This post is "FYI only" for blahaj lemmy members. It is not a debate, and is not intended for non blahaj lemmy users to weigh in and offer opinions.
I recently received reports of a feddit.uk user espousing transphobia. Specifically, this was a feddit.uk user refusing to use the word cis, repeating the "adult human female" dog whistle, and claiming that trans women are not women. I approached a member of the feddit.uk admin team and raised my concerns and sought clarification of their stance on posts like this, where the transphobia is mostly dogwhistles, and "civil disagreement" on the validity of trans folk.
I was told by the feddit.uk admin that their preferred response is this kind of transphobia is to "sort it out through discussion and voting". However, the comments in question are currently more upvoted than downvoted, and little "sorting out" has occurred. The posts remain in place.
At this point, the admin stopped responding to my messages despite being active elsewhere on lemmy. When it became clear they were ignoring my messages and had no intention of removing the posts in question, I made the decision to defederate the instance.
I know some folk agree with the feddit.uk admins approach of pushback through discussion and voting, but this instance is not designed to be that kind of space. Blahaj lemmy is meant to be a place where we can avoid the rampant transphobia universally visible on nearly every other social media platform, and where we can exist without needing to debate our right to do so.
As a Brit myself, it saddens me how much hate is leeching from my country - especially towards minorities.
Thank you to the mods for making this community open so that people like me can lurk and learn to be better, while simultaneously protecting the people who depend on and need this safe space. Defederating was the right choice.
I won’t pretend I’m well versed in trans issues and struggles - I’m a cishet guy with no real skin in the game but I want to be an ally.
If anyone has good resources for someone like me to read so I can be better armed to refute and educate others who are being hateful, please let me know. The surge in hate after the recent Supreme Court ruling here in the UK has made it painfully clear being passive on the sidelines isn’t acceptable.
Huge apologies in advance if I’ve phrased anything hurtfully. I just want to learn.
<3
As an American, I understand.
I've had "trans bodies, trans selves" recommended to me for this several times, so I went and bought it. It's a whopper of a book though, 700 pages, but it gives an amazing background and insight for cis people (like me).
Thank you for the recommendation!
Delusions of Gender and Testosterone Rex are excellent books not exactly about trans issues but go into how much bullshit is spread that is unscientific about gender and hormones etc.
Thank you for the recommendation!
Sure, we are happy to help!