[HN Gopher] A backlash against gender ideology is starting in un...
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A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities
Author : Tomte
Score : 469 points
Date : 2021-06-23 12:51 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.economist.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.economist.com)
| [deleted]
| f154hfds wrote:
| I can't imagine what this debate must feel like to someone who
| grew up in the 50's, 60's and 70's. Until 10 years ago gay
| marriage wasn't official policy of Obama or Clinton or I believe
| the majority of the Democratic party. The pace is dizzying.
|
| It feels like a race to the bottom, but I don't know where the
| bottom even is. Without push back this could spell the end of
| women's sports, women's prisons - heck, pretty much all
| institutions for women (except natal/health related) are facing
| an existential crisis over this. Women's sports are the most
| obvious. Why would a woman participate in the highest level of
| competition if she has no chance of success no matter what she
| does because she was born with XX chromosomes? One transgender
| athlete in the meet is one thing. What happens when gold, silver
| and bronze are all taken away? Of all our recent societal
| enlightenments this one seems most ill-fated. Trans activists
| should be able to foresee this eventuality and realize it's a
| bridge too far.
|
| At the end of the day, we live in a culture where identity self-
| actualization is the paramount freedom without which one is
| considered oppressed. My question is really where do we settle
| out? Where are the boundaries that we recognize as a society are
| put there for our own protection? What happens when one person's
| self-actualization is in direct conflict with another's? When one
| group's (cis women) is in conflict with another's (trans women)?
| plank_time wrote:
| > Until 10 years ago gay marriage wasn't official policy of
| Obama
|
| I think you are misremembering. Obama was actively against gay
| marriage and defended his views against gay marriage through
| the 2012 election. I think Biden was the one to first broach
| the topic in 2014 with his active support for it.
| f154hfds wrote:
| I think that's what I'm saying too unless I misunderstand.
| 2012 was 9 years ago, and Obama was anti gay marriage. So was
| Clinton for that matter until about 2015.
| https://www.eqca.org/hillary-clinton-has-a-new-position-
| on-s...
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.is/vEsW4
| neom wrote:
| https://www.printfriendly.com/p/g/9kgBJa
| uhorb wrote:
| I think this page is my takeaway of the day. Thank you!
| seunoyebode wrote:
| haha... yeah right.
|
| But doesn't work for ft.com articles
| gorgoiler wrote:
| In a shared space, should the people that share that space have
| the right to exclude someone if it makes the majority feel
| unsafe? What about if it makes just one of them feel unsafe?
|
| If one person says they feel unsafe, should they be asked to
| leave instead of the newcomer, with whom the majority are
| ambivalent?
|
| Basically what I'm getting at is what's the algebra / game theory
| of creating safe spaces based on tolerance and intolerance?
| celeritascelery wrote:
| When ever I see someone talk about "safe space", I ask myself,
| "safe space for which ideas?" The things that are safe to
| discuss are different at thanksgiving dinner, a college
| designated safe-space, a therapist's office, or a church
| meeting. There is no such thing as a universal "safe space" for
| all ideas.
| avereveard wrote:
| Ostracizing people based solely on one own feeling sits
| squarely against the whole concept of presumption of innocence,
| it's the apotheosis of prejudices against coexistence.
| HideousKojima wrote:
| Presumption of innocence is a legal presumption, and it
| exists there for very good reasons that would take too long
| to get into. Requiring such a presumption outside of a legal
| context in the way you're suggesting would undermine a
| different fundamental right, the freedom of association.
| People should have the right to associate (and disassociate)
| with whomever they like for whatever reasons they like, no
| matter how arbitrary or petty.
| avereveard wrote:
| a and b want to associate, a want to associate with c, c
| don't want to associate with b, b doesn't care as long as
| he can associate with a, as per the grandparent comment
| statement, given that neither a, b and c did anything
| reprehensible yet.
|
| everyone is free to act, but still a problem presents
| itself. what's the more just option for person a according
| to ethics and morals? that's the core of the conundrum, the
| right to associate and disassociate impacts other people
| freedoms, as such is the nature of interpersonal relations;
| of course individual have their individual freedom, but
| should A act on C prejudice, or in other word should C
| demand limits on A freedom (i.e. cancel culture)
|
| mind you, the issue is about C own personal perceived
| feeling of unsafeness, not on B having done anything
| against C.
| nrjames wrote:
| I worked for a company that hired 4 trans women (out of 7 people
| total) during a "diversity hiring" push, then touted the
| diversity of the hires. All of the trans women had been raised
| and had gone through university as white men, earning comp sci
| degrees, before transitioning in their mid- to late-twenties.
| While I do not debate that those individuals represent a type of
| diversity in the current company makeup, it always struck me that
| they likely received the same privileges that most white males do
| in technical degree programs. As competent programmers, I'm glad
| they found good jobs. Did they represent diversity hires? I still
| wonder how HR departments take this into consideration when
| pushing for diversity.
| runbathtime wrote:
| Also a white backlash against CRT that is anti white.
| drenvuk wrote:
| Can someone please tell me how important this topic based on the
| amount of news time and eyeballs it attracts relative to the
| number of people that it affects?
|
| The numbers I can find for US citizens is: 0.6% or 1,988,696 out
| 331,449,281 of people total for the entirety of the US in 2021.
|
| >https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_demographics_of_the_Unite...
|
| In the UK where the featured article took place the latest poll I
| could find comes counts the number of people who selected "other"
| when choosing a sex at 0.4% or 224,632 people out of 64,596,800.
|
| >https://practicalandrogyny.com/2014/12/16/how-many-people-in...
|
| Personally I don't think this is very important compared to other
| topics. There are more blind people than trans people. There are
| more people with Alzheimer's than trans people. There are more
| people in the US who have lost a limb than trans people.
|
| I don't mean to downplay what is happening because it is
| happening but do you not think the amount of outrage this topic
| generates surpasses the level of impact we can have assuming we
| fix it? It just feels like we're being distracted.
| NoblePublius wrote:
| 100% of people have gender.
| mkl wrote:
| No, look at agender here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-
| binary_gender.
| [deleted]
| bsder wrote:
| > I don't mean to downplay what is happening because it is
| happening but do you not think the amount of outrage this topic
| generates surpasses the level of impact we can have assuming we
| fix it? It just feels like we're being distracted.
|
| There is something about tech, though, that seems to
| concentrate the male to female transitioners far above
| background levels.
|
| I can count more than a half-dozen male to female transition
| folks in my tech circles. I can't even think of one that I
| bumped into doing any non-tech social activity.
| brighton36 wrote:
| Race and gender are infracultural values (these taxonomies
| govern architecture, city planning, and civil religion). Prior
| to recently, These are/were objective taxonomies. Which, is why
| rocking these pillars causes so much attention. (And thus, pays
| to cover, for a news syndicate)
| [deleted]
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| The media does absolutely soak it for eyeballs and outrage, but
| at the same time it really _is_ a bellwether for how gender
| works in a society at larger. Gender is simply a more social /
| less individual phenomenon than blindness itself is (to use
| your example).
|
| I find it funny and illuminating to read about conservative cis
| gays complaining about those darn genderqueer "kids, these
| days". All media fads aside, we simply haven't reached "queer
| equilibrium" yet where increasing acceptance of past social
| categories no longer triggers the emergence of new ones.
| alsetmusic wrote:
| > Personally I don't think this is very important compared to
| other topics. There are more blind people than trans people.
| There are more people with Alzheimer's than trans people. There
| are more people in the US who have lost a limb than trans
| people.
|
| Those groups aren't subjected to violence just for existing.
| The comparisons aren't at all one to one.
| omgwtfbbq wrote:
| As a share of all crimes committed what percentage are
| against trans people?
| kenjackson wrote:
| > Personally I don't think this is very important compared to
| other topics. There are more blind people than trans people.
| There are more people with Alzheimer's than trans people. There
| are more people in the US who have lost a limb than trans
| people.
|
| It's not impactful in terms of the number of people, but its a
| civil rights issue for those on the left. And for those on the
| right its just one more group trying to change things from the
| status quo.
|
| It's also a complex issue. I sit pretty far on the left, but
| the various issues related to trans policy I find to often not
| have a clear solution -- most notably around sports and
| fairness. Sigh.
| munk-a wrote:
| Honestly though the question around sports fairness is less a
| problem raised by trans people and more just an existing
| issue exposed. Female and male bodies work differently on
| average but there are a good number of women more fit and
| physically capable than 99% of men - gender is not an
| independent variable in physical fitness but I do wonder if
| there's really much of a reason to keep insisting that the
| genders be separated into exclusive leagues.
| 762236 wrote:
| The problem is the suppression of reasoned speech. People are
| forbidden to discuss this topic. People in power (e.g.,
| University Deans) use this topic to abuse those under their
| power. Students use it to abuse professors (e.g., students
| claim that they don't feel safe around a particular professor).
| In the name of trying to stop abuse of trans people, we're
| abusing non trans people (e.g, people get fired over this
| topic).
| phodge wrote:
| In Australia and most other developed countries now, this
| ideology is heavily promoted to children, encouraging them to
| believe they are trans. They are connected with websites that
| promote the ideology, and then connected with a trans
| specialist who helps prescribe puberty blockers without
| parental knowledge.
|
| If you are a parent who believes that children should be taught
| to love their own bodies as they grow rather than have surgeons
| pretend to fix them by removing essential organs, then this
| represents a massive assault on your offspring.
|
| > The numbers I can find for US citizens is: 0.6%
|
| And there's a huge number of "trans" who later realise they
| were sold a lie and have to undergo further surgery to try and
| restore their original sex. Selling this to ideology to
| children is going to dramatically increase that 0.6%. How many
| of the new cases are going to actually be trans, vs children
| that thought they were trans and started puberty blockers at
| school, but actually were just never taught to love their body?
| cwkoss wrote:
| > And there's a huge number of "trans" who later realise they
| were sold a lie and have to undergo further surgery to try
| and restore their original sex.
|
| There is no way this is a huge number. I'd be shocked if you
| could find a credible source on this. This sounds like
| conservative agitprop.
| cmh89 wrote:
| This post has a very noticeable lack of citations and vague
| terms like "huge" which make it very likely that you are
| speaking from personal bias rather than any kind of
| expertise.
| karpierz wrote:
| On the other hand, there isn't any controversy as to whether
| blindness is a real condition.
| munk-a wrote:
| People who don't qualify as legally blind but have extreme
| vision impairment would like to talk to you. My stepson is
| profoundly deaf but still has hearing and wears hearing aides
| to assist him, he'll often read lips during conversations to
| supplement that audio information and that can result in
| pretty big communication breakdowns.
|
| Pretty much everything in life is a spectrum of possibilities
| - trying to boil those down to binary states can be helpful
| for some purposes but is never clean.
| moate wrote:
| I would imagine that the rate of violent attacks on blind
| individuals specifically due to their blindness is also lower
| than hate crimes against Trans individuals.
|
| I don't hear about a lot of amputees being dragged behind
| pickup trucks for not having as many limbs as their
| attackers, but maybe I'm not reading the right publications.
| yanderekko wrote:
| Well, it's undoubtedly a condition but there are probably
| some who dispute whether it's a "disease" or "disability".
| This resistance is more commonly associated with the deaf
| community, and drawing parallels between this population and
| the trans population will get you in hot water pretty
| quickly..
| worik wrote:
| Yes there is.
|
| Being "legally blind" is a thing. The cut off for how little
| vision is enough to be blind is debatable.
|
| Not that simple.
| la6471 wrote:
| Yep sad that we cannot think of anything better to do ....
| caeril wrote:
| There's a large segment of the population that feels actively
| threatened by trans rights. The two primary components are:
|
| 1. Parents and sexual violence victims concerned about the non-
| falsifiability of trans-identification and the related concerns
| of sexual predators claiming an identity they don't actually
| have to gain access to private spaces of women and girls.
|
| 2. Feminists (TERFs) who believe being a woman is a
| fundamental, biological identity and cannot be coopted by
| males.
|
| Interestingly enough, there's not much animosity toward trans-
| men. These groups exclusively concern themselves with trans-
| women.
|
| Mormons are probably another group due to the reliance of their
| theology on binary gender, but I don't see them as being
| particularly vocal on this topic.
| eropple wrote:
| _> Interestingly enough, there 's not much animosity toward
| trans-men._
|
| One of the interesting things about spending the last few
| years studying Western European post-Roman history has been
| the discovery that, in the West, there has historically been
| relatively little resistance to AFAB folks "presenting"
| (speaking of the interpretation at the time--the dichotomy
| between "presenting" and "being" is one I am thoroughly not
| qualified to negotiate) as male unless tied into homophobia.
| There are historical examples of folks who outwardly identify
| as women taking on male roles in monastic life, and it's
| often portrayed as a good and pious thing.
|
| The reverse, it seems, is generally not true, though not
| exclusively so. I've read of, but don't have offhand,
| accounts of Church investigation into "male nuns" that ruled
| that the erstwhile offender, a male who had suffered
| prepubescent genital damage, had committed no crime being
| raised by a particular convent as a woman. But cases going
| the other way round are much more common.
|
| In terms of today's relations, however, my intuition is that
| the fear regarding transwomen is that it's largely a
| performative flavor of misogyny and the fear of those of the
| "superior" set somehow damaging all men, much as the
| performative flavor of homophobia does the same with regards
| to gay men but _shockingly_ much rarely with regards to
| bisexual or homosexual women. But, of course, that is just an
| intuition.
| plank_time wrote:
| TERF is a pejorative term, I wouldn't use it unless you are
| trying to attack feminists.
| moate wrote:
| How do you define a TERF without calling them a TERF (and
| distinguishing them from other Radical Feminists or
| mainstream 4th wave feminists)?
|
| If we can't call a spade a spade, what shall we call it?
| millzlane wrote:
| In academic discourse, there is no consensus on whether or
| not TERF constitutes a slur.
|
| But if we want to be accommodating to those who take
| offense with the term, we can use the term Gender Critical.
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| >In academic discourse, there is no consensus on whether
| or not TERF constitutes a slur.
|
| All you have to do is look at how the term is used in the
| wild to determine if its a slur. Anyone who can claim it
| isn't is being disingenuous.
| plank_time wrote:
| "Trans-exclusionary radical feminist" sounds pretty
| pejorative, most especially the "radical" part.
| ratww wrote:
| "Radical Feminist" is the only part of the term that
| everyone agrees is not pejorative.
|
| It is a real branch inside feminism, which lots of women
| identify with, and it doesn't mean what most people think
| it does.
|
| Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_feminism
| paulv wrote:
| "Radical feminism" is a branch of feminism. It is not
| used as a pejorative in the acronym.
| r00fus wrote:
| Those who are called TERFs are feminists in name only. The
| vast majority of self-described feminists don't agree with
| the TERF platform.
| SirHound wrote:
| Its not an attack on feminists though?
| ben_w wrote:
| I read the original comment by @caeril as saying that
| Feminists are TERFs, which would not be accurate as the
| expansion of the acronym is " _Trans-Exclusionary_
| Radical Feminists".
|
| From what I've seen reported, cis women are on average
| more relaxed than cis men about trans women.
| spamizbad wrote:
| > Interestingly enough, there's not much animosity toward
| trans-men.
|
| While it's true there's little animosity directed at them,
| there is a lot of stuff Shrier's view that "gender ideology"
| is seducing lesbian women into thinking they're not actually
| women. Which, honestly, as someone who lived through lots of
| the dumb gay panic in the 80s and 90s sounds exactly like
| what people thought about homosexuals (eg: gay people can
| seduce/recruit straight people and turn them gay). So trans
| men get treated like dupes or victims of some social
| phenomena, rather than treated like actual human beings with
| agency of their own.
|
| In fact, pretty much every anti-trans viewpoint I see, even
| from otherwise highbrow publicans like the Economist, are
| really just rehashes of what we heard about gays in the 80s
| and 90s, before we realized they were, in fact, not a threat
| to society.
| pavlov wrote:
| _> " sexual predators claiming an identity they don 't
| actually have"_
|
| This is such a bizarre leap of logic. Trans women are the
| pariahs of contemporary Western society. Yet the same people
| who uphold this subhuman status also assume that rapists are
| nefariously claiming trans female identity.
|
| That's not how rapists operate! They seek positions of power.
| Trans women are downtrodden and powerless -- the least
| attractive position for a sexual predator.
| mmmmmbop wrote:
| You are of course right factually, but fear of sexual
| predators is not based in stats and facts, but in feelings.
| When people think about rape, they imagine a stranger in a
| dark alley, whereas ~90% of rapists are somebody the victim
| knows.
| delecti wrote:
| I think your terminology is a bit backwards. A trans man is
| someone assigned female at birth but who later identifies
| as male. From context you seem to be talking about the
| hypothetical of male rapists professing they identify as
| trans women. A person born male who later identifies as a
| woman is a trans woman.
| pavlov wrote:
| Thanks, that's what I meant. (You write an agitated
| comment on the phone and make a basic mistake. The
| usual.)
| kaitai wrote:
| I thought that was the idea being sold by Republicans in
| the US, though, that a woman who is trans is going to be
| lurking in the bathroom to rape your daughter after
| beating her in tennis?
| delecti wrote:
| Yes. Republicans are trying to pass bills under the guise
| of protecting against trans women. Trans women are people
| who were assigned male at birth, and now present as
| women.
| kingsuper20 wrote:
| >There's a large segment of the population that feels
| actively threatened by trans rights.
|
| I'd say that's a vast overreach. It isn't like the Trans Army
| is going to come burn down your house.
|
| If anything, it's a general notion that transsexuals are
| mentally ill and that there is something odd about
| normalizing it. In a sense, that it's not different than
| people who want their limbs amputated or wear animal costumes
| at all times.
| swebs wrote:
| >2. Feminists (TERFs) who believe being a woman is a
| fundamental, biological identity and cannot be coopted by
| males.
|
| I'd wager that most people believe this. Not just feminists.
| chc wrote:
| Polling suggests otherwise:
|
| https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-women-
| supp...
|
| https://thehill.com/changing-america/respect/548775-new-
| poll...
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| There are a lot of shades of trans support, If you asked
| the most extreme questions you would probably get
| different answers.
|
| It is one thing to ask people should be able can use a
| bathroom, and another to ask questions about personal
| sexlife and behavior. i.e. if you asked people if you
| consider transwomen equally with women at birth as sexual
| partners, I bet the numbers fall through the floor.
| chc wrote:
| Well, sure. If you ask people whether they consider Black
| and Asian men equally as sex partners, the numbers would
| also fall through the floor. This doesn't mean Black or
| Asian men are less of men, or even that they're
| necessarily against either of those groups, it just means
| people have preferences in what their partners' bodies
| are like. My point is just that "trans women are women
| and trans men are men" is actually a common opinion,
| contrary to the claim in the comment I was replying to.
| jl6 wrote:
| I think you may have missed the point in GP's post.
| "Trans-women are women" is a common opinion in a casual
| context (like when greeting a colleague in an office),
| but in contexts where the stakes are higher (like when
| choosing a sexual partner), very few will treat trans-
| women as women.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Exactly my point. Many hold the philosophy that
| discriminating between the two _in any context_ is an
| attack.
|
| Most heterosexual men identify as being attracted to
| women, and don't hold trans women in that category.
| chc wrote:
| I don't think this conclusion is justified by the data,
| though. If this were just a matter of "they'll humor
| trans people, but everyone secretly knows trans women are
| men and treats them accordingly," you'd expect gay men to
| generally be attracted to trans women. But by all
| accounts I've heard, the people who are attracted to
| trans women tend to be straight men, just like any other
| woman. It's true that straight men are generally less
| likely to be attracted to trans women than cis women, but
| this just shows that being transgender is unattractive to
| them. Gay men are even less likely to be attracted to
| trans women, so it's clearly not as simple as "people
| actually perceive them as male and treat them
| accordingly."
| jl6 wrote:
| Here's some actual data that suggests "trans women are
| women for dating purposes" is the opinion of only a small
| minority:
|
| https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/026540751877
| 913...
| swebs wrote:
| 54 percent of Americans believe "whether a person is a man
| or a woman is determined at birth". There is a wide
| partisan divide with 80 percent of Republicans agreeing (so
| probably not radical feminists) and only 34 percent of
| democrats agreeing.
|
| https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-
| tank/2017/11/08/transgender...
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| The scientific community, specifically the community that
| conducts science on this topic, currently has a distinction
| on the terms sex and gender. I'd posit the possible
| consensus position that the term sex refers to physical
| anatomy whereas gender refers to one's gender role in
| interaction with others.
|
| For details on that distinction and attempts at consensus-
| building for the terminology, see https://journals.physiolo
| gy.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysio...
|
| In software development terms, this topic has no ubiquitous
| language.
|
| In relation to your comment, their belief is not based in a
| shared reality.
| ben_w wrote:
| Unless I have wildly misunderstood you, I believe you would
| lose that wager: https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-
| content/uploads/Pu...
| jollybean wrote:
| Wow - I don't think so, unless by;
|
| "2. Feminists (TERFs) who believe being a"
|
| ... you mean the groups they represent i.e. 'a lot of women'
| frankly many of them who are not 'radical feminist' or even
| 'feminist'.
|
| Huge numbers of women are uncomfortable with at least some
| parts of 'trans women' from 'changerooms' to 'sports' etc..
|
| I don't think the very notion of 'trans' really upsets very
| many people at all, and that's the funny paradox.
|
| But as soon as it crosses paths with others, then it's an
| entirely different issue and there's a lot of dust raised by
| pluralities.
| umvi wrote:
| > Mormons are probably another group due to the reliance of
| their theology on binary gender, but I don't see them as
| being particularly vocal on this topic.
|
| Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints doesn't appear to
| feel threatened by transgender rights. At least, not
| according to official stances here:
| https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/topics/transgender
| chc wrote:
| From that link:
|
| > Gender is an essential characteristic of Heavenly
| Father's plan of happiness. The intended meaning of gender
| in "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" is biological
| sex at birth.
|
| > Church leaders counsel against elective medical or
| surgical intervention for the purpose of attempting to
| transition to the opposite gender of a person's birth sex
| ("sex reassignment"). Leaders advise that taking these
| actions will be cause for Church membership restrictions.
|
| > Leaders also counsel against social transitioning. A
| social transition includes changing dress or grooming, or
| changing a name or pronouns, to present oneself as other
| than his or her birth sex. Leaders advise that those who
| socially transition will experience some Church membership
| restrictions for the duration of this transition.
|
| Their advice on what treatments they support for
| transgender people is kind of vague and circumspect, but
| the gist seems to be "A therapist should at least be open
| to conversion therapy," which is generally considered
| harmful.
|
| Given the LDS Church's open campaign against gay rights
| based on the "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" (the
| same document referenced above), it seems reasonable to
| interpret this as stating opposition to transgender rights.
| Though as the parent noted, they are much less vocal on
| this topic.
| nostromo wrote:
| I'm sorry to be so frank, but this is more of the same
| mormon bullshit.
|
| "Love the sinner, hate the sin" is the typical line. The
| problem is our actions and identity are often intrinsically
| linked.
|
| They have the same stance for gay people. "It's ok to be
| gay, god still loves you! The only catch is you can't ever
| have a romantic relationship with the person you love. If
| you do you'll be excommunicated and ostracized from your
| family. No biggy! God bless!"
|
| Nobody wants this sort of faux compassion.
| paulv wrote:
| > 2. Feminists (TERFs)
|
| I worry that this can be read as "all feminists are terfs",
| which is not accurate.
| freemint wrote:
| I think the difference between treatment of mtf and ftm can
| be mostly boiled down to difference how males being female
| spaces VS females being in male spaces is perceived.
|
| For trans exclusionary feminists one is the patriarchy coming
| to female protective places and females claiming their place
| and undermining the patriarchy. As for parents males being
| less susceptible to forceful sexual exploitation is true but
| there is also a huge societal double standard when it comes
| women forcing themselves on men or abusing their male partner
| which is also reflected in parents being less worried about
| something happening to their children. Possibly also because
| of pregnancies onesidedness.
| kaitai wrote:
| The protection of female virtue is also an enormously
| successful political tactic, from the "yellow peril" in the
| late 1890s in Europe and the US to the "white slavery"
| panic (specifically referring to the cultural phenomenon in
| the US that gave rise to the 1910 Mann Act; check out the
| contrasting commentary of Emma Goldman and Rose Livingston)
| to the murder of Emmett Till and the burning down of Black
| Wall Street in Tulsa -- all of these are really responses
| to larger questions of opportunity and freedom of movement
| for folks that crystalize in the threat to a white woman's
| sexual virtue and the justification of violent response to
| crush the threat.
|
| The bathroom bills, the panic over sports, the violence
| trans and gender-nonconforming people encounter (especially
| on racialized lines) -- it's all part of a larger political
| narrative. As you can see from the comments on this HN
| thread, you get a daddy all worked up about his daughter's
| virtue/place in life and you can move political mountains
| because it is an Existential Threat that Must Be Removed.
| That's weaponizable in a way that talking about military
| spending or tax law or gerrymandering is not.
| whateveracct wrote:
| > Feminists (TERFs)
|
| One note: Nobody self-identifies as a TERF. Or at least not
| originally (I'm sure in Internet ire people do it ironically
| by now.) It's mostly a label used to crush nuanced
| conversation.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Interesting to compare that with WASP.
| ska wrote:
| > Or at least not originally
|
| I've heard it was the other way around, i.e. it started off
| as a self identification for a niche group which people
| started to reject once it begun to be used pejoratively.
| raffraffraff wrote:
| https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/29/im-
| cre...
| ska wrote:
| Interesting, thanks! Although I supposed it doesn't
| really speak to whether it was initially embraced (by the
| identified niche group) before being rejected.
| handoflixue wrote:
| No one self-identifies as an asshole or a bigot, but there
| sure still are a lot of them out there. I'd hardly say that
| the only use of those labels is to "crush nuanced
| conversation" - people just aren't inclined to take ideas
| seriously when they emerge from people they fundamentally
| disagree with. Telling a democrat that something is a
| "republican" idea will produce the same result, and vice-
| versa.
| deadite wrote:
| >Interestingly enough, there's not much animosity toward
| trans-men. These ground exclusively concern themselves with
| trans-women.
|
| I second this. Maybe it's some echo chamber effect or a
| minority stirring shit up, but I've hardly heard anything
| over the years about transmen-as-men vs men-as-men. It seems
| like most of the focus is on transwomen-as-women vs women-as-
| women. Maybe we're not as vocal? Maybe we care less? I don't
| think we have much of a dog in this race so I'm often
| confused as to why this topic comes up on HN considering most
| of us here are men. Boring day at work?
|
| I do feel bad for the women's Olympics, but I'd like to ask
| the Olympics committee what the hell were they thinking long
| before I start any kind of anti-trans crusade. This is one
| discussion that doesn't seem to be happening much. The
| diatribe is as always directed among the proles and the
| decisionmakers get a free pass. Someone must have said, "Yes,
| lets allow a 35 year-old recently transitioned man to compete
| with early 20 year-old women," and some approval process must
| have happened. Those are the people you want to start asking
| the hard questions, not look at LH and blame her for
| participating in the Olympics that she's allowed to
| participate in.
|
| Or as someone else put it: "A female POC just lost her spot
| to a white, middle-aged, male-born son of a billionaire. This
| is supposed to be progressive?"
| [deleted]
| blindmute wrote:
| It's because there is no reason to have animosity toward a
| woman becoming a man. The main objections to MtF are about
| safety (a MtF will always be stronger and bigger than a
| woman on average) and fairness (should male born people get
| female scholarships, compete in women's sports?). A FtM is
| not hurting anything or taking any opportunities away from
| anyone really.
