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This past couple of weeks here in Greeley, Colorado, folks on “our side” here have had to come up with a verbal shortcut of explaining why the trans panic (also called gay panic) strategy for defending a client, and why in states such as Colorado with transgender status (or gender identity or expression) included in the hate crime statute definitions, this strategy is so heinous.
As most here already know, a trans panic defense is one where a man argues that, after a sexually intimate encounter with a trans woman, he commits violent behavior against a preoperative or nonoperative trans woman because he was shocked he was intimate with a man. The man — the defendant — in question states he was so surprised to find out that the woman MAN(!!!) has male genitalia, that the man flies off in a rage and does violence to the trans woman in question, often killing her. At trial the defendant, through his defense attorney(s), argues that it’s at least partially the victim’s fault for not disclosing they were really male before the two were intimate.
Why this is a particularly heinous defense in states with transgender inclusive hate crime language is this: The defendant is using a protected status delineated in law to say that a crime he committed isn’t a hate crime.
In other words, it isn’t the defendants hate of trans people that caused him to kill a trans woman, but a heat of passion against a trans woman another man who was deceptive about her his true sex and gender. So in other words, it wasn’t a hate of transgender people that motivated him to brutally hurt or kill a trans woman, but the surprise that a trans woman he thought was a female since birth deceived him in presenting as female — it’s using someone’s status as a member of a protected class to defend against why a person wasn’t killed as a member of that same protected class.
So, we’re back to figuring out how to describe this in a simple parallel to define to people why this kind of hair splitting of motive is so heinous. I know I talked to GLAAD’s Adam Bass about this, and believe he was the one who actually came up simplest parallel to describe this, although I know many people here in Greeley what a simple parallel might be.
So, the simple parallel that was worked out for discussion with the media was the strategy I now refer to as the “Jew Panic” strategy.
Here would be the elements of a “Jew Panic” strategy: A white supremacist man goes out with a woman on a Friday afternoon that he doesn’t know is Jewish, and after sharing a kiss, the woman says “I need to go home now, as I’m going to the synagogue with my parents tomorrow.” The man flies off in a rage because she didn’t disclose before kissing that she was Jewish, and he’s so repulsed by the idea of kissing a Jewish woman that he beats her to death. Then as a defendant, that white supremacist, has his attorney in court argue that it’s not because he has a hate for Jews that led him to commit this crime, but instead because he felt deceived that she didn’t disclose that she was Jewish before becoming sexually intimate that lead to his “crime of passion.”
In other words, the white supremacist would be defending himself against a hate crime by using the dead, Jewish woman’s status as a member of the protected classes of ethnicity and religious creed with a defense that depended on her membership in those protected classes.
Does this “Jew Panic” strategy sound credible? So if ethnicity, religious creed, sexual orientation, and in Colorado’s case “transgender status” are all protected classes in the same hate crime law, why is it that a gay or trans panic strategy given credibility when a Jew panic strategy wouldn’t be given credibility?
Anyway, I credit Adam Bass for boiling this down into shorthand that can be quickly and easily explained to media and media consumers. If he didn’t think of this parallel, he definitely was key in developing this into a usable shorthand.
I leave tomorrow for home in sunny San Diego.
48 Comments
Well…While I think it does work on some level to point out how ridiculous any “panic” defense is, I think there are also essential differences to the relationship our culture has with religion, or race, that might make this a confusing conflation.
I think the panic defense is so unreasonable that when you deconstruct it for reasonable people they’ll see that, without having to invoke the history of racial or religious bias. The LGBT community has a history of trampling over other people’s experiences and history to make their point (see “Gay is the New Black,” etc.), so I’d err on the side of caution here. I certainly get annoyed when cis people pull up examples of issues affecting trans people to make a point about themselves, so I wouldn’t want to risk stepping on the history and experiences of others to make my point.
That’s my $0.02.
Unrelated, but thanks again for the coverage of the trial! You are awesome!
Right. That’s why the example is of someone who is already a hater as the criminal…It’s the preexistant hate towards a group that’s the reason for the hate violence, not that the victim is Jewish. Pick any protected class that has haters for that protected class, and come up with a defense for it –”African American Panic”, “Atheist Panic,” “Veteran Panic,” “Bipolar Panic” or “Poor People Panic.” The reason we don’t hear those defenses in court is because these days these strategies would pretty much be considered ludicrous at the face.
