of factors, but it’s very clear in most circumstances that they think of it as a magic spell rather than a data-driven argument. The study gathered medical and national registry data for 324 sex-reassigned persons from 1973 to 2003, and found that both mortality and criminality were indeed higher for that group. However, thanks to improved health care and altered societal attitudes towards people with different gender expressions, these data are only significant for the people operated before 1989; yeah, it turns out that things change and that statistics from the 70s and 80s might not be all that applicable to people or society today.

Jangles: And not for nothing, but we’ve actually collected data on states before and after passing non-discrimination laws regarding bathrooms and the fears of increased safety and privacy violations from TERFs and other bigots has no grounding in reality.

*cuts back to crit*

So as I was saying, bio-fatalism falls on its face because if we tried to identify biological causes of violence, then we’d have to apply that metric to everyone, deem someone safe once countermeasures had been applied, and if we found persistent exceptions, we’d be forced to acknowledge that violence is not, in fact, stored in the balls. But transphobes are willing to do none of these for testosterone, external anatomy, or anything else. So, where is this ‘maleness’ that causes violence, exactly? If it’s not testosterone, it’s not bone testicles or ball density, then what is it?

“Male Socialization”

Jangles: “Look, Crit, you can’t kill off all of the men. Some of them are gay men.”

Crit: “I don’t care about any men. I only care about natal females.”

Crit reaches over and steals Jangle’s respect juice.

Jangles: “But gay men usually don’t womanize. And don’t those gay men deserve for there to be men in existence who they find attractive and with whom they’re romantically compatible?”

Crit: “Nah, if straight or bi women don’t get that privilege, then neither do gay men.”

Jangles: “Okay, but aren’t gay men safer for women? I think it’s pretty self-explanatory that gay men are infinitely less likely to rape women than straight men are.”

*Crit lowers gun, thinking*

Crit: “Well, how do we know which ones are gay?”

Jangles: “Well, we ask them, and-”

Crit raises gun “That just sounds like you’re trying to spare as many as possible, and that would be inhumane. Straight men would just identify out of their extermination.”

Jangles: “We’ll do phallometry?”

Crit: “Bless you.”

Jangles: “No, it’s when you hook up a [PEPSI] to a device that measures [FIZZINESS], show someone porn, and see how [FIZZY] their [PEPSI] gets.”

Crit: “Does it work?”

Jangles: “No, some people get excited or shy just because they’re having their [PEPSI]s touched and medical equipment attached to it.”

Crit: “That does sound kinda hot, actually.”

Jangles: “Doesn’t it?”

They both relax and look away with goofy grins for several seconds, and then abruptly remember that they’re in a deadly standoff and promptly resume alert/panicked.

Crit: “But regardless, bio-males all have one thing in common that makes them ALL a potential danger to every female, ever.”

Jangles: “And that is…?”

Crit: “Male socialization.”

Jangles: “What is male socialization and how can we determine whether or not someone has-”

Crit: “If you are or ever were a male and were socialized, you have male socialization.”

Jangles: “OH COME ON.”

*cut to Essay format*

The final rhetorical bastion of any transphobe who is asked to explain how those assigned male at birth are an innate threat, just generally, and that said potential threat extends to trans women, is “male socialization”

And there’s some truth to this, or at least, there would be if it were not treated as an absolute or used to justify transphobia.

You see, the patriarchy is absolutely a major problem and it does encourage people to adopt really bad attitudes and do really bad behaviors. As the great feminist bell hooks said,

“The first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves. If an individual is not successful in emotionally crippling himself, he can count on patriarchal men to enact rituals of power that will assault his self-esteem.”

Patriarchy is a complex system and one that trains everyone affected to continue it through socialization and conditioning. This particular aspect is often referred to as toxic masculinity. This isn’t to say all masculinity is toxic (hashtag not all masculinity), but the idea that manhood is defined singularly by power, sex, and aggression. Patriarchy reinforces the idea that males are men, men are strong, tough, violent, powerful, and in control, and that females are women, and women are weak, rely on males for protection but are also doomed to be victimized by males. And if you recognize any similarities to what gender critical “feminists” are saying is inevitably the case… then, well…. Congratulations, you have pattern recognition. Patriarchy is saying that toxic masculinity is good, and gender critical “feminists” are saying that it’s inevitable.

Remember my friend from earlier? How he said that bio-fatalism told him that he was doomed to become a monster - the other half of the equation is that he was being told that’s how he should be. His “rightful place”. And anyone who deviates from where they “should” be going is bullied and hazed until they either conform, self-isolate, or adapt. Very few men could pull off not performing toxic masculinity without being hazed, and even then, the acceptance wasn’t universal. And it’s both peers and parents who reinforce this. “Boys don’t cry,” “Be a man,” “Don’t be a pussy,” “Boys will be boys.” Note that patriarchy apologists use “boys will be boys” to excuse bad behavior, Gender Criticals use it to resign us to it as inevitable so they can uphold their transphobia.

