🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1996May26.183439.24138@snugbug.cts.com>, jott@snugbug.cts.com
(Joan Tine) wrote:

>I judge Masters harshly as a _person_ because she is ignorant and has
>no breeding.

I disagree; her behavior on the nets may be less than
perfect--reprehensible even, but she is not ignorant.  I won't comment on
her breeding, because I have no knowledge of how she was raised.

She has always been abrasive, and has turned off people, including her
supporters.  However, given the circumstances on these two newsgroups over
the past few months, with the underhanded, vicious attacks on her by slime
like Hamm, drumwomn, and Haugh, I find it hard to blame her for her
reaction.

>I give her short shrift as an individual because she is
>a poor strategist: she has to fight every battle, even those which
>exist only in her mind.

True, but that doesn't make her less of an individual.  Sometimes,
important battles are won because someone is too stubborn to give up,
where a more rational person would have given up and lost.

>She can't let _anything_ go, which is a sign
>of too much punishment absorbed over too long a period.

Not necessarily, although she has absorbed a lot of punishment here over
the past few months.

<...>

>So there is surely some Zen role for the (sane) Lauras of this world,
>but their venue of action isn't in our community it's in the male
>strongholds.

Perhaps there is truth in that; most of Laura's venues has been in the
male strongholds--the government.

>I'd feel safer if we decided to do a little blockbusting
>in Joe Ball's Greasy Spoon if I was sitting next to Laura than in a
>posse of exclusively passable TS sisters, for the simple reason that
>Laura scares hell out of me, and if she looks anything like she
>sounds, she's useful for area security, *besides* being my choice for
>group spokesperson if Joe Balls wants to interlocute.

She doesn't scare me at all--and I know that how people sound on line has
little to do with what they look like in public.

>Laura is so
>predominantly male in her microcode that she would undoubtedly relate
>better to Joe and put him more at his ease than I ever could.

I do not find her to be male at all.  An angry woman, but not male.  In my
abortion-clinic escort and defense, I work with quite a number of angry
women, but straight and lesbian.  Many of them sound like Laura does--when
they need to.  Or it may be that they can turn it off when they need to
turn it off.  I've found Laura to be completely nonconfrontational when
she's not being attacked.

<...>

>As to Dana and Drumwomyn...are they even still _around_?

Dana has posted here once in a while right up to about two weeks ago. 
She's mostly lurking, it appears.  Interestingly, a search of Alta Vista
and DejaNews shows that except for here, she hasn't posted anywhere on the
net since mid April.  Also interestingly, both of those searches for
drumwomn show no activity anywhere on the net since mid April.

>I figured
>they have new aliases and a new group to assault now.  Am I not
>getting all the messages at snugbug again?  Related question: did they
>ever form their alt.indignation.orthodox.ts group?

If they did, it hasn't shown up on my ISP's server yet.  I doubt that they
ever did, though.

Getting back to the subject at hand, I find both you and Laura to be in
error in your appraisals of each other.

I dunno, for some reason, I can disagree with her on just about anything
(and there's a lot that I do disagree with her on--especially the
"internalized transphobia" theme) and tell her what I think of her without
pulling punches, yet she and I remain friends.  Maybe it's because she and
I are alike in some ways.

I have a reputation on other newsgroups similar to Laura's here.  I won't
take shit from people and get very offensive in my language when replying
to them.  Those who can see below the surface (and there aren't many who
can) understand that I reply in kind, but usually escalating the
hostilities.  Most of the people here on usenet are all talk and no
action.  I have very little respect for them--I have more respect for the
anti-choicer who is at the clinic, trying to promote his cause (but would
still rather not see him there at all) than I do for those who sit behind
their computer screen and just blow steam.

Laura has tried to do something good for the transcommunity.  We may not
agree with her opinions (heck, I strongly disagree with Leslie Feinberg's
Marxism, but I admire her work--if you haven't read _Transgender Warriors_
yet, do so), and with her methods, but I think that her goals (as I
understand them) are sound.  She is trying to protect us from
discrimination and oppression, and has worked to get transsexuals access
to surgery without being categorized as mentally or emotionally unstable.

Laura is one side of the coin that Hamm, Drumwomn, and Haugh are the other
side of--unfortunately.  I think that the latter three are much more
dangerous to the community, though--they suck people in with their
"support" and try to warp them beyond recognition.

I think that I've rambled enough.

--Michelle

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|      Michelle Steiner        | ...and then the day came when the risk  |
|      steiner@best.com        |    to  remain tight in a bud was more   |
| http://www.best.com/~steiner |painful than the risk it took to blossom.|
|          59 days             |                             --Anais Nin |
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