Over on the TransAdvocate, I recently published my interview with Swedish researcher Dr. Cecilia Dhejne, author of the 2011 study, Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden. I did the interview with Dhejne because her 2011 study was being used by the right wing and TERFs alike to erroneously claim that trans care causes people to be suicidal, that trans women are rapists or probable rapists and that trans women retain “male behavior” in the form of a criminal predilection. Of course, the study’s author made it clear that those using her study to support such fact assertions are fundamentally misrepresenting her work.
Go read the debunking I did with Dhejne. I’ll wait 🙂
After having their erroneous talking points debunked by the study’s author herself, TERFs gathered on Reddit to discuss what must be a nefarious plot on my part to support a larger trans conspiracy against non-trans people. According to internet TERFs, Dhejne doesn’t understand her own study. VulvaPeople opines, “unless they messed up the abstract, they’re clearly saying that pre-1989 transitioners are more violent than men and post-1989 transitioners are as violent as men.” This user goes on to explain that I’m a well-known “MRA” that’s part of a conspiracy to have women raped, “Cristan Williams is a trans MRA extraordinaire. With all the really vile violent criminals seeking transition in prison, we’re supposed to believe that anyone seeking transition is harmless? Very convenient.”
Moreover, the fact that I posted part of an email conversation with Dhejne as proof that we conducted an interview merely proves that it was probably all a big hoax:
For those who aren’t aware, the radical feminist opinion leader Catherine MacKinnon did an interview with me. Apparently in the online reality TERFs occupy, I’ve somehow forced MacKinnon to stay quiet about the “misinterpretation and misrepresentation” of her interview with me. I’m not sure how they explain her trans-supportive interview with the New York University of Shanghai. Perhaps NYU is part of the conspiracy as well? BTW, in her NYU interview, I love what MacKinnon has to say about TERF nonsense:
I always thought I don’t care how someone becomes a woman or a man; it does not matter to me. It is just part of their specificity, their uniqueness, like everyone else’s. Anybody who identifies as a woman, wants to be a woman, is going around being a woman, as far as I’m concerned, is a woman. Many transwomen are more feminist than a lot of born women who don’t much want to be women (for understandable reasons), who don’t really identify with women, some of whom are completely anti-feminist. The fact that they’re biologically female does not improve things…
Many transwomen just go around being women, who knew, and suddenly, we are supposed to care that they are using the women’s bathroom. There they are in the next stall with the door shut, and we’re supposed to feel threatened. I don’t. I don’t care. By now, I aggressively don’t care.
Maybe radical feminists are part of the trans conspiracy too? I mean, a radfem did write the book on trans clinical care and another radfem laid the groundwork for Smith University to be trans inclusive. Anyway, back to TERFs telling a female doctor that she doesn’t understand her own work:
“The paper speaks for itself. Any attempts at spin, even from the author, are irrelevant”, proclaims user BeeeboBrinker. While everyone was sure their original interpretation of Dhejne’s study must be correct, Dhejne herself was derided as being too emotional, “‘Dhejne’ goes off on tangents and uses over-emotive language”:
The OP (Circle_of_chalk) — feeling reassured after their fellow internet TERFs agreed that they were right to suspect that the study’s author didn’t understand her own study and that I’ve likely conspired to lie (somehow, somewhere, someway, it’s never quite clear) about this interview — was happy to know their confirmation bias was actually tots unbiased:
H/T: GenderCynical
I want to thank you for this website and blog. I am currently writing a university paper on the prevalence of transphobia/transgender denial in Second Wave Feminism/Feminists and this site has been a great jumping off point for much of my research. Keep up the great work!
There are indeed many hasty interpretations of this study, and the first time I read it, I noticed that the study used non-trans people as a control. And in that light, they had higher suicide rates. Well, DUH! How about a more substantiative look that compares post-op trans people to their non-transitioning counterparts? That would be the only reasonable way to see what the effects of transitioning– instead of simply existing as a trans person– are.
But I digress. If trans women retain male pattern of crime, including violent crime, is it a fair interpretation to say that trans women retain a male pattern of violence? If not, what does the statistic itself mean?
The study *ONLY* compares conviction rates, not conviction category; moreover, this pattern was only observed in the first group whose cutoff was 1989. The study IS NOT saying that for the 1970s – 1989 group trans women raped and murdered as often as cis men. The study is merely saying that an oppressed group of women (some of whom were sex workers) was arrested at a similar rate to cis men up until 1989.
I am wondering if you could post the whole email interview? That would help immensely to ward off the naysayers.
https://mobile.twitter.com/transadvocate/status/721867351109607424
It doesn’t matter that it was independently fact checked. They’ll just claim that the independent fact checker lied. If I post an image of the entire interview, they will say that it’s Photoshop’d. If you look at the interview on the site, I do have a screenshot of the email. TERFs dismissed it saying that the image was probably fake. If I post it as text, they’ll just claimed that I edited the text. The reality is, TERFs believe what they believe because their belief tells them so.
Of course they will say that you are cheating, lying and will search in every dark hole in their subconsciousness to “create” evidences for this interview falseness.
If we actually look at their ideology and their hate speech we’ll see how twisted they are. And now to hear a person which ideology they used in their regular way of hate and lies, is denying their visions about her study own study… that drive them mad. It’s like when the atheists put strong evidences against believers. When you tries to “take” someone fundamental beliefs, the “victim” of that “crime” goes “hysterical” /even the men do it/, because they are nothing beyond their beliefs. Because they are the people who actually believe that they are nothing without their beliefs.
Beliefs born in someone else mind can’t define you!
HeehehehehehehehehehehheHAHAHAHAHAHA ! Genius going to the source Cristen. Already been viewed 600 times on my FB page.
TERFsplaining.
Female scientists “go off on tangents and use over-emotive language” now. They don’t understand their own studies. Only TERFs do.
Assuming God exists, God him/herself could swoop down from Heaven above in a burst of holy lightning and tell TERFs to their smug f**king faces “TRANS WOMEN ARE WOMEN YOU BIGOTED IMBECILES!!!” and you know they’d STILL find some way to claim it’s a deceptive conspiracy to discredit them with lies. Hell they’d probably claim Cristan dressed as God and paid Industrial Light & Magic $60’000’000 to create the effects.