How I — a trans man — went undercover on a TERF dating site
It turns out the “lesbian renaissance” only has 85 people. No, I am not talking about the Renaissance as defined by Chappell Roan, Billie Eilish, Bottoms, and Drive-Away Dolls.
That Renaissance is well populated. It’s the Renaissance defined by Jenny Watson, a lesbian and self-described TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist) committed to the idea that lesbians can only be “biologically female.” My number comes from Watson’s female-only lesbian and bisexual dating and community app, L Community, which took LGBTQ news and Twitter by storm last month when it claimed it could identify and exclude trans women to a rate of 99.89% accuracy using AI-powered “sex recognition software.” As of Aug.
7, more than 60 days since launching, the website couldn’t even break 100 users. After reading L Community’s definition of biological sex – “biological sex is firmly linked to distinct reproductive anatomies dedicated to producing sperm or eggs for reproduction” – I realized that I – a transmasculine person– fit the bill for “adult human female.” So, I checked the box verifying that I was “biologically female,” snapped a picture of my face – and signed up for the dating app.
I didn’t shave beforehand, so my testosterone-induced stubble remained in the picture. Chest photos were not required so my flat chest raised no alarms.
