The English language has had a rough few years. “Literally” has become its own antonym, “they” is clinging desperately to its linguistic usefulness, and “woman”, well, nobody seems to know how to define that anymore. In my article, What Happens If Trans Women Aren’t Women, I asked why the existence of trans women means we need to redefine “woman” at all. Why is it controversial to admit that trans women are, in fact, trans women? Why can’t we acknowledge that “woman” means “adult female human” in the same easy, uncontroversial way we admit that “lioness” means “adult female lion”? Why can’t we admit that the “trans” trans woman serves a function?
This is just the latest, and a particularly vicious, instance of a broader problem that has come to pervade our politics: substituting a semantic argument as a surrogate for a substantive one. Quibbling over the words we use allows people on all sides of an issue to declare their tribal loyalties without addressing actual policies on their substantive merits. Is government-provided health insurance “socialism”? Does giving undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship constitute “amnesty”? Is TaraElla a “woman”? As George R. R. Martin would say, words are wind.
The division of human beings (and, indeed, virtually all living things) into two biological sexes is an irreducible fact of life on planet Earth. So is the existence of a small minority of people who, for one reason or another, don’t fit neatly into that classification. What we need to be addressing is how to assure such people the safety, respect, and dignity they deserve as human beings. Instead, we’re reduced to pointless wrangling over how to label them. They, and all of us, deserve better.
"a broader problem that has come to pervade our politics: substituting a semantic argument as a surrogate for a substantive one"
100%. Aka, "Academics ruin everything."
You know there's a problem when a social justice movement starts playing around with the meaning of words. Feminism began to split around the "womxn" era. Anti-racism started to get toxic when the "racism = power plus privilege" folks started chiming in. Now here we are with trans activists trying to redefine the word "woman" itself.
Equality movements (and everything else really) thrive on concrete, measurable goals that aim to help people; voting and employment rights for women, the end of segregation, legalising gay marriage. Sensible people can get behind them, everybody who opposes them has to reveal how bigoted they are, and the arc of the moral universe gets to continue bending towards justice.
The people playing around with semantics are, without exception, the people least, if at all, affected by the injustice faced by their "group." So they have time to play stupid games that ultimately harm their cause far more than help it. And give ammunition to those who oppose them by being both outspoken and completely out of touch with the reality of most people.
“You know there's a problem when a social justice movement starts playing around with the meaning of words.”
And a related move, subtly changing the vocabulary of the conversation. From “equal pay for equal work” (a concrete, measurable goal) to “equal pay for comparable worth.” (Who’s to say what work is of comparable worth to what other work? That’s what markets are for.) From “racial equality” to “equity.” And so on. After which, using the older term becomes a punishable offense, so that speaking in favor of racial equality flags you as a bigot.
It’s Alice in Wonderland come to life: “the question is whether you *can* make words mean so many different things.”
Feminism originally pursued goals like equality in wages; women were notoriously underpaid compared to men doing the same work nd when occupations like nursing because feminized their wages fell.
And lo, feminism made some progress. Wages converged a little. Not completely but measurably. One would think this would be cause for celebration.
This isn't what happened.
Some feminists were in it for equality and political gain; others were in it for the rage. When I volunteered at a co-op I got smoldering glares from feminists with facial hair because I was male.
Anyway this is when the womon/womyn and fish/bicycle bullshit started and discussions switched from wage equality to immeasurables like patriarchal attitudes.
Can anyone say we're making progress toward diminishing patriarchal attitudes?
One in 65,000 births makes the grade as transsexual and some of these are eligible for gender reassignment, hormonal or even surgical. No decent human being should have any issue with these people; they are suffering from a medical condition they did not summon.
The the situation is lately complicated by 100-1000 times as many who are not dysphoric but are jumping on an identity and linguistic bandwagon to get attention. Politically these people are toxic as plutonium (not to mention this is an extremely unhealthy fad). People who can accept political third rails like same-sex marriage and abortion draw a line at arbitrary claims of intermediate gender.
The timing could not be worse. If the Democrats make pronouns and bathrooms part of their ensemble of policies, we can say goodbye to democracy in America and to wildlife on Earth.
And the deliberate blurring of psychology and biology is not helping one damned bit
It really has gone past the point of absurdity into downright insanity. Like the article SteveQJ cited recently, about a British woman arrested for exposing her penis in public. Yes, you read that right.
Another Web site I frequent has a pulldown menu on the personal profile page for indicating your preferred gender identity. Here are the contents of that menu. I’m not making this up:
Male
Female
Other
It’s Complicated
Agender
Androgyne
Bigender
Cisgender Female
Cisgender Male
Demi-female
Demi-male
Female to Male
FTM
Gender Fluid
Gender-neutral
Gender Nonconforming
Gender Questioning
Gender Variant
Genderqueer
Intersex
Male to Female
Man
Neither
Neutrois
Non-binary
Pangender
Queer
Trans Man
Trans Woman
Transgender
Transgender Female
Transgender Male
Transgender Man
Transgender Person
Transgender Woman
Transfeminine
Transmasculine
Transexual
Transexual Female
Transexual Male
Transexual Person
Two-Spirit
Woman
Really, 43 genders to choose from? Of course a lot of these are variant labels for the same thing: Am I a man, male, or cisgender male? Is TaraElla a trans woman, transgender female, or transexual person? But that’s just the point: all this semantic hairsplitting, not to mention umbrage at the use of the wrong label, serves no purpose other than to convince reasonable people that you have gone off the deep end. We need to cut it out and start talking about real issues.
I'm sure those people in the video Steve posted would be broiling their own brains in rage that their own favored affectation wasn't in the list.
I see shorter dropdowns in some job descriptions. Were I a hiring manager I would reject anyone who selected "they/them" since such people are bound to be nothing but trouble at work.
I find it appalling that these groups are at such odds. I’ve read recently some pretty horrible ways in which feminists are derided for supporting women’s rights to be women.
As a female, a mother, and a K-8 teacher for 12 amazing years, I reject completely the idea that a man can be in female spaces. There’s just too much historical baggage associated with man-on-women violence for this to be ok.
Much as your work with racism seeks to understand the trauma of older black Americans who cannot let go of their bitterness and disillusionment with the American creed despite its progress…so too is it frankly ridiculous to expect - no, demand - that women cede precious private space - in the bathroom, on the playing field - to trans women. I’m not talking about professional work - I’m talking about uniquely female spaces.
Have a little compassion, people. Strive for a little grace.
Do the women and girls being abused in Ukraine right now have any doubt about whether they are women (and prey) or not?
"Do the women and girls being abused in Ukraine right now have any doubt about whether they are women (and prey) or not?"
I couldn't agree more. I forget who said it, but somebody asked recently, "You know who has no problem defining 'woman'? The Taliban."
Sex-based violence and oppression is a very real thing. To be clear, so is transphobic violence. But they're different things. And happen on vastly different scales. I will not harm overlook the needs of one group to coddle the feelings of another.
I loved reading this conversation! This part from TaraElla really summed it up for me:
"I definitely agree that tying trans acceptance to willingness to embrace a certain definition of woman is unwise. I'm quite frustrated about that approach personally. Many people are willing to accept and accomodate trans people, and we should be focusing on that instead, rather than alienating people."
100%, 100%. Will need to look into her posts.
I have to think more about your idea that there are only a few areas where women and trans women's needs intersect. I feel like there are many, but then that is a feeling not a list, and it says something that I'm not able to instantly provide that list LOL. What does stand out to me is the threat of violence from men that both demographics face regularly. So maybe it is not many intersecting areas, but a small number of really big areas?
