Paris Lees: 'At college, most people thought feminist meant man-hater'

There were plenty of feminists on TV in the early 90s, and I always sided with these tough ladies, the ones that didn't see men as their superiors. Raised by my mum, my gran and my aunty and bullied by a father I despised, child-me was certain that women couldn't be the inferior gender. Teenage me wondered why there even have to be an inferior gender – or, in fact, gender at all. Couldn't we all just do our own thing and be nice to each other? At college, most people thought feminist meant "man-hater". This excluded men from feminism, including me, because, at the time, I looked like a boy.

It was a figurative kick in the teeth being born male – but when I was younger, I also got actual kicks in the face for "acting girly". Feminists have long fought to protect women from violence and I wish more of those with big platforms would discuss the very real abuse trans people suffer, often daily.

Early into my transition, I read Germaine Greer's The Whole Woman. It contained polemics about trans women in female toilets; suggesting we were men pretending to be women, trying to invade women's spaces. It's good to read authors one disagrees with. Greer caused me to question my identity, and form a more complex one. She was right: I am not a woman in the way my mother is; I haven't experienced female childhood; I don't menstruate. I won't give birth. Yes, I have no idea what it feels like to be another woman – but nor do I know what it feels like to be another man. How can anyone know what it feels like to be anyone but themselves? Strangely, thanks to Greer, I now know that I am happiest as me.

I do feel sorry for some of the feminist old guard, though. That fire they had in their bellies, that righteous indignation… it must be a shock to find they've joined the ranks of a chattering establishment, complicit in the oppression of others. I'm sure they never planned it.

I'm trans and feminist. Most of my female friends in their 20s are feminist too, though few call it that. We see ourselves as equal to others, even if they don't. We struggle to earn the same as our male peers, to be heard as much, to see as much of ourselves in public and political life. But we've progressed, through feminism and the idea that people should be treated equally despite what fate pops between your legs at birth. Who wouldn't support that? As Dale Spender so eloquently puts it:

"Feminism has fought no wars. It has killed no opponents. It has set up no concentration camps, starved no enemies, and practised no cruelties… Its battles have been for education, for the vote, for better working conditions, for safety on the streets, for childcare, for social welfare, for rape crisis clinics, women's refuges, reforms in the laws. If someone says, "Oh, I'm not a feminist!" I ask, 'Why? What's your problem?'"

Well, here's the thing. The trans movement, fuelled by the radical notion that trans people are valid humans, hasn't fought any wars either. No killing. No concentration camps. Our battles are for dignity, not to be ridiculed, abused, and murdered for who we are; to have our privacy respected by the media, to be free from harassment under the law; free to use the toilet – free to pee.

• Paris Lees is editor of Meta, a unique digital magazine that celebrates gender diversity; she is also acting assistant editor at Gay Times

Jane Fae: Feminism as academic dogma is a very cold fish

The process of gender transitioning never ends. Along the way I have experienced joy and sadness. Most joyful, perhaps, is a sense that pervades and prevails over all the rest: "I'm home". Speaking it now I could weep at that simple truth, recognising, though I had never been there before, a place that in my heart I never left: womanhood. I am home to a place where people speak, share, support and engage emotionally in ways that feel as natural as breath.

Times two for feminism, where there's all that and common purpose too. Women from all walks of life, all classes, ethnicities, orientations and history, are joined to support each other as best they can. Those with power and privilege lending it to those without, those without banding together to create their own strength. There is something magnificent about it, something strong and resilient too.

I didn't get this before my transition because feminism as creed, or academic dogma, is a very cold fish indeed. The impulse is to engage with it intellectually except that, by engaging intellect alone, too often the point is missed. Feminism needs to be lived.

Then there's "privilege". Ah yes: I had that once. Living as a guy, I was safer, less subject to random street assault, better able to maintain my personal space, not judged on my looks. All major pluses. But apart from not ever really being a guy, I missed out work-wise, career-wise, and socially by spending too much energy on trying to live a role I didn't understand.

That's gone now. Being home, I function better. Life works, it has slotted into place. Do I mind my loss of privilege? Of course, but I've not joined the feminist bandwagon to get it back – as if! I know I have privilege that non-trans women don't, but I also endure oppressions that are pretty much unique to women of trans history. Women have different pasts, you see; different lived experience. But our lives also have many similarities.