But somehow, gay and trans panic aren’t considered ludicrus at the face.
Avoid Creepy MenThis is why all gay and trans people need to avoid creepy men, period – as irresistable as it may sound.
If some guy is interested in you, but has to act all undercover (like he’ll only call you from pay phones), or gets really defensive if you consider him “gay” or whatever, then it’s best you leave him alone.
Maybe I’ve read too many True Crime books, but hooking up with some of these guys even for one night is enough to trigger some of them to get paranoid and eliminate what they just done in the bedroom, which usually includes eliminating YOU.
My take on ithttp://www.pamshouseblend.com/…
This is what I wrote on the gwen Araujo case/ The verdicts in the Araujo murder buy into the idea that Eddie “Gwen” Araujo was practicing deception, and that this ultimately led to her brutal murder. There is a strong likelihood that the murderers have been engaged in deception since they met young Gwen–first to fool themselves, then to fool their friends, and finally, to fool the Court.
The play, “M. Butterfly”, was about a French diplomat, allegedly heterosexual, who was involved for YEARS with a woman, who later turned out to be both a man and a spy. They even had a child together. The Frenchman claimed that he never knew she was not a woman. Curiously– but no surprise– some years later, the man came out as gay, no longer heterosexual.
That the Frenchman’s relationship went on without the truth being apparent at some point strains credibility, as do the claims of complete and gullible heterosexuality of Gwen’s murderers. It is possible that if she only performed oral sex on them, they were not aware that she was biologically male, though she had a life and a community of which these men were also a part. However, if she had anal sex with them, it is incredibly unlikely that they failed to suspect her biological gender. Most people do not have sex fully dressed with no touching or looking.
Gwen’s murderers were attracted to her precisely because of tendencies which they would not like to acknowledge, especially to themselves. She was “safe” because she at least appeared female. These tendencies are possibly homosexual, or possibly directed towards pre-op transsexuals; there is a plethora of pornographic websites devoted to just that interest. However, when others found out about Gwen’s true gender, histrionic outrage and brutal murder were the perpetrators’ only protection against public knowledge and scorn of their personal shame. For many people, a sin is a sin only if it is found out.
The real issue is our society’s absolute obsession with “correct” gender and sexual roles, and the fear and shame that obsession engenders. It causes violence against people whose only fault is that they cannot conform to the myth. Poor Gwen was a victim of our society’s servitude to it, as were the young men, whose lives and families have been ruined. How many more victims will we have?
panicTrans panic? Even Jew Panic? They both get my wtf face. Because he found out she was a transwoman it was okay to kill her? That is ridiculous.
http://stuffqueerpeopleneedtok…
You know, I’d half believe itAS ludicrous as it sounds, I’ve actually met people who with a straight face have told me they couldn’t be involved in anything not Christian. I remember sorority rush in college. (I went through the first round of rush and dropped out, but several of the women on my floor went all the way through and joined sororities.) We all visited all the houses. None had any religious bent any more, but there were two started years ago because at one time Jewish women weren’t allowed to join the others. One woman told me that she really liked the other women at one of the houses started by Jewish women, but that her mother wouldn’t let her join a house not started by Christian women. Even though in the past those Christian women had excluded Jewish women, so the Jewish women had to build houses where other women were welcome. It’s not that far of a stretch to think if someone wasn’t allowed to be in a historically Jewish sorority as a girl, if she had been a boy the prohibition may have been even stronger.
Just to play devil’s advocateThis analogy works on most levels, but I would point out two weak points in the argument:
The trans/gay panic defense relies on the word “panic” to hold up as as argument. For it to work on a jury, they need to believe that the defendant panicked, not became repulsed; in other words, he felt that his masculinity was threatened. Kissing someone Jewish (and presumably, enjoying it) would not threaten the man’s sense of masculinity.
Also, I agree with Aleisha that we need to be very careful when using this type of metaphor. April 21 was Holocaust Remembrance Day, and using this analogy right at that particular time could have been interpreted as either a bit insensitive or particularly apt and poignant (given that many LGBT people were murdered in the Holocaust), depending on the context and how the argument is framed. We need to remember that while the “Jew panic defense” sounds absurd to us now, the “Jew panic defense” could actually have been a winning strategy by playing into the anti-semitism that was pervasive in our culture not all that long ago. (Anybody here old enough to remember Father Coughlin?)
problem is misogyny That’s the real problem in all cases. On one hand, I don’t think of your scenario as realistic (for Jew Panic). Someone having sex with a non-Aryan woman would not have these issues, because she’s a woman. (Antisemitism has not prevented rapes of Jewish women.)