"I feel like there are many, but then that is a feeling not a list"
Yeah, I may be missing something, but as far as I see, in the great pantheon of life, the only real area of conflict is access to female-only spaces. How a person dresses or what surgeries they have (significant caveat for children here) is none of my business. Sports, female prisons, female changing rooms, if these weren't in dispute, I don't think I'd have an issue with anything else.
Ironically, the key reason this *is* an area of conflict is that trans women want protection from men. Which is what women also want! And I think that's a perfectly reasonable goal. Trans women face violence at the hands of men too.
But I'm interested in solutions that offer that protection to trans women without opening women up to greater harm. And, at the very least, that means that simply saying "I'm a woman," can't be the standard for whether you are one.
And dressing as a woman, getting hormone treatments, and surgical castration don't make a man a woman either. Not that 99% of the "trans" crowd would go any further than cosmetic and raiment changes.
If they want to live as the opposite sex, fine, I'll even refer to them by the opposite SINGULAR pronoun, should I have reason to refer to them in their absence (unlikely).
But it's clear as could be that we are seeing a fad among people who are dissatisfied with themselves or who just want more attention. I cannot regard this as healthy. For the genuinely dysphoric the crossover is liberating and they deserve our support; when one's gender identity is reduced to the level of some teen hairstyle or fashion, we got trouble.
"And dressing as a woman, getting hormone treatments, and surgical castration don't make a man a woman either."
Yes, you're right. But I wonder how many women would object to sharing a space with a male who'd had these procedures done. I'm absolutely certain it would be lower than the number who have objections to sharing a space with a male who hasn't undergone any changes whatsoever.
That's the whole point of this conversation for me; finding a reasonable middle ground. I think that's the point for most women too. The idea that you can be treated as a woman simply by saying you are one is preposterous. But the idea that you can be treated as a woman if you do everything you can to rid yourself of your "maleness"? Personally, I don't find that unreasonable.
Now, of course, it's not about what *I* find reasonable. The most infuriating aspect of his whole situation is seeing how women are being ignored and abused for expressing their feelings on what a woman is. Women, and only women, should have the final say on where the line of "womanhood" lies.
But given that I genuinely do want trans women to be protected and affirmed to the greatest degree that's reasonably possible, I hope this conversation detoxifies enough that a solution that satisfies the maximum number of people can be reached.
well, ignoring the viewpoints of women is hardly without precedent, now is it.
I don't think formally or legally redefining even a fully feminized man as a woman is going to convince everyone, male or female that this former male should be accepted into the most private of woman-only areas e.g. bathrooms. I don't think niological men should be in women's sports at all. And having so many shrieking about misogyny and "transphobia" (what a stupid word, it should be transmisia, homomisia, etc.) isn't helping at all.
You will never get unanimity, but progress is possible. That progress recedes when you count cosplay as gender identity,
I presume in your final paragraph that you are referring to the authentically dysphoric, in which case I agree; I can't bring myself to extend the same to the nonbinary, who should never be allowed into female "spaces" (ugh).
"I don't think formally or legally redefining even a fully feminized man as a woman is going to convince everyone"
Yeah, absolutely. *Nothing* is going to convince everyone. 'Twas ever thus. Some women are going to be unhappy if trans women are permanently excluded from female spaces. Some will be unhappy if even fully transitioned trans women are allowed to use bathrooms. That's why I'm hammering on the word "reasonable." And I actually think bathrooms are the least controversial spaces for most women.
Unlike us floor-pissing neanderthals, women always have private stalls in which to use the bathroom. There are certainly some women who still object to trans women using bathrooms, and I get it, but once we recognise the fact that trans people exist, the most logical solution, in my opinion, is that trans people use the bathroom of the gender they identify as.
I've written about this in more detail here (https://steveqj.substack.com/p/every-time-i-think-the-left-has-jumped?s=w) but the short version is, if you're forcing trans women to use men's bathrooms, you're also forcing trans men to use women's bathrooms. But there's a problem. Trans men, in many cases, look absolutely indistinguishable from men. Beards and all. So what you're really doing is normalising the sight of completely masculine looking people walking into female bathrooms.
There's the trope of the pervy man in a dress trying to sneak into women's bathrooms, but what you'd end up with, is pervy men not even having to bother with the dress. Bathrooms aren't segregated by sex, they're segregated by gender expression (masculinity/femininity). Butch women already find themselves questioned in female bathrooms sometimes. And trans women who "pass" sail right in unchallenged.
But while bathrooms are segregated by gender expression, changing rooms, sports and rape crisis centres are segregated by biological sex. So a different conversation needs to be had there.
And yes, I'm always only referring to genuinely gender dysphoric people when I say trans. "Non-binary" people, and everybody else who likes to "dismantle categories" because they think it's "edgy", while giving no thought to the implications of their stupid, postmodernist games, can take a running jump.
I agree with the impracticality of redefining the word "woman." We need to call those people we've historically called "women" something less cumbersome than "persons having an X and a Y chromosome." Let's stick with "women" and admit that gender is not a binary classification; we can make up all the genders we want and respect all of them. For those really want a binary classification, and think phrases referring to chromosomes are too clinical and awkward, how about "inseminator" and "incubator?"
Yep, agree. I see no reason why a third option is not considered to be just, fair, and compassionate. Women, men, trans. Or if you want 4, then women & men & trans women & trans men. I just don't see why adding a third is such a big deal to people - people from both political extremes. Like Steve wrote in his Medium post, third genders have existed since forever, across many different cultures.
In his novel "Distress" Australian SF writer Greg Egan paints a future in which a complete set of gender-neutral third-person singular pronouns is in common use:
ve nominative
vis direct object
ver possessive
There are seven of what you guys are calling genders:
umale/ufemale: gender characteristics deliberate exaggerated; men with very bony faces, women with huge breasts
male/female - what we have now
imale/ifemale - still gendered but with physical and behavioral characteristics reduced and muted
But then there are the asex, whom the new pronouns are mostly for; all physical and psychological characteristics of gender are completely suppressed. Their original sex is indeterminable, they have neither genitalia nor gonads and the neural mechanisms of orgasm are suppressed.
It's the latter part that is most interesting; Egan makes the point that "rushes" like orgasm, religious epiphany, drug-induced mental overloads ... are all illegitimate and that it's in these conditions that people make the worst decisions of their lives.
That sounds like a strange and interesting plot. I'm a science fiction fan, I'll check it out.
Probably doesn't need to be said, but I view sex and gender as different things. Not an essentialist, but I see sex as essentially binary (and not "assigned") and gender as generally trinary (male/female/trans which includes basically everything that's not specifically male or female, from trans women to nonbinary to hijras to two-spirit et al). Also to repeat, not an essentialist, but I actually resent when folks casually add a 'they' to their pronouns, despite some good intentions, because it feels faddish to me, like being bi in college for some, and more importantly, ignores actual committed lives of people who are trans/who genuinely fall out of that binary. And as long as I'm resenting things, I also resent biological males who decide to simply call themselves women and then say or imply that they are "expanding the definition of women" as if men even have that right. And while I'm rambling on, have to say that I've always been confused/irritated about how LGBT are all lumped in together when the first 3 are sexual orientations and the 4th is about gender. Ugh. I say this as a bi guy who is a strong friend to the trans communities and have dated across both cis and trans genders.
Also, my pronouns are we/us/ours, please refer to me as such. LOL
Aside from your definitions of sex and gender, I agree with everything you say. Particularly the alphabet soup.
I'm gay, I came out in 1974 in Norfolk, VA where the gay scene was mostly about drag queens. I felt no connection to them at all, and in fact most of them were thieving parasites. Let a transvestite into your house and valuables would go missing. They never worked and lived with a succession of soon-to-be-ex-friends from whom they stole.
