handmaiden
noun
Also a form of handmaid
Forms handmaidens
- noun (derogatory) A cisgender woman who supports transgender rights.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English hande mayden, handmaiden, hand mayden, hand-mayden, handmayden, hondemaiden, hond maydyn, hoondmaydyn. By surface analysis, hand + maiden.
Sense 2 is an allusion to Canadian writer Margaret Atwood's novel The Handmaid's Tale (1985), in which "handmaids" are women who serve the male commanders in a patriarchal dystopia.
Webster’s 1913
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “handmaiden”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details