But here’s the thing - upbringing is not permanent. To quote Mark Twain, “Your parents made you what you are but it's your fault if you stay that way.” And this also applies to peers, communities, and even trauma to an extent. The notion that a specific upbringing is both inevitable and permanent is several layers of incorrect but also irresponsible. It would logically conclude that nobody is responsible for their actions, only their parents and peers are. Which in turn, would absolve THOSE individuals for how they brought up their kids and peers, because they only did any of that as an inevitable result of how they were raised, and so on and so forth.

Basically, if we believed that everyone ever is purely a product of their upbringing and has no agency in their own actions, then Lucy, the theoretical first biological human in existence ever, would be the sole person responsible for all crimes, ever. ARREST HER, SCARLET JOHANSEN, WHAT ARE YOU DOING? In before some terf demands that Lucy go to a female-only prison… by herself.

So, if we acknowledge that upbringing is not the sole determinant in your behavior and allow for this neat little thing called “Free Will-”

*Clip from Free Willy*

Then we see people choosing how to respond to their upbringing, and processing the things they’ve been taught, considering the ethics thereof, and acting according to what they learn and the bad ideas they’re willing to unlearn. People generally pursue a frame of ethics that they see as most correct, and this includes kindness, support, and solidarity. One of the prime examples of this is David Paisley. He’s a Scottish actor who survived an abusive father and as a child was forced to flee with his mother into a shelter. Where is he now?

Being forced to defend his reputation from TERFs who call him an abuser because he dares advocate for trans people and being a cis man..

https://twitter.com/DavidPaisley/status/1338297827940765696

All while doing charity work for women’s domestic abuse shelters.

This is someone who faced the worst of what TERFs call “male socialization” and that they would ascribe to making him a threat to women and everyone else around him too… and instead, he saw the importance of kindness, of support, of helping people. He saw the harms of patriarchy and wanted to resist that. And he’s being attacked by transphobes because he doesn’t treat trans women as “ultimately male” and males as inherently dangerous. If there are any men you should be concerned about, it should be “gender critical” cis men. If you believe that maleness makes you inherently predatory and predisposed to violence and abusive behavior… then that just reads as a confession and an excuse, not a critique of patriarchy or a search for a solution.

But we do need to search for a solution, because there is a problem. A problem of cis men dudebros and incels. Like, this isn’t a “not all men” video, because I am going to acknowledge that enough men exhibit abusive behavior unchecked that talking about “male violence” is worth doing, as long as we recognize that it’s a problem of toxic masculinity and an ecosystem that supports rape apologism and not a problem of “maleness” in and of itself.

The problem is, that while individuals can rise above socialization, it’s an undeniable fact that socialization does have an effect, even if that effect is not universal or irreversible. People are affected by the ideas that are reinforced and endorsed by those around them. The archetypal MRA, for example, becomes an MRA because they gravitate towards communities of progressively more and more misogynistic people. They find the broader culture inhospitable, so they find an ecosystem where misogyny is tolerated and they’re reassured that misogynistic ideas are fine to hold onto. They feel like they’re being told that masculinity is both a requirement and inevitability with being male, but that also being masculine is bad, so they seek validation in people that tell them that toxic masculinity is healthy and-

*Jangles breaks in*

And to any transphobes who call themselves feminists, let’s ask a very, very important question,

DO YOU THINK TRANS WOMEN, GENERALLY, ARE TRYING TO REINFORCE TOXIC MASCULINITY OR SEEKING TO EXHIBIT MASCULINITY?

pause for effect while both Jangles and Crit look into the camera sternly.

Do you think trans women measure their worth by how “manly” they think they can be? Or that trans men measure their worth by how big their dicks are? Because if patriarchal ideas of manhood or maleness were inherent to either manhood or maleness, then… *gestures noncommittally*

Trans people merely existing counters the narratives that patriarchy relies on. And are hurt by patriarchy in ways that cis people are not. Because patriarchy is not just sexist and heteronormative - it’s also cisnormative. It assumes cisgender as the default, in fact only viable possibility, and it relies on that to more effectively force people into the roles that it wants them in.

