NZ singer-songwriter turned vegan businesswomen, polishes her halo by bad-mouthing terfs.

Flip Grater is a New Zealand singer-songwriter, who enjoyed some success here. She is now a retail businesswoman, with a vegan shop/café called Grater Goods in Christchurch. I have been in there a handful of times, and found it very pleasant. What isn’t so pleasant, is the opinion piece in The Press she’s written about women who don’t think that men who say they’re women are women - i.e. terfs.

Flip gives us terfs a bollocking in her opinion piece, and then tells us how we have to be a lot nicer. And naturally she’s the shining example of such virtue. Why else would she write a piece for the mainstream media denigrating the ‘wrong’ sort of women, if not to use us to elevate her status amongst the ‘right’ sort of people.  

Flip assures the reader she’s a feminist, though. However, she’s the ‘right’ sort of feminist – i.e. the sort that thinks men who say they’re women magically turn into women. And, according to her, those women who don’t believe this – terfs - occupy one of the “most unpleasant spaces on the internet in 2024”.

Only a person who has never visited one of the places on the internet where men who say they’re women hang out, or seen screenshots of what they talk about and the sort of pictures and videos they post, would say this. I wonder if Flip would write a condemnatory piece about any of those places if she’d gone down a “two-hour long rabbit hole” into any of them? Or, is it just ‘bad’ women she’s brave enough to give the bash.

She has clearly never done any more digging than listening to what her social circle tells her, and as such thinks that terfs are the “underbelly of feminism”. Our concerns about men who say they’re women is just “irrational fear gone mad”.  Flip can’t understand why we don’t cut men who say they’re women some slack.

We know that not all men are predators, but that doesn’t mean we let all men into our spaces so that the non-predators amongst them don’t feel offended. Well, we didn’t use to, but the Flips in the world have let in men who say they’re women, so as not to hurt their feelings. Those men’s feelings appear to be way more important than any feelings women and girls might have about that. In an ironic twist, she admonishes us to remember that “feelings aren’t facts”, which, strangely enough, is what we terfs have been saying forever.

Oh, but it’s “cis straight men” who, in her own experience, are the baddies, not the men who say they’re women, and the “data aligns with my [i.e. her] experience”. Except it doesn’t. I guess her social circle forgot to tell her that.

To be honest, I’m okay to be the ‘wrong’ sort of woman in Flip’s opinion, because the ‘right’ sort of women are advocating more for men who say they’re women, than they are for women and girls. If that makes me a wrong ‘un, I’ll take it.

Her bad-women bashing, and use of language taken directly from the transactivists’ dictionary of words, terms, slogans, and phrases, has all been said before, of course. Even though there’s nothing original about it, do read on regardless, because it’s almost compelling in its ‘angelic’ disagreeableness.

Flip Grater is a musician, author and founder of the Christchurch plant-based foods business Grater Goods.

OPINION: from Flip Grater.

“Stand up for women!” the Facebook ad screamed at me.

OK! I thought, clicking to Learn More.

What followed was a two hour-long rabbit hole into one of the most unpleasant spaces on the internet in 2024: the terf movement. Trans-exclusionary radical feminism.

It’s feminists, a group I clearly identify as part of, but the irrational-fear-gone-mad, the I-understand-being-oppressed-so-this-isn’t-that underbelly of feminism.

The issue being raised in the post was the idea that new laws designed to be inclusive of various gender identities are a threat to women.

As I was reading the comments under the post I couldn’t help wondering, “what are you all so afraid of?!”.

The answer is clearly: men.

The truth is, women have good reason to fear men. Men have and continue to abuse and kill women every single day. So a level of fear around men is actually reasonable. But directing that fear at the trans community is wildly misplaced.

And making legislative decisions or Facebook ads based on unfounded fears is hugely irresponsible.

The scenario this group seems to be concerned with is men pretending to be women in order to enter women’s spaces and cause harm. Which, let’s be clear, is a purely fictional fear based on nothing at all.

Predators don’t need to pretend to be women in order to prey. They only need to pretend to be decent humans.

Many people have hurt me over my lifetime. Nearly all of them were cis straight men. Not an ounce of harm has come to me via a queer man, a trans woman or a non-binary person. Which is anecdotal, yes, but the data aligns with my experience.

I do understand some of the discomfort that feeds this bigotry, though.

Years ago I went to a drag show at the Isaac Theatre Royal with a dear friend.

I enjoyed the show but there was also a little angst gnawing at me.

On the walk home I confessed the content of the cogs that were turning within. Part of me was jealous at the blatant joyful expression of feminine energy, of appearance and behaviours so extremely feminine I’ve been trained to judge them, hate them, avoid them in order to be “appropriate” or taken seriously. And a little part of me felt like the performer didn’t have a right to them.

I said, “women are living everyday with the realities of being women. With fear and oppression, with misogyny and inequality. But we ‘get’ to have femininity. That white guy is walking around being a dude in the world and enjoying all the things that brings. So what right does he have to also get to have femininity?”

My friend patiently explained, “Femininity doesn’t belong to you. Just like masculinity doesn’t belong to me.”

A simple explanation that changed my brain on the spot.

Our knee-jerk reaction to things isn’t our best selves, it’s our conditioning.

All harm done by one group to another group throughout history has been due to conditioning, not inherent differences.

Society has taught us to hate and judge women, and fear and revere men. The patriarchal structure relies on us continuing to believe that everybody is strictly one or the other, so that we know how to feel about and respond to everyone around us. Otherwise how could we possibly know who to subjugate or fear? Flirt with or fight with? It all gets very tricky when anyone could be anything.

After that theatre show I started gobbling up gender conversations and commenced a journey of learning to love all the parts of myself and others - the things we call “feminine” and the things we call “masculine”. I’m still working on it.

Gender isn’t simple. And people don’t disappear just because you feel uncomfortable about their existence. So we can choose to either show up in this world with cruelty or kindness. To be exclusive or inclusive.

Rights aren’t zero sum. Trans women’s rights are women’s rights.

Trans rights are human rights. Let me channel Oprah for a second and joyously declare, “you get rights! And you get rights! And you get rights!”.

Trans leaders are currently teaching an absolute masterclass in self-love, acceptance and non-violent activism to the world if we’re open to hearing it.

At the end of the day, however you currently feel around these issues, remember that feelings aren’t facts.

Don’t let fear destroy your humanity and empathy. Stay curious and kind. Believe it or not, that community doesn’t actually need your every reckon around the nuances of gender affirming healthcare, hormone levels in sports, and bathrooms without urinals.

What thought leaders in the trans and non binary space are offering us all is, in fact, the ultimate key to our humanity. The idea that love and self-expression could expand far beyond what we have previously imagined. That it could even be boundary-less.

Cutting through the conditioning to see the true lessons of gender identity | The Press