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Why "cis/trans" is often used with good intentions, but is problematic
And to many radical feminists, "cissing is dissing"

                        by Margo Schulter
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Please let me try to explain why "cis" is not only a medical term, but one
with political associations in the setting of the controversies we're
discussing.

We could have a long discussion about the fine points of feminist theory
involved, but I want to focus on the feelings evoked on both or various
"sides" by this word.


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1. Introduction: The definition and original intent of "cis/trans"
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As up-to-date dictionaries will tell us, typically cis is used for people
who identify and remain within the sex/gender category they were designated
or assigned at birth. To be trans is to identify as and if possible move
over to a different category.

As an inclusive radical feminist, I'd say this concept is well-intentioned
but has some flaws: intersex people, and many gender nonconforming people
(e.g. Butch Lesbians) don't fit a "cis/trans" binary so well, and have
spoken out to let us know.[1]

Let's look at the good intentions which many self-identified
"transactivists" and allies feel were met. We say "trans/nontrans," for
example, but that would for them be like "Lesbian/non-Lesbian" rather than
"Lesbian/heterosexual[/bisexual/pansexual...]." They felt that "nontrans"
made trans the marginalized exception, while cis/trans, like
homosexual/heterosexual, put both kinds of people on more of an equal level.


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2. Inclusive radical feminism: why is "cis/trans" problematic?
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However, from an inclusive radical feminist view, apart from some other
issues, cis/trans isn't such a good way of making comparisons between
_women_ when harmonious sisterhood requires a very delicate balance.

The cis/trans view focuses on the fact that transsexual[2] or more generally
trans women experience the special oppressions and challenges first of
growing up in a male status and male embodiment in which we do not fit; and
then the special challenges of physical and social transition. The emphasis,
and I've seen this in action, is often on the idea that "cis women" don't
experience this oppression. This focus, especially when it gets out of
balance, can lead to ugly behavior and consequences.

Any radical feminist, including those of us who are transsexual, will
emphasize that being born and raised female under patriarchy is not a
"privilege" but an oppressed situation which transsexual or trans women who
transition as adults don't experience. We also enjoy male privilege up to
transition, however accompanied with body dysphoria (dissonance with one's
sexed embodiment) and social dysphoria (dissonance with one's social gender
status). What we don't experience could be called "sex caste oppression" or
in more modern usage "DFAB/AFAB oppression" -- the oppression of women
designated (endosex) or assigned (intersex) female at birth and raised as
girls.[3]

As I've seen in real life, the biggest problem is how the "cis" concept is
used by certain "transactivists" and allies to erase the reality that
growing up female is not a privilege; and that growing up in a male status
is a privilege even for a male-to-female transsexual who will later
transition and experience the oppression that the patriarchy imposes on all
women.


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3. Feminist alternatives: WBF/WRF
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Before getting into the bad feelings and harm involved, I should explain
some more balanced alternatives. One is to speak of WBF/WRF, meaning "Women
Born Female" and "Women Reassigned Female."

Here I should explain that from one classic radical feminist view, which is
also mine, WBF/WRF is connected with but not determined by biology: the
issue is male and female socialization, as children and adults, under the
patriarchal sex caste system! Thus intersex people who may have
female-appearing external genitalia (vulvas) but 46-XY chromosomes and
internal testes, who are deemed female and raised as girls, are WBF.[4]

Nor is WBF/WRF simply a matter of identity, as sacred and important as that
is. A transsexual woman may view herself as female or as wanting to be
female from the age of 3-4 on (I expressed a desire to transition at age 4),
but doesn't directly experience "social womanhood" (living and being treated
as a woman, by her new sisters and also by the patriarchy) until she
transitions.

What I will frankly call overzealous people in this whole dialogue,
"transactivists" on one side or "radical feminists" on the other, tend to
agree in denying the full reality of transition, or moving from one social
sex/gender to another. Note that transsexual women like myself may be
radical feminists (in my case, Second Wave radical Lesbian feminism), while
natal women may be transactivist allies.