I argue that it would be FAR more effective to combat toxic masculinity to normalize being trans and nonbinary. If you don’t *have* to be a man, then you don’t *have* to force yourself into being a hypermasculine dudebro or navigate pressures of performing manhood. One thing in particular I’d like to point out is that many trans women come out during or after time in the military. This is anecdotal, but one of the main reasons this happens is that if they are in denial about being trans, pressured by stigma created by transphobia and toxic masculinity, they try to do the “manliest” occupation they can find - the literal military. A form of denial or overcompensation. Many I’ve spoken to personally have confided that they were hoping that if they dove into masculinity hard enough, they’d stop feeling dysphoric, that it would grow on them. And then it just… doesn’t. The same way, when homophobia was so much more prevalent, many gay men would force themselves to be as masculine and gender-conforming as they could to try to ‘fix’ themselves before they came to a point of self-acceptance, or lesbians forcing themselves to be more feminine for basically the same reason.

But what if… hear me out… it was seen as perfectly okay to be a woman even if you were born with a penis. Don’t you think that if being feminine, masculine, both, or neither, self-assessing yourself as a man OR a woman regardless of your birth sex, were completely normalized, that patriarchy would have a harder time trying to pressure men to fit a narrow and toxic ideal of manhood?

Not All Males, but enough (Cis) Men

*Back to Crit and Jangles*

Jangles: “So, you see, the problem isn’t males, the problem is a culture that is more likely to reinforce certain behaviors in males, and encourage them tying unhealthy behaviors to their identity, based on sexist assumptions about who can and should be what kind of person.”

Crit: “And you’ve rejected that.”

Jangles: “Yes, I’ve done a lot of introspection, a lot of listening to feminists. A lot of learning to empathize with other people, particularly cis women and trans people and nonbinary people. And cartoon foxes on the internet.”

*Jangles holds up RESPECT FOR NATAL FEMALES jug*

Crit: “Y’know, I think you might really be one of the good males. One who respects women, isn’t a threat to them,”

Jangles: “Thank you. Now you can put down the gun,”

Crit: “Nope, sorry. Because it’s impossible to know, so we have to wipe out all of them.”

Jangles: “No, you don’t! The answer isn’t even murdering any AMABs! Not even one!”

Crit: “So the problem isn’t all men,”

Jangles: “Correct, the problem is patria-”

Crit: “Haha you said ‘not all men’ you’re an MRA now.”

Jangles: *eyerolls* “All men, then?”

Crit: “.... yes?”

Jangles: “Even trans men?”

Crit turns to camera slowly….

One of the most common responses MRAs give to feminists when we try to speak up about problems is “not all men” and it’s worth talking about exactly why this phrase gets such a negative reaction,

Because when feminists talk about a problem AMONG MEN or exacerbated by toxic masculinity or harmful ideas in our culture about what manhood should look like, they’re not saying that each and every man exhibits these behaviors. We’re saying that these cultural forces are strong enough that ENOUGH men exhibit these behaviors to the point where it’s a problem for ALL women. Yes, including trans women. Almost every woman, or anyone who has even been perceived as a woman has been sexually harassed at some point in their life. Patriarchy and toxic masculinity are ubiquitous, even if some - hell, even *most* men have risen above it and no longer participate.

And this is a reason that we need feminism for everyone. I’ll be doing a whole other video soon about “feminism is for feeeemales” and my thoughts on THAT. But the reason I bring this up is because transphobes who call themselves feminists use this situation to push transphobia. Pointing out that trans women generally do not exhibit toxic masculinity is reframed by them as “you’re just going ‘not all males’ at us!”

But see, the reason “Not All Males” became a fallacy to point out… was because feminists were never SAYING “all males”, but transphobes ARE saying that ALL males should be seen as a potential threat. “We can’t know which ones are good,” they say, and even justify…

Pronouns are like Rohypnol.

They dull your defences. They change your inhibitions. They’re meant to. You’ve had a lifetime’s experience learning to be alert to ‘him’ and relax to ‘her’. For good reason. This instinctive response keeps you safe. It’s not even a conscious thing. It’s like your hairs standing on end. Your subconscious brain is helping you not get eaten by the sabre tooth tiger that your eyes haven’t noticed yet.

This is unironically comparing the ‘natural ‘dynamic between men and women to that of predator and prey. That women should fear men, “for good reason”, and they don’t even realize that this is fundamentally victim-blaming. If you trust someone, and they take advantage of your lowered guard, the fault doesn’t lie with the person who trusted, the fault lies with the abuser.

Pictured - paranoia is stored in the ovaries.

“We can’t know which males are good ones, and which ones are bad,” they often say, “And therefore, we shouldn’t allow ANY in our bathrooms or locker rooms.”

