it's a very vocal, very abusive minority of trans ppl as a whole but I think it's a combo of a lot of things. namely that there are more out trans people now than there ever was, at a political time where they feel particularly scared and vulnerable... so more people to recruit into hate movements like TIRFism.

unfortunately, when people feel scared, they tend to start fighting against whatever scapegoat they can find instead of the real issues bc it feels like an easier enemy to "win" against. hence why we tend to be the punching bag to take out the frustrations of the ills cys men have caused them, instead of actually going after cys men (and, if anything, viewing cys men quite favorably bc every cys man is a potential egg).

I think there's also an aspect of it where they're riding off of public perception of pop culture understandings of feminism (which are white and cys centered at their core) and it gives them a way to feel in tune with feminism to just swap genders instead of creating a more truly trans inclusive feminism. it also affords them much less criticism from cis women if they just swap sex for gender and otherwise barely touch feminist theory, bc then the cis women don't feel threatened (even if it means nonbinary people and trans mascs and GNC trans fems are left behind). we are all viewed as acceptable collateral.

something mentioned by the Jennifer Coates article, too, is this concept of in-group appeasement via "man-hating", particularly with it feeling gender affirming to fit in with cis women's bashing of people, even if the person being talked about is a trans person. there's this illusion that I think a lot of people like to partake in that, if you're good enough, the cis women will accept you. if you do enough performative stuff, they won't just abandon you when it inconveniences them. and while it's disturbing people would rather sell their morals to cis people for their approval at the expense of other trans people, it's not really surprising? it's a kind of bootlicking that makes a lot of sense for people who feel they have no other community and who are frequently peer pressured into abandoning and hurting their trans masc peers by cis people. I just wish people recognized it for the leopards eating faces party that it was.

I guess my last point is that honestly a lot of it is unprocessed misogyny that feels dysphoric and Bad to even acknowledge, often fueled by a shit ton of internalized transphobia (in my observation). like there's a type of bizarre punitive faux-justice some of these people do when it comes to trans mascs where they almost project their hatred of themselves onto us. but other times it just appears like it's garden variety misogyny treating us like little girls with no brains who can't possibly understand feminism themselves, deserve ridicule for everything we do, etc. and I have a whole thread on how you can both view yourself as a woman and still see trans mascs as women in a misogynistic way as well, those things aren't mutually exclusive, even though they are extremely hypocritical (but how often is bigotry rational?).