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Contents

  1. Videos Covering: The Roots of Christian Nationalism & Conservatism

  2. The history of 'Degenerates': Degeneration (1898)

  3. The Hays Code (1930s)

    • The Comics Code

  4. NCOSE - National Center of Sexual Exploitation (Previous Called 'Morality in Media) (1960s)

    • NCOSE: Fiction Becomes Reality

    • Judith Reisman

    • NCOSE Direct Quotes

    • NCOSE Board of Directors & their beliefs

  5. Present Day Examples of Conservatism (Image Archive)

  6. Anti-Trans Groups & Their Links to Censorship

    • How These Groups Disseminate Propaganda

  7. Academic Books & Studies Deconstructing Abuse, Conservatism, Morality & Media Influence

​The following examples and image archives are pulled from public websites, articles, discussion boards and social media related to key conservative organizations, groups, movements, etc. that have had strong historical impacts or present day relevance due to their current influence on how people view certain topics. The main commonalities between these groups and individuals below are that they are founded and run by White (self-identified) Christian (or specifically Evangelical Christian) men and women who show open support for anti-LGBTQ+, anti-BIPOC, anti-Women policies while embracing Traditionalist, Ethnocentric and Nationalist tendencies.

​Note that many of the following example pieces from these groups and organizations focus on condemning existing media and stirring up anxieties of what it could potentially bring about by existing. However, none of these organizations or writers ever indicated that they followed up on previously made claims, particularly with major hit TV and book series. Did the sensation '50 Shades of Gray' ever cause an epidemic of domestic violence against women? Did the global sensation 'Game of Thrones' which ran from 2011-2019 with an average of 32.7 million viewers per episode (source: cnn) contribute to a rise in sexual abuse
or incestuous relationships? No such insight into the validity of their claims is ever examined or thought after. While they may emphasize the disturbing or scandalous nature of certain media, they do not share reputable studies or evidence that specific media directly causes increased cases of certain types of abuse they focus on.

Multiple documentaries, films and clips that cover historical origins, beliefs, acts of violence and political context of Christian Nationalism, White Nationalists, Nazis, Conservatives, & Alt-Right groups. (FULL LIST)

  1. 'Homegrown Hate' (Available Free) (2020) (ABC News) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCPwrnk66pM&rco=1

  2. 'Bad Faith: Christian Nationalism's Unholy War on Democracy' (Available Free) (2024) https://tubitv.com/movies/100020971/bad-faith

  3. 'Against All Enemies' (2023) https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/against-all-enemies/umc.cmc.6rulep4q4mvc6wfyy65halnv6

  4. 'White Savior: Racism In The American Church' (Available Free) (2019) https://tubitv.com/movies/100004979/white-savior-racism-in-the-american-church

  5. 'The Politics of Hate' (2017) (Available Free) https://tubitv.com/movies/100016569/the-politics-of-hate

  6. 'Birth of a Movement' (2017) https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B06XH67D8J/ref=atv_wl_hom_c_unkc_1_1

  7. 'Who Put The Klan Into Ku Klux Klan?' (2018) https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B07B9LWP8Z/ref=atv_wl_hom_c_unkc_1_28

  8. 'Columbus In America' (2018) https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B07GTH3N5V/ref=atv_wl_hom_c_unkc_1_29

  9. 'Policing the Police' (Available Free) (2020) PBS https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/policing-the-police-2020/?

  10. 'Reel Injun' (Available Free) (2009) https://tubitv.com/movies/667966/reel-injun

  11. ​'Subnormal' (2021) https://www.amazon.com/Subnormal-Lyttanya-Shannon/dp/B09G9TM2NY

  12. 'Liberty & Slavery: The Paradox of America's Founding Fathers' (2016) https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B081B9FVFH/ref=atv_wl_hom_c_unkc_1_27

The Unsavory history of 'Degenerate' as a term, specifically in relation to labeling media, art or people 'Degenerate' (1933) & (1898):

(CONTENT WARNING: triggering topics and language below)

Almost 40 years before Hitler, Max Nordau wrote a manifesto (see below) in 1898 emphasizing how artists, writers & creatives were a dangerous bunch who, while seemingly nonthreatening at first, could be just as destructive as thieves, murderers and sexual perverts by influencing impressionable women, children and the uneducated with their works.
 