However, if you change it to a father (or mother) who finds our his(her) daughter kissed a Jewish man – now you’ve got something much more realistic. Think about all of those Black man (mostly back in the day) who were lynched for as much as looking at a white woman.
Having said that, I do agree with the general flow of your text.
Colorado SpringAutumn, I hope your stay in Colorado and especially Greeley was good. You met a few of the good citizens of Greeley. I hope they were good to you and everybody who stayed to cover the trial. You wrote of your concerns before arriving, I hope they have been allayed now.
Your experience included a week of “Springtime in the Rockies” weather. Hopefully that was not too tough on you, knowing that the weather in your home town tends to be fairly consistant. We do not lack for weather that is interesting.
Please enjoy your flight home carrying the knowledge and satisfaction that justice will happen.
Think “male privilege”In our society many people still expect a male to respond physically to challenges to his “manhood”. It is not only his “right” and “privilege”, it is his duty, and failure to fight back makes him “less of a man” to others. It then becomes a question of the means and amount of force used when fighting back.
On the other hand, women who respond with deadly force against men who have deceived them for sex are atypical: ‘David Wertheimer, former Executive Director of the New York City Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project, wryly points out,”If every heterosexual woman who had a sexual advance made to her by a male had the right to murder the man, the streets of this city would be littered with the bodies of heterosexual men.”‘ (see page 39 of “Allowing the “Gay Panic” Defense: The Importance of Making Sexual Orientation Salient” by Cynthia Lee, 2008, or you can find it in Chapter 3 of Lee’s book “Murder and the Reasonable Man”. Unfortunately, Professor Lee has devoted little study to “Trans-Panic”, an omission I mentioned to her after her abstract was available online.)
If you want more information on the gay and trans-panic defenses, Autumn, you have my email address.
Not really
A white supremacist being sexually attracted to a Jewish woman – finding in himself the potential to be a “race traitor” – would certainly be in a position to question his own identity. What is masculinity, if not one element of self identity? I don’t see it as a weak point in the analogy.
As far as the other point, sorry, I disagree completely. Both with what you said, as well as this:
How is drawing an analogy “trampling over other people’s experiences and history”? Every time I hear that, or something like it, I want to scream. Last night I listened to a woman talk about how the Holocaust was a “private Jewish pain” that only they felt, for 50 years, because no one wanted to talk about it. There were no gays slaughtered in the Holocaust? None of the Romani? No one with African heritage? No Catholics? No communists? No liberals? No socialists? No humanists? The arrogance of discounting nearly half of the people killed by the Nazis, and claiming it as a personal, private tragedy for only one group, is breathtaking. Just as arrogant is the presumption that no one can ever compare themselves to (fill in the blank) because their persecution and suffering is completely unique and incomparable.
I don’t buy it. Not for a second.
The most offensive thing I’ve read today (at least):“The LGBT community has a history of trampling over other people’s experiences and history to make their point (see “Gay is the New Black,” etc.)…”
How dare you level an insult and an accusation so completely unsupported and so utterly and obviously wrong?
Civil rights are civil rights. If there are some who wish to pretend that their civil rights are different from others, then that’s their problem and their bigotry. If some can’t see that the oppression of any is the oppression of all, then they obviously have a lot more to learn than they think they do.
Stop trampling over the LGBT community just because you’re offended that their solidarity with you cheapens, degrades or otherwise lessens your “special” victim status.
Get over it. Black is gay is Jewish is Islamic is whatever in the eyes of the people who hate. If it makes you feel any better, I assure you that you’re nothing special to them.
I agree with you“Trampling” is far too harsh and judgmental. It’s not like we are a majority.
I did not see that at first.
And I wish she would come back and debate me about that part of her statement.
?
Does black equal gay in the eyes of a gay racist?
Does trans equal gay in the eyes of…
Well, I think anyone can tell where this goes.
Or, well, anyone should be able to tell.
The LGB community (or, at least, those who have appropriated the right to speak for it) has a history of trampling over (with ‘trampling over’ here encompassing ‘ignoring’ – see AmericaBlog’s ‘extensive’ coverage of the Zapata trial) trans-you-name-it.