Like many still adjusting I claimed bisexuality (it's not really common among men at all) but unlike most I had sex with women a few times.
Sex and gender: in my lifelong understand all matters of male and female, biological and psychological, are gender. Sex is an activity that most of the animal and plant kingdoms perform to reproduce and some high mammals do for enjoyment. Yes I have seen "sex" used to mean "gender"; then again I see "media" and "criteria" used as singulars every day,
I've been around drag queens for much of my adult life, especially as a doorman-bouncer at a drag bar called the Brass Rail in San Diego, mid-90s. I've had very different experiences from you because they are mostly positive experiences. I really enjoyed the people there, very warm and amiable. They were for the most part a male community, outside of their time in drag while at the bar. Was happy to call them "she" when they adopted their female personas, dressed up and at the bar. But the things is, for the most part that was a kind of performance (or sometimes literal performance on stage). Outside of the Brass Rail, these folks were usually men. And they usually saw themselves as such, when they were not in drag. Much like the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence here in SF (well, at least the sisters I know).
To me at least, a person who is truly "trans" is a person who wants to be seen as not the biological sex that they were born in, and they want to be accepted as such 100% of the time, ideally forever. That's a hard path for many, thus my irritation with current fads that feel to me diminishing of genuinely trans individuals. I mean, even the drag queens back then often scorned actual trans women who had surgery, or were on the path to surgery. I recall a lot of transphobia from gay men back then. Fortunately, I think that has changed since the 2+ decades since.
Can you provide some data on the amount of violence, including rape, committed on women & trans women by men as compared to violence committed by women & trans women on each other? Not trying to call you out, but I can't help but assume that one number is incredibly small compared to the other. What is your estimation of "significant" when it comes to threat of violence?
I have literally heard or read zero examples of actual physical violence happening to women from other women due to woke reasons. And believe, I am anti-woke. Or at the very least, post-woke.
I have no trouble believing this; the viciousness I've witnessed in the "they/them" crowd matches or exceeds that of the MAGA beards. I despise both-sidesism but what we are seeing in these addled fools may even be worse.
Viciousness online, jobs lost, cruel words, shunning, doxing, all of that - yes. All of that is horrible. But I'm talking actual physical violence from woke women to non-woke women, which is what e.pierce mentioned. I've seen no examples of that. Not saying it doesn't exist, just that I'm not going to believe something until I read about specific instances (or see it myself, which is unlikely here in SF). Have you seen such physical attacks or can you link me to examples of those attacks? Serious question.
No. If I had I would have written "I've seen it," not "I have no trouble believing it."
I left the USA in 2010 before this whole piece of idiocy got off the ground, but I've seen a lot of it online. Even after years of reading conservative gloating over their cruelty I've been shocked by what I've read from the "non-binary" crowd; their viciousness is absolutely appalling,
There really should be no controversy here, A "trans woman" is a man who has been cosmetically altered to appear more like a woman. He is not a woman.
That Lia Thomas who came out in first place doesn't look remotely feminine; he looks like a long-haired man. He grew up with male bones and musculature; he is cerebrally wired for a competitiveness that women don't share.
And here I thought the right and their pizzagate were deluded.
Ah, Chris. thank you for consistently being a breath of fresh, sane air.😅 I've been asking around a lot recently, including in my article, and as of yet, not one single person has been able to explain why this is even controversial.
Of course, I suspect the reason is that we've decided that reality is an acceptable sacrifice if it means protecting people's feelings. And this is fine and lovely on an individual level, but absolutely destructive on a societal level. remember how, for a while, there was that other "gotcha" question?:
Is a trans woman a *real* woman?
The question itself provides the answer. But the failure to be honest there, was the beginning of the ridiculous situation we find ourselves in now.
Pure gold: “we've decided that reality is an acceptable sacrifice if it means protecting people's feelings. And this is fine and lovely on an individual level, but absolutely destructive on a societal level.”
As a pragmatist, I so struggle with this approach. It will never move us forward or solve actual bigotry in any meaningful way but will devolve society into a war of all against all.
How can major percentages of our younger generations be such weak thinkers? Is digital space toxic enough to catalyze this trend? It truly makes one wonder at the vulnerability of human perception to signalling. It's gone beyond “we are social animals” to we are predisposed to a sort of "hive mindedness.” If I were able to live my life over again, I think I would become a neuroscientist and study this one thing. There has to be an answer.
I started following TaraElla under my original now closed Medium account and follow her under my new one. Her new political series is quite good.
In keeping with the views expressed by you both in that conversation, acceptance of trans-persons without the trans prefix is a hard sell and I doubt that I will live to see it. But then, I don't think it necessary for a norm of treating trans-people decently.
I've written before that 30 years ago, before trans was in the lexicon except for transvestite (another unfortunate share for different things) I was perfectly willing to treat a "man in a woman's body" as he wished. I purposefully just used "he" because I didn't think he was a woman and saw him as a flaming gay, effeminate man. And that was OK. He knew that but was good with my considerate treatment of him. Perhaps today. now that trans is a word in my awareness and thing I would call him her, but we are no longer in touch with each other. I genuinely liked him and we had conversations without awkwardness.
Trans persons who can successfully pass will have an easier time than those who don't with acceptance, but may face more danger from outraged men who are surprised after sex has been initiated. Our perfect world has not yet arrived.
"But then, I don't think it necessary for a norm of treating trans-people decently."
Absolutely. When you consider the time and energy that's been poured into this pointless goal that could have been spent on, for example, education that challenges gender norms instead of reinforcing them in a new way, it's truly infuriating.
So many excellent posts and such a breath of fresh air that discussion brings, like nuance and complexity. I have long felt trans women being referred to as trans women IS an important distinction. As you say, the real issue is how Trans can become fully realized, unfettered humans to live their lives as they wish. Never thought it would a word choice that would become controversial. But in this tribal, yes/no, polarized, Twitter mob environment we are trapped in, this went from being just semantics to something quite dangerous. It is telling that no one is asking “what’s a man”? Because women (adult females) have experiences of being threatened by men forever. I remember once reading a survey on what worries men about women and the response was “that they will laugh at us”. What worries women about men? “That they will kill us.” This isn’t hyperbole, nor is to impugn the character of trans women. But it helps explain why there is zero discussion on “what is a man?”
"it helps explain why there is zero discussion on “what is a man?”
Yeah absolutely. It amazes me that people act as if the fact that the conversation focuses on "what is a woman" is some kind of "gotcha." Men don't *care* how you define "man", because, unless you redefine it to mean "lion" and ask us to share spaces with lions, there are no safety or privacy concerns that come with the redefinition. Any dangers we face from violent males are already the norm.
The debate is about women's rights. Not trans rights. It's only the misogyny and narcissism of some members of the trans community that make them unable to grasp this simple point.
“Never thought it would a word choice that would become controversial.” Control the language—control the culture. Autocracy is, in part, about controlling the meaning of words. The rest of it is about controlling behavior.
Since woke ideologues are only fighting a battle of language and not putting people in prisons or shooting them in the head, they can claim that they are still within liberal bounds.
Do you support lying? Do you stand behind commercial and political falsehood? Stochastic assassination? Bottling sewage and marketing it as a cancer cure?
Seriously?
Let's get serious here: free speech is intended to protect criticism of government, to allow citizens to disagree with their leaders without a charge of sedition. That's ALL it is. And like well-regulated militias it has been expanded to embrace the most vile extremities imaginable.
I was pretty shocked to read that, Steve. I associate free speech absolutism with nincompoops like Glenn Greenwald, not with people of established intelligence and command of nuance such as yourself.
😁 This is a big topic, so let's start with a few clarifications. Because "free speech" has become a very broad church in recent years.
