I guess Fox News' resident transphobic Dr. Keith Ablow must have been busy elsewhere. In the wake of FRC's Tony Perkins suggestion that trans people in California will commit crimes in order to be sent to prison so that they can get the health care they deserve (and isn't that a shocking condemnation of our society all by itself?), Fox trotted out 'psychology expert' Gina Loudon to dish its special brand of transphobia.

Loudon, a tea party activist who became a reality star after she and her husband joined ABC’s Wife Swap (that's what I would want in a psychotherapist), insisted that it was “absolutely not” cruel and unusual punishment to withhold surgery from transgender inmates.

And the science is on my side of this. I’m not sure why the other side is deciding to be science deniers now. Johns Hopkins University ended their program because they realized that people who go through with the sex change surgery have a 20 fold increase in suicide rates as opposed to those who don’t.

Not true. Well, the fact that Dr, Paul McHugh closed down the Johns Hopkins University program is true...but the fact that he did so because of science is not. McHugh is an 'orthodox Catholic' who has spent his career peddling myths about gay and transgender people.

The McHugh piece probably qualifies as intellectually dishonest, because, whether or not his intent was malicious, his selective reading of the research on transgender experience and mental health presents a hugely lopsided picture of reality—a clear exercise in nudging the data to fit a preconceived bias.

--Nathaniel Frank

The single study McHugh cites for opposing gender-confirming surgery is nearly 40 years old, and he misreads its conclusions, failing to note that its authors explicitly state that “no inferences can be drawn as to the effectiveness of sex reassignment” in improving the lives of transgender people.

--Mari Brighe

But like Dracula, this myth just doesn't die.

Not to worry, Ms. Louden has Germaine Greer on her side. The Australian "feminist icon" was scheduled to speak at Cardiff University in Wales on Women & Power: The Lessons of the 20th Century, but the university's Student Union women's officer Rachael Melhuish launched a petition to deny her a platform which garnered over 1600 signatures.

Greer has demonstrated time and time again her misogynistic views towards trans women, including continually misgendering trans women and denying the existence of transphobia altogether.

While debate in a university should be encouraged, hosting a speaker with such problematic and hateful views towards marginalised and vulnerable groups is dangerous. Allowing Greer a platform endorses her views, and by extension, the transmisogyny which she continues to perpetuate.

--the petition

The 76-year-old Greer got another platform, on BBC Newsnight...to defend her views.

Apparently people have decided that because I don’t think that post-operative transgender men are women, I’m not to be allowed to talk.

I’m not saying that people should not be allowed to go through that procedure, what I’m saying is it doesn’t make them a woman.

It happens to be an opinion, it’s not a prohibition.

--Greer

Sure, 'trans women aren't women' is just an opinion. So is 'gay people are degenerate.' And 'women shouldn't vote.'

--Laurie Penny

Greer has claimed that being trans is a delusion, a view she shares with Dr. McHugh. She has denied that there is such a thing as transphobia.

Greer has decided she will withdraw her lecture at Cardiff.

Bugger it. It’s not that interesting or rewarding.

--Greer

Responses: Silencing Germaine Greer will let prejudice against trans people flourish by Zoe Williams

The application of this to the no-platforming debate is as follows: it is precisely because there is still so much prejudice against trans people that nobody should be silenced. In terms of social ideas, you progress from A to B – from saying homosexuality is aberrant, for instance, towards homosexuality is normal – not by shutting down homophobes but by argument, persuasion, rage and ridicule, openness and candour.

What Ms. Williams fails to note or mention is that transgender people do not get access to the platforms Ms. Greer has gotten. Her speech would not have been an argument or debate...because no opposition would have been allowed to address the assemblage.

Oh, Ms. Greer by Helen Boyd

[T]he thing I tell most audiences at the outset is this: once you know one trans person, you know one trans person, & that is all you know.

So Germaine Greer has met a few trans women and she has made a decision about all trans women, and she has decided that trans women are not women. She has also clarified that she did not say this to prohibit trans women from getting surgery or other medical treatment, and also clarified that she thinks people who transition are motivated by misogyny.

Which is what leads us to theory for a definition of woman. As a feminist, my compassion is with those who experience gendered oppression of whatever kind. My intersectional feminism respects that all women experience gendered oppression in different ways: for black women, for instance, gendered oppression is racialized. For poor women, gendered oppression is classed. For trans women, gendered oppression is transphobic.

I don’t know why Germaine Greer missed out on 30+ years of gender theory which allows her to posit that woman is a stable, universal, and identifiable category. I really don’t. It hasn’t been for a very long time. I also don’t know how she can be any kind of post structural feminist and not acknowledge that socialization is what makes a woman a woman – it is, in essence, what we raise females to be, and it is made of how we treat women, including their right to self determine, to have bodily autonomy, and to resist definitions of woman-ness that oppress and restrict them.

Germaine Greer is wrong. And her speech, whether she admits to it or not, carries a greater resonance – and a greater burden – because we expect such remarkable feminism and knowledge from her. She is not dismissable nor stupid, but she is still wrong. Because everything I know as a feminist is built on inclusion; ‘woman’ is an alliance, not an identity you choose; it is the sum of all of the parts of what it is to live in a patriarchy and to feel no power and a tremendous threat of violence if you don’t follow the rules. And if there is anyone in the world who is experiencing those things right now, it is trans women. She is not just upsetting people by saying what she says. She is giving those who hate trans women permission to make their lives more miserable. And there is nothing, NOTHING, feminist about asserting the rights of the oppressors over the dignity and value of the oppressed.
...
There is nothing to see here. Ms. Greer has left the building.