Is “TERF” a slur?

And other frequently asked questions about this transphobic hate group

Recently, Teespring decided to end the fundraising campaign of a trans woman when a group of TERFs emailed them and told them that “TERF is a slur.” The backlash from that decision resulted in a boycott of teespring as well as a shattering of trust between that company and the LGBTQ community at the beginning of pride month.

As this played out on social media, many people were just beginning to learn about the TERF community, and had questions about the word TERF and how it's used. In order to clear up some confusion, I present to you a small list of questions I've recently been asked about the hate group called TERFs.

I want to include a trigger warning, because a lot of this document covers really dark hate. The tactics that TERFs use are tactics that promote social isolation, stigma, and self harm. If you’ve been exposed to this type of hate, you may want to skip sections of this document, particularly the section “What do TERFs do?”

It should also be understood that, as I’ll be delving into some of the most vitriolic and harmful forms of transmisogyny, this document may seem very dark. I don’t generally tackle issues that are this dark, I like to spend time on promoting community building and inspiring revolution, but this topic is important and needs to be addressed in a neutral and honest manner.

I also intend this document to be living, and I’ll be making changes to it and posting the changes below. If you have anything to ask or add, feel free to contact me on twitter at @SadistHailey or contact me through the contact form on my website.

What does TERF mean?

TERF is an acronym that originally meant, “trans exclusionary radical feminist.” It was a label created by cisgender feminists as a neutral descriptor for types of radical feminists who exclude transgender people from feminist discourse, or use radical feminist discourse in order to harm transgender people, as opposed to radical feminists who were neutral or supportive of transgender issues and inclusion.

Many human rights activists and feminists now interpret the acronym to mean, “trans exclusionary reactionary feminist.” A reactionary is an individual who uses politics, often conservative politics, in an attempt to push back social progress, and therefore the term, “reactionary,” is considered more apt, particularly considering the dated feminism of the 1970s and 1980s that TERFs use to justify their hate. In the sense that TERFs wish to push the clock back on women's progress and feminism 30-40 years, the movement can appropriately be described as reactionary rather than radical.

What do TERFs do?

TERFs mostly organize online. While their favourite social media seems to be twitter, they also hold space on Facebook, reddit, and independent forums. There are a few real world spaces and organizations that have a strong TERF influence, but the movement itself is centered online and focuses on the online harassment of trans women.

As a group, their primary focus is finding trans women who are willing to engage with them and then subjecting them to harassment and abuse. They do this by retweeting or screenshotting trans women and sharing them with their own audience, and directing other TERFs to attack and harass that woman, knowing they'll engage.

The tactics of TERFs include attempts to trigger dysphoria as well as associating trans women with sexual abusers. The abuse is disguised as “debate,” but the intent is to cause psychological harm. Given the way twitter works, the abusive messages are re-broadcast to the victim each time a tweet is liked, and more hate is piled on with each retweet.

TERFs will say that engaging with trans women is a debate, but choosing to intentionally trigger trans women and cause psychological harm insures that the trans woman is unable to debate on an equal playing field, with the result being the silencing of trans women in the “debate.”

Many TERFs also choose to doxx trans women by publishing their personal information online and directing members of their hate group to harass that woman in real life, in her community and at her work. The effect of this is that the trans women who are targeted are unable to escape the abuse by turning off their social media.

This psychological abuse, directed at a demographic with a disproportionately high suicide rate, has the ultimate effect, perhaps even goal, of causing trans women to self harm or take our lives.

Why do people apply the term to people who aren't a member of this hate group?

Like the term Nazi, the term TERF is often misapplied, usually by allies, to people who practice all types of transphobia, sometimes even unintentional transphobia. This has the effect of diluting the term. It's so important that people apply the word TERF properly to refer specifically to people who misapply feminism in order to harass and harm transgender people in order to avoid the term losing its meaning. The term TERF refers to a specific form of hate and its important that transgender people and allies preserve the meaning of the words we use to talk about the different types of hate we face.

When you witness transphobia, you should ask yourself; is this a TERF, is this a different form of transphobia, or is this unintentional or casual transphobia? For more information on how to spot a TERF, see the section “what do TERFs do?”

Why do people apply it so angrily? What's the deal with, “punch a TERF?”

