Sandy Stone: The Empire Strikes Back

Background: Donna Haraway’s “A Cyborg Manifesto”

(1)   This article is NOT explicitly addressed to trans issues. Nor does it explicitly take up any of the views discussed by Raymond. However, this article outlines some of the key tenets which are taken for granted by Stone in her response to Raymond.

It is a foundational piece for “third wave” feminism that is grounded in post-modern and post-colonial ideas. (It draws specifically from the work of several

women of color).

(2)   A basic concern for Haraway is the fact that previous theories of oppression and resistance (Marxism, Socialist Feminism, etc.) offer a single, coherent vision of the world. The problem is that such “stories” tend to leave certain people out. They are actually told from a particular point of view which may include the distortions of the theorists who is herself blind to her own privilege.

For example, a (white, middle-class) feminist account of the world may represent oppression strictly in terms of gender (to the exclusion of race, class, and

so forth). However, insofar as gender and racial oppressions are generally blended together (think, for example, of gender specific racial stereotypes and

ways in which racial stereotypes use notions of gender and sexuality), the whiteness of the story is invisible (at least to the narrator).

(3)   For Haraway, the attempt to offer any single account of oppression/resistance is hopeless (indeed, dangerous). Instead, there are only multiple accounts of the world – all of which are incomplete and limited in perspective. Her task is to re-think political theorizing in a way that does not covertly involve the power/domination of the theories she criticizes. So she endorses what would have been anathema (utter defeat) in the previous way of theorizing.

(4)   Her “blasphemy” involves the figure of the cyborg; she paints a picture that seems utterly “dystopic” from vantage of earlier theorizing. For example, technology (especially medical) is viewed by theorists (such as Raymond) with suspicion. A universe replete with cyborgs represents a “nightmarish” vision in which technology appears to have already won out and conquered the human.

By embracing this mixture of human and machine, for example, Haraway is eschewing the “purity” presupposed in a conception which pits humans against

machines. In Haraway’s vision, nobody is pure. Everybody is already half machine, half human.

The “arc” of the accounts that Haraway criticizes involves a kind of original “fall from grace.” For example, Raymond imagines human being prior to the imposition of sex-roles. Similarly, the historical trajectory takes us to a kind of utopia salvation/redemption. The goal, for Raymond, is to undo this damage sex roles and find a pure self “underneath” the damage.

For Haraway, however, there is no “underneath”, no original Fall, and no utopic salvation. We are already “half machine.”  (Game over!) We can’t return to what never ways to begin with. That’s a myth!

(5)   So how is resistance even possible in Haraway’s vision? For her, the cyborg can always rebel against its maker. There is no guarantee what the cyborg will do. Like Frankenstein’s monster, the cyborg can turn against its designer. But there is no redemption for the cyborg, no return to grace. It is always already a mixture of the oppressor and the oppressed.

Haraway uses the notion of “double vision” (“Mestiza consciousness”) in which an oppressed person understands both the dominant, oppressive vision of the world, as well as other ones that are hidden “under the radar.” However, the oppressive account of the world and the resistance accounts of the world are incompatible with each other. As a consequences, one can have “double vision” which is effectively a single consciousness which holds a fragmented, incoherent picture (or rather pictures) of the universe in one view.

For example, consider a black woman who, among a white family for whom she works, is reduced to the stereotype of “the Mammy.” In that dominant vision of her, she is nothing but the stereotype she animates. She is cheerful, and willingly accepts her place in her white “family.” This picture of her can scarcely capture what she does when she is not with her white “family,” however. What does she do with her own children? Does she pass on the racist values which reduce her to a stereotype? No. She resists. But in doing so, she has a double-consciousness. She understands a picture of the world that reduces her to a stereotype. But she also understands a picture of the world that allows for her own agency.  It is precisely this capacity for double-vision which allows for resistance at all (according to this account).

Sandy Stone’s “The Empire Strikes Back: A Posttranssexual Manifesto”

(1)   Stone situates her work at the intersection of two forces – (A) feminist critiques of MTF transsexuals and (B) the medical establishment. She provides several citations from autobiographies and biographies of MTFs. She raises worries about two things: The sexist nature of the remarks; and the emphasis on a radical, magic transformation from the two binary poles (male-female). “No wonder feminists are suspicious,” she writes, “Hell. I’m suspicious” (p. 227).  (So she agrees with Raymond on this point).