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| I think it is the same reason no one has ever cared much
| about lesbians compared to gay men. [1] But I am not sure
| why that is.
|
| [1] https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/lesbians-more-
| accept...
| klyrs wrote:
| A trite parody: the only thing more disgusting than a
| penis is the desire to have it removed.
| mabub24 wrote:
| I suspect it has much to do with the idea that trans-men
| are transitioning into a gender "in power." That is,
| adopting masculine social behavior and lifestyle allow
| transmen to enter the patriarchal fold and slip quite
| seamlessly into a male dominant society, _as long as they
| remain unknown_. Once they are known, the idea that they
| must be excommunicated or "proven" as female becomes
| imperative. Transmen are subject to inordinate degrees of
| violence like transwomen. This is all to say that cis men
| aren't as afraid, be it in washrooms or on a sports field,
| of transmen as much as transwomen.
|
| Transwomen, on the other hand, are much more defined, in
| the eyes of a patriarchal society, by their rejection of
| masculinity in favor of femininity. To some cis-men, they
| appear as aberrations or duplicitous (hence the nickname
| "trap"), to some cis-women they appear as potential
| unfalsifiable unknowns, and a potential thing to be feared
| for sexual violence. Transwomen are thus caught in the
| crossfires of fear from both genders.
| secondcoming wrote:
| I don't think so, that's a work of fantasy and quite the
| leap.
|
| It's probably more that in the grand scheme of things
| trans-men don't pose any sort of threat to other males. I
| don't recall ever discussing trans-men with my peers.
| kingsuper20 wrote:
| " "A female POC just lost her spot to a white, middle-aged,
| male-born son of a billionaire. This is supposed to be
| progressive?" "
|
| Perhaps it's simply a way to more firmly define the
| progressive stack.
|
| We need an ISO standard in this area.
| jfengel wrote:
| The Olympics has been dealing with the question of
| womanhood for a very long time. For a while they were
| literally stripping and groping female athletes. Later they
| did chromosome testing, until they discovered intersex
| individuals who confound that theory.
|
| Even their current testosterone-levels theory is imperfect,
| since some people have obviously female bodies but
| inordinately high testosterone levels.
|
| So they seem to be muddling along about as well as they
| can. If they want to have a separate women's category, it's
| a question they're going to have to answer.
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| >I've hardly heard anything over the years about transmen-
| as-men vs men-as-men. It seems like most of the focus is on
| transwomen-as-women vs women-as-women. Maybe we're not as
| vocal? Maybe we care less?
|
| It's really not that hard to understand. It's the same sort
| of thinking that motivates the slogan "don't punch down".
| Males aren't threatened by females identifying as men. But
| females are threatened by males identifying as women for
| many obvious reasons. For example, with self-id as the only
| criteria keeping men out of women's prisons, it undermines
| the protection women have against abuse from men while in
| forced proximity. A female in a male prison or male
| changeroom is a novelty, not a threat.
| eropple wrote:
| Seeing as how the historical perspective is almost
| directly reversed from what you claim, I'm going to have
| to be skeptical about this. The European-historical
| aversion to largely one-way nonconforming to gender and
| sexual roles (men acting as women being a problem, ditto
| male homosexual behavior) is pretty explicitly due to a
| rejection of (heterosexual) masculinity translating as a
| threat _to_ that (heterosexual) masculinity.
|
| Those currents run deep, and run through to today. And
| that's not to say that "but a guy might go in the girls'
| bathroom!" is not what bigots _say_ , because as a prima
| facie claim that's certainly common--but I very much
| doubt, were we to see some unvarnished honesty, that
| bathroom fears are actually a primary motivator rather
| than a convenient battleground.
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| There is certainly a longstanding cultural thread of
| defending traditional manhood through explicit
| castigation of male deviants, but notably the source of
| the explicit castigation is largely from other males. The
| pushback against trans-women's acceptance as women isn't
| largely driven by men. It is pretty evenly distributed,
| or perhaps even more driven by women. The point is that
| these seem to be distinct phenomena driven by distinct
| concerns.
| caeril wrote:
| > I'm often confused as to why this topic comes up on HN
|
| Take a look around, I think you'll find transmen comprise a
| much larger proportion of this community (and tech
| communities in general) than the general population.
|
| There's also a lot of desire on HN to comment on political
| topics while pretending not to comment on political topics.
| Things like gender identity, women in tech, genetic
| differences, etc are all wonderful smokescreens to allow us
| to post politically but maintain a solid veneer of simply
| having an intellectual discussion on a topic of general
| interest.
| notamy wrote:
| > Things like gender identity, women in tech, genetic
| differences, etc are all wonderful smokescreens to allow
| us to post politically but maintain a solid veneer of
| simply having an intellectual discussion on a topic of
| general interest.
|
| Especially when it comes to these topics, I imagine it's
| very easy for people who aren't affected by these issues
| to "debate" them *because* they aren't the ones directly
| affected by it.
| kingsuper20 wrote:
| >maintain a solid veneer of simply having an intellectual
| discussion on a topic of general interest.
|
| That's a good point.
|
| My guess is that practically everyone knows what side
| they are on as things get more sporty. The rest is just
| weaving arguments for the fun of it.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Interesting discussion is the HN way!
|
| Some enterprising scientists may have some cutting edge
| insights reviewing HN comments on technology topics, no
| reason to suspect otherwise for social sciences.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > maintain a solid veneer of simply having an
| intellectual discussion on a topic of general interest
|
| Some of us have an academic interest in biology,
| genetics, neuroscience, psychology, etc. while still
| aligning with the overall origin of this site as a place
| to discuss the latest in news as relates to technology
| startups.
|
| It is unfortunate that this politically charged topic is
| so misunderstood and that ignorance of the basic science
| behind it is so prevalent, but here we are.
| jolux wrote:
| TERFs primarily don't focus on trans men because they see
| them as misguided women. You can find many TERFs blaming
| trans women and "gender ideology" for convincing butch-
| identified lesbians that they're actually straight men.
| Personally I think this denies trans men the dignity and
| autonomy to define themselves as they see fit, but then
| again, I would say that, I'm trans.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| It's ironic that this transphobe fantasizing has led to
| non-conforming cis women being harassed in the bathroom.
| Whatever minimal problem there was with women being
| harassed or assaulted in the bathroom by men or AMAB
| people has been completely surpassed by these fantasies
| sparking a witch hunt.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| What level of outrage? I notice a lot of outrage online from
| people whose identities I cannot verify. I have noticed zero
| outrage IRL from real people that I interact with.
|
| Small sample size but I think that judging outrage from online
| presence is inaccurate.
| dmje wrote:
| Couldn't agree more. The airtime on this topic is insane.
| People's email signatures filled with their pronouns. The
| anger. The division. I get it's an emotive conversation but
| then so are gay rights, gender rights, race rights, democratic
| rights, inequality, and about a gazillion other topics. That's
| not belittling trans as an issue, but it's so incredibly noisy.
|
| IMO the wider question here is nothing to do with trans but
| about what being "liberal" means. We're in this insanely weird
| moment in history when the hard left is eating itself by being
| so Woke it's nearly impossible to even have a conversation any
| more.
|
| I'm as left wing as they come, but being left wing means being
| able to have open, honest and sometimes uncomfortable debates.
| Being left wing is not, and never has been, about shutting down
| conversation, de-platforming, dogma, chilling effects. These
| are the things of the hard right, and the sooner people on the
| left start realising it and start being empowered to be vocal
| in defence of the freedom of ideas, the better.
| RC_ITR wrote:
| Uyghurs are less than 0.1% of China's population, but their
| treatment is (rightfully) a huge issue globally.
|
| Most people just aren't as utilitarian in the way that your
| comment implies they should be.
| nend wrote:
| I mean, 2 million people in the US being discriminated against
| seems like plenty enough people for this to be a worthwhile
| discussion. But it's not just the number of people. It's also
| about how severe the discrimination against them is.
|
| >Personally I don't think this is very important compared to
| other topics. There are more blind people than trans people.
|
| Ok but is there a large portion of the population that believes
| blind people don't deserve health care for their disability? Is
| there a large portion of the population that believes blind
| people shouldn't be afforded working rights?
|
| You can't just go "there's only 2 million trans people in the
| US, who cares about their healthcare, there's more important
| things out there", when the consequence of doing so severely
| impacts the quality of life of .5% of the population.
|
| I don't think you would be sitting here going "only .5% of the
| US has type 1 diabetes, why are talking so much about making
| sure they get appropriate health care? Who cares if they're
| discriminated against during hiring?"
| Kharvok wrote:
| The difference is that there aren't groups cheerleading the
| deconstruction of human sight because blind people exist.
| JonathonW wrote:
| I have no real visibility (pun not intended) into the blind
| community, but similar groups _do_ exist in the Deaf
| community; Deafness-as-identity /culture is very much a thing
| and some of the general cultural views around adaptation and
| integration with the hearing world look not-dissimilar to
| what you see in some aspects of LGBTQ+ movements.
| chc wrote:
| Based on the numbers I've seen, there are slightly more trans
| people in the world than blind people, but overall -- you're
| not wrong. I don't even think most trans rights advocates would
| disagree with you that the amount of attention devoted to
| transgender people is excessive. The reason transgender people
| are getting more attention than blind people is because there
| is currently a strong movement to regress transgender rights,
| while there isn't an equivalent movement for blind people.
| Transgender people have some asks in terms of societal support
| (e.g. British law has some awkward legal red tape for trans
| people around things like marriage), but in general, most of
| the noise is being generated by the anti-transgender side (e.g.
| bans on therapy for transgender people, bathroom bans, sports
| bans, outrage at voluntarily chosen gender-inclusive phrasing
| like "people who have a uterus").
|
| So it's a bit of a hard subject. I really don't think it's
| worth this much attention, but if hate groups are devoting this
| much attention to opposing transgender people, we're faced with
| the choice of either also giving it a lot of undue attention or
| throwing transgender people to the wolves.
| UnpossibleJim wrote:
| https://www.diabetesresearch.org/diabetes-
| statistics#:~:text....
|
| I don't know from blind people, but in America, there are
| anywhere from 10.2 to 17.5% of the population that are
| diabetic. While not pursued by hate groups, they are actively
| preyed by pharmaceutical companies and politicians who don't
| let insulins go generic - one of the few medicines that
| can't. Yes there is complaint about the medical system in
| America, I have yet to see diabetic/nondiabetic show up under
| facebook ID's like He/Him/His, normalization of syringe usage
| in restaurants, blood sugar testing not become a spectacle
| (of course I pick this one because I know the most about it,
| but there are many disorders that could be used with it).
| Stigma, predation and debate is associated with many things,
| but this one will get you fired/excommunicated from society.
| Speaking ignorantly about "just eat less sugar" to a type 1
| diabetic does nothing.
| chc wrote:
| I sympathize with your overall point and agree that it's
| shameful how America treats diabetics like an ATM, but I
| think you're very far off-target if you envy the way
| transgender people are treated. Lots of anti-transgender
| people do just fine in our society. A person who actively
| fought against trans rights in California is currently the
| Vice President of the United States (though she has gotten
| much quieter on trans issues in the meantime). We have
| several openly anti-trans members of Congress. The fight
| for trans rights is so defensive that covering the insane
| medical costs isn't even on the radar. A lot of transition-
| related expenses are rarely covered by insurance, and they
| cost as much as a luxury car. Yet when you hear about
| "trans activists," what they're fighting for is not to have
| their ability to use the bathroom taken away.
| UnpossibleJim wrote:
| I'm not envious of the way transgender people are
| treated, and if I came across sounding that way I do
| apologize. My tone was for the disproportion of
| attention, not of action. In truth, very little action
| will be taken for good for the transgender population or
| health disorders. That isn't how these things play out,
| unfortunately. As a society, we only know the stick and
| not the carrot. While I sympathize with the sentiment
| that there are several openly anti-trans members of
| Congress, nearly all of Congress is anti-Medical Reform
| in action, if not in voice. My point is a scale of
| difference, which was brought up at the start of this
| thread. I really do appreciate the struggle that the
| trans community has to go through, and I am not deaf to
| their cries (and, though somehow this makes me a worse
| person to some who would hear it, I do know people who
| are trans). But if we are going to look at things on a
| societal scale, how can we ignore the statistical numbers
| of the societal woes and population impacts?
|
| As for insurance, you might be shocked at what insurance
| doesn't cover for diabetics. They don't just "cut a
| check" for everything. I can't tell you how many times my
| doctor and I have to get on the phone to argue with them
| for literal months to get things covered. For things to
| keep me alive. Not to feel right in my skin. Not to keep
| thoughts of suicide away. To keep bare minimal physical
| biological function going.
|
| As for Kamala Harris, she has a whole lot to be
| displeased about. Prison labor, drug prosecution,
| questionable school bussing policies, anti trans right
| policies. Yeah, I'm not a fan.
| yanderekko wrote:
| >The reason transgender people are getting more attention
| than blind people is because there is currently a strong
| movement to regress transgender rights
|
| Firstly, a resistance to expanding rights is not a movement
| to regress rights. For the most part (exceptions apply), the
| margins of the culture war here are not about trans people
| being on the defensive against long-standing rights being
| stripped.
|
| Secondly, obviously the margins of this battle are often
| (again, not always, particularly when it comes to health care
| issues) pretty small-stakes, especially in comparison to the
| outsized amount of attention they're given. Certainly not
| important enough to justify the "you're trying to murder me /
| dehumanize me / erase me" rhetoric that one predictably
| receives when mild resistance is offered towards this agenda.
| chc wrote:
| I gave several examples of people wanting to strip long-
| standing rights, which are probably some of the first
| examples people would think of when you mention "the trans
| debate," so I don't know what to say here except that
| you're mistaken.
|
| I also think your portrayal of the stakes for transgender
| people is a bit flippant. Gender dysphoria is a pretty
| painful mental illness that often leads to suicide, so
| forbidding a transgender girl from getting treatment and
| forcing her to go to the boys' room does seem both
| dehumanizing and dangerous to her life.
| yanderekko wrote:
| >I gave several examples of people wanting to strip long-
| standing rights
|
| I don't think you did. You threw out terms like "sports
| bans" but I don't think trans individuals being able to
| compete based on gender identity is a "long-standing
| right". If you're referring to other stuff you'll have to
| be more specific.
|
| >Gender dysphoria is a pretty painful mental illness that
| often leads to suicide, so forbidding a transgender girl
| from getting treatment and forcing her to go to the boys'
| room does seem both dehumanizing and dangerous to her
| life.
|
| Many policy issues will have some sort of effects on
| overall mortality. But I think it's pretty important in
| functional democracies that you should be able to have
| policy disagreements where these sorts of stakes are
| present without believing that the people taking the
| opposite stance are sadists or murderers instead of
| individuals who come to these debates with somewhat-
| different priors of empirical reality and somewhat-
| different but not fundamentally-abhorrent values. Trans
| issues seem to lack this normal presumption, however.
| chc wrote:
| > I don't think you did. You threw out terms like "sports
| bans" but I don't think trans individuals being able to
| compete based on gender identity is a "long-standing
| right".
|
| If these bans had already been in place, they wouldn't
| have needed to pass them. Trans people have been using
| the appropriate bathroom for their gender for ages, but
| now that transphobia is on the rise, they're actually
| being prevented from doing so. Trans people have been
| _allowed_ to compete in the Olympics for longer than many
| Olympians have been alive, but now than a trans woman has
| actually made it in, for the first time ever, suddenly it
| 's a debate. Some people have always preferred inclusive
| language, but now that people are on the lookout for
| "gender ideology," there's a decent chance that using it
| in passing will get you 10 thinkpieces and a JK Rowling
| tweetstorm about whether the phrase "menstruating people"
| erases women.
|
| > Many policy issues will have some sort of effects on
| overall mortality. But I think it's pretty important in
| functional democracies that you should be able to have
| policy disagreements where these sorts of stakes are
| present without believing that the people taking the
| opposite stance are sadists or murderers instead of
| individuals who come to these debates with somewhat-
| different priors of empirical reality and somewhat-
| different but not fundamentally-abhorrent values. Trans
| issues seem to lack this normal presumption, however.
|
| I don't completely disagree, but I think this is not so
| much about trans issues, and more an unfortunate product
| of the way bigotry works in our age. You don't have the
| KKK out burning crosses in front of people's houses
| anymore, instead you have people who are "race realists"
| and are just "worried about preserving culture." Nobody
| -- not even virulent transphobes who believe all trans
| women are pedophiles -- identifies as a transphobe, they
| are "gender critical feminists" who are "worried about
| preserving women's sex-based rights" or "worried about
| the children." Bigots have realized that bigotry isn't
| cool anymore, so they've learned to dress it up as
| moderate concern-trolling. So it's harder to tell who's
| speaking in good faith, especially since some actual
| moderates who haven't thought deeply on issues will
| parrot the bad-faith actors' talking points.
| livueta wrote:
| Regarding your last point, what do you think the
| practical implications of this are for those who seek
| social change? While there are plenty of obvious examples
| of what you're talking about, I worry that it's
| dangerously psychologically attractive to dismiss any and
| all criticism as bad-faith bigotry, at the expense of
| potentially convincing those actual moderates. That's
| especially true if the topic is personally sensitive
| and/or it's the nth repetition of a particular talking
| point. In a moral sense an explanation might not be owed,
| but that often seems like ceding a pragmatic opportunity
| to push for change.
|
| It feels like there's a narrative metagame where there's
| a risk that taking concern trolling too seriously is a
| vector for being baited into savaging increasingly
| innocuous questions from actual moderates. And since
| people seem, generally speaking, to not like being told
| to sit down and shut up even in the service of causes
| they could otherwise be brought to support, I worry that
| could broadly harm public sentiment towards movements
| that go too hard into these kinds of tactics.
| fungiblecog wrote:
| I think the importance is based not on the numbers involved -
| which are small - but on the significance of the demands.
| People are discussing our fundamental understanding and
| definitions of people's sex and gender that potentially affects
| everyone. A major concern is that once you let everyone self
| identify where does it stop? A caucasian woman was vilified a
| few years ago for identifying as black. Had she identified as
| male she would have been celebrated by the same people
| mdoms wrote:
| If the issue is that voices are being censored then the issue
| affects everyone who is studying in a university - massively
| more than your figures.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > I don't mean to downplay what is happening because it is
| happening but do you not think the amount of outrage this topic
| generates surpasses the level of impact we can have assuming we
| fix it? It just feels like we're being distracted.
|
| But downplaying it is exactly what you are doing, literally.
|
| To answer your main question, though: the very small community
| that we are talking about is disproportionately being subjected
| to murder, physical abuse, emotional abuse, and widespread
| discrimination.
|
| The disproportionate harms that this small community is subject
| to is the key to understanding the level of outrage being
| evoked on their behalf.
| josteink wrote:
| > the very small community that we are talking about is
| disproportionately being subjected to murder, physical abuse,
| emotional abuse, and widespread discrimination.
|
| Citation needed.
|
| From what I can tell they are being given more leeway than
| any other group, and anyone who dares argue against their
| "rights" risks losing their job.
|
| Trans-people does absolutely not to seem to be at risk
| anywhere.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > Citation needed
|
| Technically, no, I'd posit that in the scientific community
| of focus on this topic, it is considered common knowledge
| and likely an "a priori" logical conclusion.
|
| But let me Google that for you: https://scholar.google.com/
| scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C14&q=tra...
| alisonkisk wrote:
| Leeway? You think murderers and batterers give leeway to
| transpeople?
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > From what I can tell they are being given more leeway
| than any other group, and anyone who dares argue against
| their "rights" risks losing their job. Trans-people does
| absolutely not to seem to be at risk anywhere.
|
| You might refresh yourself on HN site guidelines.
|
| Your comment would have been much more interesting if you
| had declined to include the quoted portion.
| dvt wrote:
| > disproportionately being subjected to murder, physical
| abuse, emotional abuse, and widespread discrimination.
|
| This is provably untrue. Not that it isn't a tragedy, but in
| 2020, 44 trans people were killed[1] in the US. This is a
| rounding error even when looking at "merely" just hate crime
| statistics (for example, in 2019, the FBI reported ~7000
| criminal offenses[2] in the "hate crime" category). I get it,
| people are passionate about it, companies change their logos,
| everyone posts about it on social media, but let's not
| perpetuate these myths.
|
| [1] https://www.them.us/story/44-trans-people-
| killed-2020-worst-...
|
| [2] https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-
| release...
| FemmeAndroid wrote:
| > Not that it isn't a tragedy, but in 2020, 44 trans people
| were killed[1] in the US. This is a rounding error even
| when looking at "merely" just hate crime statistics
|
| I'm confused. How can you compare 44 deaths to 7000
| offenses? (Including 55 deaths, across all hate crimes.)
|
| I'm not arguing that trans people are disproportionately
| killed or assaulted, but that we are in no way a rounding
| error.
|
| Using your source, the 2019 FBI report:
|
| Of the 8,559 criminal offenses, 51 were Murder and
| nonnegligent manslaughter.
|
| https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2019/topic-
| pages/tables/table...
|
| 224 offenses were based on Gender Identity, this includes
| 173 Anti-transgender offenses, and 51 Anti-Gender Non-
| Conforming offenses. 342 offenses not included in those
| numbers we're targeting "Anti-Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, or
| Transgender (Mixed Group)"
|
| 5 of the 51 Murders and Nonnegligent Manslaugters were
| perpetrated because the victim was in the group "Anti-
| Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, or Transgender (Mixed Group)".
|
| 1 of the 51 Murders and Nonnegligent Manslaughters were
| perpetrated on the basis of Gender Identity.
|
| https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2019/topic-
| pages/tables/table...
|
| 5 of the 30 rapes as hate crimes, were perpetrated on the
| basis of the victim's Gender Identity.
|
| 1 of the 30 rapes as hate crimes were perpetrated because
| the victim was in the group "Anti-Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
| or Transgender (Mixed Group)".
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Disproportionate in relation to the rates of the same for
| blind people, per the parent commenters assertions.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| > This is provably untrue.
|
| Both of you are correct, you're just looking at
| probabilities conditioned in the opposite way. You're
| looking at P(trans | killed), which is low. The parent post
| is looking at P(killed | trans), which is quite high.
| Understandably, if you are trans P(killed | trans) is a lot
| more relevant to you than P(trans | killed).
| [deleted]
| dvt wrote:
| I don't agree, we were talking about proportionality.
| 0.6% of the US adult population identify as trans
| (1,254,000). Of that 0.6%, 44 were killed. The math is
| simple. The overall murder rate in the USA is 0.005%
| (population: 328 million, yearly murders: 16,425). The
| per-capita murder rates of trans people in the USA is
| 0.0035%, barely over half the national average.
|
| To make the claim that trans people are
| disproportionately affected by crime/violence is simply
| not true.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| > To make the claim that trans people are
| disproportionately affected by crime/violence is simply
| not true.
|
| It's well-known that many trans hate crimes go unreported
| or misreported (as the victim is misgendered). So unless
| you really think it was highly unlikely for there to be
| >= 19 unreported/misreported trans deaths (19 + 44 /
| 1_254_000 > 0.005%), then trans death rates are probably
| higher.
|
| At least one source which mentions it:
| https://www.out.com/crime/2020/7/02/these-are-trans-
| people-k...
| dvt wrote:
| We're dangerously getting into "no true Scotsman"
| territory here. Even being as charitable as I can, it
| just seems that you don't like the data because it
| doesn't fit your narrative.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > you don't like the data because it doesn't fit your
| narrative
|
| In counter argument, you don't like the laws of logic and
| probability because they don't fit your narrative.
|
| Edit: Furthermore, do we not agree, in the United States,
| under the rule of law, that it is a failure of civil
| responsibility, punishable by death in some
| jurisdictions, to murder even 1 person, let alone 44?
|
| How is your argument anything other than we must do
| everything within our rights and capacity, as a country,
| to prevent each and every failure of civic
| responsibility?
| dvt wrote:
| > How is your argument anything other than we must do
| everything within our rights and capacity, as a country,
| to prevent each and every failure of civic
| responsibility?
|
| Apart from the insults (accusing me of not liking logic,
| etc.), this is a straw-man and, just to be clear, is
| absolutely _not_ what I 'm arguing.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > this is a straw-man
|
| You seem to be succumbing to a psychological phenomenon
| called projection.
|
| In fact, you have set up a straw man argument, contrary
| to HN site guidelines of using the most charitable
| reading of my original comment, and then inverted your
| mental model such that you believe I am the one setting
| up the straw man.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > Apart from the insults
|
| I was implicitly referring to this exchange:
|
| > > This is provably untrue. > Both of you are correct,
| you're just looking at probabilities conditioned in the
| opposite way.
|
| Which you neglected to incorporate into your mental model
| of this topic.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Let's be extra clear: what exactly is your argument?