Overzealous transactivists will claim "We were always women, we were born
women," and maybe argue about "brain sex" (which I like many feminists
question). However, the reality remains that transition is a change of sexed
embodiment and, even more important, social location. It means joining the
social class of women.

Overzealous radical feminists, who are my sisters whatever our
disagreements, will argue that there is no such thing as transition, because
"it is impossible to change sex." That is a matter of how one defines sex.
However, it is very possible through hormones and surgery to change one's
sexed embodiment, and to transition socially through adult female (and I
would say ideally feminist) resocialization and reeducation to become a kind
of "naturalized woman."[5]


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4. An Analogy or Exercise: 
Was Albert Einstein an "American scientist"?
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Here's an analogy that might help. Let's consider Albert Einstein, a German
by birth who emigrated to the USA, and decided to stay and become a citizen,
which he did.

Please forgive me in what follows for very problematically using "American"
to mean "USAian," with apologies to the Indigenous Nations of Turtle Island,
and to Latin countries with names including "United States" or "America" (or
more precisely the Spanish or Portuguese equivalents, and with large numbers
of citizens having known or unknown Indigenous ancestors!).

Was Albert Einstein an "American scientist"? If we answer simply "yes," then
someone unfamiliar with him might think of him as a natural born citizen of
the USA who was raised here -- erasing the very important process both of
geographical relocation and of resocialization in his new country. That's
not better or worse than being raised in the USA, but it is different.

If we answer simply "no," maybe adding that "Geography is not Bigotry," then
we're denying the fact of his immigration and naturalization. In fact,
Einstein did change his geographical location and his social position
(living in and learning a new national culture), although he obviously could
not change his birthplace or the way he was raised as a child.


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5. Why too often "cissing is dissing"
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The reason that "cis" evokes passionate dislike from many radical feminists,
and serious concerns from me (who prefers WBF/WRF, for example), is that
often cis is used to wound and exercise power over natal women and
transsexual women who understand that women who've lived their entire lives
as women are the older sisters in our women's community -- "first among
equals," as it were.

If a natal woman asks friendly questions about sex/gender issues, she gets
not sisterly respect as someone who's experienced through her whole life
what we newcomers are now sharing, but "cissing." She's expected to be a
subordinate "ally" and not get out of line. And a transsexual woman like me,
who's lived as a woman for 45 years and understands that I am still a
"younger sister," may get cissed also.

Thus the saying: "cissing is dissing." Here "dissing" means disrespecting,
and potentially dominating or even dispossessing. A newcomer who comes to a
community claiming to know the culture better than lifelong members, rather
than seeking to learn it, may well be perceived as a colonizer or invader
rather than a peaceful and desirable immigrant.

Note how this kind of behavior immensely hurts the women's community, and
indeed lives down to and reinforces the view of overzealous radical
feminists that transsexuals or trans people in general are invaders and
colonizers who are acting as agents of the patriarchy to dominate if not
erase the women's and Lesbian communities.[6]

I've seen enough of the "cissing" to feel that the word is unhelpful in
seeking equal sisterhood for women from birth and women by transition who
wish to join together in feminist and Lesbian communities of affinity and
struggle. And while respecting the boundaries of women by birth who prefer
groups and events intended for themselves alone, those of us embracing
shared groups and spaces can act so as to disprove rather than reinforce the
fears of the "invasion and colonizing" narrative.


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Notes and Cautions
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1. This explanation of the "cis/trans" controversy is biased toward women
who identify and live as women, and does not attempt to focus on nonbinary
people, or on binary trans men. Nor does it focus mainly on our intersex
siblings, an estimated 1.7% of the population, who are born with bodies that
don't fit "standard female" or "standard male" patterns. Intersex people
experience oppressions that the rest of us don't, too often including
Intersex Genital Mutilation (IGM), nonconsensual surgeries in infancy or
childhood to "normalize" their bodies and fit them closer to the patriarchal
sex binary.

