Joining the dots on fascism, feminism and gender
by
Two different events happening on the same day, were not unrelated, not so much a clash as an overlap, drawing attention to their commonality. The first Trans Pride Kent, and London’s Together Alliance demonstration, on March 28th, coincided as if in a Venn diagram whose connections reveal themselves in fascist ideology and our resistance to it.
The half a million strong march against the far-right, a diverse and powerful coalition of civil society groups and people—anti-racists, Trade Unions, charities, women’s groups, Green Party and other political representatives, disabled campaigners, anti-war organisations, LGBT+ groups, religious groups, public figures, artists and musicians (see the list of blocs here)—converged with the streams of Palestine solidarity campaigners in Together for Palestine Against the Far Right. Stalwart contingents from Whitstable joined others from Kent, and the Whitstable Women in Sisterly Solidarity banner that famously appears at so many protests was mentioned in BBC reports.
In Canterbury, Westgate Hall was also transformed into a multi-generational space of joy and resistance. It filled with vibrant energy, trans people, friends, families and allies, craft stalls, info and support services organisations, musical performances, speeches and queer creativity. The Third Toilet sculptured installation created to highlight the exclusion of trans people from public facilities and originally placed outside the UK Supreme Court in the wake of last year’s controversial court ruling, made a star appearance.
There was of course no sign of the local MP, renowned for her anti-trans rhetoric, who misses no opportunity to express derisory disregard for her trans constituents.
Both of these events represented the determination and commitment of people asserting the rights of those who are minoritised and marginalised by right-wing discourse. Both embodied the refusal of erasure, ethnic/social ‘cleansing’ and denial of justice. The callous cruelty toward so-called ‘illegal’ immigrants as politicians move the goalposts around asylum legislation and increase deportations, and the lawfare waged by relentless anti-trans campaigning share an underlying theme: contempt for those they dehumanise, the hubristic assumption by self-appointed gatekeepers of an entitlement to negate and discard people they other.
Sexism, racism, classism, ableism and anti-trans ideology alike deprecate and scoff at people, replicating the racist indifference to human life underpinning the enormity of war, colonialism and genocide. The mean-spirited tenor of much of what passes for debate is as much an issue as the content of discussions. Contempt for others, ubiquitous in social media, is easy and facile. (But full disclosure: who among us hasn’t indulged in it at times?) Disagreements and debates conducted with respect and interest are harder to manage; civility vanishes in online pile-ons. Every mention of trans people in the media is leapt on immediately with untrammelled abuse. Neo-liberal capitalist atomisation and alienation has reached an apotheosis; hate crimes abound and no chance to demonise people or invalidate their realities is missed. Facebook posts are full of derogatory comments from people of whom we might assume better, who have themselves been at the receiving end of such nastiness. False reasoning abounds: extrapolations from a single incident (mentally ill/abusive person) are used to write off entire demographics. That’s classic xenophobia of course, in its generalisations and bigotry.
Those gathered in Canterbury oppose moves to reverse gains made after decades of campaigning and lobbying and strip away hard-won rights. These attempts are carried out in the name of women’s rights, when in fact many feminists disagree with efforts to remove trans women from swimming pools, civil society organisations such as the Women’s Institute and the Girl Guides while observing the irony of actions claiming to protect women’s spaces in effect damaging them.
The women of NION were marching in the Women Against the Far Right bloc, ‘representing the 95,000+ cis women who have signed our letter to say, clearly and collectively—Not in our name: Women in support of the trans+ community.’ Demonstrating a ’powerful show of solidarity against division and hate’ they state that ‘trans+ people are among those most targeted by the far right, alongside people of colour, people of different faiths, those seeking safety and refuge, and the wider LGBT+ community. We stand in solidarity with everyone facing racism, homophobia, anti-migrant rhetoric, and fear-driven politics. And we stand alongside our trans+ siblings, today and always.’
Somewhat incongruously, another women’s organisation brought its banner to the march, proclaiming itself an anti-racist and anti-fascist feminist group, despite having suppressed debate on the Gaza genocide and contributed hugely to the hostile environment endured by trans people.
Sadly, as Judith Butler opines in Who’s Afraid of Gender, ‘the ‘anti-gender ideology’ discourse places contemporary ‘radical feminists’ in a position of woeful complicity with the key aims of new fascism.’ A feminism that persecutes trans people is ‘almost like a nationalism of sex… At the psychic level, they want strong borders,’ as Sophy Lewis wrote in Enemy Feminisms: Terfs, Policewomen, and Girlbosses Against Liberation’. ‘State repression of trans people, its blatantly right wing, authoritarian and religious nature (key proponents include Trump, Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orbán, Giorgia Meloni and the Vatican) is complicated by the alibi afforded it by a handful of trans-exclusionary feminists. It is thanks to their efforts that Trump can frame a bigoted attack on a minority as ‘defending women from gender ideology.’
After all, the links between trans people’s, women’s liberation and anti-racism activisms are more than just solidarity or kind connections between oppressed groups. A bedrock of fascism is the misogynist policing of rigid binary gender roles, the masculinity and femininity that underpin authoritarian heteronormative patriarchy, determined as resting on the biological dualism: men and women, separate and unequal. Kinder, Küche, Kirche (children, kitchen, church), as the Nazis described women’s subjugation under male supremacy. In other words, ‘Serve, smile, procreate’ as Caro Claire Burke writes on the rise of the tradwife.
Those who refuse, disrupt and strive to overturn this regressive hierarchy—gender traitors, to pinch a phrase from Margaret Atwood—are at increased risk from racialised fundamentalist nationalism whose adherents advocate removing women’s voting rights and promote anti-queerness, white supremacy, fundamentalist Christianity and traditional maternalism.
Yet if organisations, movements and individuals meet these challenges with resistance rather than capitulation, and unite in a commitment that refuses to cede the ground of our common purposes, we can experience more of the hope offered by last weekend’s events. Protesting against Palestinian dispossession and commemorating the ongoing Nakba 78 years on will be one such positive opportunity!
ABOUT:
Frankie Green, aka Hewett, was born in London, lives in Whitstable and has been taking part in various political activities since the 1960s: anti-apartheid movement, the Vietnam war, the Gay Liberation Front, the Women’s Liberation Movement, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and local environmental actions. She runs a feminist music archive and collects stuff on a blog.
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