But the same is true of cis women. We can’t know which cis women have been abusive, have hurt people physically, or even which ones are predators, just by looking at them. And yet, they’re not perceived as potential threats - and transphobes say that not only is this reasonable, but that trans women are exploiting this loophole to predate on cis women. That’s right - patriarchy has conditioned us to decide whether or not people are threats based solely on their sex, and “gender critical” people think that’s a good thing. That’s literally profiling - and in the case of TERFs - assuming based on someone’s appearance what kind of upbringing they have had and how likely they are to exhibit a resulting behavior. So much for “anyone can have any personality” as the TERFs like to say when they say “just be a feminine man or a masculine woman, as long as you don’t call yourself trans”

But the idea that policing the facilities used by trans women because “we can’t just tell which ones are men!” and that it would enable sexual abuse in bathrooms and locker rooms,

So I want trans women to be safe. At the same time, I do not want to make natal girls and women less safe. When you throw open the doors of bathrooms and changing rooms to any man who believes or feels he’s a woman – and, as I’ve said, gender confirmation certificates may now be granted without any need for surgery or hormones – then you open the door to any and all men who wish to come inside. That is the simple truth.

Just plain fails because the doors are already open to anyone. Bathrooms generally don’t have guards outside of them, and again, anyone could in theory abuse anyone. The very notion of sex-segregated bathrooms is security theater - the real reason that bathroom harassment is at a phenomenally low rate of occurrence is not because of sex segregation, but because humans are generally good. There are loads of countries and cultures that have mixed-sex bathrooms that don’t have this problem that TERFs declare would be inevitable. And if men were biologically prone to being abusers, then how is sex-segregation supposed to solve the problem of cis men who abuse other men in public bathrooms? Or is that not important?

You’d be forgiven for thinking that the argument “just don’t know which natal males are dangerous or which ones are really trans” isn’t transphobic, just a reasonable precaution, but let’s also consider that some of the prominent people in the gender critical movement have said that straight cis men should be able to come into women’s bathrooms, with guns, if they think there might be a trans woman in there. If your concern was actually the safety of cis women, it would be beyond absurd to give cis men with guns free license to barge in and demand to check between their legs “just in case.” I mean, you’re throwing open the door to anyone who wishes to come inside and put cis women at gunpoint. Pretty obvious that this person isn’t motivated by women’s safety - they just want trans women shot so badly they’re willing to advocate for a practice that would result in cis women’s privacy getting violated on a regular basis. Seriously, this person claims that men cannot be trusted because they are male, and that trans women are “fundamentally male” and therefore cannot be trusted, so we need... . cis… men… because they can be trusted despite being male? So if you say your problem is with people assigned male at birth, and then exclude cis men… that leaves trans women and AMAB enbies as the people you don’t trust. Why’s that?

And that’s because TERFs don’t really hate “men” - I mean, some of them do, but most of them just pretend to as a cover for hating trans people.

[Screenshot of TERF saying she’d rather have cis men in the women’s bathroom than trans women]

Because when it’s cis men being talked about, the conversation is “stop victim blaming and hold men accountable” which, YES, WE SHOULD. Anyone should be able to safely go into any bathroom and everyone be confident that nobody’s privacy will be violated. That means the girliest, smollest, most fragile girl should damn well be able to use the men’s bathroom and be confident that she won’t be harassed. Saying that she shouldn’t expect safety and privacy is victim blaming.

Men are capable of being respectful of boundaries. Of resisting social pressures to act in abusive, unhealthy ways. And changing those social pressures so that fewer people go down that route. Scapegoating male socialization or inherent maleness relies on logic that TERFs claim they reject - pink brains and blue brains - and then applies it selectively and dishonestly in a way that gives away that they don’t want to challenge patriarchy, toxic masculinity, or how we as a culture respond to abuse and violence and gendered pressures around those things. They just hate and want to demonize trans people, particularly trans women.

And if you’re a “gender critical” man spouting these “males are predisposed to abuse and be violent and rapey” lines - you should have your basement and hard drives checked. Seriously.

Jangles: “So, you see, maleness isn’t the problem. The problem is patriarchy. An ideological ecosystem that reduces people to the genitals they have at birth and expects certain things out of them because of that. Because of social pressures based on patriarchal and paternalistic views of what men are capable of and what women are capable of.”

*CritFacts lowers the gun*

Crit: Yeah… I think you’re right. And besides, blaming biology or upbringing alone for antisocial behavior is an oversimplification that lets abusers off the hook, it ultimately would force us to conclude that people aren’t responsible for their own behavior.”

Jangles: “Uh huh….”

*Crit puts the gun on the floor or a table between them*

Crit: “And trans people should be celebrated as a counter to that kind of cynical fatalism. Accepting oneself as a trans woman means breaking free of pressure and conditioning to ‘be a man’. Almost like a rebirth from a confining chamber or-”

*Jangles jumps forward, grabs the gun, and points it at Crit*

Crit: “Ah, fuck.”

*Cut to Jangles chasing Crit to Benny Hill*