Infants deemed intersex are almost always "assigned" a binary sex, that is,
deemed female or male based on various factors. Unfortunately, "assigning a
sex" is often a euphemism for the additional process of violently inflicting
nonconsensual surgery on the child before they can discover their sex/gender
identity (sense of sexed embodiment and social identity) and decide whether
they want any medical interventions. Most intersex people spared IGM are
happy with their bodies as-is, whether they identify and live as their
assigned binary genders, or identify and live as nonbinary. Hida Viloria's
_Born Both: An Intersex Life_ (2017) gives a nonbinary Lesbian perspective,
as Viloria celebrates he/r life and intersex advocacy. A top priority for
the intersex community and its allies is outlawing IGM everywhere in the
world, just as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is recognized as a human
rights violation. Both FGM and IGM stem from patriarchal and misogynist
biases.

Radical feminists who look to Indigenous Nations and cultures in envisioning
alternatives to patriarchy should have no problem amplifying and supporting
intersex people and groups like Organization Intersex International (OII),
since many of these traditional cultures honor intersex people and recognize
a variety of gender categories and transitions. A radical feminist, of
course, will add that in appreciating a given culture, we must not only
count the number of sex/gender categories, but ask how people deemed "women"
or "usual women" or the like fare.

2. The term "transsexual," which was standard in the main Second Wave era of
feminism and more specifically in the Lesbian feminist phase of which I was
a part (roughly 1970-1980, with my becoming involved in 1973), focuses on a
transition that changes many although not all primary and secondary sex
characteristics through hormones and surgery, as well as social status. The
term focuses on sex embodiment as well as social integration into a new
community -- for transsexual women, the social class of women.

For a feminist transsexual women, this involves looking to feminist women
who have lived their entire lives as women as models and mentors, as well as
other newcomers (women by transition); and celebrating as neofemales the
aspects of sexed embodiment which we come to share with our sisters who are
women by birth, as others we do not ourselves experience but most natal
women do -- for example, menstruation and childbirth. We join in the
struggle for cliteracy, vulva cupcakes and celebrations (while respecting
the boundaries of those intended only for women by birth and raising), and
support the critically important struggle for female reproductive rights and
for the affirmation of menstruation, to many of us a sacred mystery, and the
recognition of women's health issues such as endometriosis often
undiagnosed or undertreated.

Lesbian feminists who are transsexuals often take part in the social,
cultural, and spiritual aspects of Lesbianism before surgery, but only gain
a viable and female sexuality through Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS). Like
many Lesbians who are natal women, many of us have a specific genital
preference for other people with vulvas. Given some ugly and much-touted
incidents of this controversy, I might add that sane Lesbian feminists,
women by birth or transition, recognize that no Lesbian has a right or
obligation to consider or have sex with any other Lesbian -- noncoercion and
mutually enthusiastic desire and consent are the only ethical basis for
sexual relationships!

"No means no -- no explanations needed!" It should go without saying that
any Lesbian woman is free to seek relationships only with women by birth,
for example; and that feminist ethics call for a transsexual woman to
disclose this history to prospective partners, just as women disclose
relevant sexual history that may relate to sexually transmitted diseases
(STD's). Regrettably a few self-styled "transactivists" have violated these
boundaries, compromising the trust so important for the well-being and very
survival of the Lesbian feminist community, and of feminism in general. When
unreciprocated attractions happen, Lesbian women must be able to say and
accept "No" and continue as friends and sisters in struggle.

Refuting these "transactivist" boundary violations, which indeed do amount
to rape culture, is thus an imperative for all ethical Lesbian feminists and
feminists in general, whether women by birth or transition. Specifically,
it's fair to assume that Lesbian feminists have a genital preference for
people with vulvas, and not to challenge our bodily autonomy with arguments
from sex/gender theory. Likewise, a woman who prefers women by birth has a
right to that preference, no questions asked.