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| > Even being as charitable as I can, it just seems that
| you don't like the data because it doesn't fit your
| narrative.
|
| And you seem to like the data because it does. You are
| right, I don't trust reported numbers of trans people
| hate crimes, because I'm not aware of any unified
| reporting standards around trans hate crimes (in general
| I don't trust reported numbers on newly reported hate
| crimes, especially when advocacy groups are doing most of
| the reporting; it means the issue is poorly understood
| (so badly reported) and highly politicized). I have a
| pretty large prior here that I believe trans hate crimes
| are underreported, much like I have a prior that sexual
| violence is underreported, due to the nature of these
| instances. Moreover, numbers this low have large
| uncertainty bands, just using basic frequentist or
| Bayesian probability methods, enough that I doubt we can
| even come to much of a conclusion over our topic of
| discussion. I think we'll have to agree to disagree, and
| please stop downvoting me. I felt like our discussion was
| productive.
| dvt wrote:
| > And you seem to like the data because it does.
|
| I don't have a narrative. I look at the data and draw
| conclusions. You start with conclusions and try to morph
| the data to fit them. I'll even grant you that sexual
| crimes go underreported (heck, have _43%_ to bring up
| that number up), but even so, it wouldn 't account for a
| "disproportionate" number of crime against trans people.
| It would barely _equal_ the rate of the general
| population. You 're seriously trying to argue that trans
| crimes are underreported by _multiple factors_? That 's
| quite the claim.
|
| > I think we'll have to agree to disagree, and please
| stop downvoting me.
|
| FYI, you can't downvote direct children on HN.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > It would barely equal the rate of the general
| population.
|
| You are generalizing from the specific, here. The data
| that you appear to be referencing is only looking at
| murder rates.
|
| You've then set up a straw-man argument. The straw is in
| the data that you've not incorporated into your mental
| model: the rates of crimes other than murder.
| dvt wrote:
| Yeah, I used murder rates specifically for three reasons:
| (1) they are often cited in news articles, including my
| citation above; (2) they are the easiest to compare side-
| by-site in an apples-to-apples comparison (gen pop vs
| population X or population Y); and (3) murder rates tend
| to be a good indicator of other, proximate, criminal
| activity (be it sexual assault, physical assault, etc.).
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| If you'd prefer working with the data we have presented,
| take a look at https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-
| crime/2019/tables/table-1.xls . Other than racially
| motivated hate crimes which comprise most FBI recognized
| hate crimes, the next most is religious hate crime, below
| which is sexual orientation motivated hate crimes. And
| sexual orientation motivated hate crimes rank very
| similarly to religiously motivated hate crimes. In other
| words, sexual orientation oriented hate crimes are the
| 3rd most frequent, and very close in # to religiously
| motivated hate crimes, the 2nd most frequent hate crime.
|
| Specifically with anti-gender-identity based hate crime,
| we can see that anti-transgender hate crime has one of
| the highest incident numbers for any individual cohort,
| despite knowing that only 0.6% of the population
| identifies as trans according to data presented earlier
| in this thread.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > I felt like our discussion was productive.
|
| Possibly violating HN site guidelines here, but I wanted
| to add a civilly-toned comment to thank you for
| illuminating one area where our mental models had
| diverged on this topic.
| btilly wrote:
| That is hard to say.
|
| In a world full of discrimination against trans folks, who
| knows how many people who would prefer being trans have failed
| to be identified?
|
| But the topic is much bigger than that. You see, the ideology
| being pushed says that everyone who has gender dysphoria should
| be assumed to be trans. But a LOT of teenagers, particularly
| girls, go through a period of gender dysphoria when they hit
| puberty. What little research exists on the topic says that
| most of those girls will grow out of their gender dysphoria,
| and well-meaning attempts at gender reassignment surgery for
| them will backfire. However said research is highly
| controversial exactly because it undermines the politically
| correct ideology that we should take seriously all claims that
| physical appearance is less important than chosen gender.
|
| And THAT is the real problem. I don't have statistics. But
| anecdotally I have a 12 year old with gender dysphoria. Many of
| their friends have the same. I personally know more children
| claiming to be trans at present than I've known people who were
| blind or missing a limb over my entire life.
|
| A *LOT* of parents are in my boat. It is easy to find opposing
| ideologies about how we should deal with our teenage children.
| There is very little research. And people are so focused on
| yelling at each other that nobody dares DO more research.
| Because no matter what you find, you're going to get targeted
| by someone.
| crooked-v wrote:
| > What little research exists on the topic says that most of
| those girls will grow out of their gender dysphoria, and
| well-meaning attempts at gender reassignment surgery for them
| will backfire.
|
| Except... people don't perform gender reassignment surgery on
| children just going through puberty.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| | _gender reassignment surgery_
|
| SRS/GRS is not recommended for pubescent children by anyone.
| At that age only hormone blockers are on the table,
| definitely not permanent surgery.
|
| _EDIT_
|
| Posting a reference backing up my claim since I'm getting
| downvoted:
|
| https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/mar/05/viral-
| imag...
|
| | _Professional organizations such as the Endocrine Society
| recommend against puberty blockers for children who have not
| reached puberty, and recommend that patients be at least 16
| years old before beginning hormone treatments for
| feminization or masculinization of the body. The last step in
| transitioning to another gender, gender reassignment surgery,
| is only available to those 18 and older in the United
| States._
| alisonkisk wrote:
| Does anyone have evidence to challenge this claim of fact?
| Otherswise it's useful information.
| john-radio wrote:
| No claim containing the string "is not recommended by
| anyone" will hold up, since eventually it's easy enough
| to find someone (probably a troll) who does recommend X
| practice.
|
| But the post that you're replying to, in general, holds
| up. "Gender reassignment surgery is typically only
| available to those 18 and older in the United States."
| https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/mar/05/viral-
| imag...
| btilly wrote:
| Define "gender reassignment surgery", please.
|
| Are we talking about a top operation, or a bottom one? Do
| mastectomies count as gender reassignment, or only if
| genitals are involved?
|
| Because if you include top surgery, then
| https://wng.org/roundups/state-mandates-payment-for-
| children... says that where I live in California it is
| legal, and insurance must pay for it.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| | _grounded in facts and Biblical truth_
|
| You're going to have to come up with a better source.
| alisonkisk wrote:
| Better source:
|
| https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/article-
| abst...
| btilly wrote:
| I paid little attention to what site that was on, just
| looked for the content.
|
| But it links to http://www.insurance.ca.gov/0250-insurers
| /0300-insurers/0200... which is the actual decision
| posted on an official California government website. It
| confirms what I said.
| geofft wrote:
| > _I paid little attention to what site that was on, just
| looked for the content._
|
| Sometimes people lie on the internet.
|
| And quite often, when they lie, they do so by omission or
| by inaccurately summarizing facts.
|
| In any case, the two points in this thread are in
| agreement. Top surgery is "typically only available to
| those 18 or older," as 'john-radio wrote. In atypical
| cases, it is available to those under 18, and it requires
| a doctor to a) decide that it's necessary and b)
| consciously go against WPATH recommendations when doing
| so. The legal opinion here is that an insurer may not
| come up with a rule that says that doctors may _never_
| decide that it 's the right thing to do for a particular
| patient, because that's a decision a doctor is allowed to
| make.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| | _The WPATH standards of care also state, however, that
| male chest reconstruction surgery for female-to-male
| patients "could be carried out earlier" than the age of
| majority in certain cases, and ultimately should be
| considered on a case-by-case basis "depending on an
| adolescent's specific clinical situation and goals for
| gender identity expression."_
|
| What do you think that specific clinical situation was in
| those situations?
| alisonkisk wrote:
| "typically" is bearing a lot of load there, and GRS is a
| broad term.
|
| Double mastectomy is practiced, at least:
|
| https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/article-
| abst...
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| Mastectomies are performed for non-gender-related
| reasons, such as prophylactic mastectomies, so it's
| arguable whether that falls under the definition of
| SRS/GRS. For any reason, it is exceedingly, vanishingly
| rare in children.
|
| It seems like an oddly small number to obsess over,
| especially considering over 8,000 non-trans teenagers
| between 13 and 19 receive breast augmentations each year.
|
| From your link:
|
| | _the mean (SD) age was 19 (2.5) years for postsurgical
| participants and 17 (2.5) years for nonsurgical
| participants_
|
| Surgical patients would be the ones who are in the most
| danger of suicide or self-harm or for whom nonsurgical
| (hormone) treatment is not an option.
|
| Also,
|
| | _Self-reported regret was near 0._
|
| Here is the document that the report refers to as the
| standard for care for transgender patients:
|
| https://s3.amazonaws.com/amo_hub_content/Association140/f
| ile...
|
| You'll want to look at Section VI: . Assessment and
| Treatment of Children and Adolescents with Gender
| Dysphoria.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| That seems unnecessarily pedantic, since obviously it
| should be assumed to mean "not recommended by anyone _who
| matters_ ", but I've upvoted you for providing the
| source.
|
| I was editing my comment with that exact link when you
| posted.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| >> _" and well-meaning attempts at gender reassignment
| surgery for them"_
|
| This isn't actually a thing. Certain factions who would
| prefer trans people cease to exist push this idea that kids
| are on this hot new meme of getting their bits flipped before
| reaching the age of consent, but it is simply not a thing. No
| top surgery, either.
|
| It just isn't a thing. It's a wild fantasy. The only thing
| kids can go on are puberty blockers. These are well-tested
| and their effects known and understood through their use for
| other medical concerns.
| seany wrote:
| This is just false. I personally know people in the states
| that make it false, and other evidence is very easily
| accessible.
| Tomte wrote:
| We've just had a barely unsuccessful attempt (the social
| democrats were in favor, but didn't want to end their
| coalition with the christian democrats) of legislation in
| Germany which included allowing gender reassignment surgery
| without parental consent from the age of 14.
|
| After psychological counselling, not just on a child's
| whim, but still.
|
| We've had exactly your point in the public discourse:
| "that's FUD, no surgery for minors is planned", but the
| wording in the draft law was clear, and proponents were
| unwilling to get rid of it, even though it would have made
| the law's passage much, much more likely.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Sometimes people push bills like this to make their
| opponents look like fools, though maybe that's not as
| common in the EU. Movements are infiltrated all the time.
| I don't know the details of that bill (much less the name
| or backers), so I can't really comment.
|
| What I do know is there's tons more bills trying
| (sometimes successfully) to block consenting adults and
| older kids with parental permission from even basic stuff
| like counseling or blockers. That seems way more
| dangerous than the fraction of a percent of kids who
| change their mind later being able to go through with a
| transition they'll regret.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| Note that there's comparatively little benefit to puberty
| blockers in F2M cases, because other than the obvious case
| of breasts, most _secondary_ sex characteristics, even post
| puberty, can be radically altered by taking male hormones.
| So you get very little benefit, but the risk side is a lot
| less clear. For the same reason, most F2M 's will be better
| off delaying both hormonal and surgical transition until
| well _after_ puberty and perhaps into middle-age, when
| desistance rates do get very low.
|
| The situation re: M2F is genuinely more challenging, and
| one has to balance a variety of factors pushing for
| earlier, not just later intervention.
|
| > Certain factions who would prefer trans people cease to
| exist
|
| I don't think this is fair. When we're talking about people
| this young, concerns about later desistance are very real.
| Expressing such concerns is in no way equal to preferring
| that these people "cease to exist".
| alisonkisk wrote:
| There are concerns about erroneous transitions. There
| also substanctial factions who loudly proclaim their
| preference that trans people (and homosexual) do not
| exist, and openly justify their claims with centuries-old
| supernatural myths.
| btilly wrote:
| Whether or not that is a thing depends on where you are.
|
| The most common type of surgery is breast. In the USA,
| double mastectomies on children are legal, and have been
| performed on patients as young as 13. As for gender
| dysphoria itself, according to some surveys the frequency
| of teenage biological girls diagnosed with the disorder has
| risen by a factor of 40 in recent years.
|
| For sources on both of those facts, as well as more
| background on this topic, I recommend
| https://www.webmd.com/children/news/20210427/transition-
| ther....
| cedilla wrote:
| Please note that that's an opinion article, not an
| academic source.
|
| It's borderline misleading to say that mastectomies
| "happen", and then link it with an unrelated number for
| diagnoses of gender dysphoria.
|
| It's also misleading to represent the growth of a tiny
| number relatively. A few dozen cases grew to a few
| hundred. That's completely normal and what happens with
| any novel diagnosis that was barely accepted even just 10
| years ago.
| pseudalopex wrote:
| The article cited nothing for the former claim. An
| unspecified survey for the latter.
|
| It seemed to imply the 40x increase was in rapid onset
| gender dysphoria. But ROGD isn't a recognized diagnosis
| even now. Never mind 2006. A single researcher published
| a single paper proposing it in 2018. They relied on the
| assumption teenagers tell their parents everything. And
| they selected for parents who refused to accept their
| children coming out as trans.[1]
|
| The article also claimed 100% of a small study population
| proceeding to transition after puberty blockers
| contradicts the claim puberty blockers give children more
| time to decide before transitioning. But doctors don't
| hand out puberty blockers randomly of course.
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnc_KvWkiHw&t=3324s
| cwkoss wrote:
| Are the majority of child double mastectomies done for
| gender affirmation reasons?
|
| I knew several women in college who had the procedure
| done before college to avoid familial cancer risk or back
| problems.
| rkk3 wrote:
| >> and well-meaning attempts at gender reassignment surgery
| for them will backfire
|
| > The only thing kids can go on are puberty blockers.
|
| So instead of specifying gender reassignment surgery, they
| should have something more broad, like well-meaning medical
| interventions. It seems like the heart of their statement
| is true and that these medical interventions on children
| can backfire.
| makeworld wrote:
| > But a LOT of teenagers, particularly girls, go through a
| period of gender dysphoria when they hit puberty. What little
| research exists on the topic says that most of those girls
| will grow out of their gender dysphoria, and well-meaning
| attempts at gender reassignment surgery for them will
| backfire.
|
| Could you link to this research? This is a fraught topic that
| includes fraudulent studies and claims like this mean little
| without links.
| handrous wrote:
| I can only pile on with anecdotal evidence from what my
| spouse has seen, working in middle schools: yeah, like half
| of kids who ask to start going by an opposite-gender name,
| ask to be addressed by different pronouns, start dressing
| differently, et c., in middle school end up changing their
| minds before they reach high school, and it is often girls.
|
| _From what I have heard_ this does not, however, lead me
| to believe there 's an epidemic of kids receiving medical
| intervention in support of this, who don't "really mean
| it". As best I can tell it just means puberty is weird and
| confusing sometimes, but that usually resolves itself (at
| least, more or less) after a bit, which should surprise no-
| one. I doubt many cases that are _merely_ confusion or
| uncertainty or "experimenting" or whatever, reach the
| point of even having a _conversation_ with a doctor about
| it. I could be wrong about that, but nothing I 've heard
| has me worried about The Children. Suicide rates do, but
| not that.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| I once read an anti corporate critique of this phenomenon.
| The argument went something like this:
|
| Once female beauty was commoditized, and you could literally
| purchase an upgrade to parts you were born with. Entire
| cosmetic and plastic surgery industry benefited from
| marketing and promoting this model. The unforeseen
| consequence was that men started fetishizing these upgrades
| themselves.
|
| As some men hyper focus on female body parts anyway. It was a
| way to exploit psychological tendencies for profit.
|
| I guess the counter remedy would be to promote female beauty
| as the whole, and not some collection of body parts.
| jolux wrote:
| > What little research exists on the topic says that most of
| those girls will grow out of their gender dysphoria, and
| well-meaning attempts at gender reassignment surgery for them
| will backfire.
|
| This is frequently claimed but is untrue, or at the very
| least highly uncertain. The studies most often referenced
| have serious methodological errors, including inconsistent
| definitions of dysphoria (owing partially to problems with
| the Gender Identity Disorder diagnostic criteria in the DSM-
| IV that have since been fixed with the DSM-5) and desistance
| (in some cases counting anyone who didn't follow up with the
| clinic conducting the research as having desisted)
| https://www.gdaworkinggroup.com/desistance-articles-and-
| crit...
|
| Julia Serano has also written extensively on this topic with
| much depth and nuance, at least in my opinion:
| https://juliaserano.medium.com/detransition-desistance-
| and-d...
| btilly wrote:
| I made a claim about ideology. You made a claim about
| medical professionals. That is not particularly relevant to
| what I claimed.
|
| I stand by my claim. The online echo chambers that
| children, including my own, seek out very much push the
| ideology that any claim to be male, female, non-binary or
| whatever must be accepted at face value. And that the
| person who is making the claim should have the right to any
| treatment that they wish, up to and including surgery.
|
| As for criticism of the research that exists, I agree that
| it isn't very good. But then again, most research in the
| social sciences isn't very good. See the Replication
| Crisis. Or as we used to say, news at 11.
| jolux wrote:
| > You made a claim about medical professionals. That is
| not particularly relevant to what I claimed.
|
| I removed that part as I agree it wasn't relevant.
|
| > As for criticism of the research that exists, I agree
| that it isn't very good.
|
| Unfortunately it's so poor that I judge it as being
| insufficient to use to form an opinion on this issue.
| It's much worse than the replication crisis at large,
| it's not clear that their methods prove what they claim
| in the first place if you look at their work. The pages I
| linked go into greater depth about why this is a
| difficult question to study and what the existing
| research gets wrong.
|
| > The online echo chambers that children, including my
| own, seek out very much push the ideology that any claim
| to be male, female, non-binary or whatever must be
| accepted at face value.
|
| That's as may be, but I suggest you read the WPATH
| standards of care if you're interested in what the
| medical community in general thinks about the medical
| treatment of trans people, including kids. It's a little
| out of date (2012), but if you can't find a knowledgeable
| medical professional nearby it's pretty much the gold
| standard, and is very well supported by evidence:
| https://www.wpath.org/publications/soc In particular,
| adolescents seem much less likely to desist than younger
| children.
| scubbo wrote:
| > any claim to be male, female, non-binary or whatever
| must be accepted at face value. And that the person who
| is making the claim should have the right to any
| treatment that they wish, up to and including surgery.
|
| I can understand some caution around the latter part of
| this quote, given how traumatic, invasive, and costly
| surgery can be. It is a defensible and reasonable
| position that there should be _some_ barrier-to-entry to
| such major decisions (especially for children), even
| while there's also a simultaneous reasonable concern that
| such barriers will be used to prevent access to folks who
| genuinely do need, want, and would benefit from it.
|
| But how can anyone _possibly_ deny the first part? How
| could anyone contradict an individual who states their
| own gender - on what grounds can you claim to know how
| someone feels about themselves better than they themself
| do? Even the position of "they are confused" or "this is
| a phase that will pass" or "they have been pressured into
| that belief" doesn't hold water - until that phase
| passes, that person's gender, their self-image, _is_
| whatever that phase dictates. That doesn't make the
| current situation any less true. If you told someone "I
| like broccoli" and they responded "that's just a phase,
| you'll grow out of liking broccoli soon", your response
| would, presumably be "...so? I like broccoli _now_, what
| does your guess about the future have anything to do with
| it?"
|
| Does your position on "accepting gender at face value"
| change if the statement "I am male" is replaced with "I
| see myself as male"? Are you more comfortable accepting
| the fact that someone's self-image can change over time,
| rather than imagining that gender is some abstract
| immutable inherent property?
| pchristensen wrote:
| The concepts of "man" and "woman" are already doing a lot
| of work in language, society, law, etc. Redefining those
| terms would cause/is causing a lot of upheaval.
|
| Think of the concepts of "citizen", "resident",
| "immigrant", "ex-pat", "DREAMer", etc - all terms related
| to where someone lives and what set of laws applies to
| them. Regardless of how the person feels, the label isn't
| just for their own sake. Someone can be a citizen and an
| immigrant if they are naturalized, saying someone is a
| resident implies (but not definitely) that they are not a
| citizen, ex-pats are assumed to be temporarily in the
| place where they reside.
|
| Labelling trans women as women is a lossy translation
| that ignores a lot of societal edge cases.
| apocolyps6 wrote:
| Do you think that "labeling" black women as women is
| similarly lossy? Or female cancer survivors to pick
| another example
| pchristensen wrote:
| I think for those two examples you listed, the modifier
| is orthogonal. While "black" or "cancer survivor" tell me
| more about them as a person, they don't help understand
| gender/sex. Gender and sex, or the residency words I
| listed, provide different information about the same
| attribute.
|
| Saying someone is a cancer surviving resident doesn't add
| anything to my knowledge of their medical history or
| which laws apply to them, but resident vs ex-pat tells me
| a lot.
| [deleted]
| jhrmnn wrote:
| I think your last paragraph hints at the root cause. Many
| people simply have a trouble seeing gender purely as
| self-image since it has originated from sex, which is
| objective. And this development is quite recent.
| meetups323 wrote:
| The point is clearly that we should discourage folks from
| undertaking any permanent life alterations while they're
| still in the "it could be just a phase" stage. To use
| your analogy, we're dissuading the person from tattooing
| "I hate broccoli" on them until they've reached age 18 or
| whatever. Nobody is saying we should deny them their
| self-image outright.
| noduerme wrote:
| Sure, you are what you are __now__, but as a teenager
| that is going through radical changes. That's why you
| can't even get a tattoo in the US until you turn 18. In
| some states, not even with parental permission. Because
| it's irreversible. The whole trouble with reassignment
| surgery for minors is precisely due to the fact that who
| they are today is not who they will be as adults. Of
| course people should be treated as they want to be
| treated __now__, but society recognizes that adolescents
| are not capable of seeing far enough ahead to adulthood
| to be entrusted with making certain kinds of permanent,
| life-altering decisions.
|
| There's no debate I'm aware of about lowering the age for
| getting a tattoo, or drinking, or acting in porn, or
| other things which are fine for adults, but which we
| don't permit 12 year olds to do.
| btilly wrote:
| _But how can anyone _possibly_ deny the first part? How
| could anyone contradict an individual who states their
| own gender - on what grounds can you claim to know how
| someone feels about themselves better than they themself
| do?_
|
| How do you define denying the first part?
|
| According to my child's world view, I need to ask them
| every day what their pronouns are today. And any
| accidental slip-ups on any adult's part are a
| demonstration of transphobia, which justifies a raised
| voice and lecture.
|
| While I'm perfectly OK with making an attempt to treat
| people as they wish to be treated, at what point does the
| inconvenience and stress that your constant demands make
| on others become an unreasonable ask of them? (Which is a
| question that every parent of teenagers winds up asking
| at some point, for some reason...)
| jolux wrote:
| > According to my child's world view, I need to ask them
| every day what their pronouns are today. And any
| accidental slip-ups on any adult's part are a
| demonstration of transphobia, which justifies a raised
| voice and lecture.
|
| I agree that their request is unreasonable, and I'm sorry
| for the stress it's causing you. I can't really justify
| their behavior on a rational basis (teens, right?). And
| obviously I don't know your child, and I don't know you,
| but as a trans person who went through a similar phase,
| maybe consider what they might be thinking if you want to
| understand why they might be behaving like this?
|
| For one thing, they almost certainly know your opinions
| about the persistence of trans identity and online echo
| chambers of gender identity. _If_ (real if) you 're
| hostile to the idea that they could really be trans, it's
| possible they feel hostile to the idea that you could
| really be making a good faith best effort to support
| them, which is what this sounds like to me:
| defensiveness. I had a very similar dynamic with my
| parents for several years. We came out of it
| understanding each other a lot better, but it was
| certainly rough in the thick of it. I really hope you can
| find a way to resolve the tension.
| samat wrote:
| Really sorry about the stress of raising a teenager!
| ithkuil wrote:
| Teenager brains have a outstanding circuitry designed at
| discovering what infuriates their parents (and the
| generation of their parents) and just hammer on it,
| whatever that thing is.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Teenagers: nature's pen testers.
| parineum wrote:
| I was going to say, having been a teenager, this sounds
| an awful lot like the kind of thing I'd pull. Not exactly
| to make my parents upset but them being upset was an
| indication of success. I honestly don't know what my real
| end goals were but I'm sure it's at least partially
| understood by professionals.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| My <2 year old can already convincingly fake an accident
| if he believes that doing so will lead to tasty food.
|
| I can imagine thousands of reasons why teenagers would
| lie, and maybe they'll come up with new pronouns just to
| annoy you. Because that's what kids do, they constantly
| test the limits of acceptable behavior and the limits of
| your patience.
|
| That said, I agree with you that people can choose what
| gender they feel like and others should accept it as an
| opinion. But trying to force others to change their
| behavior to accommodate your opinion very quickly becomes
| unreasonable.
|
| So gender is fine, but pronouns are already a slippery
| slope.
|
| Do you believe a horny teenage guy would be willing to
| lie and say he identifies as female, if that means he
| gets to see all of his female classmates naked?
|
| It's a tradeoff between people living out their believes
| and the inconvenience that this causes for others.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| > Do you believe a horny teenage guy would be willing to
| lie and say he identifies as female, if that means he
| gets to see all of his female classmates naked?
|
| No, I don't. Living out that type of switch for any
| length of time is an enormous investment, which will
| change the way your peers view you forever. It is
| worthwhile if you're actually trans, but anyone else
| would be so much better off just browsing the internet.
|
| That said, I also think single-gender spaces are in need
| of an re-think. Same-sex locker rooms inherently assume
| that people of the same gender won't be attracted to one
| another, which is simply not the case. So what's the
| point?
| grips wrote:
| > Same-sex locker rooms inherently assume that people of
| the same gender won't be attracted to one another, which
| is simply not the case. So what's the point?
|
| Same sex locker rooms don't only assume people of same
| gender are not attracted to each other, but also that
| women are disproportionally exposed to potential sexual
| abuse from men than the other way around. Protecting
| women from men specifically is very central to the idea.
| exporectomy wrote:
| > How could anyone contradict an individual who states
| their own gender - on what grounds can you claim to know
| how someone feels about themselves better than they
| themself do?
|
| Because people lie about themselves all the time.
| Especially teenagers. We don't take every claim made by
| teenagers about their feeling as true on face value. We
| know they're practicing how to deceive people as part of
| growing up.