Much like other hate groups, for example, nazis and the alt right, there is a lot of pain and trauma associated with TERFs. Because TERF is a hate group, the term is used similar to other ideologies of hate like “fascist,” or “nazi,” and in radical circles, those hate groups are treated similarly. “Bash the fash [fascist]” and “punch a nazi” are given the same treatment.

While I don’t particularly believe in using violence to deal with hate groups, I have no interest in tone policing marginalized groups who are speaking about at the hate groups that target them, and won’t attempt to do so in this document.

Is “TERF” lesbophobic?

TERF applies to a specific hate group, not to a sexual orientation, and is not synonymous with lesbians. A TERF can be any sexual orientation, and there are straight and bisexual TERFS. Most lesbians aren’t TERFs, and the idea that TERF is a term for lesbian is an attempt by TERFs to co-op and represent all lesbians. Hate groups often claim to represent an entire demographic, as can be seen by groups that claim to represent “right thinking americans,” but unless you’re specifically a member of those hate groups, you should push back on narratives that a hate groups speaks for you.

Is “TERF” misogynist?

TERFs can be any gender, and although TERFS claim to represent all women, most women aren’t TERFs. TERF represents a specific ideology and therefore is not a misogynist term. For more information, see “Is TERF lesbophobic?”

What is the difference between transphobia, transmisogyny, and TERF ideology?

Transphobia is hatred against transgender people in general, regardless of their gender. Trans women, trans men, nonbinary people and many people of other genders can experience transphobia.

Transmisogyny is discrimination against trans women and transfeminine people. It has aspects of misogyny, transphobia and homophobia, but it represents a unique form of oppression. For more information on transmisogyny, you should read Whipping Girl by Julia Serano, it’s considered the quintessential work on transmisogyny.

TERF ideology is the misuse of politics and feminism to deny trans women their human rights, and to harass trans women online and offline. TERF is a hate group based off of transphobia and transmisogyny, with elements of outdated second wave feminism used to justify hate and harassment.

What is meant when people say TERFs are white supremacist/colonialist?

My understanding, from listening to indigenous trans and two spirit people, is that TERFs uphold the same binary bioessentialism that was used by colonizers to destroy indigenous cultures which recognized more than two genders. Similar discussions about binarism and colonialism are also taking place within the trans community, with some transgender people upholding a gender binary, and it’s important that we make space and center the voices of queer black, indigenous, and people of colour in those discussions.

As a white woman, it’s not appropriate for me to interject on this discussion, but rather listen to sisters who are affected by intersectional oppressions of racism, colonialism, transphobia and transmisogyny and lift up their voices.

It should be noted that people of color exist within the TERF movement, they often end up subjected to racism by white TERFS, and white people labeling the entire movement white supremacist risk subjecting TERFs of color to that same oppression they face within their own movement.

There are anti-semetic sentiments within the TERF movement, particularly by TERFs who espouse conspiracy theories about how “big pharma” is behind transgender medical care. TERFs are also known to organize with far right groups.

How can allies help?

If you witness your friend getting involved in TERF spaces, or sharing articles from TERF sites, call them in. As an ally, you have the ability to address this discussion in a way that gently nudges people away from ideologies of hate. Have difficult discussions, educate yourself on transgender rights, and try to change your friend’s mind.

Understand that because of the way TERFs work, your closeness to a TERF may represent a threat to your transgender friends. Your TERF friend may screenshot things that your transgender friends say on social media, and share it within their own circles, initiating an attack on your friend, therefore you may find your transgender friends needing space away from you, or you may need to make a choice between being friends with transgender people or a TERF.

Don’t make space for TERFs. People have a right to associate with whoever they like, and say whatever they like, but freedom of expression and freedom of association doesn’t mean freedom from the consequences of the things you say or the company you keep. If you invite a TERF to speak at an event or sit on a committee, you’re giving an endorsement to a member of a hate group and creating a hostile environment for transgender people. If your organization or event is trans inclusive, you need to make sure that the people you choose to work with reflect those values. You wouldn’t make space for a member of a hate group, don’t make space or give a platform to TERFs.

What about a civil debate? Can’t you agree to disagree?

A civil debate assumes an even playing field. Unfortunately, the stakes are much different between TERFs and transgender people. TERFs wish to take away the human rights and protections of transgender people, transgender people don’t wish to do that to TERFs. Agreeing to disagree gives consent to TERFs to continue to campaign against the human rights of transgender people, therefore it’s important to always be pushing back against TERF ideology.