To this day, White Nationalists, Nazis, TERFS, & Alt-Right groups and individuals regularly use the term 'Degenerate' in this fashion (often coupled with slurs and violent rhetoric) (examples below)
 

  • In more recent history "with Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, the systematic suppression of contemporary art quickly spread throughout Germany. Sanctions were created to forbid the exhibition and even the creation of any contemporary art not approved by the Nazi Party; such work was labeled, along with the artists who created it, as “degenerate.” In 1933 this art began to be displayed in defamatory exhibits intended to disparage modern art, and to link the Jewish race with the decline of German art. The culmination of these exhibits was “Entartete Kunst,” which opened in Munich in July 1937 and was advertised as “culture documents of the decadent work of Bolsheviks and Jews.” The works on exhibit included only a small segment of the almost 16,000 works of modern art confiscated from German museums on the orders of Joseph Goebbels, the minister of propaganda. So-called degenerate works by Pablo Picasso, Wassily Kandinsky, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Emil Nolde, and other major artists of the 20th century were displayed with paintings by psychotic patients and were subjected to vicious ridicule by the press and the German people, who attended in vast numbers. This exhibit was designed to contrast with a simultaneous exhibition of art approved by Nazi leaders made up of works executed in an academic style and dealing with typical Nazi themes of heroism and duty. After showing in Munich, “Entartete Kunst” toured to other German cities. In 1939 many of the confiscated works were auctioned in Lucerne, Switzerland, or sold abroad to finance the Nazi Party; the rest are believed to have been burned in Berlin."

(Source: https://www.britannica.com/art/degenerate-art)

Degeneration (1898) Quotes

Written by Max Noradau who was a nationalist (https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51161/51161-h/51161-h.htm)

  • "Degenerates are not always criminals, prostitutes, anarchists, and pronounced lunatics; they are often authors and artists. These, however, manifest the same mental characteristics, and for the most part the same somatic features, as the members of the above-mentioned anthropological family, who satisfy their unhealthy impulses with the knife of the assassin or the bomb of the dynamiter, instead of with pen and pencil."

    • "This phenomenon is not to be disregarded. Books and works of art exercise a powerful suggestion on the masses. It is from these productions that an age derives its ideals of morality and beauty. If they are absurd and anti-social, they exert a disturbing and corrupting influence on the views of a whole generation. Hence the latter, especially the impressionable youth, easily excited to enthusiasm for all that is strange and seemingly new, must be warned and enlightened as to the real nature of the creations so blindly admired."

  • "The verbose rhetorician exposes with more or less grace, or cleverness, the subjective impressions received from the works he criticises, but is incapable of judging if these works are the productions of a shattered brain, and also the nature of the mental disturbance expressing itself by them."

    • "In the mental development of degenerates [...] That which nearly all degenerates lack is the sense of morality and of right and wrong. For them there exists no law, no decency, no modesty. In order to satisfy any momentary impulse, or inclination, or caprice, they commit crimes and trespasses with the greatest calmness and self-complacency, and do not comprehend that other persons take offence thereat."

  • "there are, nevertheless, lower stages in which the degenerate does not, perhaps, himself commit any act which will bring him into conflict with the criminal code, but at least asserts the theoretical legitimacy of crime; seeks [...] to prove that ‘good’ and ‘evil,’ virtue and vice, are arbitrary distinctions; goes into raptures over evildoers and their deeds; professes to discover beauties in the lowest and most repulsive things; and tries to awaken interest in, and so-called ‘comprehension’ of, every bestiality."