The likes of Donald Trump being banned from Twitter is not a free speech issue. I fully support his ban and actually wish it had come sooner. Private companies get to set their own rules on speech. This is a huge and nuanced issue in its own right, but I'll leave it at that.
Hate speech laws have a place, though I'd limit them strictly to incitement to physical harm. No special mean words, no hurt feelings, no liability for misgendering somebody or using the n-word. If you aren't saying something that could lead directly to physical harm, I support your right to say it (if you experience physical harm for saying the n-word, say, that's on you).
I don't support lying, the problem is the very concept of a lie itself. How do we verify what is and isn't a lie? Just as a recent example, for quite a long time, the whole Hunter Biden laptop scandal was deemed a lie. A diversionary tactic cooked up by "the Right." Yet it turns out it was true. How do we square that circle? And what would happen if that "lie" had been suppressed so thoroughly that the truth was never revealed?
Free speech absolutism absolutely means that you will have to deal with bad ideas and bad-faith actors. I truly hate this fact. But it's the price of this very important principle. I simply don't see a good way to do better. Letting people say whatever they want, safe in the knowledge that they won't go to jail, is the baseline for a functioning society.
Every deviation from this principle, however well intentioned, leads to some degree of censorship. And as we're seeing in Russia at the moment (and North Korea and China) the consequences can be catastrophic.
Yeah, the issue for me was the stolen election claims after the votes had been counted. The regular stupidity is one thing, but I think it was clear for a long time that was going to lead to real problems.
The trouble with limitations on free speech is who shall do the limiting? Donald Trump? AOC?Medium, for example, is a sea of bullshit where people give opinions as if they are truth from the lips of God while calling all disagreement false. Shall we limit the speech of these writers? Again, who is the decider. One person's wonderful "influencer" is another person's idiot. Right or wrong, I'd rather be the decider for myself.
Absolute free speech is not support of lies, but rather support of people using their own discernment with regard to statements and ideas. I am quite non-partisan in my assumption that all things political serve as propaganda which has elements of truth and lies.
A thought for consideration. How much outrageous bullshit is put out there by the opposition to make that opposition look like a bunch of nutcases? How much political thought is generated not by the good ideas of a political ideology, but as a reaction to the nutty stuff from radicals? What is the percentage of people voting for something/someone vs. against?
Democracy is a truly horrible system where propagandized people vote to impose their will upon others. Lynching and gang rape are examples of majority rule - democratic events. We can decide if someone's free speech is harmful, but to who? And who says? That is the issue. Your good and beneficial thing for society might be my idea of something horrible and destructive. Free speech lets you decide for yourself, for better or worse.
I'll answer in more detail when I have time but "who gets to decide" is never a legitimate rebuttal, it's not even a real argument. It's hiding behind the apron of relativism.
Did I say "censorship is a good thing?" No, I said no such thing. I said that "who gets to decide" is a dodge, not an argument.
This is one of the issues in democracy gone amok, just as in science gone amok, or anything else; being open to a plurality of viewpoints quickly leads to an inability, if not a refusal, to distinguish betweem legitimate plurality and rank absurdity.
I'm on some physics forums where any mention of religion is an immediate ban from the forum. You might call that censorship. I call it time management. I've wasted enough of my life dealing with God Of The Gaps bullshit and have no more such time to waste, and neither does the forum administrator.
Who gets to decide? He does.
My mind is closed to anything almost any conservative Republican might have to say because most of them are liars. If you think the exclusion of liars is a violation of "free speech" then our views are irreconcilable.
"My mind is closed to anything almost any conservative Republican might have to say because most of them are liars. If you think the exclusion of liars is a violation of "free speech" then our views are irreconcilable."
I have a right-wing friend with the same extreme partisan filter as you except for him, all things coming from Democrats and Republicans he deems to be RINOs are liars. When I tell him that there can be no critical thought when tribal membership is what you use to determine truth he usually says, we agree to disagree, and we don't destroy a friendship formed decades before either of us had a clue about each other's political views. Who gets to decide who the liars are, you, him or me? I'm fine with us deciding for ourselves. I'm quite outspoken in my disdain of political partisanship as a Litmus test for truth. That doesn't mean that we will never agree on anything, so I don't automatically dismiss your thoughts.
I assume that your science forum has stated rules about religion presented as science and if so, enforcing them is fine. It doesn't take much time to see that that is where someone's ideas are coming from so it's also fine to stop reading when you see fit. I don't read to the end of many articles or comments. Not necessarily because I disagree with them. Most often it's a what's the point? Does this lead to an actionable path to a solution or understanding (often the same thing) or is it just venting hate?
My disdain for the extremes of tribalism isn't about the views of the tribes, but rather the tribalism preempting logical thought by willfully dismissing all things that threaten an ideology. That is by the way what censorship is most often about. Not truth, but threats to the ideology of the censor. Basically, "I don't want to hear that shit!" That's your decision, but you should be the decider of that.
When are you going to explain why you think who decides is not a real argument?
Well your first response was to bait me by demanding a justification for something I didn't say. I feel disinclined to debate someone who instantly projects dishonesty like that.
In thousands of debates I've read and participated in someone will quip "who gets to decide!" and then primp and preen as if it's an incisive argument. It isn't. It's merely lazy, and lately fashionable given the blurring of fact and opinion. Compounded by the fashionable invocation of "subjectivity" as though it invalidates every clear reasoning.
Who gets to decide? Are we incapable of coming up with criteria? Let's go through a few examples.
Who gets to decide what a medical doctor is? Well there are certification boards. They have developed stringent criteria. Someone who hangs out his shingle as an MD without that certification will go to prison, even if he practices exemplary medicine. The same is true for many professions. Do you want to open this to argument? That would be irresponsible.
And then your Trumpian friend (that would be a friendship-breaker for me; I could have an uncomfortable relationship with a Bush supporter, but Trump? No) . Does your friend say Biden stole the election? Who gets to decide who the president is? Well, sorry, but it's objectively true that Biden won over seven million more votes and a decisive electoral college victory.
Who gets to decide if the earth is flat or round?
Now let me talk about a more current event; there are people spreading wantonly irresponsible misinformation about COVID, among them a once-respected epidemiologist. Social media have drawn lines in sand about this; they'll eject people like Dr. Malone for advocating ivermectin as a treatment.
Back to my original point: a society that reveres pluralism and a variety of viewpoints must take on the responsibility of rejecting and, yes, suppressing illegitimate ones. If I had my way Dr. Malone would be making license plates. The epistemological crisis we are living through right now is the result of a progression that began with a noble idea and has disintegrated into chaos. Postmodernism was like falling down stairs. Now we're going over a cliff. The most absurd ideas (a pizza parlor that doesn't have a basement is operating a child sex-traffic operation out of its basement; Trump won the election; a man in a dress is a woman). are set alongside legitimate viewpoints, and the best lack all conviction while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
If "who gets to decide" is all you have, bow out of the debate because you don't have an argument. And if you find yourself readily thinking in terms of perspective and subjectivity, you've lost your way.
"Their claim typically includes the that the mere use of objective, rational and systematic analysis to criticize the incoherence of their ideological rhetoric is "oppressive"."
This is just the latest, and a particularly vicious, instance of a broader problem that has come to pervade our politics: substituting a semantic argument as a surrogate for a substantive one. Quibbling over the words we use allows people on all sides of an issue to declare their tribal loyalties without addressing actual policies on their substantive merits. Is government-provided health insurance “socialism”? Does giving undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship constitute “amnesty”? Is TaraElla a “woman”? As George R. R. Martin would say, words are wind.
