A Major Victory for Women!

So, I saw a headline that begins “major victory for women!”

Well, I’m a feminist women’s studies student (and also trans, but that just means I’ve had to think about gender a lot more than most people), so I think, “Oh, wow! A major victory! Have we stopped domestic violence? Is universal childcare available? Have we lowered the maternal death rate? Do we have a woman President? Are people taking wages for housework seriously? Did women win the right to bodily autonomy? Are we taking women’s health seriously? Is it now a requirement to design things like cars and tools for all humans, not just the default cis-man?”

Nope. None of these.

It’s about sports.

Well, okay, I’ll adjust my expectations downward.

So, maybe we’re going to pay women athletes what men make, and they will attract the same TV, sponsorship, etc, deals that the men do? Maybe we’ll let men lose to women in sports where the rules do not need to reward male biology, but we have different rules just to keep men from being compared to women (for instance, luge)? Maybe we’re going to have more team sports where there are mixed teams of 50% men and 50% women, so competition is fair but integrated?

Okay, not this. Okay, I’ll adjust my expectations downward again. I mean, I’m a woman after all. Thus, I’m used to lowering my expectations to avoid disappointment.

So maybe some sport league is going to be run by a woman? Are we going to let women athletes wear practical uniforms rather than uniforms designed with the male gaze in mind? Or is a major sports network or network division going to be run by a woman? Maybe a group of prominent male athletes has released some sort of statement about gender equality, and are refusing to play on the same field as a rapist? Maybe some national league soccer women’s team is getting the fancy new stadium while the local NFL team is going to be playing in a shitty, run-down stadium?

Nope, none of this, either. Turns out this has nothing to do with women getting anything. It’s just a matter of keeping TRANS women from getting anything.

That’s what the article was about: a sports league banned trans women from competing as women. That’s it, in a sport where the women are usually not seen as competent, where they don’t get sponsorship deals, where successful women (limited to the women’s division!) are ridiculed for “looking like men,” because no proper women has any muscles.

But, hey, at least trans women are put in their place.

Seriously, if that is your major victory, your feminism clearly has nothing in common with mine.

But that’s also why transphobia is so exciting to misogynists: transphobia allows them to claim to be helping women without actually, you know, helping women. Heck, they even get to hurt some of us.