Respectfully disagree on some points, but…on this point I totally agree with you:
Keep in mind though, that that was one person speaking. The vast majority of Jews recognize that the tragedy of the Holocaust was not ours alone and that the other victims of the Holocaust should not be forgotten.
As somewhat of a side note, at least two of the major Jewish organizations in the US are strong allies of the LGBT community–the National Council of Jewish Women and the Religious Action Center of the Union of Reform Judaism are strong allies and send out regular action alerts supporting our rights.
Then hold AmericaBlog accountablenot the LGB community.
And I just hope you don’t think that straight black folks haven’t trampled over and whitewashed gay African Americans experiences? I’m sorry, but black straight folks treat me more like a nigger than gay white folks, IME. So let’s not go here, please.
I knowI first found out about the source of the pink triangle from someone who was Jewish. I definitely didn’t mean – and apologize profusely if I gave this impression – that all Jews are arrogant. My experience wouldn’t bear that out. It’s the few, like the woman last night, who either don’t think through what they’re saying, or are deliberately ignorant of the whole scope.
I apologize for the flamebut this type of shit really pisses me off.
No appology necessaryI know that you did not mean to imply that; only that the woman you mentioned had no right to speak for anyone but herself.
(In my experience, most of the Jewish people I know are strong allies of the LGBT community.)
They’re not wearing signs that say “creepy”The warning signs about guys to avoid aren’t always obvious at first glance, or even necessarily on a first date. Any number of vicious killers have appeared perfectly mainstream and respectable. Take the “Craigslist killer” who’s currently in the news. Or the lunatic who killed the three cops here in Pittsburgh earlier this month–virtually everyone who knows him has described is as smart, funny and likable. Part of what makes these men so creepy is precisely the fact that they’re so good at covering up their creepiness.
That said, I certainly agree with you about avoiding men who are obviously not comfortable with their own sexuality. That’s why I’ve always made it a point not to get involved with closeted men. The closet is a mental disease. Granted, it’s one that’s forced on us when we’re kids. But any guy or woman who hasn’t outgrown it by, say, college age has something seriously wrong.
You raised an inportant issueDon’t apologize! Whether people agree with everything you said or not, your post was from the heart and you are raising an issue that we often tend to talk around rather than address head-on.
Umm…The point is that with all other protected classes except gay and trans, you don’t use the protected class as an excuse for why one committed the crime; You can’t get away with saying that a minority member deceived you about their being a member of an identity community or a minority group as an excuse as the motivation for why you committed a hate crime.
Again, it’s not one’s membership in a group as to why a perpetrator selected a victim for a hate crime, but deception about being discovered to be a member of a minority group as a “reasonable” motivation for why one committed violence against as a member of a minority group. No body gets what you mean about “protected classes” until one starts plugging different hater catagories and different victim minority groups into the two positions of a “deception” based, blame the victim strategy.
That’s the only point I’m trying to get accross. We needed shorthand to do this to explain how ludicrous it sounds to use a victim’s status as a member of a protected class as an defense strategy that explains away committing brutal hate violence against a member of a protcted class.
I didn’t steal anyone else’s experience as a member of a minority group because our analogy was supposed to sound as ludicrously off kilter as it actually sounds.
For the record…I was agreeing with Aleisha solely about the need to be cautious and respectful in terms of context and tone while using this analogy, and I was speaking only to the specific analogy at hand.
Atumn, I was by no means saying that this is not a good analogy; I was merely playing devil’s advocate, as I said in my subject line.
“Trampling over other people’s experiences?”A history of it? What bullshit.
That is why I have always said, When I see or read the gay/trans panic defense, Do I have the right to shoot every straight guy that tries to pick me up? Even though I am straight, would it really matter?
This panic nonsense can grow even larger. If a woman who has been physically beaten up by a man. Would this give her the right to kill every man that scared her? You would be surprised how many people would grant that as a justifiable homicide.
Look at what is happening now in regards to torture. How the right wingers are trying to justify their use of it. This all makes me ill. The length that some people will go to justify the harming, both physically and mentally, or the murder of another human being.
And does it strike anyone that these people who are doing the most to justify the killing or beating of another human being are Right-Wing Christians? These people are claiming to be the most moral, loving and caring people on the planet.
If President Obama doesn’t see the need to investigate and prosecute those involved with these crimes, he needs to open his eyes. He is giving the green light to continue the justification of crimes against humanity, and this includes the lunatic panic defense.
