Going forward, you're absolutely correct. I would have fewer objections to a Gen Z trans woman being woman of the year in 20-30 years, because odds are she could have transitioned young enough to be subject to sexism in her career and therefore yes, we should celebrate her overcoming that obstacle, just as we would a cis woman.

Also I have no problem with trans women receiving awards where they didn't have advantages for being AMAB.

> None of this should matter, not for an engineering job, not for anything.

It does now, though, and it has for the majority of the lives of people under the age of 20-25. Cis women Levine's age HAVE experienced oppression. Erasing that is also bad. Trans rights (and queer rights in general) have progressed quickly enough that this change has happened within one lifetime, so things get a bit weird.

I've seen something similarly in gay spaces, actually, as a cis lesbian. Younger people seem to think that those of us who were old enough to live in an openly homophobic society should just...stop being affected by that. It doesn't work that way.

> The entire cultural war is completely pointless.

I mean, I agree, but I can't talk to other lesbians without trans women being the center of discussion so. Now we get trolling from everybody. It's exhausting.

I don't get the logic. Just because older women have experienced discrimination it doesn't mean that older trans women should too. I'm sure Levine had her fair share of obstacles too, but it shouldn't be up to some oppression olympics to decide who deserves what and when.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppression_Olympics

> Now we get trolling from everybody

I don't know what are you talking about, but feminist lesbians with anti-trans, gender-critical perspectives tend to be loud. They must be the sexual minority equivalent of kicking away the ladder after I got mine.

Of course not. But trans women who were in the closet for most of their lives or who didn't know being trans was an option had DIFFERENT oppressions than cis women or trans women who were able to be themselves at a younger age. And being AMAB did matter a lot more when Levine was growing up. Levine could get a credit card, for example. Levine, as a future scientist, wouldn't have had her teachers and parents telling her that her interests were inappropriate due to her sex or gender (now, she might have internalized the messages that girls received, which might have affected her, but those things would not be said to her directly and she didn't experience things like having a greater difficulty being published due to her gender until she transitioned).

A lot of awards for women are there to celebrate women who accomplish things in the face of obstacles and giving them to women who have not experienced THOSE obstacles is counter to the point. Similarly, Caitlyn Jenner was not discouraged from being athletic growing up whereas a cis woman was, so no, she didn't have to struggle for her fame in the same way a cis woman athlete from that generation would have.

Imagine giving a trans man who transitioned as a middle aged adult an award for being a man in a woman dominated profession (Like a nursing association declaring him 'man of the year' or something). That trans man would not have been discouraged from that path because of how he was born.

Basically, the logic is that the award isn't actually just about gender (despite being called 'man of the year' or 'woman of the year') - the award is 'person of gender X who did cool thing Y because cool thing Y is notable from gender X/rare from gender X'.

A lot of trans activists have a severe case of presentism where they react as though all of recent history should be looked at as though these things happened in 2022. They also like to strip context from things. Like it or not, Levine, as someone born in 1957, received advantages for being AMAB (from how OTHER PEOPLE treated her - I have no idea how she conceived of herself most of her life, that's private). Did she get ALL the advantages a cis man would get? No. But she also wasn't disadvantaged in the same way a cis woman would have been. Levine would never have had to worry about planning pregnancies/being fired for getting pregnant, would never have had to worry about procuring an abortion pre-Roe, would not have to worry about landlords refusing to rent to unmarried women, would not have grown up knowing she was limited to the 'Female' section of the 'Help Wanted' ads (which were still a thing when she was growing up).

It very much depends on the award. Levine's accomplishments are partially helped by her being AMAB, which is what makes an award for them kind of...gauche.

A non trans related example would be giving a cis lesbian (I am one) an award for balancing being a successful careerwoman and a mother. Like yes, obviously we can do that, but we don't have society or partners expecting us to do any of the domestic labor due to our sex/gender (since we're both women). So such a woman wouldn't have had to overcome the expectation she do the bulk of the parenting/household tasks. Awarding her that when she got to sidestep one of the major difficulties just reinforces that those difficulties are insurmountable. Does that make sense?

> I don't know what are you talking about, but feminist lesbians with anti-trans, gender-critical perspectives tend to be loud. They must be the sexual minority equivalent of kicking away the ladder after I got mine.

Basically, good luck having a space to discuss lesbianism without being overrun by both TERFs and newly out/chronically online pre-op trans women who want to make the entire space about trans issues. (I'm not making any statement about whether those people belong: lesbian trans women are lesbians). We can't have a space to discuss something like the difficulties in dating when your dating pool is minute without having TERFs shriek about trans women and some trans women bringing up girldick out of insecurity every 2 seconds. Both sides use us as a validation machine and I'm sick of it.

This is relevant because I don't get to step away from the culture war. It keeps invading the communities and groups I'm a part of against my will, and it's not always conservatives or TERFs doing it.

I kind of understand your perspective now. An award honoring women could be less appropriate for people who only transitioned later in their life, since they basically newcomers to being a woman. Though there are also awards that are for women, but for specific things, like flying the longest distance this year. Sport awards on the other hand can be problematic, because transgender women typically outperform women and by a lot.

This is a complicated issue I guess. One one hand it feels like maybe we don't need women-only awards, on the other hand women deserve a special recognition. I guess it should be up to the people giving the award. USA Today for example gave 12 people Women of the Year award in 2022, Dr. Rachel Levine was only one of them, she just kind of overshadowed everyone else because the controversy equals clicks.

> It keeps invading the communities and groups I'm a part of against my will

I don't know how it is for the lesbians, but for gay men you won't find an uncontested space, unless you go deeper into specific preferences. People are different, they want different things, like some people are into older people, bigger people, cross-dressing people, submissive people, more serious, less serious, not serious at all. There are millions of pet peeves, and the dating pool is about fighting your way through them. Nobody would notice an invasion by transgender men, just throw them on the pile. A lot of gay man are insecure, especially older people, nothing new there. I guess it's different for lesbians, or maybe it's just your communities, I don't know.

It is complicated and context dependent. Like awarding Laverne Cox an actress of the year/woman of the year award or giving Eliot Page an actor of the year award doesn't engender the same annoyance on my part since acting as a career is open to both sexes so Laverne would genuinely be 100% standing on her acting chops.

I do hope that eventually there's no need for identity specific awards and honestly, I find them a little condescending myself. But they matter to a lot of women I speak to.

The primary difference in spaces is that as a 34 year old lesbian, I can tell annoying, insecure, or assholeish cis baby or older insecure lesbians to knock it off. I can't tell trans lesbians that because then I'm transphobic (this has happened). They like to have it both ways: They want to be treated like any other lesbian until it's pointed out that they're ignoring social protocol, then they want special treatment. Ironically, TERFs do the same thing. Call out their trolling and then it's 'I can be here, I'm a lesbian!'

Gay men are less worried about group cohesion and more open about conflict than lesbians are. Both TERFs and insecure trans women take advantage of cis woman socialization unfortunately.

> The conservatives are obsessed with who's what color and gender, what they are doing in the bedroom or in the hospital, but we don't have to. None of this should matter, not for an engineering job, not for anything.

Tell me again, which side is establishing “affirmative action”?