The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival was a feminist, body positive festival that ran for 40 years before closing in 2015. In their last years, Michfest had been in hot water over their admissions policy. Labeled binary and discriminatory, only female-bodied individuals were allowed into the park. When pre-operative transgender women tried to enter, they were denied on the basis of their sex.

When faced with the backlash of this decision, rather than change their policy the Michfest leaders opted to close the event, forever.

Even in the most body positive and feminist spaces, transphobia lurks in the background. The Michfest leaders tried to force their ideas of womanhood on everyone there, and when women came who didn't meet the qualifications, they were denied access.

Michfest wasn't an exclusive member's only golf course. It was a music festival.

I'm no stranger to feminism. Before coming out, I was strongly anti-feminist. A young, gender dysphoric teen like me didn't take kindly to people telling me to love my body. Accept my genitals? Never, never, never.

Through the dysphoria lens it's impossible to see clearly. I was worried about growing up, becoming an adult, because to me women appeared to be trapped in the lower rung of the equality ladder. I was destined to be a miserable woman married to a successful, good looking husband. Women were lesser to men, and I was a woman, therefore I was less.

But then, I realized my identity and came out. Like magic, my views on feminism changed. I joined the feminist organization at school, I advocate for women's rights whenever I can, and I try to change minds about what feminism is about.

But believe me, I know very well that feminism is still in bed with transphobia. It's not anti-feminists calling me a gender traitor, it's the women playing on the same team that I am.

When asked who feminism is for, the knee-jerk response is "well, everyone.” Feminism helps everyone. Freeing women from their oppressive chains helps men be free as well.

But, for every feminist offering to walk with a trans woman to the bathroom, there's another calling that trans women a sick man. For every feminist who advocates for health insurance to cover transition expenses, there's another telling me that I'll always be a woman and no amount of surgery can change it.

With any step towards progression, we take two steps back. The leech on feminism's side is growing stronger, with more people reaching their "Peak Trans Moment," and more progressives buying into the huge amount of lies about trans people. On an online trans forum I frequent, one of the warnings is to watch for feminists who use the forum to bully trans people into leaving the site. High profile feminists like Cathy Brennan and Germaine Greer have publicly denounced transsexuality.

Ignorance is a poison to any movement, but feminism especially needs the antidote. You cannot advocate for the rights of the oppressed with this kind of hate in the underbelly. I know that feminism is broad and big. It's impossible for everyone under the feminist umbrella to agree, but right now Gender Critical Feminism has a large presence in feminist discussion. Gender Critical Feminists are feminists. It's a label anyone can have.

I love feminism. I think body positivity, self-acceptance and equal rights should be universal traits. But I love feminism enough to want to fix it. And right now, it's broken.