    • "the scholar [...] is a constituent part of the governmental machine, and honours and dignities fall far more to his lot than to the poet and artist. The enthusiasts of the latter are youths and women—i.e., those components of the race in whom the unconscious outweighs consciousness; for artist and poet address themselves first of all to emotion, and this is more easily excited in the woman and the adolescent than in the mature man; their [artists'] accomplishments are, moreover, more accessible to the multitude than those of the scholar [...] whose importance is in general fully appreciated only by a few specialists"

The Hay's Code (1930s)

​​

Was written by a Clergyman and Priest

(The following are Quotes taken from Hay's Code documentation) (http://www.umsl.edu/~gradyf/theory/1930code.pdf):

  • "It has always recognized that entertainment can be of a character either helpful or harmful to the human race, and, in consequence, has clearly distinguished between: Entertainment which tends to improve the race, or, at least, to recreate and rebuild human beings exhausted with the realities of life; and Entertainment which tends to degrade human beings, or to lower their standards of life and living. Hence the moral importance of entertainment is something which has been universally recognized. It enters intimately into the lives of men and women and affects them closely; it occupies their minds and affections during leisure hours, and ultimately touches the whole of their lives. A man may be judged by his standard of entertainment as easily as by the standard of his work. So correct entertainment raises the whole standard of a nation. Wrong entertainment lowers the whole living condition and moral ideals."

  • "Art can be morally good, lifting men to higher levels... Art can be morally evil in its effects. This is the case clearly enough with unclean art, indecent books, suggestive drama."

    • "[Art] is the product of some person's mind, and that mind was either good or bad morally when it produced the thing. And the thing has its effect upon those who come into contact with it. In both these ways, as a product and the cause of definite effects, it has a deep moral significance and an unmistakable moral quality."

      • (Film then was seen like the Internet often is now, difficult to monitor and control:)

        • "Because of the mobility of a film and the ease of picture distribution, and because of the possibility of duplicating positives in large quantities, this art reaches places unpenetrated by other forms of art... Psychologically, the larger the audience, the lower the moral mass resistance to suggestion."

  • "No picture should lower the moral standards of those who see it. This is done:

    • (a) When evil is made to appear attractive, and good is made to appear unattractive.

    • (b) When the sympathy of the audience is thrown on the side of crime, wrong-doing, evil, sin. The same thing is true of a film that would throw sympathy against goodness, honor, innocence, purity', honest)'.

    • (c) That evil is not presented alluringly. Even if later on the evil is condemned or punished, it must not be allowed to appear so attractive that the emotions are drawn to desire or approve so strongly that later they forget the condemnation and remember only the apparent joy of the sin.

    • (d) That thruout the presentation, evil and good are never confused and that evil is always recognized clearly as evil... [and] in the end the audience feels that evil is wrong and good is right."

    • No plot should be so constructed as to leave the question of right or wrong in doubt or fogged."

NCOSE (1960s)  [Previously Known as 'Morality in Media' until 2015]

 

(More on NCOSE in "McDowell, Z. J., & Tiidenberg, K. (2023). The (not so) secret governors of the internet: Morality policing and platform politics. Convergence, 29(6), 1609-1623. https://doi.org/10.1177/13548565231193694) Founded by 3 Clergymen (1962)

  • NCOSE's About Page (as of 2023) States:

    • "Using every 'social media' tactic of the era, Morality in Media became the beacon of hope and light for those concerned about the insidious trend toward normalization of sexual exploitation in American culture. It worked relentlessly to educate the public about the harms of pornography and bring about the robust enforcement of federal obscenity laws. By the late 1980s and early 1990s, the producers and distributors of pornography across the country found themselves under federal prosecution...But what MIM’s leaders, and most others, could not foresee was the rise of the Internet... Indeed, porn-free spaces are increasingly hard to find. From television, public libraries, public and private schools, home computers, and handheld devices, the Internet and streaming capabilities have cast the shadow of pornography far and wide...We see that pornography is linked to sexual violence and is used to groom children for sexual abuse. We know that demand for commercial sex fuels prostitution and, therefore, sex trafficking as well. The connections go on and on....Our decades’ long battle against pornography, has also shown us that like the tobacco industry, the pornography industry has created a public health crisis. However, despite tobacco’s former widespread use and acceptance in American culture, once its harms became apparent, society took action and adopted dramatic new policies to limit the harmful effects of smoking. Similarly we believe that people need to be protected from pornography exposure and made aware of the risks associated with its use."