Well, well…Autumn, first off I want to make it clear I did not mean my post to be taken as an attack, despite the response of many of the commenters. That people have responded the way they’ve responded to a comment which has such passive language (“err on the side of caution” – now those are fighting words) seems a bit ridiculous to me, honestly.
I respect your writing a great deal, however I don’t think this is a valuable metaphor. I think it is potentially confusing and alienating if misunderstood. Framing oppressions in the experiences of others is not a good strategy, and always runs the risk of being appropriative.
I am capable of disagreeing with people at the level of ideas, and I don’t take that personally. I hope it’s clear I am disagreeing with one idea here, and I agree with most of what you write.
…You know, if my comment was the most offensive thing you’ve read today, you’ve had a pretty good day I’d say.
I disagree, we cannot roll all oppression into one ball, because that allows us to never deal with our own shit or dismantle the complexities of individual oppressions. To do so is a very privileged attitude, and erases the experiences of those whose oppressions we decide are just like ours.
What are you even talking about here? This is ridiculous, nowhere in my comment did I claim any victim status. And, hello, I’m a trans woman and a dyke, I can be critical of this community and still be a member of it. If you want to imagine that the LGB community has an unblemished history with things like race, trans, ableism, etc., and as such shouldn’t consider being cautious about appropriating the experiences and oppressions of others, then I think that’s pretty myopic view and not really showing a great deal of respect or empathy for others. Personally I choose to err on the side of respect.
TrampleLook, if you’re going to focus on a word while willfully ignoring the context and the message of the entire comment, then fine, come at me like I’m the enemy. My point is this: As an oppressed minority we should be aware of and cautious of appropriating or erasing another’s oppression. Using the metaphor of another experience does that.
Sure, queers aren’t a majority, but if you think you can’t oppress or appropriate as a minority, then I’m not sure what common ground we have to start from.
Is appropriation ever a consideration?
You might want to talk to some trans people or queers of colour before you dismiss that as bullshit. Or people with disabilities. The queer community has a history of putting on a happy face of diversity when it is convenient, and throwing a lot of us under the bus when it isn’t.
My point, ultimately, was that despite that, as an oppressed minority we should err on the side of respect and caution. We should show real solidarity with other oppressions not by needing to frame them against our own, but by letting those oppressed by them define their own experience.
…
We can’t opt out of our communities like that. If this was about one blog post or lack of a blog post, that would be a cogent argument, but isn’t. That’s a reductionist argument, this is about complex issues and intersections of experience.
I’m still trying to wrap my mind around this oneRe: Obama and the torture memos. I just don’t see where he/the US has a CHOICE, no matter what he and the adminstration might say publically.
We are part of the UN and as such, subject to upholding the Geneva Convention rulings. If we FAIL to investigate in light of the evidence so far revealing itself, aren’t we essentially “aiding and abetting” criminal behavior?
Law is absolutely not my strong suit- but it IS the strong suit of many in the administration. Because it is distasteful does not give the Obama adminisrtation the leeway to give BushCo a pass…
You’re changing the subject.Your comment was about making historical analogies between different prejudices and hatreds. And you implied that making such analogies is equivalent to “trampling on other people’s experiences.” Additionally, you made the claim that reckless disregard for other people is particularly characteristic of our community. (John Aravosis’s failure to advocate for some segments of our community is an interesting and important topic, but a red herring as far as this discussion goes.)
Historical analogies are great thought-provoking tools. There’s always plenty to compare and plenty to contrast, and we can all learn a lot. It certainly helps to actually know some history, so that one isn’t glib when trying to make comparisons, but the idea that it’s inherently offensive to make them, period, is a dead end of counter-productive resentment–and more often than not indicative of unacknowledged prejudice on the part of the person taking offense.
I find your attitude dismaying and kind of nihilistic, actually, because it undermines the whole idea of a common humanity–that we can learn to develop empathy for one another despite all our individual and cultural differences.
…
But thanks for responding to everyone and keeping the discussion going. Sorry I was so, er, curt, in my first comment. Calling bullshit doesn’t at all do the subject justice. I should have said something more substantive.
I think the LGBT community is very unfairly charged with selfishness whenever we stand up for ourselves or even, as in this example, when we simply try to explain our experience to others. I don’t want to see any of us internalize that.
You might recall the republicans giving First Lady Michelle Obama a rationed of shit for her comment about this is the first time in her adult life she is proud of her country,
Well, I will always love this country, but I am not proud of what the Bush Administration did regarding torture. And with President Obama not aggressively investigating and prosecuting those who have committed war crimes, I am not proud of my country. What was done is wrong, and letting it go unpunished is wrong.