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| > But how can anyone _possibly_ deny the first part? How
| could anyone contradict an individual who states their
| own gender - on what grounds can you claim to know how
| someone feels about themselves better than they themself
| do?
|
| A lot of us remember similar mistakes from their own
| teenage years. I had a short phase where I thought I was
| gay, because my classmates were starting to date girls
| but I had a close guy friend and wasn't very interested
| in girls. Then I looked it up, found some resources
| clearly explaining that's not what being gay is, and
| walked away more secure in my identity. If someone had
| told me that I _couldn 't_ be wrong, because nobody knows
| how I feel better than I do, I would probably have come
| out and then been confused and insecure for years.
| kaitai wrote:
| Where is this ideology that "gender dysphoria = trans"
| pushed? This is really bizarre -- could you give me some
| references?
| recursive wrote:
| I wouldn't think of it as an ideology. I mean, maybe it is,
| but it doesn't seem at all bizarre. I'm not really aware of
| the details, but I'd be hard-pressed to name a difference
| between the two. I don't (think I) have a position on the
| issue.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| There are competing ideologies between the United States
| and the Rest of the World, essentially culminating in two
| approaches of diagnosing psychological and psychiatric
| health concerns.
|
| One comes from the American Psychological Association,
| called the DSM and another comes from the World Health
| Organization called the ICD.
|
| https://www.apa.org/monitor/2009/10/icd-dsm
| brundolf wrote:
| This is a wonderfully nuanced thread on the subject from a
| trans woman in her thirties:
| https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1385411504669790208.html
|
| Edit: I just noticed the original poster already converted
| this into a longform post, so the "reader app" version isn't
| really necessary https://liminalwarmth.com/the-hard-thing-
| about-hard-things-m...
| zozbot234 wrote:
| A 77-fold tweet storm, that has got to be some kind of
| world record. It's surprising how much of it is just plain
| old common sense that would never be seen as sensitive or
| "political" in a halfway sane environment, stated in what
| comes off as a painfully diplomatic way, going to extreme
| lengths to not ruffle any feathers.
| btilly wrote:
| Thank you for posting it. Some definite food for thought.
| fao_ wrote:
| It's also important noting, semi-related to your post, that
| nobody is pushing for trans-surgeries for teenagers -- they
| are pushing for _puberty blockers_. What this means is that
| puberty is medically halted until the teenager is a legal
| age, when they will be able to decide which puberty they
| want.
|
| This avoids a lot of dysphoria-provoking secondary sexual
| characteristics from progressing, and also avoids
| accidentally "transing" a cisgender teenager.
|
| Nobody hesitates to give puberty blockers to cisgender
| teenagers, for other medical reasons. I knew a young girl
| who had to have puberty blockers because she had a
| precocious puberty and it was literally destroying her
| young body -- she was not old enough physically or mentally
| to be able to deal with it.
|
| However, for whatever reason, there is a huge backlash
| against giving it to transgender teenagers, despite it
| representing the best and ultimate choice in self-
| determination -- "Take these for a few years and then when
| you are 18 you can decide which puberty you want to go
| through". It leaves room for the individual to decide. If
| the person decides against it before then, they can stop
| and puberty immediately resumes as normal.
|
| When the suicide rates are as high as they are for
| transgender people, and there is the option of halting the
| things _causing_ the suicidal feelings, the dysphoria, all
| of the physical and emotional and societal _pain_. Halting
| an onslaught of pain that is _utterly soul destroying_ ,
| and just giving them more time to make a choice and more of
| an informed decision, how can there be any empathically-
| cogent argument against that?
| bradleyjg wrote:
| What, if any, are the permanent consequences of being on
| puberty blockers from, say, 13-18?
|
| I'd guess they'd be significant but that's just a guess.
| pmoriarty wrote:
| _" There are more blind people than trans people. There are
| more people with Alzheimer's than trans people. There are more
| people in the US who have lost a limb than trans people."_
|
| There are more white people than black people in the US. More
| Christian people than Jewish people. More able-bodied people
| than disabled people. More descendants of immigrants than
| Native Americans.
|
| That's what makes all these people _minorities_.
| matthewmacleod wrote:
| I think there will be rather a lot of us who are quite animated
| by this issue--one that doesn't directly affect us--because of
| our own past experiences.
|
| As a gay man growing up in the 90s, I very acutely remember
| some of the public discourse around gay rights while I was a
| teenager. In the UK, that specifically included a coordinated
| campaign against mentions of homosexuality in education, with
| some pretty stark attempts to smear gay men in particular as
| dangerous predators and paedophiles intent on sneaking their
| agenda into schools so that they could abuse children.
|
| If I'm honest with you, I wouldn't be particularly animated
| about trans rights myself (beyond being generally supportive)
| if it weren't for the fact that I see exactly the same
| techniques and accusations levelled against the trans community
| --specifically trans women--as were used against people like
| myself 20 years ago.
|
| So I've personally gone from generally supportive-if-
| disinterested, to being absolutely fucking furious that this is
| being allowed to happen again. I've observed absolute outright
| lies about a minority group being repeated by people in
| positions of influence, and while it might not affect that many
| people directly I am so absolutely disgusted by it that I fully
| intend on being extremely vocal about it.
| munk-a wrote:
| Back in the nineties I remember scare campaigns about gay
| schoolmates in locker rooms taking advantage of other
| students - it is literally the same playbook.
| plank_time wrote:
| This is how the ruling class controls us peons. They have us
| fight each other vociferously over things like this or abortion
| or gay marriage, while they stay above it and do nothing except
| minor moral victories.
|
| The sad thing is that this works.
| jfengel wrote:
| It wouldn't work if we didn't subject ourselves to it. The
| "ruling class" may be working to control us, but they don't
| have to work very hard. They don't even make the lies
| plausible. There are an awful lot of people willing to die on
| the hill of the most astonishing idiocies, just because it's
| their idiocy.
| psychlops wrote:
| Here's a chart I love showing how the news distorts based on
| what people want to read (or what they are pushing) versus
| reality:
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/does-the-news-reflect-what-we-die...
|
| I'm not sure how the world would be if proportional importance
| news were the norm, but it's certainly not the case today.
| throwaway284534 wrote:
| There's a lot that's already been said in this topic but I feel
| compelled to bring up the damage imposed by TERF talking points.
| The conversation goes something like this: "Transgender women
| possess an innate maleness that carries a non-zero threat to
| female spaces." They believe that dictionary definitions of woman
| are prescriptive, declared at the chromosomes during birth,
| rather than descriptive, as in how one presents in both dress and
| phenotype.
|
| In my experience this is the center of every "debate." It's less
| about the merits of the cause and more about convincing this
| point against the hypothetical risk of a male who's taken
| advantage of self identified gender. TERFs are generally not
| interested in dynamics of trans men, who seem to be more like
| "gender traitors" than their deceptive counterparts.
|
| Personally I find this whole movement a farce. Every talking
| point not only misaligns with trans women, it causes more harm to
| cis women at scale. "Real women" give birth -- except hundreds of
| thousands who cannot. "Real women" look like the contemporary
| feminine ideal, yet 1 in 10 women suffer from PCOS enduring
| testosterone levels higher than any trans woman has to contend
| with. And the cake topper of them all, "trans women fuel negative
| stereotypes of femininity," while simultaneously not appearing
| feminine enough, often barred from HRT until after puberty. This
| Goldilocks zone of womanhood is always out of reach, and
| therefore transness is never acceptable.
|
| - a trans woman
| tabtab wrote:
| CIS (as born) women may also have (traditional) male-like
| traits. If you separate people by traits in prison, then why
| separate based on trans-ness alone? For example, large women
| are more likely to rape small women in prison simply because
| they can. If you separate based on such risks, then separate
| large women from small women also; why focus on _just_ trans?
|
| Many prisons _already_ separate by ethnic group simply to keep
| the peace. Yes, it 's segregation, but the alternative is more
| prison riots.
|
| Thus, if separation happens for practical reasons, then don't
| limit the separation practices to one group; otherwise, you
| will be accused of discrimination, perhaps justifiably. Use
| statistics, not stereotypes, to find the split points.
|
| Or get better security so mixing doesn't result in problems.
| Lowest-bidder security has down-sides.
| lovegoblin wrote:
| > "Regular" women
|
| The word you're looking for is "cis".
| tabtab wrote:
| I corrected it; however, keep in mind many readers don't
| know that means.
| mkl wrote:
| It's not an acronym, it's a prefix, like "trans" but the
| opposite.
| teh_infallible wrote:
| The world you're looking for is "real"
| freemint wrote:
| What you just said will understood as extremely hurtful
| and a purposeful attack on trans people by (some) trans
| people or trans advocates. Did you do that on purpose?
| pumaontheprowl wrote:
| It's the truth. Trans women are not real women as they do
| not have the same DNA and cannot birth children (amongst
| many other differences).
|
| I may be offended when people talk negatively about my
| under-performing sports team, but that doesn't give me a
| right to delete their comments just because I perceive
| them to be hurtful.
| dang wrote:
| Trolling will get you banned here. You've unfortunately
| been doing this repeatedly lately. Please stop.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| ta122347 wrote:
| Its this sort of thing that backlash is all about. You
| cant have an unapproved opinion or refuse to use their
| terminology or authoritarians will silence you, label it
| as trolling or hate speech etc. Real is absolutely the
| simplest and best description. Trans and cis are poisoned
| terms their use designed to support the legitimacy of the
| identity. There is only real and fake.
| lovegoblin wrote:
| I assure you it is not.
| josteink wrote:
| "Real" and most people will know what you're talking about.
|
| The only people using the term "cis" are trans-activists.
| worik wrote:
| I like the term "natal women/men".
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| That seems to me a very uncharitable take on the TERF position.
| For example, approximately 1/4 of women have been raped at some
| time. It's not very hard to see that such women could have a
| problem with someone who's biologically male in the women's
| room - a serious, traumatic problem.
|
| You can say that and still be sympathetic to the plight of
| trans people.
| [deleted]
| ENIanDEM wrote:
| Sorry, I don't buy this concept that hordes of (or any, for
| that matter) predatory trans women are queuing up for the
| chance to prowl round changing rooms. Do you, really?
|
| Say you're right. What stops them sneaking in right now? It's
| not like there are mandatory ID checks at the entrance.
| meragrin_ wrote:
| > predatory trans women
|
| How about predatory men pretending to be trans-women?
| eropple wrote:
| If you're going to hypothesize, doesn't it obligate you
| to substantiate the claim?
|
| Are predatory men pretending to be transwomen a problem
| on any statistically noticeable level?
| ENIanDEM wrote:
| Can we please return to some semblance of reality?
| throwaway384028 wrote:
| In a thread related to women thinking they're men and men
| thinking they're women
| long_time_gone wrote:
| This is what I don't understand. How many examples are
| there of the horrible ills these bathroom bills will
| "solve"? Trans people exist today, they use bathrooms,
| where are the problems?
| delecti wrote:
| Virtually none. In fact trans people are vastly more
| likely to be victims of the sorts of things that the
| people pushing those policies argue those bills are meant
| to prevent.
| worik wrote:
| Use the bathroom you are comfortable using.
|
| Gendered bathrooms are a concrete expression of the fact
| that it is gender that is the major fault line through
| our society. The fact we need them is a damming
| indictment on our society (on men probably)
| thereddaikon wrote:
| That's a strawman.
|
| Without proof to the contrary the assumption should be that
| the trans population has a similar proportion of rapists as
| any other does.
|
| Since its been well established that essentially all rape
| no matter who is raping who goes under reported it is
| completely rational for women to be just as fearful as they
| would with any other stranger.
| notahacker wrote:
| The question isn't whether women should assume that a
| transperson is less likely to rape them than any other
| stranger. That's not what "bathroom bills" are about.
|
| The question is whether bathroom bills forcing
| transpeople who wish to not break the law (potential
| rapists are obviously not part of this set...) into men's
| bathrooms, and a surrounding climate of generalised
| hostility towards anyone with any remotely masculine
| element of their physique or style in women's bathrooms
| actually meaningfully reduces the risk of rape, or just
| makes the environment more intimidating for everyone.
| ENIanDEM wrote:
| It's literally in response to the posit that trans women
| would rape strangers in changing rooms. I've tried to
| make it as far from a strawman as possible by arguing
| against even a single occurrence of that happening.
|
| Cis women can perpetuate rape. Should we ban them from
| changing rooms too? How far through the looking glass
| does this have to go?!
| worik wrote:
| > That's a strawman.
|
| It is a dessicated vegetative hominoid surely?
| MyHypatia wrote:
| I don't see how it is unreasonable for a female inmate to be
| uncomfortable sharing sleeping quarters with a person who has a
| penis (regardless of how that person identifies).
|
| The fear that cis-women have of rape is real. The fear that
| transgender women have of rape in a men's jail is real. I think
| the fairest thing to do is take both of these fears seriously
| and house intact trans-women in a space where they neither feel
| threatened with rape, nor impose that threat on cis-women.
|
| I think referring to this fear as a "TERF talking point" is as
| disrespectful as it would be to minimize the fear that trans-
| women experience in men's prisons.
| tomp wrote:
| Why would trans women have any greater fear of rape (by men)
| than (smaller, weaker) men have?
| mkl wrote:
| There are a lot more straight male rapists than non-
| straight male rapists, just because there are a lot more
| straight people. Yes, there is also situational
| homosexuality, but trans women change the situation.
| fastball wrote:
| I can't really speak to the psychology of rapists in
| prisons, but I imagine there are a good number of people
| that, if they're gonna rape someone with a penis anyway, it
| is more enjoyable to rape the person that is presenting as
| a woman.
|
| Also because rape in prison is very much about power, and
| exerting power over people you dislike for one reason or
| another (in this case trans people because they are trans)
| especially.
| notahacker wrote:
| Fear of rape or pressurised sex amongst prisoners is
| perfectly real, but if a tiny minority of transpeople are a
| distant third in terms of sexual threat to female prisoners
| behind male warders and natal females and a campaign
| organization proposes rehousing transpeople (all 125 of them)
| in different prisons as their solution to prison rape over
| better safeguarding practises or single occupant cells which
| might offer many more women more protection from more
| pervasive threats it sounds suspiciously more like a "talking
| point" against the target group than a practical solution to
| sexual violence in prisons. Especially if the campaign groups
| responsible have long lists of other issues with transpeople,
| and somehow the sexual activity involving people with penises
| _and keys_ doesn 't get the same attention...
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| >but if a tiny minority of transpeople are a distant third
|
| Here's the problem I have with this line of defense: it
| doesn't accommodate the reality of self-id and the likely
| downstream effects if it becomes the accepted norm. If all
| it takes for a male to be housed in a female prison is a
| checkmark on a form, we should expect that many cis-men
| will take advantage of the situation, thus creating a very
| real threat of abuse for women in women prisons. If I were
| being locked up for an extended period of time and all it
| took was a declaration to be housed in a female prison, I
| would do it. I would go from one of the smaller and weaker
| inmates to one of the biggest and strongest. It is a no-
| brainer in terms of my personal safety. And I have no
| interest in abusing anyone or taking advantage of forced-
| proximity. Imagine how many abusers would take advantage of
| that circumstance? An argument in defense of gender-
| affirmation in prison assignments that doesn't accommodate
| this likely reality isn't substantive.
| worik wrote:
| The prison debate is a red herring
|
| People who run prisons are often sadists.
|
| In double bunked men's prisons rapists get to ply their
| trade. Get double bunked along with the rest.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| I think housing intact trans-women in single occupant cells
| in women's prisons is a reasonable middle ground. The
| trans-women are in a space that affirms their gender
| identity, but it does not require cis-women to share a cell
| with someone who can rape and impregnate them.
| jolux wrote:
| Cis women rape other cis women too, and not all trans
| women can impregnate people.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| These are true statements. Cis-women can be raped and
| impregnated by people with penises is also a true
| statement. Perhaps the complete solution is to house all
| in-mates in separate cells regardless of sex or gender. I
| do not think that creating situations where female
| prisoners can be sexually assaulted and impregnated by
| their cell mate is a positive step forward.
| jolux wrote:
| > I do not think that creating situations where female
| prisoners can be sexually assaulted and impregnated by
| their cell mate is a positive step forward.
|
| You keep combining impregnation and sexual assault as if
| they're the same thing. Cis women are already sexually
| assaulted by other cis women in prisons! This is not a
| problem created anew by housing trans women in women's
| prisons. I venture that the problem is not trans women,
| the problem is the assumption that prisons cannot stop
| inmates from sexually assaulting each other.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| Impregnation and sexual assault are obviously not the
| same thing, and I am not combining them as if they are.
| Housing cis-women and trans-women creates a unique
| situation where cis-women can be sexually assaulted AND
| impregnated. I don't dispute that cis-women can sexually
| assault other cis-women, and that sexual assault is a
| problem in men's prisons and women's prisons and exists
| with or without the presence of trans men and women.
|
| To completely stop sexual assault in prisons, people
| would have to be housed in separate cells. Housing cis-
| women and trans-women in the same cell does not stop the
| sexual assault problem.
| jolux wrote:
| > I don't dispute that cis-women can sexually assault
| other cis-women, and that sexual assault is a problem in
| men's prisons and women's prisons and exists with or
| without the presence of trans men and women.
|
| In that case you're hard pressed to argue why housing
| trans women in women's prisons exacerbates this issue,
| unless you think trans women are more likely to be
| rapists. Excluding an entire population on the basis that
| some of them might rape people is not just if rape is
| already a problem.
|
| > To completely stop sexual assault in prisons, people
| would have to be housed in separate cells.
|
| I mostly agree, but it's very easy to construct a
| solution to these problems while ignoring the present
| reality. Almost no trans people are currently housed in
| prisons that accord with their gender identity, and 35%
| of trans people in prisons themselves report having been
| sexually assaulted in the past year as of 2015 [1]. The
| status quo is pretty dire for them too, and their safety
| should be weighed against the safety of the cis people
| they might otherwise be housed with.
|
| https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/transgender-
| women-ar...
| MyHypatia wrote:
| No, I don't think trans-women are more likely to be
| rapists. Trans-women are at high risk of sexual assault
| in male prisons and that should be taken seriously. Cis-
| women are at risk of sexual assault and being impregnated
| from that sexual assault if they are housed with intact
| trans-women.
|
| I think both of these concerns can be addressed. None of
| the options address everyone's needs and preferences, but
| are certainly better than leaving trans-women completely
| vulnerable in men's prisons.
|
| 1) House trans-women in a separate part of men's prisons
| so that they are not at high risk of sexual assault. Some
| people do not like this because it doesn't affirm their
| gender identity.
|
| 2) House trans-women in prisons for trans people. This is
| likely unrealistic because the number of people is small
| and for most inmates it would mean spending prison time
| far away from their community, making it harder for
| friends and family to visit.
|
| 3) House trans-women in women's prisons, but not force
| cis-women to share a cell with intact trans-women. This
| scenario would remove the threat that trans-women face,
| affirm their gender identity, but not impose an unfair
| burden on cis-women who fear being sexually assaulted and
| impregnated by intact trans-women.
|
| I think scenario (3) goes most of the way in protecting
| trans-women from sexual assault, allows them to serve
| their sentences (hopefully not too far away from family),
| yet still acknowledges that many cis-women in prison have
| been sexually assaulted or fear sexual assault by people
| with penises because it can result in pregnancy which
| creates an entire new set of physical, psychological, and
| moral challenges for that cis-woman.
| jolux wrote:
| Are you also in favor of enforcing that only cis women
| are allowed to be correctional officers at women's
| prisons, which is not currently the case?
| fastball wrote:
| Without any stats for transwomen in particular, human
| males are more likely to be rapists, and an intact
| transwoman is closer to a man than a ciswoman is, no?
| Unless _you_ think that the reason men are more likely to
| be rapists is purely a result of their gender identity
| and has nothing to do with biology.
|
| With regards to the danger of trans people being sexually
| assaulted in prisons: yes, it is absolutely a problem.
| MyHypatia literally made the same point you're making in
| their original comment.
| jolux wrote:
| Side request: if it doesn't bother you too much I would
| prefer you refer to trans women with penises as trans
| women with penises rather than as "intact" trans women.
| Such phrasing suggests that trans women without penises
| are damaged.
|
| > Without any stats for transwomen in particular, human
| males are more likely to be rapists, and an intact
| transwoman is closer to a man than a ciswoman is, no?
|
| This argument is rather tangential. Is there any
| empirical evidence that trans women are more likely to
| sexually assault people than cis women? Is the median
| trans woman more likely to sexually assault people than
| cis women who have been convicted of sexual assault, or
| who have already committed sexual assault in the prison?
|
| > MyHypatia literally made the same point you're making
| in their original comment.
|
| Specifically, they said that putting trans women in
| women's prisons would be imposing the threat of rape on
| cis women. After I pointed out that cis women already
| rape other cis women in women's prisons, they clarified
| that it was actually impregnation they were really
| worried about introducing, not rape as such. I don't
| think my criticism of this concern has been addressed.
| fastball wrote:
| Sure, no problem. Though I would point out that "intact"
| is also a word used to describe uncircumcised males,
| without strictly implying that circumcised males are
| damaged.
|
| I don't think there are enough transwomen in prisons to
| make any reasonable statistical statement about
| transwomen in particular being more or less likely to be
| rapists. And I don't really think the argument is
| tangential. People with penises are more likely to be
| rapists than people without them, this is a clear
| statistical reality. If a large population of people are
| being held together, historically because they did not
| possess penises, and are worried about the introduction
| of someone with a penis (who statistically is _much_ more
| likely to be a rapist by nature of having a penis), I
| think the burden is on you to demonstrate that gender
| identity is a confounding factor in those statistics. And
| if there _isn 't_ a difference between having a penis and
| not having one in this circumstance, why do we even need
| to have gendered prisons?
|
| With regards to MyHypatia, I was referring to the fact
| that, in the second half of your comment to which I
| initially replied, it seemed like you felt MyHypatia did
| not recognize the direness of the trans situation in
| prisons. But they clearly do, as evidenced by this from
| their first comment:
|
| > The fear that transgender women have of rape in a men's
| jail is real
| jolux wrote:
| > Though I would point out that "intact" is also a word
| used to describe uncircumcised males, without strictly
| implying that circumcised males are damaged.
|
| It may be used to describe their foreskin, but I've never
| heard or seen it used to describe them as whole people.
| It sounds very odd. What is the negation of intact? You
| can't really use a word to describe a category
| exclusively without implying the opposite of the other
| category.
|
| > People with penises are more likely to be rapists than
| people without them, this is a clear statistical reality.
|
| I don't think you can argue this is a clear statistical
| reality without data about trans women. As far as I know
| contemporary research suggests sexual assault by women
| has been historically undercounted. I don't know if the
| numbers come out similar in the end, but it seems like
| the kind of thing that is easily colored by social bias.
|
| > If a large population of people are being held
| together, historically because they did not possess
| penises
|
| Is it because they didn't have penises? Or because they
| weren't men? I don't know of any specific information,
| but this is an important distinction, because the general
| perception for a long time has been that men are more
| violent than women, and I think it's more because of male
| secondary sexual characteristics (muscle tone and height,
| mainly) than primary. Would a burly intersex person with
| high testosterone and ambiguous genitalia who sexually
| assaulted somebody have been put in a women's prison?
| Should they be today?
|
| > And if there isn't a difference between having a penis
| and not having one in this circumstance, why do we even
| need to have gendered prisons?
|
| I don't know, but I do think it's worth asking the
| question! Do we segregate people by gender because it's
| fundamentally necessary, or because our prison system is
| so brutal that we can't imagine inmates of different
| genders living together peacefully? There could very well
| be science on this subject that I'm not aware of, but on
| its face the sexual segregation of American prisons seems
| hard to separate from their brutality and corruption.
| eropple wrote:
| I think your posts in this thread are downright
| admirable, and for that reason, in case you're not aware
| (and if you are, readers probably aren't)--it is probably
| worth noting that "intact" is common TERF watchwording,
| pushed and intended to normalize the position that trans
| women are not women.
| throwawayboise wrote:
| You would have to place them in solitary confinement then, as
| a trans woman could rape another trans woman.
| baldanders wrote:
| By that line of reasoning every inmate should be held in
| solitary confinement by virtue of the fact that rape is
| possible between every possible pair of gender identities.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| No, you don't have to place them in solitary confinement.
| You can place them with other trans-women.
|
| Men are housed with men in jails. Yes, sometimes they
| commit violence against each other, including rape. But we
| don't put all men in solitary confinement.
| Latty wrote:
| This begs the question of why it is acceptable for men
| and trans women to be raped, but unacceptable for cis
| women to be raped?
|
| There is no justification for accepting _any_ prison rape
| --or, for that matter, sexual assault, which cis women
| are entirely capable of.
|
| (And, to be clear, sexual assault is not inherently a
| lesser crime than rape, rape is just a specific form of
| sexual assault, and depending on jurisdiction, may be
| defined in such a way as a cis woman can be a rapist).
| MyHypatia wrote:
| It is not acceptable for men nor trans-women nor cis-
| women nor anyone to be raped in prison. My comment does
| not condone rape. If you think that all men and all
| trans-women should have separate cells to prevent this
| possibility, I think that could be a positive step
| forward. I do not think that subjecting cis-women to the
| fear of rape is a positive step forward.