(2)   She then considers the role of the medical establishment in producing a discourse about transsexuality. She claims that transsexuals have taken up this discourse in order to gain access to medical technologies. (One has to “prove” one meets the diagnostic criteria in order to gain access to the medical technologies. In order to do so, one takes up the views of the medical establishment). However, the medical account also reproduces sexist and binaristic accounts of gender. (So she agrees with Raymond on this point).

(3)   Stone argues that this monolithic medical story of the transsexual has buried other stories about trans people. (She is echoing Harway’s concerns about monolithic stories which hide the views that go “under the radar”). Her concern, however, is that there is no theoretical space available for transsexuals to speak as transsexuals.  Her goal in “Empire” is to open up that space.

(4)   Stone attacks the medical model of transsexuality which requires that transsexuals invent a fictional past and then pass as their gender of transition. She argues that transsexuals need to become visible as transsexuals in order to formulate resistant accounts (i.e. to speak out in a resistant way).

(5)   Stone’s most important accomplishment in this article is to open up a way to understand the oppression/resistance involved in transsexuality in a way that does not collapse into traditional views about sexism and societal gender roles.

Recall that for Raymond, transsexuality is first explained by dissatisfaction with traditional gender roles. For Raymond, an MTF is an unhappy man -  a man who dislikes his assigned gender role. In this way, all gender oppression is read as sexist oppression (oppression of people Raymond calls ‘women’).

            Stone begins with the view that transsexuality is positioned problematically with respect to the traditional binaries of man/woman. She claims that in order to

            articulate a trans specific subject position, one needs to use this problematic position to advantage. By seeing transsexuality as “beyond the binary”, Stone

            can reveal another kind of gender-based oppression - an oppression that does not reduce to sexism but which involves the oppression of transsexuals.

(6)   Rather than viewing transsexuality as a third gender, Stone argues that it be viewed as a third genre. By this she means to avoid any monolithic account of transsexuality. Instead she means to open up space so that many of the accounts which have been buried under the medical account (perhaps circulating under the radar) can finally be told.

(7) Borrowing from Haraway (and Anzaldúa) Stone emphasizes the postive value of "mixture" (and "impurity"). In Raymond's work, there is a yearning for a return to innocence prior the damage inflicted by societal gender roles. She imagines that people might have selves "undistorted" by cultural gender. She contrasts this (which she calls "integrity") with "integration." Integration involves mixtures and things strewn or sewn together. For example, she sees androgyny as as kind of "mixture" of masculine and feminine. For her, this involves fragmentation and damage. Consequently, she values the importance of a return to a whole self prior to the destructive force of gender. Stone (following Haraway) thinks that this alleged return to a mythical past conceals a dangerous tendency to provide a universe narrative of oppression/resistance which leaves out multiple accounts. Stone sees "mixture" (and "impurity") as inevitable. Yet it is precisely the "double vision" afforded by such mixture that makes resistance possible. (Note: Stone does not say some of these things explicitly, but it is inherent in the position she is taking). 

Some Criticisms of Stone

(1)   I worry about her critique of MTF autobiography. Notice that she draws mostly from ONE work (which was written in the 30’s). This work is plainly “over the top.” However, I don’t think she provides enough evidence to support her claims more generally. Her citations from the other works are minimal.

Moreover, I worry that she is engaged in “hunting down the vulnerable.” While she is right that the examples she provides indicate both sexism and a binaristic way of thinking, she does not note that sexism and binaristic thinking is socially systematic. No doubt she takes this for granted. But then it raises the question what motivates the select targeting of a vulnerable group of people. Instead of agreeing with Raymond-esque critiques of transsexuals, she might have asked the question why transsexuals are isolated as particular examples of sexism and binaristic thinking.

(2)   While Stone is open to multiple accounts, an announced position of her “call to arms” is one which presupposes unproblematic access to the medical procedures of transsexuality. Consider that there are trans people who may consider accessing medical transsexuality, however there may be economic, cultural, and other reasons which make a close fit problematic.  My concern is that while Stone wants to open the door for alternative accounts of trans people, the politics she recommends apply specifically to transsexuals who are a close fit with the medical model – transsexuals for whom access to medical technologies is not in doubt.

Consider cases in which economic conditions (and many other factors) make sex-work the only serious option for trans women. In urban areas, there are often visible public areas in which trans women work. In this situation, the issue of forced visibility (instead of invisibility) seems to be an issue. Instead, the issue is one of coerced visibility in potentially dangerous areas through criminalized behavior is the issue. Once multiple subject positions are considered, it isn’t clear that the politics remain fixed!