Unfortunately some overzealous radical feminists have used, or in some cases
one is tempted to say "exploited" such boundary violations by a few
"transactivists" and allies, to argue that transsexuals or trans people in
general are out to "demand sex from Lesbians" and ultimately erase
Lesbianism itself. Fighting rape culture means upholding a woman's absolute
right to decline sex with anyone or everyone, and have it only on the basis
of mutual and enthusiastic consent and desire. Women by birth or transition
are too often perpetrators of woman-on-woman sexual harassment, assault, or
domestic violence. With or without a history of past male privilege, women
are unfortunately capable of internalizing patriarchal misogyny and rape
culture.

It's also worth saying that dialogues among those interested in issues of body
image and sexuality related to race, colorism, fat, beauty and glamour
stereotypes (often specifically white ones), intersex, and nonbinary identity,
etc., take part within the Lesbian community. The issue is when women, by
birth or transition, are urged or pressured at least to consider having sex
with others in this or that group or category.

Another kind of boundary violation is the "policing" of Lesbian identity by
some overzealous radical feminists who seek to enforce their own boundaries
and preferences -- of which they are the rightful sovereigns for their own
bodies or private groups, spaces, and events -- on other women. Thus Lesbian
relationships between women with vulvas, where one or both happen to be
women by transition rather than birth, are denounced as "not Lesbian" --
perhaps a bit like the "un-women" in Margaret Atwood's _Handmaid's Tale_.
Fully informed and enthusiastically consensual relationships including a
trans woman who has not yet gotten surgery, or does not intend to, or
between a Lesbian woman and a trans man who has surgically transitioned, are
likewise denounced.

Radical feminists aware of the more flexible attitudes of many Indigenous
societies will not be so alarmed, and understand that "Lesbianism" is a
category with fuzzy borders -- but where everyone's boundaries should be
respected and honored. We can agree that each group or event can set
boundaries on what a "woman" or "Lesbian" is, and expect these boundaries to
be honored, without needing to police other people and groups which may have
different definitions. As Radicalesbians remind us in their classic
manifesto "The Woman-Identified Woman" (1970), concepts such as
heterosexuality and homosexuality (and also bisexuality, pansexuality,
asexuality, etc.) are social ways of construing attractions, desires, and
loving partnerships which do not always fall in neat categories. We are
interested in respecting personal and group boundaries, not in enforcing
this or that neat categorical rule on the entire Lesbian feminist community.

3. Because the "assigned" at birth concept applies especially to intersex
people and is often connected with the risk and too frequent reality of IGM
(see note 1), with other feminists borrowing it from the intersex community,
some intersex people and also allies such as myself prefer to speak of
endosex (nonintersex) people being "designated" female or male at birth.
Thus we have AFAB/AMAB for intersex people, and DFAB/DMAB for endosex people
(assigned or designated female or male).

4. Many radical feminists, including myself, emphasize that although
patriarchy operates _through_ biology (and especially through the
reproductive enslavement of women, of whom the great majority can bear
children, a sacred capacity that becomes a vulnerability under patriarchy),
the oppression is _because_ of society. More specifically, some millennia
ago, certain societies evolved (or devolved) in aberrant directions which
turned women into subjugated breeding machines and radically increased birth
rates, equating sexed embodiment and sexuality with forced female
reproductive labor (e.g. Paola Tabet, who documents this in brutal detail,
although we do not know exactly where or when patriarchy first emerged).

From the kind of radical feminist perspective I share with many of my
sisters (women by birth or transition), the main issue is not "biology" in
itself but patriarchal childhood socialization in a sex caste system where
those deemed female at birth and raised as girls are treated very
differently than those deemed male and raised as boys. This does not mean
that transsexual women cannot transition, but that we must experience adult
female (re)socialization, preferably feminist (re)socialization and
reeducation. This is the traditional human pattern in social communities:
newcomers accept members from birth as elders and mentors, and gain trust
and status through a process of initiation and learning.