The NCOSE Board Members affiliations & beliefs (as of 2023):

  • Executive Director of NCOSE is:

    • Executive director of 'Americans United for Life' (Founded in 1971, the group opposes abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, embryonic stem cell research, and certain contraceptive methods. The group has been influential in the spread of so-called "Heartbeat" legislation across a number of American states.)

    • Legal counsel for 'The Family Research Council' which is designated a Hate Group by the SPLC for it's anti-LGBTQ+ views which have included labeling LGBTQ+ people pedophiles.

    • Director of Affairs for 'The American Family Association': A Christian Fundamentalist organization also listed as a hate group by the SPLC

  • A Christian Clinic owner:

    • their site includes links to 'Focus on the Family'. This site contains numerous materials to treat "transgenderism": "The growing transgender movement fights against God’s design for male and female"

  • The President of an app designed to monitor porn use on the web:

    • (visible by a parent, spouse or friend) to prevent people from viewing pornography.​

  • A writer for 'The Catholic Thing':

    • Portion of a 2019 article reads "We fast-forward to our own day, and we encounter the irony of a false idea turning on itself.  In the awful unfolding of the “culture war,” abortion has been deeply planted in the law, along now with same-sex marriage, and the drive toward “transgenderism.”"​

  • A Company Chairman who is an avid contributor to Republican politicians

  • A College Dean to a Private Christian University who believes sexual content in video games leads to assaults​

  • A University Professor who considers himself "Un-Woke" and "Un-Cancelable"; holds multiple anti-LGBTQ+ views

  • National Regent of Catholic Daughters of America:

    • "As Catholic Daughters and as citizens, we have the obligation and the power to actively support patriotism."

  • A College Professor of Gender and Women's studies who wrote:

    • an anti-trans manifesto which included "The trans-sex fantasy has imagined—and is enacting—a world in which how a man feels is more real than his actual reality. And now the fantasy has the weight of the federal government behind it."

  • A Doctor who stated:

    • "Internet pornography makes a perfect learning environment for the pornification of culture: It starts with permission-giving beliefs: “What I’m doing is normal, and everybody is doing it.” It miseducates about sex: it says it’s not about intimacy, caring, child-creation, etc. Instead, Internet pornography is about designer sex–the “perfect” and always-available bodies." ... "women exposed to porn are also trained that rape isn’t such a bad crime, and are more likely to accept rape myths. They reduce support for the women’s liberation movement. They’re more critical about their bodies and more likely to be victims of rape" ... "Porn is sex education for many people, and they’re not learning the beauty of the way God designed it."

  • A Bishop and Writer for a Religious Journal:

    • "It is about time that we as a nation finally admit to ourselves that pornography is not some benign “entertainment” that affects only those who use or produce it. In the era of rampant second-hand smoke which I experienced as a young adult, there were countless people who discouraged any effort to define carcinogenic smoke as a “public health crisis”."Four False Arguments1. “There are no victims, so
      no one is being harmed.: Pornography is not a private, victimless sin. It does serious harm to many people, including the person viewing it." "Pornography is not a healthy way to cope with temptation, nor a healthy way to relax. It feeds and
      perverts sexual desire, closing the user in on himself" "Women certainly have a critical role in this fight and should take a stance of absolute intolerance toward pornography, but in a particular way men need to be recalled to their God-given role as protectors of their families and of society if we are to overcome it."

  • A Former US State Attorney who argued this about Transgender bathroom bills: "“If you have a sex stereotype that you want to be like that day you just simply are that you identify that and that gives you the right to walk into a women’s restroom—and we’re the odd ones here?”"

​​

NCOSE, Extremism, and Judith Reisman:

[NCOSE Endorses Reisman who is known to be anti-LGBTQ+, firmly anti-trans, and wishes for America to return to the Founding Fathers' "Judeo Christian Worldview"]:

  • Quotes From Reisman's (2016) Work: 'The Origins of the Transgender Phenomenon: The Challenge and Opportunity for Training Lawyers, Judges and Policy Makers in the Historicity of Alfred Kinsey’s Pansexual Worldview':

  • "With the pedophile, bi/homosexual Kinseyan principle that homosexuality was an attribute of personhood now ensconced in the Supreme Court precedent, the stage was set for the next phase, i.e., dismantling marriage as an archaic, discriminatory institution that did not conform to the new, pansexual paradigm."