The division of human beings (and, indeed, virtually all living things) into two biological sexes is an irreducible fact of life on planet Earth. So is the existence of a small minority of people who, for one reason or another, don’t fit neatly into that classification. What we need to be addressing is how to assure such people the safety, respect, and dignity they deserve as human beings. Instead, we’re reduced to pointless wrangling over how to label them. They, and all of us, deserve better.
"a broader problem that has come to pervade our politics: substituting a semantic argument as a surrogate for a substantive one"
100%. Aka, "Academics ruin everything."
You know there's a problem when a social justice movement starts playing around with the meaning of words. Feminism began to split around the "womxn" era. Anti-racism started to get toxic when the "racism = power plus privilege" folks started chiming in. Now here we are with trans activists trying to redefine the word "woman" itself.
Equality movements (and everything else really) thrive on concrete, measurable goals that aim to help people; voting and employment rights for women, the end of segregation, legalising gay marriage. Sensible people can get behind them, everybody who opposes them has to reveal how bigoted they are, and the arc of the moral universe gets to continue bending towards justice.
The people playing around with semantics are, without exception, the people least, if at all, affected by the injustice faced by their "group." So they have time to play stupid games that ultimately harm their cause far more than help it. And give ammunition to those who oppose them by being both outspoken and completely out of touch with the reality of most people.
Your entire response here is spun gold, Steve.
“You know there's a problem when a social justice movement starts playing around with the meaning of words.”
And a related move, subtly changing the vocabulary of the conversation. From “equal pay for equal work” (a concrete, measurable goal) to “equal pay for comparable worth.” (Who’s to say what work is of comparable worth to what other work? That’s what markets are for.) From “racial equality” to “equity.” And so on. After which, using the older term becomes a punishable offense, so that speaking in favor of racial equality flags you as a bigot.
It’s Alice in Wonderland come to life: “the question is whether you *can* make words mean so many different things.”
"concrete, measurable goals"
Steve rings the bell.
Feminism originally pursued goals like equality in wages; women were notoriously underpaid compared to men doing the same work nd when occupations like nursing because feminized their wages fell.
And lo, feminism made some progress. Wages converged a little. Not completely but measurably. One would think this would be cause for celebration.
This isn't what happened.
Some feminists were in it for equality and political gain; others were in it for the rage. When I volunteered at a co-op I got smoldering glares from feminists with facial hair because I was male.
Anyway this is when the womon/womyn and fish/bicycle bullshit started and discussions switched from wage equality to immeasurables like patriarchal attitudes.
Can anyone say we're making progress toward diminishing patriarchal attitudes?
One in 65,000 births makes the grade as transsexual and some of these are eligible for gender reassignment, hormonal or even surgical. No decent human being should have any issue with these people; they are suffering from a medical condition they did not summon.
The the situation is lately complicated by 100-1000 times as many who are not dysphoric but are jumping on an identity and linguistic bandwagon to get attention. Politically these people are toxic as plutonium (not to mention this is an extremely unhealthy fad). People who can accept political third rails like same-sex marriage and abortion draw a line at arbitrary claims of intermediate gender.
The timing could not be worse. If the Democrats make pronouns and bathrooms part of their ensemble of policies, we can say goodbye to democracy in America and to wildlife on Earth.
And the deliberate blurring of psychology and biology is not helping one damned bit
It really has gone past the point of absurdity into downright insanity. Like the article SteveQJ cited recently, about a British woman arrested for exposing her penis in public. Yes, you read that right.
Another Web site I frequent has a pulldown menu on the personal profile page for indicating your preferred gender identity. Here are the contents of that menu. I’m not making this up:
Male
Female
Other
It’s Complicated
Agender
Androgyne
Bigender
Cisgender Female
Cisgender Male
Demi-female
Demi-male
Female to Male
FTM
Gender Fluid
Gender-neutral
Gender Nonconforming
Gender Questioning
Gender Variant
Genderqueer
Intersex
Male to Female
Man
Neither
Neutrois
Non-binary
Pangender
Queer
Trans Man
Trans Woman
Transgender
Transgender Female
Transgender Male
Transgender Man
Transgender Person
Transgender Woman
Transfeminine
Transmasculine
Transexual
Transexual Female
Transexual Male
Transexual Person
Two-Spirit
Woman
Really, 43 genders to choose from? Of course a lot of these are variant labels for the same thing: Am I a man, male, or cisgender male? Is TaraElla a trans woman, transgender female, or transexual person? But that’s just the point: all this semantic hairsplitting, not to mention umbrage at the use of the wrong label, serves no purpose other than to convince reasonable people that you have gone off the deep end. We need to cut it out and start talking about real issues.
"We need to cut it out and start talking about real issues."
WE WILL NOT STOP UNTIL THERE ARE ~8 BILLION OPTIONS ON THAT DROP DOWN!!😅
STOP OPPRESSING ME
And God help you if you forget them all or which one applies to whom.
I think when I have to "expand comment" to get the full list, it's too much. LOL? Yeah, why not. Semantic hairsplitting indeed.
Issues like not broiling the planet.
I'm sure those people in the video Steve posted would be broiling their own brains in rage that their own favored affectation wasn't in the list.
I see shorter dropdowns in some job descriptions. Were I a hiring manager I would reject anyone who selected "they/them" since such people are bound to be nothing but trouble at work.
I find it appalling that these groups are at such odds. I’ve read recently some pretty horrible ways in which feminists are derided for supporting women’s rights to be women.
As a female, a mother, and a K-8 teacher for 12 amazing years, I reject completely the idea that a man can be in female spaces. There’s just too much historical baggage associated with man-on-women violence for this to be ok.
Much as your work with racism seeks to understand the trauma of older black Americans who cannot let go of their bitterness and disillusionment with the American creed despite its progress…so too is it frankly ridiculous to expect - no, demand - that women cede precious private space - in the bathroom, on the playing field - to trans women. I’m not talking about professional work - I’m talking about uniquely female spaces.
Have a little compassion, people. Strive for a little grace.
Do the women and girls being abused in Ukraine right now have any doubt about whether they are women (and prey) or not?
"Do the women and girls being abused in Ukraine right now have any doubt about whether they are women (and prey) or not?"
I couldn't agree more. I forget who said it, but somebody asked recently, "You know who has no problem defining 'woman'? The Taliban."
Sex-based violence and oppression is a very real thing. To be clear, so is transphobic violence. But they're different things. And happen on vastly different scales. I will not harm overlook the needs of one group to coddle the feelings of another.
I loved reading this conversation! This part from TaraElla really summed it up for me:
"I definitely agree that tying trans acceptance to willingness to embrace a certain definition of woman is unwise. I'm quite frustrated about that approach personally. Many people are willing to accept and accomodate trans people, and we should be focusing on that instead, rather than alienating people."
100%, 100%. Will need to look into her posts.
I have to think more about your idea that there are only a few areas where women and trans women's needs intersect. I feel like there are many, but then that is a feeling not a list, and it says something that I'm not able to instantly provide that list LOL. What does stand out to me is the threat of violence from men that both demographics face regularly. So maybe it is not many intersecting areas, but a small number of really big areas?
"I feel like there are many, but then that is a feeling not a list"
Yeah, I may be missing something, but as far as I see, in the great pantheon of life, the only real area of conflict is access to female-only spaces. How a person dresses or what surgeries they have (significant caveat for children here) is none of my business. Sports, female prisons, female changing rooms, if these weren't in dispute, I don't think I'd have an issue with anything else.
Ironically, the key reason this *is* an area of conflict is that trans women want protection from men. Which is what women also want! And I think that's a perfectly reasonable goal. Trans women face violence at the hands of men too.
But I'm interested in solutions that offer that protection to trans women without opening women up to greater harm. And, at the very least, that means that simply saying "I'm a woman," can't be the standard for whether you are one.