An inclusive radical feminist -- and I hope feminist or human being in
general -- with compassion will also understand how some women from birth
will feel uneasy about sharing close associations in private groups and
spaces with women who once lived in a male status. Some claims that "Trans
women are not women" or "Trans women are men" may express a need: "Trans
women are not people I am obliged to trust and welcome into my life as I
would others who share my experience of girlhood and womanhood from birth
on." Compassion is to understand and respect this stance, and the boundaries
that some women's and Lesbian groups and events may accordingly draw. At the
same time, it's important to understand that many other radical feminists
and feminists in general cherish women's and Lesbian groups and events
including women from birth and women by transition.

Overzealous radical feminists, who have been a part of radical feminism and
expressed such views since at least the 1970's, hold that transsexual women
have no place in the women's and Lesbian communities because of "simple
biology." Yet these women very often would or do include intersex women who
were Assigned Female At Birth (AFAB) and raised as girls, but have
male-typical chromosomes (46-XY) and internal testes rather than ovaries,
for example. They are in practice following the classic radical feminist
insight that society -- patriarchal society and childhood socialization --
is the problem, not "biology" in itself.

In theory, however, they appeal to such arguments as "to be a woman is to
have ovaries, a menstrual cycle, and have the capacity for motherhood."
These things are indeed central women's concerns and feminist concerns,
since a very large majority of women do directly experience them. However,
not all women do -- women by birth who have survived girlhood, or women by
transition.

If there were no intersex people, the question of sisterhood between natal
and transsexual women might not be much different: intersex people and their
unique oppressions and issues should be centered in their own right, and not
used mainly as a political football in argument about and between endosex
feminists. However, the natural reality of intersex people, embraced and
celebrated in many traditional cultures but despised, marginalized, and
subjected to IGM and other childhood medical abuse by the patriarchy,
highlights why "simple biology" arguments do not recognize all the facts of
biology or society on which classic radical feminism focuses. Often these
arguments tend to pathologize and marginalize intersex people in a way we'd
expect from the patriarchy that sponsors FGM and IGM alike, rather than from
feminism, let alone radical feminism.

5. A complication of the "Can sex be changed?" question or debate is that
sex can mean different things to different people at different times. For
many radical feminists, "sex" means above all, in the context of patriarchy,
the sex-caste system. From this perspective of "sex-caste oppression," one's
status at birth is by definition immutable. Note that "sex class" is often
used by these radical feminists in the sense of "sex caste," in contrast to
the possible change or mobility of status which "class," as opposed to
"caste," may imply for some of us coming from a background in sociology or
political theory.

However, for many feminists, "sex" relates also to "sexed embodiment," the
various female or male primary and secondary sex characteristics that we
have. Hormones and surgery definitely can change many, although not all, of
these characteristics, so that a person deemed male at birth would, after
medical transition is completed, be deemed female under the same criteria
(specifically, possession of a vulva, and of a phalloclitoris with the
external and thus visible portion of such a size as to be deemed a clitoris
rather than a penis). For me, and many other transsexuals, this is from our
perspective a change of sex from male to (mostly) female.

Note that in nature, there is variation along a continuum in humans from an
endosex female clitoris, comparable in size to an endosex male penis and yet
more intricate and richly innervated (supplied with nerves), but mostly
internal so that the visible glans is only "the tip of the iceberg"; through
many intersex forms; to the mostly external and thus visible endosex penis.
Australian urologist Helen O'Connell, in the 1990's and later,
revolutionized our understanding of the clitoris and especially the
"invisible" internal clitoris. She is an emancipator for natal and
transsexual women alike, with recent Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS)
techniques focusing on the creation of a sensate clitoris, although not of
the full scale and intricacy of the internal clitoris in endosex or intersex
women by birth. While the intersex community often uses the term
phalloclitoris (covering the continuum from endosex clitoris to endosex
penis), an alternative medieval Latin term is _virga_, literally "rod," used
in the 13th century for either clitoris or penis, and which can be used for
intermediate or intersex variations also.

