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The phrase “women’s sex-based rights” genuinely interests me, because in many ways it seems to go backwards in terms of fighting for women’s liberation.
In order to redefine the struggle for women’s lib to solely include cis women, issues relating to anatomical sex and biological reproductive function are focused on exclusively. These are obv. really important, but have never been the sole focus of any previous feminist movement
These demands have typically appeared alongside suffrage, sexual health more broadly, ending domestic and sexual violence, formal and informal labour relations etc. All the above issues are incredibly relevant to trans women, and can’t be solely attributable to anatomical sex.
It requires sacrificing these areas of struggle in order to frame the movement for women’s liberation as necessarily trans-exclusionary, when in fact “women’s sex-based rights” cover only a portion of the struggle.
Being discriminated against in the workplace doesn’t necessarily happen because one is “biologically female”, it happens because one is perceived as being a woman, which is why similar/worse patterns of discrimation happen for trans women.
It’s an aspect of how TERF theory is profoundly anti-materialist, like some other strands of radical feminism. The material oppression of women cannot be solely explained by bodily reproductive function alone.