| Latty wrote:
| Then why did you present it as a zero-sum game where you
| were quite willing to suggest putting trans-women into a
| situation you find unconscionable for cis-women?
|
| You have thoroughly proved the original poster's point:
| TERF talking points are damaging. You bought one up,
| defending it as "reasonable", but when pressed you accept
| that there is a preferable solution that doesn't involve
| throwing trans people under the bus.
|
| The talking point is there to push a narrative that trans
| people are dangerous, just as was done with gay people
| before. It is designed to imply that we must choose
| between women's rights and trans people's rights, which
| is a false dichotomy.
| nepeckman wrote:
| There is no evidence that trans women are more a threat
| to cis women than cis women are to each other. If a cis
| women is afraid of being assaulted by a trans women, that
| is a fear rooted in bigotry, not reality. If the
| individual in question is a convicted rapist, than
| precautions should be taken regardless of that persons
| genitals or gender to make sure they dont assault anyone
| else. Prison rape is horrific and needs to be addressed,
| and concern trolling about trans women doesnt help anyone
| and does hurt public perception of trans women.
| rmah wrote:
| It turns out there is evidence...
|
| plank_time wrote: _In the UK prisons, transgender women
| sexually assault women 5x more than cis women sexually
| assault women.https://archive.is/iYD5T_
|
| Haven't dug into it to see how strong that evidence is,
| but to say none seems incorrect.
| nepeckman wrote:
| It is actually incorrect, I just responded to that
| comment. See below:
|
| If you read the article you linked, you will find that is
| not true. From the article: "between 2016 and 2020, there
| were seven sexual assaults against females in women's
| prisons by trans women." 7 assaults in 4 years is not 5x
| more.
|
| If you are referring to the statistic that "trans inmates
| are 1% of the population and commit 5.6% of the
| assaults", you will find that the trans inmates in
| question are actually trans men being incorrectly housed
| in women's prisons.
| rmah wrote:
| I see, thanks for the clarification
| MyHypatia wrote:
| The fear of being impregnated from a sexual assault is
| not rooted in bigotry. It places cis-women in a very
| uncomfortable position of having to birth and raise a
| child created from sexual assault or have an abortion.
| This is not concern trolling. It is a very real fear.
| Prison rape is horrific for everyone, not just cis-women.
| It is horrific for men and trans-men and trans-women as
| well. Housing cis-women with intact trans-women does not
| solve or address the prison rape problem.
| nepeckman wrote:
| > It places cis-women in a very uncomfortable position of
| having to birth and raise a child created from sexual
| assault or have an abortion.
|
| I want to be very clear: I do not want this to happen. I
| don't want any woman to be raped, especially not
| impregnated as well. But my point still stands: this does
| not happen on any sort of regular basis. I do not think
| you're arguing in bad faith here, and I hope you see that
| I'm not either. Segregating trans women from cis women
| does nothing to protect cis women. Implementing this
| segregation across the prison system would not impact the
| occurrence of prison rape by half a percent. But by
| insisting that trans women are a threat to cis women, you
| are hurting trans women. You are playing into and
| amplifying a very popular narrative in our society that
| trans women are deceptive, dangerous predators. And this
| leads to legislation that harms the whole trans
| community.
| Latty wrote:
| Even beyond that, a cis woman can sexually assault another
| woman (Rape has different definitions depending on where
| you are, but clearly the distinction is irrelevant--sexual
| assault isn't inherently of a different impact, just
| different exact actions).
|
| It's the exact same argument that was used as justification
| to try and criminalise homosexuality, that they would all
| be assaulting people in bathrooms, changing rooms, and
| prisons.
| watwut wrote:
| Trans people are way more likely to be raped then non trans.
| And cis women do get attacked by trans men. Like, if your
| concern is prison rape, it is quite odd to start with lowest
| probability events and ignore high probability events.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| My comment was in response to the parent comment referring
| to cis-women's concerns as "TERF talking points". I am
| saying that cis-women's concerns shouldn't be invalidated,
| and that we can figure out a path forward that acknowledges
| the threat that trans-women may face in men's prisons and
| also acknowledge the threat that cis-women may face being
| cell mates with a person who has a penis.
|
| Basically, I think that sexual assault in prisons should be
| taken far more seriously for everyone. That may mean every
| prisoner should get their own cell regardless of sex or
| gender. I don't think housing cis-women and intact trans-
| women in the same cell alleviates this.
| watwut wrote:
| I am cis woman. I happened to look at prisom rape and
| sexual violence statistics a while ago.
|
| The trans men in jail abusing cis women is real thing.
| They are housed together now. The trans women being raped
| or abused is incredibly frequent thing - includig by
| guards. (Male on male rape is a joke, basically.
| Transwomen in prison are assumed to enjoy sexual abuse
| basically.)
|
| But despite the former being literally about cis women
| safety too, it just dont interest people. There are many
| ways to make prisons safer and making it so trans women
| or gender non conforming men are a bit safer is topic
| only for radical trans activists and no one else.
|
| If there is heated discussion about issue that dont
| currently exist which ignores issues that do cureently
| exist, it is ok to call it talking point.
| throwaway675309 wrote:
| Additionally if you only have to vocally identify as a woman
| without having to take any further steps (Hormone
| replacement, srs, etc) this seems exploitable.
| freemint wrote:
| While you are throwaway I am still gonna remind you of
| "assuming good faith" is one of core tenants of hn.
|
| Other things that are exploitable: driving vans/cars in
| cities as they can be driven into crowds.
|
| I agree that it is thinkable that some people might want to
| exploit these rules. However I haven't seen anything that
| suggest abuse will be rampant enough and not be able to be
| dealt using existing laws and shaming exploiters. So I
| think we should give trans people their rights and deal
| with perverts and abuser separately.
|
| A cost on switching can be imposed but it shouldn't make it
| more stigmatising or harder on trans people ideally.
| fastball wrote:
| How would you see anything to suggest abuse will be
| rampant before the abuse is even viable?
|
| There have already been people I would describe as
| attempting to abuse[1] the nascent systems that do exist.
|
| [1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/10/23/canadian-
| transge...
| brandmeyer wrote:
| Alternatively, this could be an opportunity to address sexual
| assault in prisons more broadly. No inmate, no matter how
| heinous their crimes, should be subjected to sexual assault.
|
| The prevalence and sexual assault in prisons is an example of
| a normalization of deviance that should be opposed, instead
| of tolerated.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| I agree that it can be an opportunity to address sexual
| assault in prisons more broadly. My comment does not
| normalize or tolerate sexual assault.
| noobermin wrote:
| Given rape is a fear in general (women without penises can
| rape, you know) may be people shouldn't share sleeping
| quarters.
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| > house intact trans-women
|
| Why would a rapist stop wanting to rape regardless of the
| state of their genitals? Is sexual violation with a penis so
| much more horrific than other violations it deserves special
| consideration?
| vmception wrote:
| Its also about the possibility of being impregnated
|
| Just personalize the idea, your sister or female
| significant other was thrown in jail, and then housed with
| a male who is a trans woman who has sex with her with or
| without her consent and creates an ongoing consequence that
| is impossible if trans women were not there
|
| That would be the expectation you would start with to form
| a conclusion
|
| Sex in male prisons does not result in pregnancy
| Latty wrote:
| By this logic, it would be fine if they were infertile,
| which is obvious nonsense.
|
| Sexual assault does not hit some magic breaking point
| where it becomes an unacceptable risk at the chance of
| impregnation. If there is a significant risk of sexual
| assault, then the prison has fundamentally failed and
| that is the thing that needs fixing.
|
| It simply doesn't matter if someone is trans or not, cis
| people are just as capable of sexual assault, and prisons
| must be protecting _all_ inmates, not only cis-women,
| from assault.
| vmception wrote:
| the rest of us are _starting_ with the premise that
| prisons have all failed equally, and find them equally
| incompetent at any additional vector of assault such as
| the one that introduces pregnancy
|
| its not nearly as gendered as you are making it out to
| be, this a condition statement satisfied by some gendered
| combinations
| freemint wrote:
| In good faith and not as whataboutism: Do you think being
| forced to impregnate someone against your will is
| similarly horrific although less burdensome for the first
| 9 months?
| vmception wrote:
| Yes
|
| What circumstance made you think of that?
| werber wrote:
| Some trans men get pregnant and some trans men commit
| crimes. It's interesting that conversations on gender
| identity tend to zero in on trans women
| vmception wrote:
| That was the prompt so the replies will be towards that
| hackinthebochs wrote:
| >Why would a rapist stop wanting to rape regardless of the
| state of their genitals?
|
| Testosterone is correlated with sexual aggression. Chemical
| castration is a treatment for rapists after all.
| MyHypatia wrote:
| Yes, because women can get pregnant. Then not only do you
| have to deal with trauma of your sexual assault, you have
| to deal with the trauma of having a child born from that
| sexual assault or have an abortion.
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| So, if someone were infertile it would reduce the threat
| and be acceptable? You said intact, not fertile.
| plank_time wrote:
| In the UK prisons, transgender women sexually assault women
| 5x more than cis women sexually assault women.
|
| https://archive.is/iYD5T
| nepeckman wrote:
| If you read the article you linked, you will find that is
| not true. From the article: "between 2016 and 2020, there
| were seven sexual assaults against females in women's
| prisons by trans women." 7 assaults in 4 years is not 5x
| more.
|
| If you are referring to the statistic that "trans inmates
| are 1% of the population and commit 5.6% of the assaults",
| you will find that the trans inmates in question are
| actually trans men being incorrectly housed in women's
| prisons.
| robocat wrote:
| From article:
|
| "there were 125 trans prisoners in 2017, 60 of whom were
| serving sentences for sexual offences. Of those 60, 27 were
| serving a prison sentence for rape." which is more shocking
| than your 5x statistic. Note the 5x statistic appears weak
| to me because "Between 2016 and 2020, there were seven
| sexual assaults [reported] against females in women's
| prisons by trans women.".
| teakettle42 wrote:
| > They believe that dictionary definitions of woman are
| prescriptive, declared at the chromosomes during birth, rather
| than descriptive, as in how one presents in both dress and
| phenotype.
|
| If you were responsible for compiling a dictionary, what is the
| accurate definition of "woman" that you would provide?
| throwaway284534 wrote:
| I must admit that I'm apprehensive to give an answer given
| this thread's...liveliness, but I'll do my best.
|
| "Woman" describes a collection of chromosomal and
| phenological traits observed within an ongoing and temporal
| culture lens. A human is often perceived as a woman when she
| simultaneously embodies a variety of these traits, especially
| so when those traits contrast that which is considered male.
|
| Much like the concept of feminism, consensus on what is and
| isn't in these categories continues to evolve as it's
| observed and informed by the experienced of both genders.
|
| I can understand why a definition like this wouldn't be as
| satisfying as something more concrete and well, definitive.
| slibhb wrote:
| I don't think your explanation of "TERF talking points" is
| fair. Contra Judith Butler it's not clear that feminism has any
| meaning without some essential idea of "womanhood". That is
| fundamentally what disturbs "TERFs".
|
| When you talk about "this Goldilocks zone of womanhood," I
| think you've rediscovering one of the oldest philosophical
| discoveries: mental concepts and ideas (in this case "woman")
| do not apply perfectly to the world of appearences. But this
| does not mean we can jettison concepts and ideas altogether. In
| fact they seem necessary. So the fact that we cannot seem to
| come up with a perfect criterion for defining "biological
| woman" does not mean that we can dispense with that category.
|
| And that's what's being asked of us. We are told "trans women
| are women". What does that mean? It if means "there is a
| category, women, and in that category there are trans women and
| biological women," that's fine with me. If it means "there is
| no distinction between biological women and trans women," that
| seems wrong to me and to the vast majority of people.
| worik wrote:
| I am with you until "...the vast majority of people".
|
| I am not sure it is true, and utterly sure it does not matter
| analognoise wrote:
| I don't think "trans women are women" is a literal
| statement - I think it means "we should give trans women
| the rights and protections afforded to women"; it's an
| expression of support.
|
| Kinda like "Black Lives Matter" - obviously they do, but
| the fact that you have to say it out loud and directly
| highlights the disparity and systemic injustices faced by
| people of color.
|
| At least, that's what I think those things mean, someone
| with a more sophisticated understanding will probably
| correct me if I'm wrong.
| merhart wrote:
| Just want to say thank you for taking the time to express your
| perspective on this, particularly as a heavily affected
| individual in these matters.
| Latty wrote:
| Indeed, well said. Even outside of the realm of gender, the
| rhetoric of biological essentialism is harmful.
|
| When I see people say things like "biology is what is real", I
| think about the harm done to every adopted child who is being
| told that their parent isn't _really_ their parent, that their
| relationship should not be respected as much as someone who is
| biologically related to their parents.
| metalliqaz wrote:
| Sorry to break it to you, but chromosomes _are_ prescriptive.
| You cannot simply ignore that there are differences between X
| and Y chromosomes. Society 's distinctions between the sexes is
| not arbitrary. Why do we have separate bathrooms in public but
| not at home? Why do we have segregated sports? Why do we
| celebrate feminists but not MRAs? It's because there is a real-
| world difference.
| [deleted]
| dang wrote:
| Flamewar tropes like "Sorry to break it to you" are not
| acceptable on HN in any case and certainly not on a painfully
| divisive and inflammatory topic like this.
|
| If you can't keep in mind that you're talking to other human
| beings who may have deep and good reasons to feel differently
| than you do on a topic, then please don't post here. This is
| a difficult enough topic without poisoning it with swipes and
| snark.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| jbay808 wrote:
| > Sorry to break it to you, but chromosomes are prescriptive.
|
| ... Except when they aren't. Even biology doesn't paint such
| a simple picture. Chromosomes are important, but not as
| important as hormones -- and how the body responds to those
| hormones.
|
| If you're not aware of CAIS, it is probably the clearest way
| for you to re-evaluate your view that chromosomes are
| prescriptive.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complete_androgen_insensitiv.
| ..
|
| Edit - puzzled by the downvotes here. Do you _know_ what
| chromosomes you have? Have you checked? If you do, there 's a
| nonzero chance that they aren't the chromosomes you're
| expecting to find.
|
| If you were to test your chromosomes and found they didn't
| match your expectations, you would either have to change your
| belief about the prescriptiveness of chromosomes, or your
| belief about your gender. Which belief would you change?
| Which belief do you hold more strongly?
| tsimionescu wrote:
| Chromosomes are not detectable from the outside. Phenotype is
| not entirely dependent on genotype. Trans women may suffer
| from both certain "female" diseases and certain "male"
| diseases.
| benjohnson wrote:
| I don't think it's fair to dismiss what seems to be a
| reasonable discussion as simply "TERF talking points" and then
| reframe what your opponents are saying in an un-sympathetic
| way.
| loopz wrote:
| Maybe it's like telling ME patients it's all in their head,
| and they can be cured psychologically. It may work on some,
| but for many they get permanently damaged from too much
| pressure and stress. After such abuse and being ground down,
| it's hard to be sympathetic to ignorance and abuse.
|
| I don't know enough to conclude, but trying to understand and
| ask more questions is a first step.
| postmodernbrute wrote:
| Right. Another loud article published on a very mainstream media
| about how a very established academic is being silenced and
| prevented from "debate". I wonder, if one collates all the
| articles on British media about transgender people, how many of
| them would actually concern the daily experiences of real
| transgender people, versus how many that consist of an
| established writer complaining loudly that they have been
| silenced?
|
| Or to put it more quantitatively: how many words uttered by real
| transgender people have been published on British media, and how
| many words of these brutally silenced "gender-criticals"?
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| To put it bluntly, this is irrelevant.
|
| You put "debate" in quotes like it's somehow a dirty word,
| which is shocking and depressing to me. I DO care about what
| real transgender people have to say, and to be honest,
| especially on college campuses in the US, it is very easy to
| see they have a voice and are able to speak there opinion.
|
| I have no idea whether this academic's opinion is one I agree
| with. Primarily because she wasn't allowed to speak.
| postmodernbrute wrote:
| She was allowed to speak far more than any trans people has
| been allowed to speak - she is speaking on The Economist. I
| do not see any trans people speaking on The Economist. The
| same applies across the entirety of published British media.
| That you willfully ignore this epistemological injustice,
| does not render it irrelevant.
|
| The university ground is one of the very few places where
| real transgender people, along with other socially
| marginalised groups, are generally allowed to speak, and
| allowed to speak for themselves. They are particularly
| visible on campus, precisely because they are effectly not
| allowed to speak in other places. Such as The Economist and
| other print media.
|
| And yes, certain "debates" are quite dirty. Debates are not
| neutral fields of free intellectual inquiry, but potent
| manifestation of prevailing epistemological injustices. It is
| shocking and depressing, that certain people must again and
| again defend their own existence in "debates" premised on a
| claim to the absurdity of their condition. It is shocking and
| depressing, that sincere experiences of trans people are not
| taken, but rather must be put under the forensic lens of
| "debate" to be constantly challenged and invalidated. These
| "debates" are dirty constructs, serving as a powerful
| mechanism of collective gaslighting.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I am not British, so I can't quite comment as well on the
| media landscape there, but I see tons of articles about
| transgender issues, with lots of commentary by trans
| people, in mainstream American media. A few simple
| examples:
|
| 1. https://www.newsweek.com/trans-air-force-officer-trump-
| ban-1...
|
| 2. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/opinion/transge
| nder...
|
| 3. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-
| safety/trangende...
|
| And your last paragraph about claiming people are debating
| about forcing certain people to, as you put it, "again and
| again defend their own existence", is what I find so
| frustrating, because this is absolutely NOT what is going
| on _in this instance_. Yes, there are a tons of examples
| where this DOES happen, but lumping all honest debate about
| difficult problems (say, how does one determine if someone
| is eligible to compete in women 's-only sports) as
| "defending your own existence" is just silencing all views
| that don't 100% agree with you.
| altcognito wrote:
| Hey look another outrage article about censorship.
| zapdrive wrote:
| Slightly off topic, but where can I get some popcorn?
| fungiblecog wrote:
| I think the irony of the current battle around identity is that
| we have been making steady progress based on the idea that
| personal characteristics shouldn't matter. However this whole
| debate is reversing that by not only saying it matters a great
| deal but that other people should be forced to defer to others
| personal choices even when it directly affects them
| colechristensen wrote:
| You can notice this in a few fields of popular ideologies these
| days, that is overcorrecting for a problem to the point of
| becoming exactly the thing one was originally fighting against.
|
| I am of the somewhat progressive-unpopular opinion that some
| people have an unhealthy interest in how they label themselves
| and how others perceive them, and in the attempts to be
| supportive the popular opinion is doing more harm than good.
| Don't get me wrong, I'm not against anyone with a certain
| genotype or phenotype having any particular interest in whom
| they love, how they dress, their hobbies, behaviors, etc. as
| long as they don't put hurts on other people. I do have doubts
| about the amount of "identifying" people do with their
| preferences though. It can be a subtle point that is hard to
| make just right without getting pitchforks raised, I'm never
| sure i've done it right.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| I agree and I'll add to that activists claiming to speak on
| behalf of a particular group are often not actually
| representing that group. I think there is currency in
| identity these days, to your earlier points, and some wish to
| spend others' currency for themselves.
| colechristensen wrote:
| Whatever the situation, people in positions of power and
| authority have a tendency (not absolute) to be in it for
| the power and authority.
| TimTheTinker wrote:
| The problem is that people entangle their sense of identity
| with their opinions. (I think PG had an essay on HN recently
| that talked about this - he called out religious and
| political opinions in particular.)
|
| So their opinions aren't up for discussion. If you disagree
| with them, they feel offended and personally attacked.
| umvi wrote:
| > You can notice this in a few fields of popular ideologies
| these days, that is overcorrecting for a problem to the point
| of becoming exactly the thing one was originally fighting
| against.
|
| I've noticed this too, it's not only gender ideology but
| racial ideology and more. Seems to be form of ideological
| "pilot-induced oscillation"[0]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilot-induced_oscillation
|
| "[Pilot-induced oscillation] occurs when the pilot of an
| aircraft inadvertently commands an often increasing series of
| corrections in opposite directions, each an attempt to cover
| the aircraft's reaction to the previous input with an over
| correction in the opposite direction" (in this case the
| "pilot" is "society")
| adav wrote:
| I can't comment on a particular field or ideology per se,
| but perhaps it's social media newsfeed algorithms that are
| creating the similar effect to pilot-induced oscillation
| that you're identifying?
| colechristensen wrote:
| And the mechanism of this oscillation is people joining and
| leaving a movement.
|
| In the beginning the radical idea is a basic kind of
| equality where some kind of person shouldn't be
| disadvantaged for some characteristic.
|
| There is then a growth phase where many people join and
| small specific victories turn into general victories.
|
| There is then a shrinking phase where people leave the
| movement or lose zeal as general victories are had.
|
| The movement keeps much of its ideology capital and with
| the more moderate people losing interest, the median
| ideology moves towards special privileges for hyper-
| specific characteristics defended by a very real "the
| problem still exists".
|
| The end stage is a movement that tries to conflate its
| extreme views as being equally as beyond question and
| equally morally right as the views during the growth phase,
| and you get conflict when people have a hard time sorting
| out the complexities of which is right and which is too
| far... and you get the backlash where the basic right is
| threatened by the connection with the extreme views... and
| so it goes.
|
| The 21st century is the century of complexity, the basic
| problems are often solved and the complex ones need more
| nuance than the basic ones took... and the struggle is
| getting this point across that things aren't as simple as
| they were before.
| flavius29663 wrote:
| Speaking of racial ideology, I honestly don't understand
| how we're supposed to become less racists if we're drawing
| so much attention to race and putting it left, right and
| center of any policy discussion?
| munk-a wrote:
| Because, honestly, shutting up about it and ignoring it
| is the solution we tried from the 70s through the 2000s
| and it didn't accomplish anything - racist folk were just
| empowered by not being called out on it.
|
| At least when it comes to America - there are some very
| deeply entrenched societal issues that we'd need to
| resolve to achieve anything near equality including
| generations of depriving wealth accumulation in
| communities (i.e. Native Americans).
| whydoibother wrote:
| How can you fix what you never talk about? If people
| speaking out and identifying discrimination makes you
| more racist, well buddy, you were always racist to begin
| with.
| karpierz wrote:
| I don't think it's an issue of people being interested in how
| they label themselves so much as society being interested in
| labels for people. If you come out as gay, suddenly there are
| a load of assumptions placed on you about how you speak,
| dress, act, what your hobbies are, etc. People adopt
| identities in these cases because society has preconceived
| notions of the identity, not because the individual
| themselves has decided that they want to make a big deal out
| of their identity.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| This is a vicious circle. Gays or non-whites are now
| expected to vote for certain parties (depending on country)
| etc., and reap bewilderment at the very least if they do
| not comply with the expectations.
|
| There is, for example, a fairly famous author (Ayaan Hirsi
| Ali), who is a Somali ex-Muslim, and she says she was
| having really hard time from the Dutch left when she lived
| there. Her ideas simply did not fit the preconceived
| concept of an African immigrant.
| colechristensen wrote:
| Well there are three separate interests
|
| * self labeling
|
| * others labeling you
|
| * how others are labeled
|
| any of the three can become unhealthy when overdone, and
| different people have different amounts of interest in the
| three. They each have a set of problems associated with
| them.
|
| I wouldn't go out of my way to say any one in particular is
| more of an issue. (i.e. they're all issues in different
| ways)
| mike00632 wrote:
| Do you feel the same way about nicknames? If you call someone
| by a nickname that they don't like and they let you know they
| prefer their own name then do you consider it too onerous to
| defer to them about it?
| jotux wrote:
| Wouldn't this be the opposite of that scenario? As in,
| someone has a given name at birth but they prefer a nickname
| and some people find using the nickname too onerous and use
| their given name instead?
| mike00632 wrote:
| Yeah, my legal name is "Michael". If I asked you to call me
| "Mike" is that really such a pain for you?
| jotux wrote:
| No, it wouldn't be a pain for me or most people.
|
| The point I was making is that giving someone a nickname
| they don't like is completely different from not calling
| someone a nickname they prefer.
|
| Regarding nicknames, I do sometimes interact with people
| that have nicknames that I'm not comfortable with or the
| thought of using that name for them doesn't seem
| respectful. For example, I took a two week class that was
| taught by former astronaut Sherwood "Woody" Spring. His
| peers all called him Woody but it seemed too personal for
| the teach-student relationship we were in and I defaulted
| to calling him Mr. Spring. He didn't mind that. I suspect
| the majority of people that go by nicknames don't really
| mind when people call them by their given name or a
| formal version of their name.
|
| Generally I think nicknames are just a bad analogy for
| gender, so we shouldn't use the comparison at all.
| textgel wrote:
| No, but if you ask me to call you a chartered mechanical
| engineer when you aren't then that changes things.
| mike00632 wrote:
| Trans people aren't asking to get credit for
| certifications or degrees they didn't receive. Calling
| someone by their preferred pronouns isn't bestowing an
| honorific upon someone (as if it's up to you to be the
| arbiter of that anyways). It's basic decency.
| textgel wrote:
| Pronouns are defacto and typically dejure certifications.
|
| Do you think previously male transgender women should be
| permitted to enter women's athletic competition?
|
| Do you think it is trans-phobic to say you wouldn't date
| someone who was transgender?
|
| Do you think misgendering a transgender individual should
| be a "hatecrime"?
| kofejnik wrote:
| If I asked you to call me "Your Majesty" and bow your
| head every time (only slightly, tho), would it really be
| such a pain to you?
| mike00632 wrote:
| I will leave it as an exercise to you to describe the
| difference between calling someone by their preferred
| pronouns and treating them like royalty.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| _I will leave it as an exercise to you_
|
| Not the OP, but what a smug reply. This is not
| mathematics, you are not the professor, and it would be
| only fair if you started with your own description of
| said difference, as you see it. You cannot expect that
| everyone sees it in the same way, can you?
| throwaway_8Z3E wrote:
| Can my nickname be, "My lord and master" ?
|
| I assume you will call me by my preferred nickname.
| Causality1 wrote:
| I have that exact situation at work, twice in fact. One
| woman's nickname is Pookie. Some people are uncomfortable
| with using that term and they use her legal name. It doesn't
| bother her. Another man insisted on people calling him
| "PawPaw". Nobody was comfortable with that, especially the
| women he borderline harassed every day. He was fired for
| stealing food out of the break room before the name situation
| came to a head.
|
| You don't have the right to compel speech in other people in
| any way. You don't even have the right to make people call
| you by your birth name. Some jurisdictions like NYC have laws
| against malicious miss-naming by an employer or landlord, but
| even that only applies if they essentially make it a
| harassment campaign.
| handmodel wrote:
| I don't think that is what commenter is saying. I,
| personally, of course defer to nicknames and pronouns.
|
| I think it is more similar to race-blind versus race-
| conscious policies - along with gender-blind versus gernder-
| concious.
|
| Is it better to assume that men and women are pretty much the
| same in academia and each are capable of the same thing? Or
| is it better to assume that men and women are intrinsically
| better at different things with certain characteristics.
|
| I think the answer is in the middle but clearly there has
| been a move in the last five years to say that gender
| inherently effects your worldview/characteristics while
| simultaneously saying that men/women should have equal
| outcomes in all fields. Its not internally consistent.
| sophacles wrote:
| It's certainly consistent. Worldview happens as a result of
| experiences - if ones biological sex and/or gender is used
| as a reason to allow or deny certain experiences to
| someone, then maybe it affects their worldview, no?
|
| This is different than whether the gating on biological sex
| makes sense.
|
| (Note I don't mean strictly mechanical stuff like peeing
| your name into the snow, I'm talking about things like
| teachers "not wasting time on helping girls understand
| math"[1] - because I suspect that teachers not helping
| girls with math is probably more causal to fewer women in
| math than their vaginas.
|
| [1] I've personally heard math teachers say this, and heard
| stories of others saying it too.)
| klyrs wrote:
| > Is it better to assume that men and women are pretty much
| the same in academia and each are capable of the same
| thing? Or is it better to assume that men and women are
| intrinsically better at different things with certain
| characteristics.
|
| This is something I think a lot of people misunderstand
| about [id]-consciousness. Is it better to assume that you
| as an individual have biases that align/oppose with
| overarching biases in our society, or is it better to
| assume that you alone, or society at large, are bias-free?
| Can we address inequality by treating everybody the same in
| this moment and ignoring the historical context they exist
| in, or do observed biases need to be compensated for in
| some manner?
| xupybd wrote:
| This is common in many of the team sports I've played in. The
| more someone hates their nickname the more likely it will
| stick. Generally it's only done with close friends.
| watwut wrote:
| It is also done with people you want to bully. Also, this
| mocking relationship is very often one way instead of
| symmetric.
| mike00632 wrote:
| Yeah, but is such behavior acceptable in the workplace? And
| is it right to use this behavior as a guide to lessen the
| legal status of trans people?
| just_to_reply wrote:
| It's not just like a nickname, though. It's about who you're
| willing to date, who is put in which prison or who is allowed
| to compete in which sports competitions.
| [deleted]
| mike00632 wrote:
| Are you in prison or competing at the highest level of
| sports? If not then why not just respect the preferences of
| trans people?
| a1369209993 wrote:
| > > It's about who you're willing to date, who is put in
| which prison or who is allowed to compete in which sports
| competitions.
|
| > Are you in prison or competing at the highest level of
| sports?
|
| I assume they're dating.
