it's weird, isn't it, the strength of that response? Like you, while I know many trans people, both my contemporaries and my students, I am not close to any, so the visceral response is not on behalf of any individual person. I think it's an essentially protective reflex which I suspect may partially be an outgrowth of my own feminist convictions - these are ours, they are fellow women, they have chosen to identify with us, how dare any so-called feminist presume to attempt to eject them? Cue Mama Bear response. And partially it's a reflex protective of feminism itself: how dare you, you closed-minded TERFy bigot, presume to narrow and cheapen feminism by demanding the ejection of certain kinds of women? feminism is not about turning on other women! misogynists and fuckboys turn on women, other women shouldn't! Cue Mama Bear response again, this time slightly more in Victorian Governess mode.

I am happy that my ranting struck a chord with you :>.