Female Erasure

In different voices, this compendium of articles shows how transgenderism is erasing the reality of what it means to be a woman. There are some marvelous essays in Female Erasure that make this book the recent go-to analysis of gender identity as “an inherently misogynist idea.” Read the writings by medical and psychological professionals who tell us about the wrongs their professions have inflicted on transitioners, including children; the accounts of women caught in the vicious cycle of transitioning and the stories of young lesbians pressured to be ABF (Anything But Female); and the narratives of wives of men who would be women, wives who learned the hard way that “women are [not] actually real to these men.” These are only a few of the meaningful essays in this anthology that address the current travesty of gender identity orthodoxy.

~ Janice G. Raymond is Professor Emerita of Women’s Studies and Medical Ethics, University of Massachusetts and author of The Transsexual Empire: the Making of the She-Male.

As the liberal/postmodern dogma of transgender politics becomes the norm in more and more social and intellectual spaces, it gets harder to ask crucial questions, let alone offer a critique, of the sex/gender politics of that movement. Coming from a variety of philosophical/spiritual backgrounds, in a variety of literary styles, this is an impressive collection. All the writers in Female Erasure share a crucial commitment to rejecting patriarchy, which opens up space for the blunt, honest talk we need. Waving away these feminists’ questions and critiques with demands for “inclusion” won’t magically answer the questions or respond to the critiques. As a man who has come to understand sex/gender politics through radical feminism, I hope readers will not back away from the fight against institutionalized male dominance. Neither liberal individualism nor postmodern posturing offer much hope in the struggle against patriarchy.

~ Robert Jensen, author of The End of Patriarchy: Radical Feminism for Men (Spinifex, 2017)

If you believe that women, including those who have been sexually assaulted by males, should not be forced against their will to share their most vulnerable spaces with males, this book is for you. If you believe that reality exists and is more important than ideology, this book is for you. If you believe that if a little boy likes dolls, he is a little boy who likes dolls and should be loved as he is; and that a little girl who likes working on cars is a little girl who likes working on cars and should be loved as she is, then this book is for you. On the other hand, if you think there's something wrong with little boys who like dolls and little girls who like cars, and these children need medical intervention, then you really need this book, because it will help bring reality into the discussion. This courageous book lays out how the transgender narrative and phenomenon are an end point of patriarchy's hatred of women, the body, sexuality, and the living planet; and how it is the end point of patriarchy's valuing of what we think about reality over reality itself. But brave women (and some men) are opposing this erasure of women and of material reality. With truth and reality on our side, how can we not prevail?

~  Derrick Jensen, author of Endgame, The Myth of Human Supremacy, and A Language Older Than Words