  • "Furthermore, advocates such as the late Dr. John Money, founder of the gender reassignment clinic at Johns Hopkins University, are urging an end to age of consent, which would lead to the de-criminalization of pedophilia and incest."​

  • "If gender identity becomes part of non-discrimination policies, the protection accorded by sex separate bathrooms, locker rooms and similar private places will be removed, leaving women and children vulnerable to predators who will now have license to enter their private spaces with impunity. Instances of cross-dressing men entering into women’s spaces illustrate how making such conduct acceptable could traumatize women and children. News report show the extent of the problem of women and girls being victimized even before gender identity becomes part of non-discrimination policies."

  • Other Quotes from Articles Promoted by Reisman's website:

    • (2012) 50 Shades of Grey - Pedophilia Hiding In Plain Sight

      • "When you read it, look for the signs. They are all there. The female character has no sexual experience. None. She is given the age of 21, but that age is itself a cover. Her true emotional age is much-much younger. She has never even masturbated. She has never even experienced an orgasm. That alone is one of the greatest attractions to the pedophile. That is the psychology of that kind of act. You get off on taking purity." ... "There is spanking and the use of Baby oil. Why baby oil? Think about it." ... "...she is absolutely convinced the book is purposely advocating the raping of a child and attempting to normalize that atrocity." ... "We are reading child pornography. Remove the false age of the girl, which has no basis in reality, and what we are actually reading is the abuse of a little girl." ... "Are women actually that shallow? Yes, we can be. But women, the vast majority of us, are not people who knowingly condone the sexual abuse of children. We do not condone in any way, the horror that is pedophilia. Sadly though, that is exactly what is happening with the popularity of 50 Shades of Grey.  It's a pedophilia con."​

    • (2015) 'The Harm Caused by Comprehensive Sexuality Education':

      • "every child or young person who views sexually explicit images suffers real harm."[27] This harm is irreversible on a child's brain." ... "President Obama, however, endorsed teaching "medically accurate, age-appropriate, and responsible sex education" in kindergarten as "the right thing to do."[33] Who determines what is age-appropriate for a kindergartener? Planned Parenthood? Local school boards? The federal government? Since schools have "obscenity exemptions," schools can expose children to sexually explicit material and deem it "age-appropriate" by their own standards."

Quotes from NCOSE Articles Discussing The (Alleged) Dangers of Pornography:

  • (2009) (How the proliferation of adult pornography contributes to sexual exploitation of children)

  • [An article linking the expression of adult sexuality amongst adults to enabling pedophilia. lack of evidence, personal assumptions, because minors may access something meant for adults it should be barred:]

  • Claims Made:
    • Perpetrators use adult pornography to groom their victims.

    • For many perpetrators there is a progression from viewing adult pornography to viewing child pornography.

    • Children imitate behavior they view in adult pornography with other children.

    • Perpetrators use adult pornography to sexually arouse themselves.

    • Addiction to adult pornography destroys marriages, and children raised in one-
      parent households are more likely to be sexually exploited.

  • “For the most part, however, these same…entities have turned a blind eye towards the explosion of hardcore adult pornography on the Internet and elsewhere…[T]hose who fight sexual exploitation of children but who turn their backs to the adult pornography problem are making a tragic mistake.” ... "He explains why it is a mistake for the Justice Department and FBI to focus their energies almost exclusively on child molesters and child pornography because of limited resources. “In the first place,” he writes, “the explosion of hardcore adult pornography is contributing to sexual exploitation of children in various ways. In the second place, children are harmed not just by predators; they are also harmed by exposure to hardcore adult pornography…In the third place…a frequent result of a successful federal obscenity prosecution is a significant fine and/or forfeiture of property…[which] can offset in whole or part the cost of these cases. In the fourth place…it isn’t just children who are harmed by hardcore adult pornography.”

