TERF Island’s TERF Island

I first came across Mumsnet four or five years ago within my first year of transitioning. An acquaintance of mine from the U.K. who I had known in college and who had never been a particularly vocal feminist was posting occasional TERFy posts. I commented, outing myself, and had a back and forth in private messages before I wisely disengaged. It prompted a deep dive into How the U.K. became TERF Island even before its more recent rightward lurch.

Quite a lot has been written about the rise of TERFdom in the U.K. context:

“The Roots of Anti-Trans Feminism in the U.K.”

“How British Feminism Became Anti-Trans” (by Sophie Lewis, a British scholar, shortly after some British TERFs ambushed Sarah McBride in D.C.)

“The Rise of Anti-Trans “Feminists,” Explained” from Vox by Katelyn Burns, an independent trans journalist. This piece covers WoLF, (Women’s Liberation Front–WOmen?) and the collaboration between TERFs and conservative politics.

“Inside the Great British TERF War” including Hampstead Heath’s sex-segregated bathing ponds (still a Hot Topic on the Mumsnet boards)

“Scholar Explains TERFism on TikTok“

“Why British Media is so Transphobic” (an interview with Shon Faye)

“Where JK Rowling’s Transphobia Comes From” (in Vanity Fair of all places, with a flattering photo but a rather scathing discussion of U.K. media)

And one of the deepest dives from SophieLewis in Lux Magazine “TERF Island” (there have always been enemies among us), a piece she elaborates on in her latest book Enemy Feminisms.

Transgender Studies Quarterly (TSQ) had a whole issue on TERFs, Gender Critical movements, and Postfascist feminisms.

Long story short, the current surge in TERFism across the pond has some ties to previous feminist arguments including Janice Raymond’s The Transsexual Empire that literally described trans women as raping “real” women through the appropriation of womanhood. (More on that some other time) Lesbian separatists often tarried with the TERFs, forging feminist community out of biological essentialism. The TERF wars over the Womyn’s Music Festival in Michigan are another obvious touchpoint. But the feminism of UK TERFs feels rather devoid of this kind of depth of historical engagement or, for that matter, feminism. I have perused the boards (a practice I will concede is akin to self-harm) for several years and both the Feminism and Sex and Gender boards (the split between the two is in itself lore but they converge more than they diverge) are dominated by discussions of trans issues.

Much of Mumsnet is a relatively mundane discussion board clearly targeted at, well, mums. Many boards focus on parenting issues, relationship troubles, consumerism, etc. The board as an active Am I Being Unrasonable? (AIBU), a variant on Reddit’s popular Am I The Asshole (AITA)? Most questions focus on disagreements with partners, spouses, children, friends, parents, and many, many disagreements with in-laws. TERFism bleeds into these other spaces occasionally but is mostly contained to robust posting on the two boards dedicated to, ostensibly, feminist issues.

Policy wise the discussion focused on debates around the Gender Recognition Act of 2004 that allowed trans individuals to obtain a “gender recognition certificate” with requisite medical documentation. While moving toward demedicalization, allowing trans individuals to attest to their own identity, the U.K. debate kicked up controversy over whether and how self-i.d. would work. The board has followed legal controversies around Keira Bell, a detransitioner who sued the Tavistock Clinic, the largest gender clinic run by the NHS. The board rallied around Maya Forstater’s employment tribunal case in which she claimed to have lost employment for voicing anti-trans views (the court found “gender critical” views to be protected beliefs). And the board, of course, celebrated the UK Supreme Court ruling that the Equality Act which defined sex as a protected characteristic defined women as defined by the biological category of sex. Other occasional celebrities in their circles include anti-heroes India Willoughby, Shon Faye, Katy Montgomerie, Imane Khalief, David Tennant, and others. They have rallied behind Kathleen Stock, Graham Linehan, Helen Joyce, Posie Parker (Kelli Jean Kay), and others.

Their patron saint is, of course, J.K. Rowling. I am too old to have been a Harry Potter reader nor do I have kids who would have been enmeshed in the Potterverse so I do not have any personal connection to her, the books, or the movies. Her villain arc appears to be quite familiar. She liked a tweet from a transphobe, apologized, got some criticism, and went full TERF, forever a victim of “trans activism” even as she has continued to wipe her tears with Potter Pounds. Her arc is less tragic than, say, Graham Linehan’s. I have a more personal connection to Glinner having lived in the U.K. when Father Ted was airing on Channel 4 (and watching The I.T. Crowd which was a part of his joker origin story–more on him in the future). His public self-immolation has been a microcosm of the U.K.’s collective ongoing freak out that has included not just the TERF wars but Brexit, toppling PMs, Tory self-combustion, Labour incompetence, and an all too familiar rightward slump.

All of this is to say Mumsnet has been an ongoing source of fascination and horror, wallowing in the bizarrely hyper-focused community with in-group acronyms, self-referential ‘facts’, inside jokes, and moral panic. A wretched hive of scum and villainy that genuinely believes trans women are an existential threat to women even as the cis men discussed all over the other boards–bosses, husbands, boyfriends, sons, brothers, co-workers, strangers–are and always have been a much greater peril. As the world slouches toward Bethlehem they are consummate posters, always alert to the Gender Menace. And if you can’t beat them, post them. I can vent my spleen here, airing out the mumsnutters at their nuttiest.

I will start with this quintessentially mumsnet post. Behold, your guide to 3-D printing an ornament of J.K. Rowling on her yacht, with a cigar and champagne, toasting to the U.K. Supreme Court’s defining of “woman” to exclude trans women. Congratulations, mums, I’m sure this rising tide that lifts Rowling’s yacht will be highly consequential in your lives.