Post ALDVvmlyiYkLbBZ3BI by teamochi@spinster.xyz
 (DIR) More posts by teamochi@spinster.xyz
 (DIR) Post #ALDVvmEIjlo9ujo9gm by MadamMim@spinster.xyz
       2022-05-27T19:14:08.373626Z
       
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       I'm reading Frans de Waal's new book Different, which is a primatologist's perspective on sex and gender. It started out relatively promising, stressing the importance of recognizing sex differences, but after chapter 2 I'm not so sure anymore. 🤔 He writes about trans people as valid, born with a mismatched brain and they all knew they were trans at an early age. Very young trans kids are of course also a thing and denying trans people access to the sports and bathrooms of their choosing is demonizing them. Makes me wonder, has De Waal really not encountered the modern trans movement of girldick and ROGD in his research or is he trying not to rock the boat and get the transgender thing out of the way so he can just continue writing about animal behavior.  Something else that irked me: he also describes the case of Donna, a female chimp who acts in a more masculine way, is extra hairy and has period/reproductive problems. You'd think he would address possible biological (hormonal/intersex) causes, but instead he talks about the ape's potential trans status, concludes that we cannot ask her about her gender feelings and ends up describing her as asexual and gender non-conforming (some psychology podcaster has already picked this story up as 'Donna the non-binary chimpanzee').
       
 (DIR) Post #ALDVvmlyiYkLbBZ3BI by teamochi@spinster.xyz
       2022-07-06T11:41:03.416821Z
       
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       @MadamMim Ugh, hasn't he heard of the glory and joy that is Poly-Cystic Ovarian Syndrome or PCOS? Because women with PCOS often are more hairy, can have more testosterone and VERY MUCH have period/reproductive problems. It seems like as a typical male scientist, he is not really interesting in female health...had he been, he could have guessed that perhaps Donna the chimp might have something like PCOS, if chimpanzees can have that (quite likely, we are very similar afterall).
       
 (DIR) Post #ALDVvnXpqd1lzbxGm8 by MadamMim@spinster.xyz
       2022-06-04T22:54:16.646550Z
       
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       A couple of more thoughts on De Waal's book now that I've finished:-Overall it was another interesting book about the parallels between human and primate/animal behavior (including a whole lot of bonobo sex).-I'd say De Waal pays a lot of attention to the position and importance of women, including praise for overlooked female researchers and calls for men to help create more gender equality.-He believes biology matters and trying to make society gender neutral is not useful. We should have more gender equality, less gender prejudice and more acceptance of people who are gay or otherwise different - so far, so good.-But then there's the trans stuff (which is mainly one chapter and some bits near the end). I think the key to this is in the acknowledgements at the end of the book. He writes about the topic of gender being an "ideological minefield" and that writing this book might have been a foolish decision. So yeah, I think he knows a little more about this than he wants to talk about, but felt compelled to write a biological validation of trans people in order to keep himself from getting cancelled or aggressively questioned for talking about biology.  -His validation of gender identity as a unchangeable biological thing that one is born with feels kind of lazy and easy to debunk. It mainly hinges on challenged research about brain sex, the extreme male brain theory on autism and outdated transsexual stereotypes, completely ignoring the modern trans movement and possible non-biological causes of gender dysphoria.-I've read a couple of recent interviews. Most of this book is not about human gender identity stuff but of course that's what journalists want to talk about. And De Waal just runs with the whole 'gender identity is real', 'trans kids know what they are', 'why would people pretend to be trans' and 'they used to say that about gay people' thing in response to any difficult questions, which is very disappointing. 🙄
       
 (DIR) Post #ALDVwNnh396SRDeRUW by TheWitchBitch@spinster.xyz
       2022-07-06T14:03:28.798049Z
       
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       @teamochi @MadamMim good point. He's another idiot.