  • ['Minor Coded' rhetoric:] "Mr. Peters observes that while hardcore adult pornography does not depict actual children, it does “include hardcore depictions of sex with persons who look like children"

  • [lack of evidence, personal assumptions, because minors may access something meant for adults it should be barred:] “Pornography defenders overlook at least three factors. First, much if not most hardcore adult pornography is consumed by a relatively small percentage of individuals who are addicted to it. Second, just because a person experiments with hardcore adult pornography for a period of time or on occasion succumbs to the temptation to view it does not mean he or she approves of what is viewed, especially when hardcore adult pornographers promote their products aggressively…Third, many visitors to ‘adult websites’ are minors.”

Archive of Examples

Common Dogwhistles & Arguments TERFs & Gender Criticals use:

​​

  • Often referring to women as 'females' in regular conversation. 'Adult Human Female' is an anti-trans dogwhistle.

  • The Human Brain Doesn't Mature Until Age 25: An argument to deny specific adults autonomy and healthcare (generally trans and autistic adults)

  • Usage of 'Groomer': Framing people who help trans & queer youth as child predators

  • Negative view of 'Fetish': Anti-trans groups believe Trans identity to be a mental illness and fetish. Their "official" terms are 'autogynephilia' (AGP) and 'autoandrophilia' (AAP). They will claim trans people 'fetishize' the bodies of women and men.

  • No Kink at Pride: This is once again a talking point used by trying to make gay men appear to be child groomers. Fear of children being exposed to sexuality is the center point, despite PRIDE riots being pioneered by sexual minorities (and workers) since stonewall.

  • Homophobic Straight Women: A term used by cisgender gay men who are against trans-men. They see trans men as infiltrators of their spaces who are trying to "trick" gay men into being in relationships with them.

  • TRA (Trans Rights Activists): Negative connotation and not a term used by actual trans activists

  • Their term for trans men: TiF (Trans Identified Female)

  • Their term for trans women: TiM (Trans Identified Male)

  • LGB (Drop the T): An alliance of Largely Gay men and Lesbian women who reject and exclude identities outside of Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual (although bisexuals are not largely supported by them either)

  • Clocking: The idea of being able to tell who is trans and who is not by physical appearance and behavior.

  • Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria (ROGD): not an accepted clinical term "coined in 2016 to describe an alleged epidemic of youth coming out as trans 'out of the blue' due to social contagion and mental illness."
     

  • Gender Essentialism: Claims men are biologically predisposed to be predators:

    • Claims anyone who identifies with maleness or masculinity (or looks the part) (including queer men, nonbinary or ‘masc’ people!) are inherently predatory, abusive oppressors
       

    • Claims that gay men are perverse, impure or gross compared to women (because they see ALL men as sex-driven and ‘porn-brained’)
       

    • The belief that women are incapable of being sexually abusive; Believe no male person (of any age!) can be sexually abused by a woman; which also leads to not taking women sexually abused by other women seriously (“That’s something men do”).
       

  • Anti-Intersectionality: With Gender Essentialism naturally comes racism:

    • Suddenly, BIPOC men & boys are incapable of being victims which allows White women in these spaces to deny their racial privilege and the institutional racism they historically participated in and still today benefit from.
       

  • Banning Media over Prioritizing Education & Awareness:

    • Ultimately believe banning fiction will prevent abuse; fail to address the fact that abuse was and still is happening in places where certain “problematic” media is inaccessible, and before mass media (film/television/comics/adverts/etc) became the standard less than 100 years ago.
       

    • Instead of prioritizing resources educating teen girls & women on consent and healthy real-life relationships, censoring fiction is seen as the solution.
       

    • Instead of prioritizing teaching young boys and men how to be good partners, understand consent, and have healthy real-life relationships, censoring fiction is seen as the solution.
       

    • Leads to Infantilizing & demonizing women: Women are framed as too foolish and stupid to know reality from fantasy and thus have to be protected from themselves “The novels are poisoning their fragile woman minds!”
       