It is true that transsexual women cannot "change sex" from endosex male to
endosex female. Like intersex women, we live as women with mixed or variant
sex characteristics; and like some but not all intersex women, we do not
have internal female reproductive organs and cannot reproduce. The two most
salient differences are that intersex women but not endosex transsexual
women are subject to intersex oppression (including the risk of IGM); and
that intersex women deemed female and raised as girls are WBF, while we are
WRF (childhood socialization). Note that some intersex people are Assigned
Male at Birth (AMAB), but later choose to go through medical and social
transition to WRF or neofemale status, some identifying as transsexual or
more generally trans.

A term I like to express my embodied reality as a transsexual woman is
"neofemale" -- suggested by the medical terms like "neovulva" and
"neoclitoris" used to describe our surgically reconstructed sex
characteristics.

Incidentally, very rarely a person deemed male at birth and raised a boy may
later give birth -- a very "female" act by tests of "simple biology" and a
concrete material reality. This famously happened in the Italy of 1601, when
a soldier named Daniel Burghammer surprised his commanding officer and his
wife, among others, by giving birth to a girl who was named Elizabeth and
greeted as a miracle. We also learn that his wife obtained a divorce, on the
grounds that a person who could bring forth children was not a suitable
husband. What happened to Burghammer after this we do not know, but the
acceptance of this interesting occurrence as a miracle rather than a curse
suggests some semblance of the ancient celebration of natural sex variations
remained even in the midst of the Burning Times (centered not on the "Dark
Ages" of the 5th-8th centuries, but on the European cultures of the
13th-14th century High Gothic and 15th-17th century Renaissance).

Just as a women with an intersex variation who is assigned female at birth and
raised as girl is deemed WBF despite male sex characteristics such as 46-XY
chromosomes and internal testes, Daniel Burghammer was assigned male at birth
and raised as a boy, and so would not be deemed WBF (a survivor of girlhood,
or sex-caste oppression) despite later giving birth -- at least from the
perspective of a radical feminism that focuses on sex caste and society as
the source of patriarchal oppression. These exceptions do not erase the
overwhelming reality that women in general, and a large majority of women
personally, can bear children; and that the vast majority of people who give
birth are designed or assigned female, and thus WBF from a sex-caste
perspective.

6. The idea that transsexual women were actually a patriarchal plot or
conspiracy to dominate or even replace natal women started in the 1970's,
with the most famous or notorious statement of that era in Janice Raymond's
_The Transsexual Empire_ (1979). This was at least 15 years or so before
such things as modern "transactivism" and the "cis/trans" concept as used by
that movement. While some radical feminists of this era such as Raymond and
Robin Morgan (one of the founders of Second Wave radical feminism in the era
of 1967-1970 or so) vehemently opposed the presence of transsexual women in
the movement, many other radical and often also Lesbian feminists were
welcoming and inclusive.

The most heated and destructive conflicts, then and now, have come when the
intention of a given feminist group or space is not respected by others.
Thus in 1976-1979, radical feminists including Raymond launched a campaign
against the Olivia Collectives, a Lesbian feminist community which included
sound engineer Sandy Stone, a transsexual woman. This attack on Olivia,
which had welcomed Stone fully aware of her transsexual history, ultimately
forced Stone to leave and almost destroyed the Collectives (including Olivia
Records, a premier source of women's music in that era).

The other most famous example is the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival,
Michfest or MWMF (and sometimes "Michigan" or simply "Fest"). After 15 years
without incidents of which I have heard, in 1991 a Lesbian woman, Nancy Jean
Burkholder, was expelled from Fest because of her transsexual history,
although the policy of exclusion had not been announced. During the next
years, 1992-1994, there was dialogue about the policy which some
participants favoring the policy and well as others seeking to change it
remember as mostly respectful, and centered around the Lesbian feminism for
which Fest (1976-2015) remains iconic.

(Note that "Womyn" is a feminist spelling meant to declare an independence
from the "men" in the usual spelling "women," and that some transsexual as
well as natal women have favored this spelling, especially among likeminded
feminists.)

