There is a lot to say about this post about "why queer theory is bad for trans people", but right at the start I got stuck at the following:

//The fundamental reason why queer theory is bad for LGBT people is because it is ideological, i.e. it is rooted in certain philosophical commitments rather than empirical reality or the actual lived experience of LGBT people.//

It is impossible for anyone to discuss anything with some kind of preconception or given paradigm. That paradigm will always have some kind of philosophical component, a narrative and a language, if you will.

This understanding may be explicit, as in a philosophical theory, or it may be implicit - that is "given" or seen as "self-evident".

When preconceptions are taken as given, that is when the pre-judices, for good and for bad, take over.

It is much better to discuss a well thought out philosophical theory than implicit, unconscious, ideas and narratives.

There is no "empirical reality" completely disconnected from narratives, concepts and philosophy.

You need a theory to interpret "empirical data", and that theory will be made by people, who all inherit concepts, ideas and philosophies from the past.

These days we see TERFs trying to disconnect "empirical science" from philosophy and the end result is a stream of bigoted prejudices disguised as banal pseudo-science. We, as queer and trans people, must be much better than that.

//As a trans person, I can say that my life experience of the world does not agree with the postmodern worldview. I simply don’t see how language games will change anything.//

I am not buying into everything Foucault said or wrote, but he gave us powerful tools to analyze oppression and the brutal ways existing power structures hold outsiders down.

You are suffering from gender based oppression every single day because of the way the insiders control language.

"Gender is nothing more than biological sex", "biological sex is nothing more than binary genitals", "transgender people do not exist", "trans people are perverts". This is the way language is used to oppress trans people.

Foucault was a gay men and wrote a lot about the way cis/het power structures held queer and gender variant people down. There is much to learn from him. Have you really read him?

//Queer theory sees both gender (male and female) and sexuality (e.g. straight, gay and bi) as entirely socially constructed, and to be deconstructed.//

This is true, and if you want absolute certainty, you have to go elsewhere (and be fooled).

That being said, unlike what right wing extremists tells you, they do not deny the reality of biology. They just say that anything we say about biology is colored by the cultural context. In this they are right.

You should ask yourself why transphobic right-wingers and TERFs use some of the same arguments as you do against "gender theory".

I can tell you why: This is because they believe their view of sex, gender and gender roles is the only correct and objective one, and that if we just stop people from questioning the status quo, they will remain in power.

They are right about that.

//The deconstructive orientation of queer theory has produced real world confusion about why people identify as trans, leading to accusations that trans people are doing it for political reasons. This, I believe, is behind the so-called ‘trans ideology’ moral panic.//

In other words: If we stick to the narratives of our oppressors, they will not be confused, and then they will understand who we really are.

This is nonsense. The only kind of acceptance we will get from them is the total erasure of trans lives. We should never blame trans and queer activists and thinkers for the stupidity of the transphobes.

//This blending has created multiple points of contradiction...//

Of course there are contradictions. There is so much we do not know about gender identities. Moreover, we of all people, the outsiders, should know how dangerous it is to limit discussions to one and only one model of reality.

//We need to speak out continuously until the bubble of academic queer theory is popped, and our counter-narrative can no longer be ignored.//

What counter-narrative are you talking about? Because there is not one, coherent, counter-narrative around that will please everyone.

And, you know what? I think that is a good thing.