    • Leads to Victim blaming: People doing this insist women who write ‘bodice rippers’ or erotica are contributing to their own and other women’s abuse. “What was she wearing?” Becomes “What was she writing?”
       

    • Leads to Giving Predators an Easy out: “Well she writes non-con fanfiction or erotica, I thought that meant she was into being sexually abused” “The porn made me hurt them, I didn’t make conscious and deliberate efforts to be abusive. In a way, I too am a victim of degeneracy.” (This is like saying music or a horror villain made someone kill people)
       

    • Leads to literally re-inventing the 1930s Hay’s Code made by religious, racist White men
       

    • Mentions of Porn Addiction or being Porn Brained: Often used to shut down constructive dialogue. Instead of discussing sexual topics with nuance they’ll just call people porn addicts to belittle them as simple ‘perverts’.
       

  • Fascist Buzzwords:

    • Unabashed use of ‘Degenerate’ or ‘Degeneracy’: Literally Nazi concepts. For example, doing a search for these terms on Twitter, dozens of first results were from White Nationalist, Anti-LGBTQ+, Conservative and Nazi accounts. Unsurprisingly, these terms are also often found being used among racists & on anti-porn accounts.
       

  • Being Anti-Porn & Moving Goal Posts:   

    • (See entire above section)
       

    • The Anti-Porn stance is inherently connected to conservative & religious groups that also prioritize banning media instead of educating. “Porn” as an idea is vague and can be considered anything (i.e., gay characters existing is ‘porn’, discussions of uncomfortable racial topics is ‘porn’).
       

    • ‘Porn’ as a concept in TERF spaces becomes synonymous with always taking place in real life, being inherently abusive and inherently heterosexual; Something only used by men to subjugate women. While there is definitely a constructive dialogue to be had here in terms of historical commodification of women’s bodies, misogyny, hyper sexualization in media and advertising etc. The arguments in these spaces are shallow & flawed as they aim to suppress iterations of what could be considered erotic or pornographic wholly ignoring the fact that queer pornography and porn women make for themselves are already systematically censored & suppressed. These groups are not protected but instead vilified.
       

    • Sex Negative: This largely leads to ultimately controlling how women express themselves sexually and horseshoes back to conservatism. Women who like porn/erotica or defend its existence are considered less intelligent. ‘Porn’ is a frightening and evil presence with a mind of its own that people must be protected from (Again removing agency; “I know what’s best for you”).
       

  • Communities built around trauma bonding:

    • In these spaces use discretion. While violence & abuse against women are extremely important to acknowledge and completely valid to be angry about, many TERFs focus on trauma bonding; Instead of focusing on uplifting other women they focus on feeding anger and building resentment.
       

    • While by no means is every instance of this bad or ulterior, TERFs weaponize women’s anger and trauma to get them on board with more extreme points of view. Keep an eye out for the other points mentioned in this Red Flag list in these spaces. Without fail, every time I would come across posts like those on Twitter, digging into the account owner and who they were following; there were always TERFs sprinkled in.
       

  • Demands for women to "De-center Men" / ​Complaints of women 'Centering Men':

    • The application of this idea of de-centering men in real life can be genuinely beneficial as it is meant to encourage women to be self-reliant, and prioritize their own lives and happiness; not sacrificing their autonomy, dreams and goals for the men in their lives (e.g., A girl who drops her life (school/job/family/friends/etc.) to move far away with her boyfriend for his new job. Or women who frequently give up their own dreams to be housewives).
       

    • However, many times these groups misuse the concept, instead wielding it as a bludgeon against other women, demanding women give up men completely. This even includes in fiction: Women shouldn't write fiction about men, Women shouldn't draw men, Women's favorite characters or celebrities shouldn't be men, etc. It does not even matter if a woman is married to another woman. Objectifying fictional male characters to empower herself is still viewed as bad because just the concept of a man (even if she has humiliates him or shapes him to be her ultimate fantasy) is bad because she is giving any concept of male-ness attention.
       

    • Additionally this demand may also be used against bisexual women by Lesbian Separatists who feel bisexual women to be traitors for dating men.

Examples of previously discussed topics below: