TERF () is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist. First recorded in 2008, the term TERF was originally used to distinguish transgender-inclusive feminists from a group of radical feminists who reject the position that trans women are women, reject the inclusion of trans women in women's spaces, and oppose transgender rights legislation. Trans-inclusive feminists assert that these ideas and positions are transphobic and discriminatory towards transgender people. The use of the term TERF has since broadened to include reference to people with trans-exclusionary views who are not necessarily involved with radical feminism. In the 2020s, the term "trans-exclusionary radical feminism" is used synonymously with or overlaps with "gender-critical feminism". Though TERF was created to be a "deliberately technically neutral description", the term is now often considered pejorative. The term has been widely adopted in academia. People labeled TERFs often reject the label, instead describing their beliefs as gender critical.
Origin Trans-inclusive radical feminist blogger Viv Smythe has been credited with creating and popularizing the term in 2008 as an online shorthand. The first recorded use of the term was in a blog post she wrote reacting to the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival's policy of denying admittance to trans women. In 2014, Smythe recalled that she and another user, "Lauredhel", had been privately using the term in private chatrooms before that blog post, and believed that it may have been adapted or adopted from an IRC discussion involving other individuals. In the blog post, Smythe wrote that she rejected the alignment of all radical feminists with "trans-exclusionary radfem (TERF) activists". It was used to describe those feminists who espouse sentiments that other feminists consider transphobic, including the view that trans women are men, opposition to transgender rights, and the exclusion of trans women in women's spaces and organizations. These viewpoints have been alleged to be divergent from the majority of feminist organizations. In a 2014 interview with Cristan Williams of The TransAdvocate blog, Smythe – using her net-pseudonym "TigTog" – said:
It was meant to be a deliberately technically neutral description of an activist grouping. We wanted a way to distinguish TERFs from other radfems with whom we engaged who were trans*-positive/neutral, because we had several years of history of engaging productively/substantively with non-TERF radfems...
Usage Smythe initially used TERF to refer to a particular type of feminist whom she characterized as "unwilling to recognise trans women as sisters". She also notes that the term has taken on additional connotations and that it has been "weaponised at times" by both inclusionary and exclusionary groups. The term has since become an established part of the contemporary feminist language, but its usage is contested. Cristan Williams writes in The SAGE Encyclopedia of Trans Studies that "the term has been rhetorically helpful in distinguishing TERF activism from the long-term radical feminist community members who are inclusive of trans women." Several writers have observed that TERF can be used in broader senses to refer to trans-exclusionary feminists who are not radical, people with a certain kind of trans-exclusionary politics regardless of whether they are radical feminists or even things that are culturally associated with second-wave feminism in general. Kara Dansky, a gender-critical feminist, stated that "many feminists have chosen to reclaim the term TERF". The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) added an entry for TERF (noun) in June 2022, which states that although the term was first intended as a neutral descriptor, it is "now typically regarded as derogatory". OED editor Fiona McPherson explained that because "there is a little bit more nuance behind its usage – it's not always just a straight-out insult", the dictionary's editors opted to explain this rather than simply label the term "derogatory" or "chiefly derogatory". In 2023, the AP Stylebook advised journalists to avoid the term, deeming it "vague and politicized."
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