And yet there are a few reporters that have been arrested in Iran and North Korea that the United States wants released. We have no authority to request anything. We have set the new precedent that people can be arrested and held for no reason. The reporters could be tortured and there is nothing the United States can say without being hypocritical. The only way to have the moral authority again in this world would be to investigate and prosecute those who were involved in committing such crimes. And if that means a former president, vice president, secretary of defense, secretary of state, attorney general and/or others in top positions of the Bush administration being tried in a court of law, if found guilty, then sent to prison or even the death penalty, so be it.
This isn’t politics of the right or left, this is about the rule of law and right and wrong.
Please consider showing some respect yourselfYour minority group credentials, extensive as they may be, do not give you moral status to lecture everyone else. When you start off a discussion by hurling broad accusations without laying much foundation you are not being respectful, you are being provocative. When you use a post about transphobia as a soapbox to voice your own critique of the LGBT community’s history of dealing with POC issues, you are not broadening the discussion, you are hijacking it.
Unlike most other marginalized minorities, being trans means we have no native social or ethnic subculture to draw upon for support. We are like isolated exiles and expatriates, negotiating the fringes of other subcultures open-minded enough to welcome our participation. Because our own personal backgrounds fall so short of meeting our needs, trans people appropriate everything we can absorb from other people’s experiences and incorporate into our own personalities. We know that other people may think we have no natural birthright to become who we desire to be, but we’re past the point of accepting the identities they would impose on us.
…I never claimed “minority group credentials.” People are reading a lot into what I’m writing here.
This isn’t a soapbox about issues with the LGBT community and people of color. The post is about conflating transphobia with antisemitism, which I apparently seem to be the only person who sees as problematic. Calling addressing that hijacking is just a silencing tactic.
“Appropriate” in the context I was using it means a specific thing, regardless of how you’ve decided to use it in your comment. I’m discussing the dynamics of groups and oppressions, and to appropriate the experience of another group renders that group’s experience invisible. So what I’m saying, as an oppressed group we should show a great degree of caution at even appearing to appropriate another oppressed group’s experience. In my original post I suggested in very mild terms that we probably should not do this.
In all that I’ve written on this at no point did I say any oppression was worse or harder. I pointed out they are different, not a part of a hierarchy of oppressions. Just because we’re queers and oppressed ourselves, though, doesn’t mean we get to use imagery or context of the oppressions of others. Doing that places them in a hierarchy, as we engage our privilege to use their experience as we choose.
As far as my point about the LGBT community having a bad history at this stuff, the histrionic defensiveness at bringing it up seems to me to be making my point. Focusing on the word I used allows people to avoid responding to the criticism.
Keep going, I want to appropriate your whole riffI’m totally on board with your deconstruction of “conflating transphobia with antisemitism” as a type of appropriation . That’s exactly what I want to learn how to appropriate, that ability to contextualize my rivals as appropriating other people’s oppression (or even just appearing to appropriate other people’s experience and render it invisible). It’s such a powerful rhetorical technique, to appropriate a discussion into how it is not appropriate for oppressed people to appropriate other people’s oppression. And I can totally relate it to my own experience as a trans person whose experience as a target of oppression was a result my appropriation of the experience of women.
Well said, Happy.
You’re just choosing to demonize now…Now you’re just creating straw men, red herrings, putting words in my mouth, intentionally ignoring my point to focus on the words you want to be inflammatory about, and making me into, what, a homophobic transphobe because you can’t or won’t have a nuanced discussion of the way oppressions work?
This is ridiculous. You’re willfully ignoring what I’m saying to demonize me, and not then to have to address the point I’m making, if you even understand that point, which I don’t think you do.
No, you clearly don’t understand my point if that’s the parallel you’re making.
I really expected to be able to have a discussion of this here of all places, and not be attacked for dissenting or having a critical opinion.
For anyone who is still reading at this point, or who has skipped ahead, despite the popular rendering of me as a hateful a***hole, I have only said this – Using the experiences of another marginalized or oppressed group as a metaphor is a bad idea:
a) The mechanics of different oppressions work differently, and never apply directly to another oppressed group.
b) It is appropriation to take the experiences of other marginalized groups and apply them to one’s own experiences or claim them as your own. This is regardless of the whether the group adopting the experiences of the other group is dominant or another marginalized group.
c) Acknowledging that different oppressions occur in different ways, and respecting those different oppressions by allowing the groups affected them to own their experience does not mean any one oppression is worse than the other. It is merely that we should respect the experience of their oppression and not apply it to ourselves, even as metaphor, because in doing so we silence and erase their actual experience of oppression.
d) On the level of activism is can be confusing to conflate two experiences for people who aren’t a member of either group, thus reducing any value of the metaphor, while running the risk of offending the group.
I’ve been doing progressive trans activism for a long time now, and I’m used to heated discussions as we’ve struggled to find the best way to convey our message. I’m not used to, however, the degree of personal attacks I’ve seen here. Like, jeez, people… I disagree with a tactic because my personal framing of oppression suggests it is a bad idea, and suddenly people are taking tiny bits of my argument out of context as ad hominem attacks?
I’m not sitting here sobbing into my tea, I have a thick skin from years of dealing with actual hateful attacks on trans and queer people, but I am incredulous at how ridiculous this conversation became so quickly.
Thank youThe analogy makes sense to me, but my first reaction was to recoil because of this very issue.
…Thank you for acknowledging that we’re having a discussion of ideas and not escalating the language. The tone of my posts might have begun to sound more defensive, but if you look at the very first post I was trying to frame it in a very passive, subjective way, expecting conversation and disagreement, perhaps, but not this ad hominem demonizing.
Look, historical analogies are one thing, but even then you can really only talk in broad terms. The way this original idea of “Jew Panic” is being presented isn’t a historical analogy, it’s blurred to suggest that the experiences are the same, and I think that’s a bad tactic that will confuse and possibly alienate people from the group we’re using as an analogy.
I don’t see how I’m a nihilist, either, by suggesting we respect the experiences and oppressions of others, and that isn’t not our right to pick and chose from others’ lives and experiences the things we decide to apply to our lives. That’s not about undermining a sense of humanity at all, it’s about respecting their experience as we’d hope they’d respect ours. We can explain what is wrong with trans panic as a defense without using the experiences of others as shorthand.
As for a lack of empathy, I see it as a lack of empathy and understanding to expect to use the history or experiences of another group to make one’s own point. Really, how nuanced or deep is anyone’s understanding of antisemitism here? I’d guess not very, instead it’s based on very simple shorthand of popular representations of that oppression. Taking a simplistic understanding of another’s oppression and applying it to yourself does nothing to expand your empathy or understanding. It’s just consumption.
I find a great deal more empathy and understanding for other groups who face oppression and marginalization by listening to their experiences. I don’t know why the reluctance to apply those experiences to my life in ways that aren’t really equatable makes me less able to be empathic for them. That reluctance comes from a place of empathy and respect, but I don’t think anyone’s seeing that.
No, I’m no Miss Polly Purebread about the issue of appropriationBut as a gay man of color, I catch this from both sides, understand what my frustration is with the use of a word such as “trampling.” If that’s the case, then African Americans “trampled” over the Jewish experience and even, to some extent, the Indian (East exp.). So that history is really not all that rosy either. Nor did African Americans have much of an issue with the apporpriation of the women’s movement. But straight black folks all of a sudden have these gigantic issues with gay people appropriating? Please.
meaning that there were waysin which other movements for social justice appropriated, in ways, the African American movement for civil rights? I have to ask myself why are African Americans all up in arms this time. That’s all.
“Trampling,” to me, implies multitudes of gay people doing this.
Awesome work, taking notes as we speak…It’s the reflected counterattack I seem to have the most trouble wrapping my tongue around. That knack of silencing any objection not simply with sheer verbiage, but by objecting to any appropriation of another people’s oppression as silencing that people’s experience, without appearing to appropriate their silenced oppression yourself. I think it’s an especially appropriate technique for trans people to appropriate, since it’s never trans people’s oppression that other people even want to appropriate, another example of how trans people aren’t even given the opportunity to object to being silenced.
Also, what kind of tea would you recommend not sobbing into? Earl Grey would suit my ethnic complexion most appropriately, but its taste is so bitter. I’m rather partial to ginseng, but its been too widely appropriated to serve as much of a fashion statement at this point. Something with a Tibetan flavor would be nice, but I’d need some assurance there were no insects involved, as I wouldn’t want to appear to condone the consumption of animal products.
