QUESTIONS: WILL GERMAINE GREER’S LECTURE AT CARDIFF UNIVERSITY ON NOVEMBER 18, 2015 TAKE PLACE, AND IF SO, WILL IT BE WITHOUT DISRUPTION?

WILL MEMBERS OF THE TRANSGENDER COMMUNITY, THROUGH LIES AND DISTORTIONS, BE ABLE TO DESTROY GERMAINE GREER’S REPUTATION, NO MATTER WHAT SHE SAYS? 

Dear Readers:

My assistant, Madison, and I spent several days on the following entry. I realize that it is date and fact-filled, not a casual read.  However, whether we like it or not, a new era is upon us, in which not only are feminists having strong disagreements within ourselves on the issue of whether trans women are women, these disagreements are rancorous. They are tearing us apart.

I believe it is worthwhile to read through this blog entry, and I also believe that opening up each hyperlinks and reading full article is highly educational. 

I am hyperlinking you to Payton Quinn’s article on huffingtonpost.co.uk because she does really get past the name-calling, and states her reason for thinking that “the safety of trans people outweighs the rights of cis women to question the validity of their gender expression.”

Let me hear what you think.

In Sisterhood, Carol Downer

P.S.  Of course, I believe that I do recognize the validity of trans women’s gender expression, I only question that they can appropriate the term “women”.  (I believe that “trans women” is the correct term).

       

         Germaine Greer doesn’t consider post-operative M-to-F transgender people to be women.  She states this opinion forthrightly.  She also makes it clear that in no way does she oppose anyone’s decision to go through the procedure to appear and behave like the gender they identify with, and she will use the gender pronouns each person requests as a courtesy.  Nevertheless, transgender activists call her misogynistic claiming she continually misgenders trans women and denies the existence of transphobia altogether—and many feminists agree with them.  They do not address the key issue: does considering transgender women not to be women constitute bigotry in and of itself?  By the continued misquoting and distortions of Greer’s statements, they destroy her reputation for opinions and statements she’s not made, rather than ever discussing the statements she has made.

            An online controversy erupted after an online petition asked that the speech Greer is scheduled to give at Cardiff University be cancelled.   BBC2’s Newsnight interviewed Greer on October 23^rd, to respond to the petitioner’s charges.    

            My reading of a transcript of the interview shows Germaine Greer does not misgender trans women or express transmisogynistic views.  Despite this, she’s been misquoted and various statements have been incorrectly attributed to her to further attack her. 

Kirsty Wark’s questions create a veritable minefield for Greer to negotiate. Wark clumsily misgenders trans women throughout.  For example, she asks “if a man who is gender reassigned, and outwardly—and he feels, inwardly, he’s a woman--in your view can he be a woman or not?"

            Several online newspapers covered the story, and kept to the facts, ignoring Wark’s inept questions and accurately quoted Greer’s answers.   However, several commentaries in online media and blogs misquote her, others attribute statements to her that she never made.  In none of the attacks, did they address her controversial opinion that men cannot become women through drugs and surgery.  Instead, they put insulting or sarcastic terms and language in Greer’s mouth to characterize her as transmisogynistic.

            Richard Dawkins, an ethologist and an evolutionary biologist, decried the petition in a series of tweets.  He defended open debate at the university.  He was then accused of insulting the transgender community, although my reading of the language of the tweets clearly showed otherwise.

           

The amazing part is that it is possible for anyone to see these misquotes and distortions for themselves, because the disputed language is still online, yet the character assassination continues. So, it has to be asked, are the detractors so angry that their rational faculties have deserted them?  Or, do they assume that no one will go back and check for the accuracy of their statements?  Or, have the lines in the sand been drawn so deeply on this issue that the author assumes their audience will just read the headline and skip through to the “juicy parts” not caring if the statement is accurate?

            RICHARD DAWKINS DID NOT SAY THAT THOSE WHO DISAGREE WITH GERMAINE GREER SHOULD NOT BE AT UNIVERSITY

            Amy Walker, on October 26, 2015, starts her article, “Richard Dawkins Insults Transgender Community” by copying a series of Richard Dawkins’ tweets.  One tweet:  “Students who suppress a distinguished scholar’s lecture because they disagree with her have no place in a university.” (online article on Planettransgender.com)  She then comments, “Yes, a university may not be a ‘safe space’, but to claim that people who disagree with a ‘distinguished scholar’ should not be at university is farcical….” 