And dressing as a woman, getting hormone treatments, and surgical castration don't make a man a woman either. Not that 99% of the "trans" crowd would go any further than cosmetic and raiment changes.
If they want to live as the opposite sex, fine, I'll even refer to them by the opposite SINGULAR pronoun, should I have reason to refer to them in their absence (unlikely).
But it's clear as could be that we are seeing a fad among people who are dissatisfied with themselves or who just want more attention. I cannot regard this as healthy. For the genuinely dysphoric the crossover is liberating and they deserve our support; when one's gender identity is reduced to the level of some teen hairstyle or fashion, we got trouble.
"And dressing as a woman, getting hormone treatments, and surgical castration don't make a man a woman either."
Yes, you're right. But I wonder how many women would object to sharing a space with a male who'd had these procedures done. I'm absolutely certain it would be lower than the number who have objections to sharing a space with a male who hasn't undergone any changes whatsoever.
That's the whole point of this conversation for me; finding a reasonable middle ground. I think that's the point for most women too. The idea that you can be treated as a woman simply by saying you are one is preposterous. But the idea that you can be treated as a woman if you do everything you can to rid yourself of your "maleness"? Personally, I don't find that unreasonable.
Now, of course, it's not about what *I* find reasonable. The most infuriating aspect of his whole situation is seeing how women are being ignored and abused for expressing their feelings on what a woman is. Women, and only women, should have the final say on where the line of "womanhood" lies.
But given that I genuinely do want trans women to be protected and affirmed to the greatest degree that's reasonably possible, I hope this conversation detoxifies enough that a solution that satisfies the maximum number of people can be reached.
well, ignoring the viewpoints of women is hardly without precedent, now is it.
I don't think formally or legally redefining even a fully feminized man as a woman is going to convince everyone, male or female that this former male should be accepted into the most private of woman-only areas e.g. bathrooms. I don't think niological men should be in women's sports at all. And having so many shrieking about misogyny and "transphobia" (what a stupid word, it should be transmisia, homomisia, etc.) isn't helping at all.
You will never get unanimity, but progress is possible. That progress recedes when you count cosplay as gender identity,
I presume in your final paragraph that you are referring to the authentically dysphoric, in which case I agree; I can't bring myself to extend the same to the nonbinary, who should never be allowed into female "spaces" (ugh).
"I don't think formally or legally redefining even a fully feminized man as a woman is going to convince everyone"
Yeah, absolutely. *Nothing* is going to convince everyone. 'Twas ever thus. Some women are going to be unhappy if trans women are permanently excluded from female spaces. Some will be unhappy if even fully transitioned trans women are allowed to use bathrooms. That's why I'm hammering on the word "reasonable." And I actually think bathrooms are the least controversial spaces for most women.
Unlike us floor-pissing neanderthals, women always have private stalls in which to use the bathroom. There are certainly some women who still object to trans women using bathrooms, and I get it, but once we recognise the fact that trans people exist, the most logical solution, in my opinion, is that trans people use the bathroom of the gender they identify as.
I've written about this in more detail here (https://steveqj.substack.com/p/every-time-i-think-the-left-has-jumped?s=w) but the short version is, if you're forcing trans women to use men's bathrooms, you're also forcing trans men to use women's bathrooms. But there's a problem. Trans men, in many cases, look absolutely indistinguishable from men. Beards and all. So what you're really doing is normalising the sight of completely masculine looking people walking into female bathrooms.
There's the trope of the pervy man in a dress trying to sneak into women's bathrooms, but what you'd end up with, is pervy men not even having to bother with the dress. Bathrooms aren't segregated by sex, they're segregated by gender expression (masculinity/femininity). Butch women already find themselves questioned in female bathrooms sometimes. And trans women who "pass" sail right in unchallenged.
But while bathrooms are segregated by gender expression, changing rooms, sports and rape crisis centres are segregated by biological sex. So a different conversation needs to be had there.
And yes, I'm always only referring to genuinely gender dysphoric people when I say trans. "Non-binary" people, and everybody else who likes to "dismantle categories" because they think it's "edgy", while giving no thought to the implications of their stupid, postmodernist games, can take a running jump.
Some good points in there, I take to heart the one about rape crisis centers over bathrooms.
Some countries only have one bathroom for everyone. Not here.
Love your final sentence.
I agree with the impracticality of redefining the word "woman." We need to call those people we've historically called "women" something less cumbersome than "persons having an X and a Y chromosome." Let's stick with "women" and admit that gender is not a binary classification; we can make up all the genders we want and respect all of them. For those really want a binary classification, and think phrases referring to chromosomes are too clinical and awkward, how about "inseminator" and "incubator?"
Yep, agree. I see no reason why a third option is not considered to be just, fair, and compassionate. Women, men, trans. Or if you want 4, then women & men & trans women & trans men. I just don't see why adding a third is such a big deal to people - people from both political extremes. Like Steve wrote in his Medium post, third genders have existed since forever, across many different cultures.
In his novel "Distress" Australian SF writer Greg Egan paints a future in which a complete set of gender-neutral third-person singular pronouns is in common use:
ve nominative
vis direct object
ver possessive
There are seven of what you guys are calling genders:
umale/ufemale: gender characteristics deliberate exaggerated; men with very bony faces, women with huge breasts
male/female - what we have now
imale/ifemale - still gendered but with physical and behavioral characteristics reduced and muted
But then there are the asex, whom the new pronouns are mostly for; all physical and psychological characteristics of gender are completely suppressed. Their original sex is indeterminable, they have neither genitalia nor gonads and the neural mechanisms of orgasm are suppressed.
It's the latter part that is most interesting; Egan makes the point that "rushes" like orgasm, religious epiphany, drug-induced mental overloads ... are all illegitimate and that it's in these conditions that people make the worst decisions of their lives.
Read this book. It will really make you think.
That sounds like a strange and interesting plot. I'm a science fiction fan, I'll check it out.
Probably doesn't need to be said, but I view sex and gender as different things. Not an essentialist, but I see sex as essentially binary (and not "assigned") and gender as generally trinary (male/female/trans which includes basically everything that's not specifically male or female, from trans women to nonbinary to hijras to two-spirit et al). Also to repeat, not an essentialist, but I actually resent when folks casually add a 'they' to their pronouns, despite some good intentions, because it feels faddish to me, like being bi in college for some, and more importantly, ignores actual committed lives of people who are trans/who genuinely fall out of that binary. And as long as I'm resenting things, I also resent biological males who decide to simply call themselves women and then say or imply that they are "expanding the definition of women" as if men even have that right. And while I'm rambling on, have to say that I've always been confused/irritated about how LGBT are all lumped in together when the first 3 are sexual orientations and the 4th is about gender. Ugh. I say this as a bi guy who is a strong friend to the trans communities and have dated across both cis and trans genders.
Also, my pronouns are we/us/ours, please refer to me as such. LOL
"I've always been confused/irritated about how LGBT are all lumped in together when the first 3 are sexual orientations and the 4th is about gender."
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. I have a LOT of thoughts about his issue. It's especially interesting in the context of "conversion therapy."
I would love to hear more about these thoughts!
Aside from your definitions of sex and gender, I agree with everything you say. Particularly the alphabet soup.
I'm gay, I came out in 1974 in Norfolk, VA where the gay scene was mostly about drag queens. I felt no connection to them at all, and in fact most of them were thieving parasites. Let a transvestite into your house and valuables would go missing. They never worked and lived with a succession of soon-to-be-ex-friends from whom they stole.
Like many still adjusting I claimed bisexuality (it's not really common among men at all) but unlike most I had sex with women a few times.