I think we differ substantially on……whether or not the comparison presented does actually imply or assert an equivalency of experience between Jews and transgender people. I really don’t see that. If I did, I would be much more likely to agree with you.
I’ve seen a few instances where comparisons of that type have been made in media, re: black versus gay experience explicitly, and they’ve made me uncomfortable. But far more often–and in this case, I think–the focus is on the psychology of the prejudice involved, not on the social manifestations of the resulting oppression.
And that’s the kind of comparisons that I was claiming can be useful–looking at some of the negative aspects of human psychology from different vantage points relative to our individual identifications and allegiances. Figuring out what’s different from situation to situation is also definitely part of the learning.
You’re correctSome of the most prolific serial killers were able to hide behind the mask of a decent person. Gacy killed 33 boys and young men, buried most in his crawlspace, and hosted theme-parties in his back yard. Dahmer appeared normal enough to police when they handed naked and drugged 14 year old Konerak to him.
I consider myself to have a sensible judge of character, which leans more towards NOT trusting people I don’t know. If I sense something peculiar about a person in public, I won’t wander off alone with that person.
TruTV In Session did.The light bulb went off in the the television reporter’s head when I used it with her. It’ helped explain to her, in language she could understand, why it’s wrongheaded to use the same protected class status that’s protected in law as a tool to identify someone as being “deceptive” for not disclosing their membership in a protected class. She used the example on the air, and she’s neither trans nor Jewish. It especially worked when that reporter used it because she was neither trans nor Jewish.
Aleisha, the point isn’t which hater and which protected class one plugs into the “_____ panic” defense, but I found that plugging different groups into two positions –besides the two of homophobe and trans (or gay) — was necessary for media folk to get why the “deception”/”blame the victim for not disclosing as the reason for a crime of passion” shouldn’t be tolerated in courts of law, and why we need more Justice For Gwen Araujo Act solutions to panic defenses.
I believe you’re looking for an appropriation of experience that I didn’t imply, and I didn’t even do. The point wasn’t that “Jew Panic” actually happens to Jewish people, if fact I was specifically saying that it didn’t happen to Jewish people. And, I was saying that it shouldn’t happen to trans people in courts of law just as it doesn’t happen to Jewish people in courts of law.
I believe, Aleisha, that you’re looking for an appropriation of experience where there actually was none. And, Aleisha, it bothers me a lot that you perceive that I appropriated another minority group’s experiences. In fact, I was saying that no other group has to put up with what trans and gay defendents have to put up with in panic defenses.
You stated above that it isn’t a good strategy and not a good metaphor, and yet I saw the metaphor actually work in changing how someone in mainstream media — someone who was both an attorney and a journalist — perceived the “deception” strategy of a trans panic/gay panic strategy is used by defense attorneys. And then I saw very positive coverage by all of the journalists of that cable network, where neither defense or prosecution specialists I saw on air approved of the trans panic/gay panic defense.
In other words, I couldn’t disagree with you more because I believe I saw it used in a way that changed coverage. I don’t know that for sure, but I certainly believe it’s true.
I agree we certainly can disagree without being disagreeable. But just be aware that when I say I’m disagreeing with you, that means I’m going to continue using this metaphor.
It may not work for you, but I see it as a useful shorthand. You haven’t swayed me with your arguments to stop my use of it, and after seeing it work in the real world in showing another reporter why panic defenses shouldn’t be acceptable, I doubt you’ll be able to.
another take on the “jew panic”I enjoyed reading your reports and observations on the trial, but i have to disagree with the “jew panic” analogy for a couple reason.
1) many racist and homophobes of that level are outspoken in their hatred. it seems a bit off that the jewish woman would not notice he was a klansman/skinhead/white supremacist. If she did know, it would be deception on her part to date him.
2)If the man is a white supremacist, then he may have a prior history of violence, which may destroy the strength of the analogy.
3) the jewish woman and society both agree on her jewishness
I think a better parallel can be taken from “an imitation of life,” where Sara Jane identified as white, even though she was classified as black by the rest of society. when her previously nice boyfriend attacks her after learning her mother is black, I am reminded of Andrade. sara and society disagree on her racial category. she lived as a white woman, knowing that she could be hurt or murdered because of the circumstances of her birth.
in response to appropriation; it can be done correctly. The user must be aware of the issue they wish to appropriate, to make sure that they are not being offensive. i think that what annoys people is comparing bananas to plaintains, same family, different tastes and textures.