However, starting in 1999, those seeking to change the policy adopted some
intrusive and at times alarming tactics, especially when practiced in a
rural setting where women could rightly feel special security concerns (and
I would have felt as a transsexual women if there, I might add). Given that
Fest was meant as a healing space for women recovering from Post-Traumatic
Stress Disorder (PTSD) from sexual assault or domestic abuse, for example,
such actions tended to escalate distrust and perceptions that transsexual
women "were not really women," or at least women of a kind one would want to
welcome into the Michfest community.

In the first years of the new millennium, Michfest reaffirmed its intention
of inviting women who had lived their entire lives as women -- originally
known as "Womyn Born Womyn" (WBW), and later modified to "Womyn Born Female"
(WBF) in recognition that one is born a baby, not a grown woman (an adult
human female or neofemale, one might say). This language, as explained in
Michfest documents, was meant also to recognize that there are women who
were not born female but have transitioned into that status. My Women
Reassigned Female (WRF) thus grows out of Michfest and the dialogues on
sex/gender it inspired in the feminist community. In 2006, Michfest
clarified that no woman would be refused the purchase of a ticket or asked
to leave because she was transsexual or more generally trans -- although she
was disrespecting Fest's boundaries in so doing.

However, while some of the dialogue may have been highly productive, the
conflict itself from 1999 on had some toxic aspects, sometimes exploited by
outsiders with no interest in the Lesbian feminist community who were out to
create and exacerbate conflicts between women, as in some sabotage and
intimidation evidently committed by an "anarchist" group in 2010, which was
quite frightening for the women at Fest. At least one women then present
later related that the main perpetrator was someone not a transsexual or
trans woman.

There seemed a continual contest between those who wished to defend the
"intention" that only WBF attend, and others who sought trans inclusion --
including some on either side who took part in intimidating and offensive
acts. All this distracted from the purpose of Fest, which was to celebrate
an autonomous female space and Lesbian feminist politics and culture.

Finally, in 2015, Michfest founder Lisa Vogel declared that the gathering
that August would be the last. She explained that Fest seemed to have run
its course, a tradition of 40 years, and that it was time to evolve
something new. Whatever role trans issues may or may not have played in this
sad development, there is a lesson to be learned from the stories of Olivia
and Michfest alike.

That lesson, which I had not fully learned when I took part in an online
dialogue in August-November of 2014, was that trying to change the intention
of a feminist group or space like Olivia or Michfest will almost always be
counterproductive. Respecting boundaries, and creating new groups and spaces
with boundaries addressing the needs and desires of those doing so, is a far
better solution.

This does not mean that reconsideration of boundaries is always wrong, but
that violating them or persisting in attempts to change them once such a
reconsideration has taken place rarely helps and can do immense harm. Thus
in 1991-1994, the expulsion of Nancy Jean Burkholder (for which Lisa Vogel
apologized in 2014) led to some mostly sisterly and respectful dialogues on
a policy which had not earlier been published and debated in the community.
However, when by 1995 or so the policy had not changed, those women who
could not support it (natal or transsexual) might better have sought to
create new and inclusive festivals on the Michfest model, doubtless with
many variations. Michfest might still have ended around 2015, since 40 years
may have simply been enough for Lisa Vogel; and the example of other
flourishing Lesbian feminist festivals with women by birth or transition
harmoniously celebrating a shared and diverse women's culture might have
caused Michfest to reconsider its policy on its own initiative, with its
boundaries respected at all points.

I mention Olivia and Michfest because they typify the kind of horizontal
hostility among sisters that has marked this conflict at least since 1973,
the year that I transitioned and became part of the women's and Lesbian
community, and also the controversy.

Using terms other than "cis/trans" to describe women by birth (and raising)
and by transition, e.g. WBF/WRF, can serve to build trust, center lifelong
women while recognizing and honoring newcomers, and show respect also for
the seniority of women by birth who prefer to associate in groups and events
for those sharing their situation only.

Margo Schulter
20 July 2018