            Dawkins not only did not claim that people who disagree should not be at university, he said the opposite.  His other tweet said, “Those who think it’s nonsense are entitled to stay away.  Or come and argue.  They should not censor views they think are nonsense.”

           

            Amy Walker either cannot read accurately, or her strong feelings are blinding her; otherwise, why would she display her own bias by running his actual statements right next to her distorted version of his statement for all to read?

            And what about Planettransgender.com?  Are articles reviewed to check for blatant errors?

GERMAINE GREER DID NOT REFER TO CAITLYN JENNER AS “HE/SHE” 

           

          In my experience, the use of the term, “he/she”, is derogatory.  In the U.S., if Greer used this term in her interview with Kirsty Wark on BBC’s Newsnight, she would definitely be called out by feminists. But, did she do so?  My reading of Wark’s question that preceded her statement, and her full reply casts doubt on the charge that she used the term “he/she”.

          In the “Amateur” transcript by commenter eigensprocket:UK that I read, Greer utters these syllables in response to the following question from Kirsty Wark: “But are people, you would say necessarily, born a woman, or born feeling female.  And if he feels more female..? (OPENS HANDS QUESTION GESTURE)…"

Wark’s question is unintelligible to me.  Is she referring to “people” or to “he”?

          Greer answers Wark’s earlier question about what Greer thinks about Jenner being considered for an award for being Glamour magazine's woman of the year.  She continues Wark’s use of “he” and then shifts over to “she” and refers to “other female members of the family”.   “It seems to me that he…that, ah, what was going on there is that he…he/she…ah, wanted the limelight that the other female members of the family were enjoying….”

          Omitting punctuation marks, Greer said three pronouns in a row; “he”, then “he” again and then “she”.  The transcriber uses “…” several times to indicate that Greer momentarily paused between these pronouns, and then paused between them and the rest of the sentence.  The transcriber’s slash creates the term he/she, even though the rest of the sentence shows she accepted Jenner’s self-definition as one of the female members of the family.

          Greer stated earlier in the interview that she would use the pronouns that a transgendered person wants as a courtesy.  Reviewing the context shows that Greer rebounded from a poorly-framed question to refer to Jenner using female pronouns and included her among her female relatives.

            On October 27^th, Kate Lyons’ commentary on Theguardian.com repeated the charge that Germaine Greer misgendered Jenner by “referring to her as he/she.  Lyons presumably was relying on a excerpt from the Guardian’s transcript of the BBC2’s Newsnight interview in Damien Gayle’s October 24th Guardian Article which didn’t include Kirsty Wark’s question, nor Greer’s twice-uttered “he”.  (Note: this transcript was not available online)

GERMAINE GREER DID NOT SAY THAT CAITLYN JENNER, TRANSGENDER WOMEN ARE NOT ‘REAL WOMEN’

            October 25^th, online magazine, jezebel.com ran Stassa Edwards commentary on Greer’s BBC2’s Newsnight.  The headline “Germaine Greer Says Caitlyn Jenner, Transgender Women Are Not ‘Real Women’. 

            According to the transcript I viewed, Greer did not make that statement on BBC2’s Newsnight, nor was there any discussion of any prior statement that transwomen were not “real women.” And, if she ever made such a statement, Damien Gayle didn’t mention it in his Guardian article, October 24, which Edwards’ cited as her source, “Caitlyn Jenner ‘wanted limelight of female Kardashians’- Germaine Greer, htttp://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/Oct/24/caitlyn-jenner-wanted-limelight-of-female-kardashians-germaine-greer.

DOES GREER THINK THAT TRANSGENDER WOMEN ARE NOT PROPER WOMEN

            Edwards’ disinformation about Greer’s comment that transgender women are not ‘real’ women is adopted by Kaite Welsh in her commentary in the online Telegraph newspaper to jazz up her characterization of Greer’s opinion.  Actually, Greer simply said they are not women.

            Cardiff University is not withdrawing its invitation.  Germaine Greer has agreed to speak.  Considering the intemperate and inaccurate statements made by Greer’s critics so far, I wonder if the event will come off.  Also, if she does appear on November 18, which is 2 days before Transgender Day of Remembrance and within Trans Awareness Week, I wonder if she will encounter protest similar to the “glitter bombing” of March 14, 2012.