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| Not really an apt comparison since there's nothing about a
| nickname that defies observable reality, a name is a social
| construct to begin with. Sex however is a biological
| construct in which the characteristics are directly and
| quantitatively observable.
| saxonww wrote:
| The idea is that sex and gender are different though;
| gender _is_ a social construct. I think lack of agreement
| on this is a big part of the issue right now.
|
| Edit: as pointed out below, gender roles are something
| we've made up, but preferences and behavior themselves
| (which we're calling gender) are not. Still separate from
| sex.
| teakettle42 wrote:
| > gender _is_ a social construct.
|
| If gender is distinct from sex, then can you explain the
| qualifying characteristics of a "gender"?
|
| What is the definition of "woman"? What is the definition
| of "man"?
| whateveracct wrote:
| That's kind of the point. There isn't one.
|
| Wearing high heels isn't related to being a woman
| intrinsically, and you don't have to be a woman to wear
| high heels.
| teakettle42 wrote:
| That's largely the source of my confusion.
|
| The way I see it, either:
|
| - 'gender' is a synonym for 'sex'
|
| - 'gender' is being misused as a synonym 'gender roles',
| which are defined by one's sex.
|
| If that's not correct, then what _is_ the actual correct
| definition of gender?
| saxonww wrote:
| I don't think I'm exactly right about this, but consider
| three sets of words:
|
| - man/woman
|
| - male/female
|
| - masculine/feminine
|
| There is a concept of grammatical gender, where words can
| be masculine or feminine (or neuter in some cases, and
| there are other systems as well with different words).
| You don't talk about man words or male words, it's
| masculine. So, I tend to think of gender as masculine or
| feminine. That covers most people (although not all:
| nonbinary, gender fluid, genderqueer, etc. are all real).
|
| I tend to think of sex as male or female. At least for
| human beings, that covers most people (not all, intersex
| is a real thing, and there are other unusual but
| 'natural' configurations as well)
|
| So one way to look at this - which again, is probably not
| exactly correct, but it's how I think - male/masculine
| and female/feminine are what we've traditionally thought
| of as man and woman. But, I think it's pretty clear now
| that we need to account for the other combinations, i.e.
| male/feminine and female/masculine. That's where cis- and
| trans- come in: male/masculine is a cis male,
| female/masculine is a trans male, both are subsets in the
| set of all men. Same with women.
|
| We've got nonbinary, genderqueer, etc. as well. I don't
| really understand the latter, but the former is pretty
| easy to explain: imagine being told you had to be
| masculine or feminine, and your response was "No, I
| don't. I prefer or reject some of each."
|
| Overall, to me, gender is about what you like and how you
| behave, while sex is more biology (i.e., what's in your
| pants). It's easier to understand the arguments if you
| completely separate gender from sex, and don't make
| assumptions about one based on the other. In fact, I
| think the assumptions - e.g. gender roles - are the
| entire problem, and if people would just stop with that,
| a lot of things would get better.
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| This distinction doesn't sit right with me though. What
| is Gender really, in the modern definition (since it
| seems to have changed over the years)? From what I gather
| it's a way for people to tell others that one of their
| physical characteristics (Sex) does not match their
| mental state (Gender). To me this doesn't really seem
| like a positive thing, it comes off like a potentially
| harmful delusion from someone who can't come to terms
| with their own biology.
|
| There's absolutely nothing wrong with a feminine man or a
| masculine woman, people can behave however they wish
| regardless of biology. But the most feminine man on the
| planet is still a man and saying so shouldn't turn you
| into a pariah, it's true after all.
|
| Imagine we came up with 'Gender' like terms for other
| physical characteristics, it seems to me like the logic
| quickly breaks down when you think about it-
|
| Gender is to Sex as ____ is to Race as ____ is to Age as
| ____ is to Height as ____ is to Weight as ____ is to Eye
| Color etc.
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| As I wrote in another comment, trans individuals' gender
| identity is hardwired to the same extent that people's
| sexual orientation is hardwired, so there must be some
| innate physiological component to gender identity. My
| guess is it's neurological, since there aren't
| discernible hormonal, genetic, or anatomical differences
| between trans and cis people.
|
| Your analogies don't apply because, with the exception of
| age (mental age vs. physical age), there is no mental
| analog to race, height, eye color, etc.
|
| I'd analogize gender identity to sexual orientation:
| there is nothing physiological that distinguishes
| heterosexual people from homosexual people, but the
| former are hardwired to be sexually attracted to members
| of the opposite sex, while the latter are hardwired to be
| sexually attracted to members of the same sex.
| throwaway8582 wrote:
| > My guess is it's neurological, since there aren't
| discernible hormonal, genetic, or anatomical differences
| between trans and cis people.
|
| That's exactly the point. If someone's "gender identity"
| doesn't refer any observable characteristic other than
| their "gender identity", then the entire concept is
| circularly defined and therefore meaningless. It's like
| if I were to say my biological height is 5'7" but my
| "height identity" is 6'3". What meaning does "height
| identity" have and why should anyone take a concept like
| this seriously?
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| >Your analogies don't apply because, with the exception
| of age (mental age vs. physical age), there is no mental
| analog to race, height, eye color, etc.
|
| Why? What specifically makes transrace/race-identity any
| less valid of a concept than transgender/gender-identity?
| You say there is no mental analog to race but there's
| just as much proof of that as there is for gender
| identity. I've always loved african-american music and
| culture, I use black slang a lot, I felt like I didn't
| fit in with my white peers growing up- maybe I identify
| as black and will designate myself as such on my
| job/college applications going forward. Who are you to
| tell me my race-identity isn't valid? Maybe I'm just
| hardwired that way.
|
| >I'd analogize gender identity to sexual orientation:
| there is nothing physiological that distinguishes
| heterosexual people from homosexual people, but the
| former are hardwired to be sexually attracted to members
| of the opposite sex, while the latter are hardwired to be
| sexually attracted to members of the same sex.
|
| If there is nothing physiological to make that
| determination I think 'hardwired' isn't the right term
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| > Why? What specifically makes transrace/race-identity
| any less valid of a concept than transgender/gender-
| identity?
|
| Because there aren't any (or infinitesimally few) people
| who believe from a very young age that their "race
| identity" doesn't match their genetically defined race.
| Gender dysphoria is rare but not infinitesimally so (~1%
| of the population), and it usually first emerges in
| childhood.
|
| > If there is nothing physiological to make that
| determination I think 'hardwired' isn't the right term
|
| Sorry, I was a bit sloppy with my language. I should have
| written "there is nothing _grossly_ physiological that
| distinguishes heterosexual people from homosexual
| people." Colloquially, we don't generally consider
| neurology to be physiological, since we don't yet have
| the technology to identify subtle differences in neural
| topology. Doesn't mean that neurological phenomena aren't
| hardwired, and thus "physiological" on a microscopic
| level we aren't yet able to detect. As an extreme
| example, mental retardation is certainly hardwired, even
| though there's often nothing grossly physiological (i.e.
| detectable physical brain abnormalities) that causes it.
|
| I suspect that as science and medicine advance, we will
| identify the neural wiring patterns that determine one's
| sexuality and gender identity (assuming we are allowed to
| study such things), at which point we can actually point
| to a definitively physiological determinant of both.
| HideousKojima wrote:
| Attempts to separate sex from gender are prescriptive,
| not descriptive. And the academic who first attempted to
| separate their meanings was a child molester with strong
| personal and ideological motivations for doing so:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Money
| delecti wrote:
| Various societies throughout history have recognized
| gender identities as distinct from biological differences
| for about as long as there have been societies. That the
| modern English terms for those two categories emerged
| from academia is pretty irrelevant.
| saxonww wrote:
| This has no bearing on whether the idea is right or not,
| and shame on you for trying to shut down conversation by
| comparing adherents to child molesters.
| tomp wrote:
| But "gender" is a made-up concept with no clear (non-
| self-referential) definition, seemingly made up
| specifically to cause confusion and conflict.
|
| It's as if there were two concepts, "race" and "grace",
| and you could be "biologically" white but "identify" as
| black, or "height" and "gheight", and you could be
| "factually" 180cm tall but "identify" as 165cm.
| rmah wrote:
| Um... this actually makes no sense to me. Could you
| clarify or elaborate?
| MontyCarloHall wrote:
| Certain _gender roles_ are social constructs, but gender
| as a whole cannot be a social construct because gender
| dysphoria exists. A transgender person's gender identity
| is hardwired (and opposite of their genetic sex and
| outward sex characteristics), which is strong evidence
| that gender is an innate physiological characteristic.
| It's likely something neurological, since trans people's
| obvious physiological characteristics (e.g. hormone
| levels and anatomy) are consistent with their genetic
| sex.
|
| (This is why trans-exclusionary feminists exist, because
| the existence of trans people nullifies their belief that
| gender is 100% a social construct.)
| zehnfischer wrote:
| Well, while it could be argued that sex is biological
| given, it is surely that our society overstates the
| difference between men and women - plus our current society
| still aims to standardises / normalizes all other sexes.
| The social meaning of being male, of being female etc. is
| still socially constructed and therefore which sex you are
| born into has measurable impact on your life, your chances
| in terms of career.
| mike00632 wrote:
| Sure there is. My legal name and the name I sign on
| documents is "Michael" but I could have a preference for
| "Mike". Are you really going to deny that to me because
| there is an "observable reality" that is different from my
| preference?
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| A name is not an intrinsic trait of a person, it's a
| legal abstraction. Your name has no meaning outside of
| it's designation as a name and you can change it at any
| time. 'Mike', 'Michael', and 'Michelangelo' all mean the
| same thing- it's just an arbitrary word used to identify
| a person. 'Him' and 'Her' on the other hand are not
| arbitrary and do not mean the same thing, they refer to
| directly observable biological traits that cannot be
| changed.
| karpierz wrote:
| How do you tell if someone is a 'him' or 'her'? What are
| the criteria you use to make that decision, and why are
| they immutable?
|
| (Please don't say XY chromosomes, you don't do a genetic
| test on everyone you meet.)
| cheeseomlit wrote:
| We can tell instinctively based on a whole slew of
| traits, within a split second of looking at a person your
| brain identifies their sex whether you want to or not.
| Skeletal structure alone is a dead giveaway.
| karpierz wrote:
| So if your brain instinctive recognizes someone as a
| "her", they're a "her"?
| blindmute wrote:
| Yes.
| jlawson wrote:
| A him is someone who was born with a penis.
|
| A her is someone who was born with a vagina.
|
| The very, very few people who don't fit clearly into
| either of these categories (intersex) are exceptions and
| can be handled on a case-by-case basis.
|
| They are immutable because their reproductive role is
| immutable. A her can never impregnate. A him can never
| gestate.
|
| (Either can choose not to perform their particular
| ability, or lose the ability to do so, but that doesn't
| change the meaning of these words.)
| frumper wrote:
| We use our best judgement. In my experience it's most
| often confused in babies because it can be difficult to
| tell at times. I do not get upset when they say my son is
| adorable even though I don't have a son. I accept the
| spirit of their comment and try to politely correct them
| with something like: Thank you, she loves to flash a good
| smile. Then I go on my way.
| LanceH wrote:
| Are you going to lose your shit, call my boss and try to
| get me fired when I call you Michael because it's what's
| written down for everyone to see?
| mike00632 wrote:
| I think it's pretty clear that other people's preference
| for nicknames (or gender pronouns) are not a burden on
| you and your insistance to call people by the wrong name
| (or gender) is for some other reason. That was my point.
| This isn't about trans people causing undue burden on
| you.
| turfwars2 wrote:
| Pretending people are not the biological sex they
| actually are, to me that's an undue burden. I don't have
| to pretend a furry is an actual dog. The truth,
| evidential truth about the World, is central to _my_
| identity; why do I have to yield my identity to others?
| You identify as the third coming of Moses, well that 's
| nice for you, why do I have to get involved in your
| delusion?
|
| You're a male that feels like a female, well ok, why do I
| need to care again?
| briffle wrote:
| I had this exact same argument with a family member who's
| legal name is William, but has gone by 'Bill" his whole
| life...
| omginternets wrote:
| Do you think legislators and employers should get involved in
| decisions about nicknames? If so, that would make you some
| sort of authoritarian.
|
| And this is what the debate is really about: authoritarian vs
| libertarian political attitudes. I'm certainly ready to have
| that debate, but it would require the "woke left" [0] to
| abandon the moral high-ground.
|
| [0] There's surely a better term to use, but I can't think of
| it right now.
| klyrs wrote:
| Freedom to choose one's gender _is_ a libertarian value.
| Would you rather the government pick one for you?
| omginternets wrote:
| As I've said before: we _agree_ on this point.
|
| Where we seem to disagree is on the question of whether
| government, employers or other institutional powers have
| the power to silence those who don't see it our way. If
| we do indeed disagree, then by definition you lean
| towards authoritarian politics. You are willing to go
| further than I in restricting freedom of expression to
| defend trans people. You may even be right, but that
| makes you more authoritarian than me.
|
| Why does this matter? Because it's the actual subject of
| debate. I want trans people to be treated with respect
| too, but my political opinion is that authoritarianism is
| the wrong way to achieve this outcome.
|
| I think you will find that many people who reject
| identity politics / CRT / etc don't actually hate trans
| people. They fear authoritarian mobs and the governments
| they elect.
|
| (Apologies for the multiple stealth-edits. It sometimes
| takes me a few tries to articulate my thoughts.)
| klyrs wrote:
| Woah there, you're putting a whole lot of assumptions on
| me. I'm not against the rights of white men being up for
| debate in the public sphere any more or less than the
| rights of transgender people.
|
| But we live in an authoritarian system which limits the
| rights of transgender people by various means. It's
| better in the US than it is in the UK, which in turn is
| much better than Saudi Arabia. The Gender Critical folks
| want more authoritarianism. They want the government to
| decide your gender, and segregate transgender people from
| cisgender people.
| omginternets wrote:
| >you're putting a whole lot of assumptions on me
|
| Not at all, I promise.
|
| If you reread, you'll surely notice the qualifier
| "seems". I used it precisely because I can't be sure what
| you actually think, and can therefore only talk about
| surface-level appearances. Please be assured that I am
| doing my best to interpret your comments charitably, and
| assuming the best of your character :)
|
| >But we live in an authoritarian system which limits the
| rights of transgender people by various means.
|
| I believe you are confusing authoritarianism with
| something else. Authoritarianism is roughly the idea that
| institutions (government, businesses, etc.) should exert
| more control over individuals. The presence of inequities
| don't qualify as authoritarianism on their own, and
| neither does outright discrimination. To illustrate:
| discriminating against a group doesn't imply that
| government should have more control over individuals.
| It's definitely bad, but it's something else.
|
| I would urge you not to conflate the two, as this is
| precisely what prevents the majority of liberals from
| adhering to CRT _et al._
|
| >They want the government to decide your gender, and
| segregate transgender people from cisgender people.
|
| I don't know if you're talking about the US, the UK or
| Saudi Arabia here, but in the US and UK -- two countries
| in which I have, incidentally, lived for quite some time
| -- this is not what the majority of CRT-critics want. The
| majority are attached to liberal values, and are
| concerned that the confusion of ideas that permeates CRT
| discourse (of which your earlier conflation is an
| example) lead its proponents to the conclusion that
| authoritarian measures are desirable.
| klyrs wrote:
| > You are willing to go further than I in restricting
| freedom of expression to defend trans people. You may
| even be right, but that makes you more authoritarian than
| me.
|
| Sorry, no. I'm not sure how many "seems" you've inserted
| since my first reading, but those two sentences are what
| I characterize as putting assumptions on me. You continue
| to respond to things I haven't said, so I'll stop trying.
| Have a nice day.
| alach11 wrote:
| > Where we seem to disagree is on the question of whether
| government, employers or other institutional powers have
| the power to silence those who don't see it our way
|
| Isn't it the default case that employers can set rules
| about how employees speak to each other? Do you see
| anything wrong with an employer saying "you must make a
| good-faith effort to call people by their preferred name
| and pronouns"?
| mike00632 wrote:
| My point was that this is not about how personally
| difficult it is for you to respect someone else's
| preferences. It's actually very easy and we do it all the
| time for other things, like nicknames. If you're so against
| trans people having similar status as you then you
| shouldn't claim that it's because trans people are causing
| you a burden.
| omginternets wrote:
| >If you're so against trans people having similar status
| as you then you shouldn't claim that it's because trans
| people are causing you a burden.
|
| Yes, I understand. But, much of the opposition you're
| seeing isn't because people are "against trans people".
| It's because they're opposed solving the problem of
| intolerance through authoritarian methods.
| mike00632 wrote:
| Aren't you being the "authoritarian" by insisting on
| calling people by the wrong nicknames (gender), promoting
| laws that outlaw nickname (gender) preference and going
| as far as violence if that person continues to disagree
| with your name (gender)?
|
| The proposed protections for trans people are in response
| to real acts of violence that are not in line with laws
| like the 14th Amendment which promotes equality for all
| people.
|
| And let's remember that these laws to protect trans
| people are only being proposed. Many laws on the books
| are against trans people. What you're reacting to is
| _social_ pressure to treat trans people with respect, not
| authoritarian legal pressure. If anyone is feeling
| authoritarian legal pressure it 's trans people.
| omginternets wrote:
| >Aren't you being the "authoritarian" by insisting on
| calling people by the wrong nicknames (gender) ...
|
| Of course not. I'm perhaps being an asshole, but
| authoritarianism is a concept applied to policymaking,
| not manners. It roughly translates to the belief that
| institutions should have more power over individuals.
| Calling people the wrong name, no matter how mean-
| spirited, is expressing no such belief.
|
| The point is that certain things -- bad though they may
| be -- are not to be legislated. You may disagree with
| this premise, and you may even be correct, and that would
| definitionally make you lean towards authoritarianism.
|
| To reiterate, many people -- myself included -- agree
| with you that it is unkind to call trans people the wrong
| name. Where you seem to disagree with us is that we find
| the prospect of things like compelled speech to be
| terrifying and fundamentally at odds with the principles
| of liberal government.
| newsbinator wrote:
| I defer to nicknames, but if the State or my university or my
| company forced me to, on pain of getting fired, expelled,
| fined, or worse, then I wouldn't want to defer to nicknames
| anymore on principle.
|
| I don't care what gender someone calls themselves, and as a
| nice person I'll try to remember and use it, so long as they
| don't attempt to get me fired if I get it wrong.
| mike00632 wrote:
| What if you insist on calling that person by the wrong name
| even though you know it's not what they prefer? That seems
| like a pretty good example of creating a toxic work
| environment and you should be fired over it.
| RealStickman_ wrote:
| That's called being an asshole
| omginternets wrote:
| It would depend on the specifics. There is a difference
| between harassing someone and not deferring to their
| request on the basis that you don't agree with it
| (however misguided you may be).
|
| Conflating these two things is precisely why there's a
| backlash against CRT _et al._ from otherwise left-leaning
| individuals.
| golemiprague wrote:
| Name has no factual meaning, it is an ID, referring to
| someone as male or female indicates a fact, the way you
| see the world. It is like demanding saying about someone
| that he is tall even though he is short factually. So I
| don't think it is a good comparison. Sometimes people
| sugarcoat reality, especially women when they compliment
| other women's kids in social media, but that's out of
| their own will and reasons, not because someone is
| demanding it from them.
| kwanbix wrote:
| 100% Agree. At least in my home country, this is mostly fueled
| by the left (I consider myself center).
|
| Lots of them just "work" of doing nothing but protesting, so
| once they get something they wanted, they have to move to the
| next thing.
|
| For example, they start by making changes to the language so,
| instead of being "los" (male) or "las" (female) they started to
| say "les" (does not exists in spanish) as they say it is more
| inclusive (nor male nor female).
|
| But it is not that they say "los", "las", and "les", they want
| you to say "les". So first it was an "innocent" thing, and now
| they are trying to pass laws and indoctrinate everyone,
| included kids from any age, 6 years old or less.
| lotu wrote:
| Language is defined by the people who speak it, not by some
| authority. If people are using "les" than it is part of
| Spanish.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| The parent is pretty clearly saying that "les" wasn't
| previously a Spanish word, because HN is an English
| language forum and some of us don't know that. Let's not
| nitpick the English of folks for whom it's a second
| language.
| kwanbix wrote:
| If it was natural an used by all, it could be, but it in
| this case it was not natural, not used or liked by all, and
| forced.
|
| For example, thief's use their own words and it is not
| considered part of Spanish for example.
|
| They started with gender ideology and then started to
| escalate. And it is not more inclusive if you force me to
| leave my believes. If you want to be called "les", and you
| ask nice, I will probably have no problem. Now, if you want
| me to embrace that "les" is more inclusive because you just
| say so and you force me to do it, is not part of Spanish.
|
| A similar thing happened with abortion. First they started
| saying it has to be legal, then that it had to be free, and
| then that if you are a doctor and you don't agree with
| abortion you have to do it anyway (they force you to do it
| by law).
| Djvacto wrote:
| Do you have any more information on the abortion policy
| you're using as a comparison?
|
| Tried to guess which country you were referring to but
| couldn't find concrete info after a bit of googling.
|
| I don't think the comparison between using more inclusive
| language to refer to people, and you being forced to
| abandon your beliefs, makes much sense. Putting aside
| potential issues with beliefs and their effect on a
| person's treatment of those around them, no one is
| forcing you to stop believing whatever it is you believe.
|
| Potentially limited may be how you treat or talk to
| people, but that is a separate limit than what you are
| allowed to believe, since once it becomes words or
| actions, now it's not just in your head but out in
| reality and potentially affecting others.
| kwanbix wrote:
| This is in Argentina.
|
| MY MISTAKE: apparently the law does allow a doctor to say
| no for his believes. I cannot edit the previous post.
|
| Again, so this people today say that you have to say
| "les", what prevents me from saying I am not filling
| included, I want everybody to start saying "lus" or
| "chimichangas" for that matter? The problem for me is
| that they force you to behave however they want you to
| behave.
| munk-a wrote:
| Honestly though, in my day job I've been trying to eschew
| gendered pronouns across the board - my coworker's gender
| is not relevant to them being my coworker. For a long
| time we've promoted gender as the single most defining
| trait as a person in a way we don't promote with height,
| weight or even skincolor. It's Mr. Smith and Mrs. Smith
| that are used as common forms of address - but not Tall
| Smith or British Smith. I'm pretty much done with such an
| emphasis being placed on gender in common social
| interactions, the only thing it's relevant to is who's
| going to sleep with who which isn't really something I
| want to discuss at work anyways.