Sex and gender: in my lifelong understand all matters of male and female, biological and psychological, are gender. Sex is an activity that most of the animal and plant kingdoms perform to reproduce and some high mammals do for enjoyment. Yes I have seen "sex" used to mean "gender"; then again I see "media" and "criteria" used as singulars every day,
I've been around drag queens for much of my adult life, especially as a doorman-bouncer at a drag bar called the Brass Rail in San Diego, mid-90s. I've had very different experiences from you because they are mostly positive experiences. I really enjoyed the people there, very warm and amiable. They were for the most part a male community, outside of their time in drag while at the bar. Was happy to call them "she" when they adopted their female personas, dressed up and at the bar. But the things is, for the most part that was a kind of performance (or sometimes literal performance on stage). Outside of the Brass Rail, these folks were usually men. And they usually saw themselves as such, when they were not in drag. Much like the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence here in SF (well, at least the sisters I know).
To me at least, a person who is truly "trans" is a person who wants to be seen as not the biological sex that they were born in, and they want to be accepted as such 100% of the time, ideally forever. That's a hard path for many, thus my irritation with current fads that feel to me diminishing of genuinely trans individuals. I mean, even the drag queens back then often scorned actual trans women who had surgery, or were on the path to surgery. I recall a lot of transphobia from gay men back then. Fortunately, I think that has changed since the 2+ decades since.
"Read this book. It will really make you think."
Sounds fascinating! My sister is a sci-fi nut so I'll recommend it to her too!
Can you provide some data on the amount of violence, including rape, committed on women & trans women by men as compared to violence committed by women & trans women on each other? Not trying to call you out, but I can't help but assume that one number is incredibly small compared to the other. What is your estimation of "significant" when it comes to threat of violence?
I have literally heard or read zero examples of actual physical violence happening to women from other women due to woke reasons. And believe, I am anti-woke. Or at the very least, post-woke.
I have no trouble believing this; the viciousness I've witnessed in the "they/them" crowd matches or exceeds that of the MAGA beards. I despise both-sidesism but what we are seeing in these addled fools may even be worse.
Viciousness online, jobs lost, cruel words, shunning, doxing, all of that - yes. All of that is horrible. But I'm talking actual physical violence from woke women to non-woke women, which is what e.pierce mentioned. I've seen no examples of that. Not saying it doesn't exist, just that I'm not going to believe something until I read about specific instances (or see it myself, which is unlikely here in SF). Have you seen such physical attacks or can you link me to examples of those attacks? Serious question.
No. If I had I would have written "I've seen it," not "I have no trouble believing it."
I left the USA in 2010 before this whole piece of idiocy got off the ground, but I've seen a lot of it online. Even after years of reading conservative gloating over their cruelty I've been shocked by what I've read from the "non-binary" crowd; their viciousness is absolutely appalling,
And Medium stands right behind them.
People are often their worst selves online. People are a lot less brave in person. I guess believe what you will.
There really should be no controversy here, A "trans woman" is a man who has been cosmetically altered to appear more like a woman. He is not a woman.
That Lia Thomas who came out in first place doesn't look remotely feminine; he looks like a long-haired man. He grew up with male bones and musculature; he is cerebrally wired for a competitiveness that women don't share.
And here I thought the right and their pizzagate were deluded.
"There really should be no controversy here"
Ah, Chris. thank you for consistently being a breath of fresh, sane air.😅 I've been asking around a lot recently, including in my article, and as of yet, not one single person has been able to explain why this is even controversial.
Of course, I suspect the reason is that we've decided that reality is an acceptable sacrifice if it means protecting people's feelings. And this is fine and lovely on an individual level, but absolutely destructive on a societal level. remember how, for a while, there was that other "gotcha" question?:
Is a trans woman a *real* woman?
The question itself provides the answer. But the failure to be honest there, was the beginning of the ridiculous situation we find ourselves in now.
Pure gold: “we've decided that reality is an acceptable sacrifice if it means protecting people's feelings. And this is fine and lovely on an individual level, but absolutely destructive on a societal level.”
As a pragmatist, I so struggle with this approach. It will never move us forward or solve actual bigotry in any meaningful way but will devolve society into a war of all against all.
How can major percentages of our younger generations be such weak thinkers? Is digital space toxic enough to catalyze this trend? It truly makes one wonder at the vulnerability of human perception to signalling. It's gone beyond “we are social animals” to we are predisposed to a sort of "hive mindedness.” If I were able to live my life over again, I think I would become a neuroscientist and study this one thing. There has to be an answer.
I started following TaraElla under my original now closed Medium account and follow her under my new one. Her new political series is quite good.
In keeping with the views expressed by you both in that conversation, acceptance of trans-persons without the trans prefix is a hard sell and I doubt that I will live to see it. But then, I don't think it necessary for a norm of treating trans-people decently.
I've written before that 30 years ago, before trans was in the lexicon except for transvestite (another unfortunate share for different things) I was perfectly willing to treat a "man in a woman's body" as he wished. I purposefully just used "he" because I didn't think he was a woman and saw him as a flaming gay, effeminate man. And that was OK. He knew that but was good with my considerate treatment of him. Perhaps today. now that trans is a word in my awareness and thing I would call him her, but we are no longer in touch with each other. I genuinely liked him and we had conversations without awkwardness.
Trans persons who can successfully pass will have an easier time than those who don't with acceptance, but may face more danger from outraged men who are surprised after sex has been initiated. Our perfect world has not yet arrived.
"But then, I don't think it necessary for a norm of treating trans-people decently."
Absolutely. When you consider the time and energy that's been poured into this pointless goal that could have been spent on, for example, education that challenges gender norms instead of reinforcing them in a new way, it's truly infuriating.
So many excellent posts and such a breath of fresh air that discussion brings, like nuance and complexity. I have long felt trans women being referred to as trans women IS an important distinction. As you say, the real issue is how Trans can become fully realized, unfettered humans to live their lives as they wish. Never thought it would a word choice that would become controversial. But in this tribal, yes/no, polarized, Twitter mob environment we are trapped in, this went from being just semantics to something quite dangerous. It is telling that no one is asking “what’s a man”? Because women (adult females) have experiences of being threatened by men forever. I remember once reading a survey on what worries men about women and the response was “that they will laugh at us”. What worries women about men? “That they will kill us.” This isn’t hyperbole, nor is to impugn the character of trans women. But it helps explain why there is zero discussion on “what is a man?”
"it helps explain why there is zero discussion on “what is a man?”
Yeah absolutely. It amazes me that people act as if the fact that the conversation focuses on "what is a woman" is some kind of "gotcha." Men don't *care* how you define "man", because, unless you redefine it to mean "lion" and ask us to share spaces with lions, there are no safety or privacy concerns that come with the redefinition. Any dangers we face from violent males are already the norm.
The debate is about women's rights. Not trans rights. It's only the misogyny and narcissism of some members of the trans community that make them unable to grasp this simple point.
“Never thought it would a word choice that would become controversial.” Control the language—control the culture. Autocracy is, in part, about controlling the meaning of words. The rest of it is about controlling behavior.
Since woke ideologues are only fighting a battle of language and not putting people in prisons or shooting them in the head, they can claim that they are still within liberal bounds.
(Slamming on brakes and nearly overturning)
WAIT a minute. Free speech absolutist? Seriously?
Do you support lying? Do you stand behind commercial and political falsehood? Stochastic assassination? Bottling sewage and marketing it as a cancer cure?
Seriously?
Let's get serious here: free speech is intended to protect criticism of government, to allow citizens to disagree with their leaders without a charge of sedition. That's ALL it is. And like well-regulated militias it has been expanded to embrace the most vile extremities imaginable.
I was pretty shocked to read that, Steve. I associate free speech absolutism with nincompoops like Glenn Greenwald, not with people of established intelligence and command of nuance such as yourself.
