Into a broader fight
The ACLU has a page for Women in Prison.
I wonder if they really mean women in prison, in the sense of women in prison. The first link we see suggests they don’t.
How Women’s Rights Paved the Way for Gender Justice at the ACLU
Many recent legal battles for the rights of trans and non-binary people are rooted in the same cases that pioneered women’s rights decades ago.
So much for women in prison, and women in general.
When Ruth Bader Ginsburg co-founded the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project in 1972, she recognized that laws that stereotype by gender hurt everyone — no matter your gender.
Then why did she call it the Women’s Rights Project? Why doesn’t the ACLU have a page for All Lives Matter? Why is it only women who get shoved into the All category by the ACLU?
That’s why some of WRP’s early cases involved men who had been discriminated against — and it’s why many of our recent legal battles for the rights of trans and non-binary people are rooted in the same cases that pioneered women’s rights decades ago.
Oh piss off. Women still need to work for our own rights just as other subordinated groups do. We still get to talk about our rights without being told to talk about those other people’s rights too and instead and at the same time.
Today, WRP is headed by Director Ria Tabacco Mar. Below, she explains more about why women’s rights are inextricably linked to the broader fight for gender justice.
How has the ACLU’s women’s rights work evolved into a broader fight for gender justice?
So they admit it. I don’t think I’ve seen them spell it out that explicitly before. They no longer fight for women’s rights, they fight more “broadly” for gender justice. All genders matter.
So many of the cases that we are litigating in the LGBTQ space were built on early victories in women’s rights. Those were cases that were initially fought by cisgender women who were considered to be the wrong kind of women, either because they were mothers of young children or because they were, “too macho” and didn’t wear jewelry. Being fired because you’re a transgender woman is just another variation of the same problem.
No it isn’t; not unless you oversimplify the “problem” drastically. Transgender “women” can’t be mothers of young children, for example, because they’re men. A lot of the restrictions and injustices imposed on women were indeed related to their reproductive role, as the subordination of women always has been. Being fired because you’re a man who calls himself a woman is not a variation of that problem.
Gender justice is really about ensuring that everyone has an opportunity to structure their lives and thrive, regardless of gender, unlimited by gender stereotypes.
Which is why it’s no use to women, in exactly the way All Lives Matter is not a useful slogan for anti-racism activists. It’s not only “gender stereotypes” that interfere with women’s ability to structure our lives. It’s not a “gender stereotype” that women need abortion rights in a way that men don’t, however desirable men may find abortion rights. It’s anatomical. The woman makes the baby inside her body; the man does not.
The ACLU has completely lost the plot.
The ACLU has evolved from being an organization devoted to upholding civil liberties to one that’s devoted to social justice causes. You could once respect the ACLU even when it got involved in protecting speech you didn’t like, because there might be a time when your own right to speak was threatened. That the ACLU is now on the side of those who would cancel women who speak up for their sex-based rights is dismaying to say the least.
Even when I was still on the other side of the trans wars, I would be howling in rage at this. This rewrite of history needs to be challenged. RBG did not select cases involving men because “she recognized that laws that stereotype by gender hurt everyone — no matter your gender.” She did it because at that point in time (as is still too often the case), juries were more sympathetic to male complainants, and she needed to establish precedent first, before she could actively engage on behalf of women directly. Getting a win with a male client meant that it was harder for judges to change the rules in later cases.
It was a brilliant and calculated tactic, and one that had precisely FUCK + ALL to do with worrying about how men in general might be hurt by stereotypes built into law.
First they attached themselves to LGB rights, benefiting from the work done by other people. Then they attached themselves to women’s rights, benefiting from the work done by other people. They also attached themselves to racial justice causes, benefiting from the work done by other people. All of these groups have nothing to do with being trans, and everything to do with actual marginalized classes who fought and even died to achieve their rights. Some of them were imprisoned just for being who they were. Others were enslaved. Domestic violence has been a constant threat for many, and reproductive responsibilities fall heavily on one group more than another.
Yet our rights are being dismissed for the pretend right of being able to pee in the women’s room when you are not a women, and the pretend right not to be called “him” when you are clearly a “him”. None of them have fought, bled, or died for their rights, or been imprisoned merely for putting on a dress. (I imagine there have been times and places where men could be imprisoned for that, but that has nothing to do with the modern day trans movement).
All they are is parasites. Parasites on the movements of people who suffered enough under oppression to be willing to suffer the consequences of speaking out about it.