| jhgb wrote:
| Mr. and Mrs. are not adjectives, though.
| heswrong wrote:
| >Do you have any more information on the abortion policy
| you're using as a comparison?
|
| No, s/he doesn't because is talking nonsense:
| conscientious objectors rights/persons are protected in
| Argentina by its Constitution and plenty of case law.
|
| Re: Abortion: Doctors can (and have) very much deny to
| perform or "facilitate" abortions on moral or religious
| grounds but by law ("Ley del Aborto") they also have the
| legal obligation to refer the woman/patient WITHOUT delay
| of any kind to another doctor or another hospital (mostly
| public ones) to have the procedure.
| kwanbix wrote:
| My bad, apparently you are right. Doctors can say they
| don't want to do an abortion.
|
| Just no need to be smartass about "nonsense". I read it
| somewhere and I don't follow all the news all the time.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Some languages actually do have a central authority. IDK
| about Spanish, but my native language (Czech) definitely
| has an official standard.
|
| Anyone _can_ , of course, use any weird construction they
| want, it is just not correct Czech.
| kwanbix wrote:
| Spanisch also hast it. Real academia espanola
|
| But he post of the other member was about that languages
| naturally evolve, which is true, but this is forced and
| unatural.
| joshuamorton wrote:
| What makes it forced or unnatural? It's intentional, to
| be sure, but hope does that make it less natural? Or put
| differently, how do you distinguish between a natural and
| unnatural change to language?
| kwanbix wrote:
| Unnatural because they thought of inventing it, they
| started saying "tod@s" (todos is everyone), didn't catch,
| they then moved to "todxs", didn't catch, then they said
| "todes", and because people don't naturally use it. They
| even use it wrongly all the time. But more importantly,
| unnatural because if you have to impose it and call me
| names for not using it, you are doing it wrong.
| [deleted]
| jhgb wrote:
| > Language is defined by the people who speak it, not by
| some authority.
|
| This may be true in case of English, but not necessarily in
| case of many national languages.
| kenjackson wrote:
| > But it is not that they say "los", "las", and "les", they
| want you to say "les".
|
| Trying to indoctrinate kids to use a non-gender specific
| term? It seems like using the term indoctrinate seems a tad
| strong.
| kwanbix wrote:
| No, left people in my home country do it all the time.
|
| In general they are "militants" of the Peronist party.
|
| There are videos and books for kids that shows Peron,
| Evita, and more recently our current Vice President as
| heroes and such.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/zgVUcjS.jpg There it literally says:
| Peron is the leader, everybody loves Peron, everybody sings
| long live Peron!, long live the leader! hurrah!
|
| https://i.imgur.com/gkqespa.jpg This one is about Evita,
| Peron's wife: Evita loves the kids. The boys and girls love
| Eva. Long live Evita! Hurrah! Hurrah!
|
| This two are pages of books for kids of elementary school
| from 60 something years ago.
|
| However, you can still see in school:
|
| https://i.imgur.com/MJuFrQx.jpg This one shows Cristina
| Kirchner, our current VP, in a book that tries to
| "leftiside" the kids.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/YIgEDja.jpg that is the results, kids
| with the "La Campora" a militant group from peronism.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/Ei2VWG0.jpg And there again.
|
| It is what has brought Argentina to is knees.
| tshaddox wrote:
| I don't see any irony there, because there is a huge difference
| between accepting that certain personal characteristics
| _shouldn 't_ matter, and accepting that people nevertheless
| _do_ face a wide range of problems because of their personal
| characteristics that shouldn 't matter. The former has
| experienced some progress as you mention (at least for what's
| considered acceptable to voice publicly), but the latter
| appears to be highly controversial.
| evo wrote:
| There's a nuance here: it's possible to both want systemic
| change on the macro scale, but also meanwhile seek a local
| maximum for oneself given the current system dynamics at play.
|
| By proxy, I might advocate that income inequality is too high,
| and that some form of wealth redistribution should be
| considered. You might say that, therefore, I ought to donate my
| entire salary to charities. Someone might do that, as a radical
| stand against capitalism, and I would support that. However, I
| would also support someone that is trying to seek better wages
| under the current system, even if they do support wealth
| redistribution on the wider political scale--in context, it's
| understandable.
|
| Translating that back to the original space, it seems that you
| advocate that someone that might today identify as a trans
| woman might instead identify as a man (or person) with
| phenotypically female presentation, due to medical treatment,
| and with a significant number of traditionally feminine
| attributes, as 'personal characteristics shouldn't matter'.
| This would place them in the vanguard of challenging gender
| dynamics. I think that's admirable of people that choose to do
| that. I understand that many other trans folk want to challenge
| the status quo less severely, and identifying as their gender
| allows them increased safety, sanity, and happiness within the
| confines of the current world.
| yanderekko wrote:
| >However this whole debate is reversing that by not only saying
| it matters a great deal but that other people should be forced
| to defer to others personal choices even when it directly
| affects them
|
| Yep, and the problem is that this is obviously a principal that
| is not going to be impartially implied, but instead that
| deference towards personal identity is going to be parceled out
| based on tribal lines - look how common it is for many on the
| left to argue that black conservatives are "not really black"
| (or maybe they're black, but not Black?)
|
| The battle for trans rights is intertwined much more tightly
| with a battle for control of language - extending to
| affirmative demands that others deeply change their normal
| language to avoid giving unintentional offense - than any other
| civil rights push I can think of, and I wonder if this will
| become more commonplace in the future.
| [deleted]
| smoldesu wrote:
| This was ironically one of the things that was hardest about
| coming out as gay, for me. Nobody ever treated me the same way
| again. I was either uncomfortably praised or silently judged,
| with practically no in-between. Suffice to say, my sexuality is
| on a need-to-know basis, now.
| r00fus wrote:
| As someone who is CIS, I also don't try to imply a sexuality
| in myself or others unless I'm with people I know. I try not
| to speak about my wife, but my "spouse" and try to use
| gender-neutral terms where appropriate.
| lovegoblin wrote:
| > As someone who is CIS
|
| I often wonder where this misconception originated: why do
| people think that "cis" is an acronym? What do they think
| it stands for? It's just a prefix; the antonym of "trans."
| delecti wrote:
| I've seen people mistakenly assert the backronym
| "comfortable in skin". I'm not sure why else it would be
| so common.
| koonsolo wrote:
| > my sexuality is on a need-to-know basis, now.
|
| Ideal solution, because the people who don't care also don't
| care to know. And those who do care definitely don't need to
| know.
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| As a visible minority because of my race, I wish I had the
| option. I just try to avoid meat space.
| a1369209993 wrote:
| > I just try to avoid meat space.
|
| This is really the best solution, to the extent possible.
| On the internet no one knows you're a dog, as the saying
| goes.
| throwkeep wrote:
| This is changing tho, with avatars and pronouns and
| emojis that display skin color. Now a thumbs up in Slack
| is segregated by color. Why people don't see this as an
| incredibly bad idea, I don't know.
| munk-a wrote:
| We've got that happening by gender as well - dancing is a
| gender independent activity, I don't understand why I
| need to pick a gender to express when I want to say "I
| feel like dancing".
|
| It honestly feels extremely regressive.
| smoldesu wrote:
| In all fairness, the good old yellow ones still work fine
| too. It's not like they were overwritten by the constant
| burden of choosing a race for your ephemeral internet
| hand.
| jacquesm wrote:
| And the reverse: your sexuality - or anybody else's who is
| not my mate - is not on my list of 'want-to-know'. I simply
| do not care about the choices and/or attributes of other
| people though I believe they should be 100% free to make
| whatever choice they want and be whoever they are, and have
| gone out of my way to ensure that this is the case for people
| who find their life's choices frustrated or their reality
| denied by others.
|
| This is probably a sign of my advancing age, I'm probably a
| prude by today's standards, but I simply don't find these
| subjects for semi-public or even public discussion with
| strangers.
| robotnikman wrote:
| Same here. I only address my sexuality when the topic comes
| up or with good friends. Otherwise I have noticed people do
| treat me differently, as was apparent at my previous
| workplace.
| TimTheTinker wrote:
| It's weird to me that sexuality and identity are so
| intertwined. Why should someone "come out" as anything?
|
| (I know a lot of people "come out" as various things in a
| mere bid for attention... I'll leave that issue aside.)
|
| If I knew someone casually for a while who never talked about
| his/her sexuality, but one day they said "I never said this
| before, but I'm a heterosexual", I'd certainly feel awkward
| about it. Why did he/she say that to _me_?
|
| To take it further, why phrase it "I am ..." instead of "I
| have ... desires"? If the latter sounds awkward, why is the
| former any _less_ awkward?
| watwut wrote:
| People come out, because they keep their gayness secret for
| a whole lot of good reasons. The alternative to coming put
| is not dating your boyfriend and going to reataurant. It is
| making sure no one ever see you with him, kiss him, hold
| his hands.
|
| Also, parents and relative reacting badly on finding out
| ypu are gay are not exactly unheard of. There are also
| plenty of accepting parents, sure. But as heterosexual,
| they already assume you are one and you dont have to guess
| whether it will be breaker for them or not.
| delecti wrote:
| It's because it was ostracized for so long. If most of
| society is telling you that something is wrong with you,
| then you'll seek out other people who share that trait and
| develop a sense of community with them. It's normal to
| identify with your community.
| ssully wrote:
| Because it is something they felt the need to repress for a
| potentially long portion of their life. Coming out is the
| start of a process to release the pressure that has built
| up from that repression and letting the person's personal
| view of themselves realign with the public view of
| themselves.
|
| Also, yes it is weird that sexuality and identity are
| intertwined, but that is not something that is new and it
| is something that is tied to all sexualities, including
| heterosexuals.
| [deleted]
| smoldesu wrote:
| The experience of "coming out" (to me) was reconciling my
| sexuality with my family. In America, you're basically born
| straight and everyone in your family assumes so. The
| easiest part of it was coming out to my close friends, who
| already know that I'm not vain or chasing attention with
| it. The harder half is finding some way to frame it to your
| parents (and grandparents). Knocking on their door, sitting
| down in their home and eating their food is just
| irreversibly ruined. In some sense, I know it's my fault:
| I'm basically telling them that their bloodline ends here,
| I hope they enjoyed their transient acknowledgement on this
| earth while it lasts. That's a tough pill to swallow for a
| generation that's all about making the idyllic "50s family"
| a reality.
|
| > To take it further, why phrase it "I am ..." instead of
| "I have ... desires"? If the latter sounds awkward, why is
| the former any less awkward?
|
| I wish we could do that too, but if I told that to people
| now I'm gay _and_ a freak. Society won 't care one way or
| the other, because queerness is political now. You're
| either with "them" or against "us", and never the two shall
| meet.
|
| That's just my view on it though. I'm only 1 (one) gay
| person out of millions, so take my anecdata with a grain of
| salt.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > In some sense, I know it's my fault: I'm basically
| telling them that their bloodline ends here, I hope they
| enjoyed their transient acknowledgement on this earth
| while it lasts. That's a tough pill to swallow for a
| generation that's all about making the idyllic "50s
| family" a reality.
|
| That is an uncommonly insightful and empathetic
| characterization.
| orthecreedence wrote:
| I think many times coming out is about reconciling
| expectations with reality. If people assume one thing about
| you but that is not the case, coming out can be a way to
| correct assumptions. In a sense, _not_ coming out can feel
| like lying to those close to you.
|
| It can also have the effect of making a relationship more
| close...sharing something intimate with someone can
| strengthen a friendship (or, obviously, break it in some
| cases).
| notJim wrote:
| > Why should someone "come out" as anything?
|
| > Why did he/she say that to me?
|
| Isn't this just the process of getting to know someone? As
| you get to know someone, you share more information about
| yourself. I think it's a pretty normal desire for people
| you spend time around to understand you, and part of that
| is understanding the way you relate to other people.
| dougmwne wrote:
| It's only weird to you because you are almost certainly
| straight, cis and male. Let me explain.
|
| All of society is structured around your identity. Like the
| fish, you can't even see the water because you have always
| been in it. I'm unlikely to help you see the water, but let
| me at least try.
|
| If you meet a friend, he might comment he saw a movie with
| his new girlfriend. He shows you a photo on his phone and
| you say she's really cute and nice catch. He asks if you
| want to grab a beer later. You say you have to pick up your
| wife from the airport later and pick up the kids from their
| school.
|
| All of this, the girlfriend, the comment she's cute, the
| wife the kids, they are your life. It is who you are. If
| someone asks what you are doing later, it's all you have to
| say, because that's what you do. It is your identity.
|
| I have a partner. We have lived together for 14 years. In
| order to tell you anything about myself, I have to tell you
| about him too. It is my life. It is what I do. This is who
| I am.
|
| Coming out is something you do with each and every new
| person you meet. I am not rubbing your face in my
| sexuality. I'm just talking about me. If I tell you I went
| out for lunch, but avoid telling you with who, that is in
| the closet. If I tell you it was with my boyfriend, that is
| out of the closet.
|
| So yup, done hiding here, and not going to start again
| because some people might be clueless or treat me as less.
|
| Edit: nice, downvotes. Did I make you feel silly for
| listening to taking points from bigots?
| jfengel wrote:
| Thank you, that was very nicely said.
|
| It's distressing the degree to which people want to blame
| others for their identities while regarding their own as
| some kind of fundamental default of nature. It's only
| "identity politics" when it's somebody else's identity.
| dougmwne wrote:
| Thanks. I think that gets lost easily in these
| discussions. This is my family. My partner, my mother and
| father-in-law, my sister-in-law, my nephew, my home, my
| plans for the future. It's connected to everything I
| might tell you about my life over the past 14 years.
| Having someone label all that as "awkward" or "political"
| is pretty extreme, especially when the person suggesting
| it doesn't even have a hint at the enormity of what they
| just said. It's the very definition of "casual erasure",
| something that sounds political and till someone comes up
| to you and tries to erase you.
|
| Edit: to the people down voting my mother-in-law, she is
| a kind and caring woman!
| oceanplexian wrote:
| I don't think you deserve to be downvoted but I don't
| believe having a conversation about heterosexual
| relationships is somehow free of consequences. Even if I
| had a conversation about a partner who is straight,
| people are going to make snap judgements about the their
| appearance, what they do for work, what religion they
| belong to (Be prepared to be judged if it is the wrong
| one!) etc.
|
| Many children have been disowned by their parents because
| they fell in love with someone from the wrong family.
| There is no shortage of thousand year old stories and
| plays describing this exact situation. So, the idea that
| "Like the fish, you can't even see the water because you
| have always been in it." doesn't really resonate with me.
| That doesn't mean our society is free from discrimination
| and unfair treatment, but painting people with a broad
| brush serves to alienate those who might be your allies,
| and is ironically the very thing you are advocating
| against.
| dougmwne wrote:
| I think you need to experience some discrimination to see
| the "water." It gives you an ability to better understand
| what other people deal with, even if you don't share
| their identity. I absolutely think experiencing religious
| discrimination, gender discrimination and so on can give
| you lots of empathy for a person not like you, but
| dealing with similar challenges.
|
| To me it's pretty clear the person I was responding to
| had zero frame of reference to what discrimination feels
| like, which is why I said so. I really don't know how to
| get that through to a person with words alone. I think
| there needs to be a parallel experience to build on.
|
| It's no broad brush to say that a person who thinks
| sexual orientation has no bearing on identity must be
| squarely within the favored majority.
| smoldesu wrote:
| > To me it's pretty clear the person I was responding to
| had zero frame of reference to what discrimination feels
| like, which is why I said so.
|
| I sympathize with you here, I really do: but making such
| broad assumptions is a bad way to foster real, productive
| conversations. Identity and queerness are deeply personal
| topics with all sorts of nuance and interplay between
| them. I appreciate that you're living your truth, but
| coming off with this "scorched earth" rhetoric isn't
| going to win you any fans.
| bob_roberts wrote:
| > Why should someone "come out" as anything?
|
| Because the choice is either to hide important aspects of
| yourself, or else come out, whether that's explicitly by
| saying something, or implicitly by your actions.
|
| In my case, if I didn't explicitly come out as nonbinary /
| trans, the change in my wardrobe and appearance was going
| to "out" myself regardless. It seemed healthier and
| emotionally safer to be upfront about it with the people I
| know.
|
| In your example, a person doesn't have to "come out" as
| heterosexual, they can just introduce their spouse, or
| mention who they are dating. Maybe in an ideal world that
| would be the case for everyone, but it's not today.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| > If I knew someone casually for a while who never talked
| about his/her sexuality, but one day they said "I never
| said this before, but I'm a heterosexual", I'd certainly
| feel awkward about it. Why did he/she say that to me?
|
| That's because the dominant mode of society in _most_
| cultures involves a heterosexual identity; it's just so
| deeply embedded in culture that most people can't tell. For
| the longest time, it was (and still is in many cultures)
| socially acceptable for men to ogle women. Why? Because
| there was a tacit understanding that part of being a man
| meant being hypersexual, and because all men are attracted
| to women (in this trope), ogling women is just part of
| "being a man". This ties a man's behavior and identity with
| his sexuality.
| anoncake wrote:
| "Gender critical" people claim that someone's sex cannot be
| changed, not even using surgery and hormones. So what is sex
| then? Obviously not one's hormones as those can be replaced just
| fine. That leaves chromosomes, primary and secondary
| characteristics.
|
| They also claim that gender is more important than sex. When
| they, for example, address someone as "Dear Mr. Smith", they must
| be referring to their sex then. Which means they mean something
| like:
|
| - "Dear Smith, who has XY chromosomes"
|
| - "Dear Smith, who has a natural grown penis"
|
| - "Dear Smith, who has a penis that works well enough that I
| consider them a man
|
| - "Dear Smith, who can grow a beard"
|
| - "Dear Smith, whose shoulder width is typical for a human male"
|
| All of these are either bafflingly irrelevant, fucked up or
| inaccurate. So how exactly is one's sex relevant to anyone except
| their doctors and partners?
|
| > In February, when Donna Hughes, a professor of women\u2019s
| studies at Rhode Island University, published an article critical
| of gender ideology, petitions sprouted calling for her to be
| fired.
|
| The article, which the Economist didn't bother to link to:
|
| https://4w.pub/fantasy-worlds-on-the-political-right-and-lef...
|
| It's more of a pamphlet filled with lies, sexism and conspiracy
| theories. I think academic freedom is too important to fire her
| over this, but I understand the petitions.
|
| > In February Holly Lawford-Smith, a professor of philosophy at
| the University of Melbourne, launched a website which invited
| women to describe their experiences of sharing female-only spaces
| with trans women. It is not a research project and its reports
| are unverified. Most describe a feeling of discomfort rather than
| any form of physical assault.
|
| So? I'm sure some women feel uncomfortable around black women. Or
| lesbians. Someone feeling uncomfortable around people of a given
| group is a common cause of discrimination and bigotry.
|
| > If Maya Forstater, a British researcher who lost her job
| because of her gender-critical views
|
| No, Mr. Forstater lost his job not because of his views but
| because "It is a core component of her belief that she will refer
| to a person by the sex she considered appropriate even if it
| violates their dignity and/or creates an intimidating, hostile,
| degrading, humiliating or offensive environment".[1]
|
| [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-50858919
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Maya Forstater might be a trash goblin and disgrace to
| humanity, but she's still a she last I heard.
| anoncake wrote:
| She's in no position to complain, is she?
| mkr-hn wrote:
| A huge part of advocating for the right to self-identify is
| about respecting identity whether you like/respect someone
| or not. She didn't get her contract renewed because she
| made it clear she was going to be an asshole to coworkers
| on this exact dimension.
|
| Correct gendering/identification is not something you have
| to earn. I still write J.K. Rowling's name out like that
| because it's how she goes by even though I wouldn't waste
| spit on her in hell.
| anoncake wrote:
| I was being petty, yes.
| mfarris wrote:
| J.K. Rowling has stated her love of transpeople and her
| wish to see them be fully accepted members of society.
| She has differences of opinion about the best political
| approach to achieving equality.
|
| Because she makes a rational, temperate argument that you
| do not like, you "wouldn't waste spit on her in hell."
|
| Which of you is the more hateful?
| [deleted]
| pgcj_poster wrote:
| I'm not going to read or respond to any of the comments in this
| thread because I don't want to self-harm today. However, I have
| to comment on the site linked in the article,
| noconflicttheysaid.org, because it's absolutely hilarious. It has
| stories about the supposed negative impact of trans women in
| women's spaces. I'm not cherry-picking; from the top, the stories
| on the first two pages are:
|
| 1. A woman and her two daughters went into a _unisex_ bathroom.
| As you might expect, there were men there. Then nothing happened.
| Also, several years earlier, she went into a women 's bathroom
| that indicated it allowed transgender women, but there weren't
| any there. https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/scienceworks-
| immunol...
|
| 2. A trans woman in a Facebook group for mothers was trying to
| simulate a pregnancy and asked people there to share their
| experience with miscarriages since she knew she couldn't have a
| baby in the end. She also said she would like to breastfeed
| someone else's baby. As far as it's indicated, these requests
| were not made to anyone in particular, they were just posted in
| Facebook group. https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/online-
| group-for-bre...
|
| 3. Some trans students at a girl's school don't have to wear the
| uniform, miss school a lot, and do school projects on transgender
| issues. Apparently, other students resent them for this.
| https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/all-girls-senior-sch...
|
| 4. A trans woman cursed at some counter-protesters at a trans
| rights rally. In the included video, we see that this was in
| reaction to the counter-protesters (although not the same ones
| apparently) spraying water(?) at people.
| https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/who-s-unsafe-on-camp...
|
| 5. A woman who was previously sexually assaulted by men says that
| she gets nervous and her body tenses up when she's sees a large
| man. She claims that this is something trans women will never
| understand. This is completely ridiculous: I myself have this
| reaction too if I'm alone or it's at night (in a way I did not
| before I transitioned), and I know other trans women who have
| similar anxieties about men in general. Anyway, the story is that
| a trans woman on a bus (where trans women have always been
| allowed) told some young women that they were pretty and asked
| them where they bought clothes and underwear. I'll admit that's a
| bit creepy, but no more so than things men already say to women
| in public spaces. And again, is the suggestion to ban trans women
| from buses? https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/trans-woman-
| harassin...
|
| 6. There was a trans woman in a women's bathroom lingering near
| the sink. https://www.noconflicttheysaid.org/post/women-s-
| toilets-in-h...
| foolinaround wrote:
| while this article focusses on the gender ideology issues, IMHO
| the censorship in universites is on a wider range of issues, with
| the common denominator being the viewpoints espoused in far-left
| circles (not passing judgement here on whether they are right or
| wrong)
|
| Enforced group-think is going to be the death of these
| universities.
| metalliqaz wrote:
| "Enforced group-think is going to be the death of these
| universities."
|
| How?
| jollybean wrote:
| By expunging, shaming, expelling, disinviting, cancelling,
| eschewing, not offering positions, denying grants, avoiding
| publication, demoting those that don't meet the requirements
| of a radical orthodoxy.
|
| Noam Chomsky of all people (!), and a bunch of other
| staunchly centre-left luminaries had to take out a full page
| ad in Harper's to make the point. [2]
|
| How far would an ugly trend have to exhibit itself in order
| for these fairly respectable and otherwise mild mannered
| people to not only 1) notice but 2) act and then 3) make a
| big show out of it in a worldwide signal?
|
| They tried to cancel Stephen Pinker [2] for postulating that
| the problem of Law Enforcement in the USA is a generally
| overbearing justice system, not necessarily specific to one
| race, although conceding that's a problem. For that utterly
| reasonable statement, they tried to remove his Chair and
| participation a bunch of groups. He was fine, but 'they came
| for him' and were he to have been less prominent, 'they'
| would have won.
|
| It's intellectual cowardice and social bullying by angry
| people. My belief is that it's not even ideological at the
| end of the day, rather, it's the petty expression of power by
| those who've never had it before and who were transgressed
| themselves at some earlier point in their lives.
|
| [1] https://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-
| know/506314-jk-...
|
| [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/15/us/steven-pinker-
| harvard....
| breckenedge wrote:
| Here's the actual letter rather than a blog about it:
| https://harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/.
| Very brief, only three paragraphs.
| selimthegrim wrote:
| The late (devout Christian!) William Stuntz wrote an entire
| book (in front of me right now) about the overbearing
| justice system and and never got cancelled for it.
| jollybean wrote:
| Pinker's mistake wasn't about 'the justice system' - it
| was disagreeing with BLM populist orthodoxy.
|
| It's revolutionary 'Reign of Terror' stuff around
| ostracizing the impure (i.e. Trumpers destroying Romneys,
| Rubios), not academic disagreement.
| arminiusreturns wrote:
| Mostly because it is a rejection of first principles
| thinking, which is a key tool in the toolbelt of critical
| thinking, supposedly part of any university's mandate.
| bachmeier wrote:
| > Enforced group-think is going to be the death of these
| universities.
|
| I've been working at universities for a couple decades now and
| have never experienced "enforced group-think".
| jollybean wrote:
| Well then you're both 1) of the same political mindset of the
| majority and therefore less likely to notice and 2) unwilling
| to take the social temperature of such things because it's
| obviously happening [1] and there is a mountain of empirical
| evidence to support the fact that students and faculty are
| wary of speaking their minds.
|
| [1] https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/rabble-
| rouser/201811...
| bachmeier wrote:
| I very seriously doubt that a middle-aged white male
| economics professor (who grew up in the sticks in North
| Dakota, no less) is of the same political mindset of "the
| majority".
|
| > students and faculty are wary of speaking their minds
|
| If you're worried about disapproval of others, being an
| academic is the wrong industry for you. If academic freedom
| and the first amendment aren't enough to protect your
| speech, you'd really be in trouble working in any other
| industry.
|
| Now if you're going to claim that _in society at large_ you
| have to use restraint when talking, and that you 'll be
| attacked by people of all political views, I'd probably
| agree. That's pretty different from what you wrote.
| notahacker wrote:
| Funnily enough, I spoke earlier this week with an academic
| whose concern about recent developments was that legal/policy
| papers he was writing for government departments were much
| more likely to be unpublished or partially redacted than in
| previous decades, for reasons which had nothing to do with
| culture warring.
|
| Easy to see why governments would prefer the public believe
| the real threat to university research was a handful of
| students picketing the intentionally provocative...
| danielodievich wrote:
| One of my favorite sci-fi authors is Ian M. Banks (discussed here
| on HN with regularity). His Culture series describe a post-
| scarcity interstellar society of human(oid)s who among many, many
| things can change their own gender just by thinking about it.
| After suitable body alteration time, you can be a male, female,
| or even something in between (that happens to be important part
| of one of the characters in one of the books), with most citizens
| transferring back and forth at least once to act as both a father
| and a mother at least once in their long lifetime.
|
| In this society, there is no gender inequality. Ian's own "A Few
| Notes on the Culture" essay
| http://www.vavatch.co.uk/books/banks/cultnote.htm states it best:
|
| _A society in which it is so easy to change sex will rapidly
| find out if it is treating one gender better than the other;
| within the population, over time, there will gradually be greater
| and greater numbers of the sex it is more rewarding to be, and so
| pressure for change - within society rather than the individuals
| - will presumably therefore build up until some form of sexual
| equality and hence numerical parity is established._
|
| Until our science invents this, this is a great thought
| experiment to conduct.
| dekhn wrote:
| You may also enjoy some of John Varley's early work (the short
| stories and books about the Eight Worlds). Physical sex changes
| (by cloning a new body and plopping the brain in, plus some
| extra "science magic" to make that work) are routine.
| JabavuAdams wrote:
| I really loved Banks' work. Sadly he's gone. But there was
| always this split between the humanoids and the Minds. I want
| to be a Mind, not a humanoid.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| The Ian M. Banks quote equates gender and sex. That's probably
| a product of when it was written (1994) and I don't think too
| badly of Banks for writing it, however, in the contemporary
| dialogue, these are not equivalent terms. I caution you against
| getting caught up in an uninteresting semantic argument here:
| the question isn't one of definitions, but rather whether the
| phenomena classified as gender (clothing, hairstyles, etc.) are
| or should be tied to the phenomena classified as sex (genitalia
| and/or chromosomes). I won't comment my opinion on that as I
| don't have the time to do it justice, but I will say that to
| ignore the fact that those phenomena are very much in debate,
| misses a pretty big point:
|
| That point being, that you _can_ actually change your
| presentation of gender with relative ease. Norah Vincent did it
| (dressed as and pretended to be a man) for a year and wrote the
| book _Self Made Man_ about her experience. The fact that the
| majority of people never change their presentation of gender
| and those who do change their presentation tend to feel
| strongly about it, says that there 's more complexity to the
| choice of how to dress or style your hair than an economic
| cost/benefit analysis. The fact is, _people want to be their
| gender_ even while claiming that their gender is treated
| poorly, and in the case of trans people, choosing to present in
| a way that is _obviously_ treated poorly. If the hypothesis
| that people will gravitate to the gender presentation which is
| treated most positively were true, few people would choose to
| be the gender that gets spit on in the grocery store (happened
| to a trans friend of mine).
