Germaine Greer: "Trans women are not women"

[Bruin Fisher]

This from the BBC today:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34625512

Germaine Greer, for those who haven't heard of her, is a radical feminist and academic, famous for her seminal book 'The Female Eunuch'. She has been around for decades, often a thorn in the side of the establishment on women's issues, and generally well respected. However in my humble opinion in recent years she has seriously lost the plot.

Maybe she's always held these opnions but wisely kept them to herself because she wanted to be listened to with other less objectionable opinions, and now at her advanced age she no longer cares about that so much, or maybe she's recently developed such opinions. I don't know. What I do know is that it is cruel to tell someone who has gone through so much to emerge as their true self as they see it, that they're not a 'real' woman. Shame on you, Germaine.

[Bruin Fisher]

I'm getting more cross about this the more I think about it. Greer at one point in the interview says:

"A great many women don't think that... trans-sexual M-F people look like, sound like or behave like women."

So what do women look like, sound like and behave like, then, Germaine? I think I can state confidently that while there are average looks, sounds, behaviours, there is a wide spectrum of deviance from those averages which easily encompasses transgender women. So a particular transgender woman may have a rather strong jawline, or a rather deep voice, or a rather masculine walk. So do lots of women. So what.

Germaine's argument is so despicable that it beggars belief that an intellectual of her standing could spout such nonsense.

Rant over.

[dude]

She just underscores the opinion of those who regard her as a 'pompous old woman.'