A civil debate also assumes that transgender people’s humanity is up for debate. In many progressive spaces, we’ve already had this debate through the 90s and 00s and 10s. The debate is over, transgender people have a right to their humanity, and promoting the debate is reactionary and serves only to take away the human rights that transgender people and our allies have fought for and won.

The reactionary and regressive nature of going back to the time of debating trans people’s humanity also means that transgender people are subject to increased stigma and isolation. Given the link between stigma, social isolation, depression and suicide in transgender people, this is a debate with a body count. We need to weigh whether it’s worthwhile to go back and have that debate, again and again, and expose trans people to the same stigma and isolation, again and again.

Why fight terfs? Why not fight men who actually harm trans women?

Trans women often do fight against violence at the hands of men, but men who harm trans women aren’t organized as a group in order to fight to eradicate us from the public circle. TERFs, as an organized group, are trying to strip us of our rights. TERFs testify in political spheres and push for legislation to deny us our humanity. They fight against our right to medical care. They also attempt to harass us individually, and do so from a structural and organized space. By doing so, they uphold the work of the patriarchy, the stigmatization of transgender people, and the root causes of violence against trans women.

TERFs attempts to draw attention away from themselves and onto a different form of oppression are simply slight of hand tricks, similar to the Wizard of OZ, “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain,” and simply replicate the type of structural homophobia we see in far right groups when they say, “don’t fight for LGBT rights here in America, look at how bad LGBT rights are overseas!” It’s misdirection, we can fight oppression on many fronts, and we can’t fight one form of oppression without fighting the root causes of our oppression.

What is a SWERF?

A SWERF is a sex worker exclusionary radical feminist. They are a type of feminist who uses dated ideology in order to uphold a hatred for sex workers and the sex trade. SWERFs often claim to care about sex workers, but uphold stigmatizing narratives and attempt to pass laws that make sex work less safe.

The significance of SWERFs in this document, is that they use similar politics to uphold their views. They also often organize within the same spheres and publish on the same websites, and because of that, the ideologies often become inseparable. A common saying in transgender activism is “scratch a SWERF, reveal a TERF.”

Sex work is still a controversial issue within feminism, and not every feminist who opposes sex work is necessarily a SWERF. SWERFs specifically use dated, 1970s and 1980s ideology to justify their dislike of sex workers, organize with other SWERFs and are often extremely vocal about their hatred of sex work.

Being anti-sex-work is more acceptable than being transphobic and TERFs may hide their transphobic views but openly be SWERFs, therefore SWERFs can make a space feel hostile and unwelcoming for transgender people.

What is your connection with the TERF movement?

I’ve always been open and honest about my prior experience in the TERF community. Prior to transition, I became heavily involved in online trans exclusionary radical feminist boards. TERF boards operate off anonymity, so there’s no way to prove who is a member of that community and who is not. I didn’t participate much, but I absorbed a lot of the ideology, followed the discourse and tried to keep the peace. I even still have access to some of the boards, but I haven’t used it in years.

When you realize you're transgender, you often try to fight it in strange ways. Some trans women convince themselves it’s a fetish, some become obsessed with fitness, I developed an eating disorder and consumed as much anti-transgender ideology as I could in order to swallow my thoughts of transitioning.

Through my exposure to the community, I’ve developed an insight into how TERFs and SWERFs work, particularly in the PR sense. I witnessed as the community labeled itself “trans critical,” then decided that term made them look like a hate group, so they re-branded as “gender critical.” I also witnessed how some people have so much hate in their hearts, and how their entire ideology is formed primarily by hatred and how they spend almost every hour they have satiating that hatred online.

I think part of me still sees where the ideology comes from, and I could probably explain it in this FAQ, but I’ll leave that up to currently active TERFs. They don’t need my help spreading their ideology.

Is TERF a slur?

No, it's an accurate descriptor of a specific hate group that targets trans women for isolation, exclusion and harassment. Attempts to label it a slur by TERFs are Orwellian attempts to rob trans women of the language we use to speak about a specific form of hate that we face.

Oppressed people have a right to name their oppression, and if you feel offended by a term used to talk about oppression, you should internalize those feelings and reflect on whether the term actually applies to you. If it does, you should consider changing your attitudes and behavior so the term can no longer be applied to you.

If you would like to contribute to this document or ask a question, please contact me through twitter or my website. I intend this to be a living document, and welcome collaboration, expansion, corrections and questions from transgender people and their allies.