Some wrongs that I never experienced before, I experience now: from being patronised and sidelined in meetings to feeling fear when walking alone late at night. Others, I hope I never will: the extremes of despair that result from economic degradation; domestic abuse and humiliation. For that, too, is the point. I can and do campaign on issues where I personally have been wronged, but I have a voice and empathy to use for other women in different situations from mine.

I am not here to lead or to lecture, but to join and to share. I have come home. I will defend it as fiercely and as long as I am able.

• Jane Fae is a feminist and writer on issues of political and sexual liberty

CL Minou: 'Feminism is an inclusive force'

I remain an optimist when it comes to feminism, and my own occasionally problematic place within it. Perhaps it's because I have to believe that the struggle to improve the lives of women won't leave me behind, and that if feminism is the "radical belief that women are people", then there's room for the radical belief that trans women are people too.

I believe in a feminism that recognises that oppression against one is oppression against many, and that even within the more narrow scope of misogyny, there are always other factors: race, nationality, religion, social class, age – we are all caught in a web of power relationships, and as nice as it would be to focus on one strand to the exclusion of others, that won't mean that you're any less caught by the rest.

Perhaps because of my age – I am a member of Generation X – I find myself caught between the faithless promises and never-ending culture wars of the boomers and the matter-of-fact egalitarianism of the millennials. But in the circles I have walked in, feminism is an inclusive force: they are feminists who not only accept my womanhood and place in their struggle, but are also willing to fight for the particulars of my own. Helen Boyd, the writer and activist who organised an online support forum for trans people and their partners, is a committed and no-nonsense feminist who put iron into my previously wishy-washy "people are equal" feminism. From Helen I came to the writings of bell hooks and Julia Serano, two authors whose books gave me the uncanny sense of finally putting on paper all the inchoate ideas that had been lurking in my own skull. These three women were the catalyst for my own writing and activism.

I think many feminists here in the US remain baffled by the exclusionary and prejudiced attitudes of so many prominent UK feminists. Perhaps it's a cultural difference. In north America, the vanguard of the 1970s feminists were followed by a group that had to confront the unexamined racial and class bias present in the women's rights movement. Maybe it's because academia has been less important in the civil rights struggle in the US. But I really don't see how, to paraphrase Audre Lorde, using the master's tools will ever tear down the master's house.

• CL Minou writes frequently on feminist and transgendered issues

Stuart Crawford: 'Trans people have unique perspectives on sex and gender'

I'm a transvestite, in that I often wear what are generally deemed women's clothes. I don't set out to "pass" as a woman; it's just that most people tend to assume that I am one and I'm disinclined to correct them. While often reluctant to describe myself as such, I consider myself to be a feminist.

Feminism means different things to different people. My own feminism is rooted in my experience of everyday sexism. Few things open your eyes to the disparity in how men and women are treated than being able to easily flit between gender presentations. As a white, not visibly disabled man, you are Default Human, able to walk the streets with a minimum of hassle. As an apparent woman – no matter how modestly dressed – you're an immediate target for catcalls, wolf-whistles, and grasping hands.

I feel relatively safe, for all that, when I walk in the guise of a woman. Over the years I've got pretty good at talking my way out of trouble. It's only when I have to spend time in close quarters with people that the fear sets in. Fear of how quickly the unwanted sexual attention will turn to violence if I'm "discovered"; if the wandering hands wander into something they weren't expecting to find. There's not much that draws out violence like causing people to question their own sexuality. Misogyny, transphobia, homophobia: these things are interwoven.

My experiences sensitised me to some of the myriad injustices to which women are constantly subjected. They prompted me to discuss them with my female friends, and gradually I learned about the ones my experiences hadn't prepared me for: the friend who was fired because, unlike her co-workers, she wasn't prepared to put up with her boss groping her; the friend who found she was being candidly photographed by fellow students on her 95% male college course; the friend who was raped by a partner; the partner who was raped by a member of her family.

Many of these friends are, like myself, hesitant to label themselves feminists. The transphobia of second-wavers isn't just insulting and offensive, it's also damaging to the feminist movement. Trans people have unique perspectives on sex and gender, and to exclude our voices from the discussion is to do feminism a disservice. The personal is political, after all.

• Stuart Crawford is a Glaswegian photographer and film-maker