"(Slamming on brakes and nearly overturning)"
😁 This is a big topic, so let's start with a few clarifications. Because "free speech" has become a very broad church in recent years.
The likes of Donald Trump being banned from Twitter is not a free speech issue. I fully support his ban and actually wish it had come sooner. Private companies get to set their own rules on speech. This is a huge and nuanced issue in its own right, but I'll leave it at that.
Hate speech laws have a place, though I'd limit them strictly to incitement to physical harm. No special mean words, no hurt feelings, no liability for misgendering somebody or using the n-word. If you aren't saying something that could lead directly to physical harm, I support your right to say it (if you experience physical harm for saying the n-word, say, that's on you).
I don't support lying, the problem is the very concept of a lie itself. How do we verify what is and isn't a lie? Just as a recent example, for quite a long time, the whole Hunter Biden laptop scandal was deemed a lie. A diversionary tactic cooked up by "the Right." Yet it turns out it was true. How do we square that circle? And what would happen if that "lie" had been suppressed so thoroughly that the truth was never revealed?
Free speech absolutism absolutely means that you will have to deal with bad ideas and bad-faith actors. I truly hate this fact. But it's the price of this very important principle. I simply don't see a good way to do better. Letting people say whatever they want, safe in the knowledge that they won't go to jail, is the baseline for a functioning society.
Every deviation from this principle, however well intentioned, leads to some degree of censorship. And as we're seeing in Russia at the moment (and North Korea and China) the consequences can be catastrophic.
"I fully support his ban and actually wish it had come sooner."
Since Trump's tweet storms made him his own worst enemy, shutting him down sooner would have been doing him a favor.
Yeah, the issue for me was the stolen election claims after the votes had been counted. The regular stupidity is one thing, but I think it was clear for a long time that was going to lead to real problems.
The trouble with limitations on free speech is who shall do the limiting? Donald Trump? AOC?Medium, for example, is a sea of bullshit where people give opinions as if they are truth from the lips of God while calling all disagreement false. Shall we limit the speech of these writers? Again, who is the decider. One person's wonderful "influencer" is another person's idiot. Right or wrong, I'd rather be the decider for myself.
Absolute free speech is not support of lies, but rather support of people using their own discernment with regard to statements and ideas. I am quite non-partisan in my assumption that all things political serve as propaganda which has elements of truth and lies.
A thought for consideration. How much outrageous bullshit is put out there by the opposition to make that opposition look like a bunch of nutcases? How much political thought is generated not by the good ideas of a political ideology, but as a reaction to the nutty stuff from radicals? What is the percentage of people voting for something/someone vs. against?
Democracy is a truly horrible system where propagandized people vote to impose their will upon others. Lynching and gang rape are examples of majority rule - democratic events. We can decide if someone's free speech is harmful, but to who? And who says? That is the issue. Your good and beneficial thing for society might be my idea of something horrible and destructive. Free speech lets you decide for yourself, for better or worse.
I'll answer in more detail when I have time but "who gets to decide" is never a legitimate rebuttal, it's not even a real argument. It's hiding behind the apron of relativism.
We are capable of criteria.
Really? It is absolutely a valid argument? I look forward to your explanation for how censorship is a good thing.
Did I say "censorship is a good thing?" No, I said no such thing. I said that "who gets to decide" is a dodge, not an argument.
This is one of the issues in democracy gone amok, just as in science gone amok, or anything else; being open to a plurality of viewpoints quickly leads to an inability, if not a refusal, to distinguish betweem legitimate plurality and rank absurdity.
I'm on some physics forums where any mention of religion is an immediate ban from the forum. You might call that censorship. I call it time management. I've wasted enough of my life dealing with God Of The Gaps bullshit and have no more such time to waste, and neither does the forum administrator.
Who gets to decide? He does.
My mind is closed to anything almost any conservative Republican might have to say because most of them are liars. If you think the exclusion of liars is a violation of "free speech" then our views are irreconcilable.
"My mind is closed to anything almost any conservative Republican might have to say because most of them are liars. If you think the exclusion of liars is a violation of "free speech" then our views are irreconcilable."
I have a right-wing friend with the same extreme partisan filter as you except for him, all things coming from Democrats and Republicans he deems to be RINOs are liars. When I tell him that there can be no critical thought when tribal membership is what you use to determine truth he usually says, we agree to disagree, and we don't destroy a friendship formed decades before either of us had a clue about each other's political views. Who gets to decide who the liars are, you, him or me? I'm fine with us deciding for ourselves. I'm quite outspoken in my disdain of political partisanship as a Litmus test for truth. That doesn't mean that we will never agree on anything, so I don't automatically dismiss your thoughts.
I assume that your science forum has stated rules about religion presented as science and if so, enforcing them is fine. It doesn't take much time to see that that is where someone's ideas are coming from so it's also fine to stop reading when you see fit. I don't read to the end of many articles or comments. Not necessarily because I disagree with them. Most often it's a what's the point? Does this lead to an actionable path to a solution or understanding (often the same thing) or is it just venting hate?
My disdain for the extremes of tribalism isn't about the views of the tribes, but rather the tribalism preempting logical thought by willfully dismissing all things that threaten an ideology. That is by the way what censorship is most often about. Not truth, but threats to the ideology of the censor. Basically, "I don't want to hear that shit!" That's your decision, but you should be the decider of that.
When are you going to explain why you think who decides is not a real argument?
Well your first response was to bait me by demanding a justification for something I didn't say. I feel disinclined to debate someone who instantly projects dishonesty like that.
In thousands of debates I've read and participated in someone will quip "who gets to decide!" and then primp and preen as if it's an incisive argument. It isn't. It's merely lazy, and lately fashionable given the blurring of fact and opinion. Compounded by the fashionable invocation of "subjectivity" as though it invalidates every clear reasoning.
Who gets to decide? Are we incapable of coming up with criteria? Let's go through a few examples.
Who gets to decide what a medical doctor is? Well there are certification boards. They have developed stringent criteria. Someone who hangs out his shingle as an MD without that certification will go to prison, even if he practices exemplary medicine. The same is true for many professions. Do you want to open this to argument? That would be irresponsible.
And then your Trumpian friend (that would be a friendship-breaker for me; I could have an uncomfortable relationship with a Bush supporter, but Trump? No) . Does your friend say Biden stole the election? Who gets to decide who the president is? Well, sorry, but it's objectively true that Biden won over seven million more votes and a decisive electoral college victory.
Who gets to decide if the earth is flat or round?
Now let me talk about a more current event; there are people spreading wantonly irresponsible misinformation about COVID, among them a once-respected epidemiologist. Social media have drawn lines in sand about this; they'll eject people like Dr. Malone for advocating ivermectin as a treatment.
Back to my original point: a society that reveres pluralism and a variety of viewpoints must take on the responsibility of rejecting and, yes, suppressing illegitimate ones. If I had my way Dr. Malone would be making license plates. The epistemological crisis we are living through right now is the result of a progression that began with a noble idea and has disintegrated into chaos. Postmodernism was like falling down stairs. Now we're going over a cliff. The most absurd ideas (a pizza parlor that doesn't have a basement is operating a child sex-traffic operation out of its basement; Trump won the election; a man in a dress is a woman). are set alongside legitimate viewpoints, and the best lack all conviction while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
If "who gets to decide" is all you have, bow out of the debate because you don't have an argument. And if you find yourself readily thinking in terms of perspective and subjectivity, you've lost your way.
"Their claim typically includes the that the mere use of objective, rational and systematic analysis to criticize the incoherence of their ideological rhetoric is "oppressive"."
Yep, it's also "white supremacy."🙄
Please don't refer to these idiots as "the left."