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Sort of a star-bellied sneetches deal, yes.
| jollybean wrote:
| This won't happen though. It reminds me of 'Star Trek' futurism
| where we crudely apply some neat technology to our own
| circumstances, without thinking about the real dynamic changes
| that would come about if the tech did exist.
|
| If we ever get to the point of this level of technology, then
| the notion of 'gender' would be completely arcane.
|
| People would be 'growing' wings, tails, horns, extra limbs,
| extra large brains, fur, hoofs, cross breeding with animals,
| creating new species in petrie dishes.
|
| The 'regular humans' in that culture would be viewed like we
| view Amish people or Mennonites.
| dryrun wrote:
| This seems very interesting, however instinctively I would have
| thought otherwise, meaning a society would tend towards the
| most rewarding, to the extreme of resulting in a non viable
| civilization. If you can change at will, why pick up the losing
| side?
|
| As much as I would like it to be different, I wouldn't trust
| the human race with this capability.
|
| Will definitely read, thanks.
| otde wrote:
| On other subjects on HN (software, mostly), I find curious,
| questioning people, who will, for the most part, engage very
| seriously with the subject matter. I think this is because users
| here engage with software -- the creation, maintenance,
| collaboration, the joy and misery of it all -- frequently and
| with a passion for nuance.
|
| When high-visibility articles on trans people show up, it's
| almost inevitably when our transness -- our ability to move
| through the world, to exist in certain spaces, or even if we
| exist at all -- is the subject of debate. I don't know how many
| cisgender folks here really get how fundamentally exhausting it
| is to have some part of your identity always be part of a debate,
| to be talked _about_ or on rare occasions talked _to_ , but
| almost never engaged _with_ in a substantive way.
|
| It's just fear fear fear, 24/7 -- simulating hypothetical
| nightmare worlds where trans rapists lurk in bathrooms and
| prisons, where every Olympic gold medal is taken by a man
| masquerading as a woman, roving hordes of red-faced trans
| activists screaming incoherently online at nice, well-meaning,
| harmless people who just want to learn.
|
| I just wanted to put out there that the flattened, simplified
| perspectives trans people are portrayed with may not give you the
| whole picture, and I'd encourage people here to give perspectives
| from trans people the same (well, more, preferably) curiosity and
| interest that you might give to scare quotes and soundbites about
| prisons, bathrooms, and sports.
| worik wrote:
| I agree that there is more heat than light in these debates.
|
| The Gender Critical Feminists do make up bogeyman stories about
| rapists in prisons, trans women disrupting breast feeding
| groups etcetera.
|
| The Trans lobby though has also been guilty of the same sort of
| thing. E.g. I am no fan of professional sport (I hope this
| kills it dead) but to claim that trans women have no advantage
| over natal women is opinion not fact. The main fault line ion
| our society is gender, and to claim otherwise is simply wrong.
| (Not all Trans activists do that, just as not all Gender
| Critical Feminists are mean).
|
| To me it is heartbreaking that this is not about fixing that
| fault line. No person has the right to take a interest in
| another person's gender unless they are their doctor or fancy
| them and are fussy. That is the issue we should address - how
| boys are raised to be violent sexual predators requiring female
| admiration and women are raised to be weak victims requiring
| male support.
|
| That is getting lost, instead of helping fix the fault line,
| this debate (the excess of heat, deficiency of light) is making
| it worse.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| > _But it would be better if universities, which owe their
| success to a tradition of dissent and debate, did in fact defend
| it._
|
| From the article
| dalbasal wrote:
| I'm surprised that the article isn't more sports-centric.
|
| This "battle," has been mostly an elite-ish, university-centric
| one this far. Gender studies departments were always known as
| bastions of avant garde quirkiness. The Germaine Greare's of the
| world have always been at war with someone, name-calling and
| whatnot. Theatrical protests aren't new, and neither is their
| intensity.
|
| Leakage into the real world was indirect at best, and leakage
| into the elite world was usually in the form of recreational
| rhetoric. When ordinary people hear about it, it's usually from
| the politically polar... reaching for examples of crazy social
| progressives.
|
| Sports though... sports is something people actually care about.
| That's where "gender ideology" is now, and this is where things
| start to get serious... where we see what sticks and what
| doesn't.
|
| Prisons and shelters... those are bystanders, one way or another.
|
| ^ I'm not talking about the actual changes or lack thereof
| affecting trans people. I'm talking about the war over abstract
| philosophical points.. which manifest in specific areas such as
| prisons, sports, etc. The "fat man on a rail cart" scenarios.
| neartheplain wrote:
| The battle has very much leaked off-campus, and not just in
| sports. One intense area of disagreement involves the rights of
| trans children to medically transition without their parents'
| knowledge or consent. Research consistently shows that most
| children who identity as trans revert to their original gender
| identity post-puberty [0]. However, more states are now
| enabling children to seek and obtain irreversible gender
| transition care on their own, without parental consent, to
| include surgery and hormone therapy [1]:
|
| >[Seattle] minors age 13 and up are entitled to admit
| themselves for inpatient and outpatient mental health treatment
| without parental consent. Health insurers are forbidden from
| disclosing to the insured parents' sensitive medical
| information of minor children--such as that regarding "gender
| dysphoria [and] gender affirming care." Minors aged 13 to 18
| can withhold mental health records from parents for "sensitive"
| conditions, which include both "gender dysphoria" and "gender-
| affirming care." Insurers in Washington must cover a wide array
| of "gender-affirming treatments" from tracheal shaves to double
| mastectomies.
|
| >Oregon passed a law permitting minors 15 and older to obtain
| puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries at
| taxpayers' expense--all without parental consent. In 2018,
| California passed a similar bill for all children in foster
| care, age 12 and up.
|
| Similarly, in a Canadian family court case involving a 14 year
| old trans child [2]:
|
| >Attempting to persuade AB to abandon treatment for gender
| dysphoria; addressing AB by his birth name; referring to AB as
| a girl or with female pronouns whether to him directly or to
| third parties; shall be considered to be family violence under
| s. 38 of the Family Law Act.
|
| In the event where the trans child de-transitions post-puberty,
| these procedures may leave them with severe body dismorphia or
| render them unable to produce or bear children.
|
| I don't have kids (yet), but I had body dismorphia as a young
| adult. It almost killed me, but I grew out of it in time.
| Fortunately, it wasn't the kind that compelled me to seek life-
| altering medical procedures. I fear that my future child may
| suffer from a similar case of _temporary_ body dismorphia, seek
| and obtain _permanent_ life-altering procedures which I am
| legally unable to prevent, and later come to deeply regret the
| damage done to their body by these procedures. Again, the best
| data we have on trans kids shows that most choose to revert to
| their original gender identity post-puberty [0].
|
| [0]
| https://www.thestranger.com/features/2017/06/28/25252342/the...
|
| [1] https://www.city-journal.org/transgender-identifying-
| adolesc...
|
| [2] https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/sc/19/06/2019BCSC0604.htm
| Animats wrote:
| Sudden outbreak of common sense.
|
| We need, on social media, to learn how to deal more effectively
| with excessively loud, but not very numerous, activists. As some
| previous articles noted, trolling gets more clicks than facts.
| This empowers extremists, from Q-Anon on to trans activists.
| ausbah wrote:
| it's very disingenuous to equate Q-Anon to trans rights
| activists
| bart_spoon wrote:
| I'm not sure it is. There are disimilarities of course, but
| there are enough similarities to support the point they were
| making. That it makes you uncomfortable doesn't invalidate
| that.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| _A flyer with an image of a gun and text reading "shut the fuck
| up, terf" (trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a slur) was
| circulating_
|
| Not accepting incivility from people is hardly what I'd call a
| "backlash". We don't operate our universities on the heckler's
| veto.
| JanneVee wrote:
| > We don't operate our universities on the heckler's veto.
|
| I've seen a few videos from various Universities where invited
| speakers are shouted down because of supposed wrong views. But
| then it isn't the heckler's veto if their views are wrong or
| what?
| nemo44x wrote:
| What's weird is that not long ago is popular to say "I
| disagree with everything you have to say, but I'd die for
| your right to say it". It's amazing how times have changed
| from that shared belief.
|
| The videos you haven't seen are the ones that were never made
| because the wrong-view person was stopped from even giving
| their scheduled talk via "de-platforming".
| Latty wrote:
| Someone having a right to say something doesn't mean they
| are entitled to every platform to broadcast it.
|
| Not everyone can go and speak at a University, there is not
| enough time and space for that to be viable, just as not
| everyone can demand to be broadcast on TV.
|
| If you can't get enough support at a University to speak,
| the public square and the soapbox are always at your
| disposal. The government can't arrest you. That is the
| freedom of expression that is protected.
|
| You are talking about enforced speech, where private
| individuals must listen to a speaker, and/or use their
| platform to amplify the speaker's words. It is a violation
| of _their_ freedom of expression to tell them they cannot
| refuse or protest against what someone else wishes to say.
| nemo44x wrote:
| The person in the article was invited by the university.
| This isn't a random person demanding to be heard. This is
| the university succumbing to pressure from a small group
| to ban a guest from sharing their ideas with the student
| body that choose to attend.
| Latty wrote:
| The students have a right to freedom of expression in
| protest.
|
| The University should _absolutely_ be providing speakers
| that challenge the student 's views and offer ideas they
| may not agree with, but that's an educational decision,
| not a free speech one.
|
| If the student body wants to lobby the University not to
| accept you as a speaker, that's their freedom of the
| speech, and it is up to the University to weigh that
| against the potential educational value.
|
| For example, to start somewhere obvious, someone coming
| in to talk about how your friends are subhuman doesn't
| provide a lot of educational value, and students rightly
| don't want their tuition spent enabling it.
|
| Don't like it, use your freedom of speech to demonstrate
| enough value to your ideas the University and student
| body are willing to listen. Students are at University
| for an education, and they have a right to say what they
| find valuable and demand value from the University.
| Denying them that is limiting _their_ freedom of
| expression.
| nemo44x wrote:
| I think another point of the article is the masses of
| silent people are starting become less silent. Their
| politeness has been mistaken for agreement.
|
| The university should only allow speakers that the
| students agree with? That's sort of ridiculous and an
| abdication of the university's responsibility to expose
| their students to challenging and possibly hurtful
| intellectual thought. I listened to no shortage of
| intellectuals that criticized white men in western
| society in many ways for example. And that's Ok if it's
| thoughtful and with a point, however idiotic I might
| think it is.
|
| The university has the job of determining what this level
| is. This speaker wasn't claiming anyone was subhuman. And
| you don't have to attend - it's simple.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| It was popular to say, but I challenge the idea that people
| have somehow become less tolerant of speech they disagree
| with than, say, Christians in the 1980s or the US
| government during the Red Scare.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| They were wrong then, and these people are wrong now.
| Unfortunately, they also have an indelible record of the
| internet to hunt down those they don't like for words
| uttered back to their pubescent years.
| ribosometronome wrote:
| Among a certain sect of internet libertarians, maybe. And
| we saw that the result of that was the proliferation of
| communities on popular websites dedicated to legal but
| sexually suggestive pictures of girls (ex. /r/jailbait on
| Reddit), communities dedicated to voyeuristic photography,
| vitriolic hate against people who are overweight, etc.
| busterarm wrote:
| I'm sorry but Evelyn Beatrice Hall first wrote those
| words in 1906, as a description of the beliefs of
| Voltaire, who died in 1778 and whose ideas were extremely
| mainstream at the time the US was founded.
|
| These ideas long predate the internet and the Libertarian
| political party and to box them in as such and dismiss
| them carelessly is extremely intellectually dishonest and
| bordering on flamebait.
|
| Additionally, if your best evidence against freedom of
| speech is Reddit, I suggest you retool your arguments
| from scratch.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| I'm not convinced the US considered these values
| mainstream, as exclusion of most people from voting, and
| from slaves their natural rights shows
| busterarm wrote:
| Following on nemo44x's response, we also don't really
| have much written evidence to the contrary.
|
| Literacy rates in late colonial America were 85-90% north
| of Virginia and around 60% in Virginia and south of it.
| If large numbers of people were disagreeing, they surely
| weren't writing about it.
| nemo44x wrote:
| Western Liberalism is a self correcting, evolving system
| of ideas and rigorous analysis of what is considered
| knowledge. So yes, per the people that were considered
| "the people" during those times, this belief was very
| strongly held indeed.
| digbybk wrote:
| > I've seen a few videos from various Universities
|
| I've also seen a few videos from various Universities.
| _Remarkably few_, given how much attention this topic gets.
| [deleted]
| underseacables wrote:
| It's too late. The University is now the violent echo chamber,
| paranoid that the slightest disagreement or questioning of
| radicalism and power-obsessed minority tribalism, will lead to
| a collapse of the university's cushy well-paid status as the
| true halls of higher learning.
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| Also, I'm not aware of anyone who seriously considers "TERF" an
| _offensive_ slur...
|
| It's like saying "bigot" is a slur, or being more afraid of
| being labelled a racist than actually being racist...
| ribosometronome wrote:
| Plenty of TERFs consider it a slur and negative. JK Rowling,
| for example, wrote: "...activists who clearly believe
| themselves to be good, kind and progressive people swarmed
| back into my timeline, assuming a right to police my speech,
| accuse me of hatred, call me misogynistic slurs and, above
| all - as every woman involved in this debate will know -
| TERF."
| noobermin wrote:
| >"shut the fuck up, TERF" (trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a
| slur)
|
| I stopped reading there. The protestors are framed as crazy and
| insane but TERF is a slur, there's no "opinion" marker on the
| article, it's pretty clear the author is coming from a biased
| perspective although framed as objective. When they can't even
| start the article of a controversial topic with even a weak
| attempt at objectivity I know enough not to indulge.
| kerkeslager wrote:
| Why don't you quote the whole sentence there?
|
| > A flyer with an image of a gun and text reading "shut the
| fuck up, terf" (trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a slur)
| was circulating.
| noobermin wrote:
| How does that help??? TERF is not a slur, it is definitely
| used as an epithet, but only the targets of the term call it
| a slur making it obvious the authors are sympathetic to the
| terfs.
| octernion wrote:
| TERF is not a slur, lol. what?
| weakfish wrote:
| Yeah, asserting TERF, an acronym subsection of feminism, as a
| slur shows the true feeling behind the article.
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| I don't know if this article is describing this phenomenon
| accurately, as the first paragraph contains an obvious falsehood:
| " A flyer with an image of a gun and text reading "shut the fuck
| up, terf" (trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a slur) was
| circulating. ".
|
| TERF isn't a slur. No one has successfully beaten and killed a
| woman while calling her a TERF and then got away with it in court
| like the gay panic defense and the trans panic defense has. No
| one was lynched for being a TERF like black people have been.
| This is a gross talking point trying to claim victim positioning
| and is inaccurate journalism. The whole article is suspect to be
| sympathetic to anti-trans politics as a result.
|
| I do want to talk about how much gender has invaded the academic
| life in a way that gets in the way of education. Obviously, I
| don't want even more gender politicking from the other "side"!
| at_a_remove wrote:
| Well, you could consider counter-examples from terfisaslur.com.
| You probably even know that such a thing exists, but you failed
| to bring it up.
|
| An experiment you can perform at home: do an exact search on
| Google for the phrase "punch a terf" and wonder if this is
| meant to suggest violence.
| beervirus wrote:
| > TERF isn't a slur. No one has successfully beaten and killed
| a woman while calling her a TERF and then got away with it in
| court
|
| That's hardly the defining characteristic of a slur.
| [deleted]
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| I've associated the term slur in the common understanding
| with an actual history of marginalization, and I think the
| claim is totally unnecessary politicking in the reporting.
| beervirus wrote:
| A slur is any term that's "a disparaging remark or slight"
| according to dictionary.com. It's hard to argue they're not
| using the term TERF as disparaging.
| mike00632 wrote:
| The problem is that you are saying "TERF" is a slur by
| using a wide definition but then using the narrow
| definition to claim it's a travisty to be called a
| "TERF". The point is that "TERF" is not on the same level
| as the n-word, f-word or the t-word which you are
| likening it to when you insist it's a slur. It's simply
| not harmful to call someone a "TERF" like it is to use
| slurs against the groups that TERFs are marginalizing.
| beervirus wrote:
| You're putting words in my mouth. All I'm saying is that
| it was silly to insist that it _isn't_ a slur.
| mike00632 wrote:
| Ok, but do you understand why it's incorrect to consider
| it a slur in this context?
| beervirus wrote:
| No. Like I said, it's silly to insist that it isn't a
| slur. The whole argument is rather silly, frankly.
| spiffotron wrote:
| A slur is an insult, no one has to have died for something to
| be a slur, not sure where you got that idea from.
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| Right, but "slur" by itself is used as shorthand for
| "offensive slur" - typically racially-offensive slurs or
| homophobic slurs, and so on - I'm not aware of normal public
| discourse referring to everyday insults as "slurs" - whatever
| the original definition slur had it now has a connotation of
| insulting the target by way of comparing the target to an
| intentionally hurtful stereotype. (I could enumerate examples
| but nothing good can come from that, methinks...)
|
| Whereas "TERF" is an acronym - it isn't appealing to anyone's
| emotional opinions about what a "TERF" represents - that is
| if _anyone_ is even clued-up enough to know what it actually
| means.
|
| Maybe the people complaining are _assuming_ that TERF is an
| offensive slur without doing their research first? I 'll
| admit it does have that feel to it, the way it sharply rolls
| off the tongue...
| kian wrote:
| TERF both manages to connote something that should be
| stepped upon and is used to box in a person's opinions to a
| caricature so that a label can be applied (a stereotype, in
| other words), rather than listening to what they say. I'd
| say that between that, karen, anti-vaxxer, and anti-masker,
| a number of niche slurs have been popularized recently.
| [deleted]
| fwn wrote:
| Wikipedia writes about that thought in their two opening
| paragraphs and concludes:
|
| > In academic discourse, there is no consensus on whether or
| not TERF constitutes a slur.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TERF
|
| Sure, if someone uses it in their paper on, for example,
| history of feminist thought I wouldn't assume it to be
| offensive. On the other hand I don't think that the intention
| behind a sentence like "shut the fuck up, terf" is very
| unclear.
| terfisaslur wrote:
| Oh yeah Wikipedia has NEVER shown ANY bias on political
| topics
| seneca wrote:
| > No one has successfully beaten and killed a woman while
| calling her a TERF and then got away with it in court like the
| gay panic defense and the trans panic defense has. No one was
| lynched for being a TERF like black people have been.
|
| That is a bizarre standard for what constitutes a slur, and
| would exclude the vast majority of slurs. This reads more like
| an attempt to inject an emotional appeal to deny a point you
| personally disagree with.
|
| TERF is a phrase pretty much always used to attack its target.
| Coupling it with "shut the fuck up" makes the intention pretty
| clear.
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| I don't actually care about the term itself, I care that a
| supposed journalism piece is actually inserting it's own
| politics so blatantly.
| sorenjan wrote:
| 1a : an insulting or disparaging remark or innuendo
|
| b : a shaming or degrading effect
|
| https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/slur
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| It's not shaming to say someone is against trans people nor
| is it disparaging unless someone is bringing politics and
| moralism into it. Like I said I don't want even more gender
| politics from the other "side" as some kind of "backlash"
| journalistic piece. It's all a wash of nonsense.
| terfisaslur wrote:
| No one in the mainstream is "against trans people," what
| they're against is denying biological realities like sexual
| dimorphism in pursuit of a fashion trend.
|
| I don't care if you're a man and you want to go by she/her,
| that's totally fine, but you're still not going to be
| placed in a cell with a female in prison if you've raped
| someone and happen to be trans identifying, sorry.
| sorenjan wrote:
| It's a disparaging remark to make it clear that the other
| person's opinions are wrong and that they as a person is of
| lesser value and should be ignored or attacked. It's used
| as a conversation stopper and to polarize the discussion,
| i.e. rally support from like minded and suppress the other
| party.
|
| It's also not used merely to say that someone is against
| trans people, like you suggest. It's used by a toxic
| community that are immune to nuance and opposed to debate
| other than to force their own view on everyone else. Very
| few people are against trans people, but maybe some doesn't
| buy all of the identity politics. Saying that women
| menstruate is enough to be labeled a terf by the online
| mob. There's also rarely any radical feminism expressed by
| the people being labeled as terfs.
| jdross wrote:
| A slur is an allegation that is likely to insult them or damage
| their reputation. That's clearly why terf was used in this
| context.
|
| I've noticed leftist communities frequently attempting to
| redefine incendiary words (such as 'racism') as a political
| tactic, to a lot of success.
| terfisaslur wrote:
| The onslaught of neologisms and redefinitions come directly
| from the academic Critical Social Justice fields
|
| These are federally subsidized academic fields
|
| So if you want to see the Left stop redefining words, the
| public needs to stop funding their careers in academia
| burnished wrote:
| It seems like the critical thing at stake in this thread is
| what 'slur' means. Like you, I think of slurs as being only the
| words associated with minority violence, maybe curse-words+,
| the sort of thing that would make me feel uncomfortably
| speaking aloud due to the associations. Evidently other people
| feel that it means something more like 'insult'. I can't say
| what this means in the broader context, but it might be a good
| signal to re-evaluate how you interpreted its use-age in the
| article.
| gumby wrote:
| > TERF isn't a slur.
|
| I think the economist's usage was OK, as it appears in the
| supplied context to have been used _as_ a slur (I 'm not
| adequately connected on the topic to know what the "normal"
| usage would be).
|
| > The whole article is suspect to be sympathetic to anti-trans
| politics as a result.
|
| Clearly, given what I said above, _I_ don 't agree with this
| diagnosis. In particular I think a few articles like this are a
| good antidote to the "the universities are insane and have been
| taken over by crazy extremists" narrative.
|
| Perhaps if this commend page doesn't descend into vitriol, more
| contextual discussion could lead me or you to modulate our
| opinion. As I said I don't follow this topic particularly
| closely, so my interpretation could be naive.
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| There's a difference between saying it's used as a way to
| disparage someone and as a slur here. I've generally
| associated the term slur with a significant history of using
| it against a demographic, such as f _ggot, n_ ggr, ch*nk,
| etc. saying that TERF is on the same level as those terms
| struck me as politicking and not journalism, which made me
| suspect the rest of the piece as political nonsense from the
| right.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Language is dynamic. Use something as a slur often enough,
| and it becomes a slur. And here it's clearly being used as
| a slur. That doesn't make it _always_ a slur (yet), but
| here it clearly is.
| terfisaslur wrote:
| It is a slur, it's used as an insult against women who refuse
| to bow to the gender ideology insanity. You don't get to be the
| arbiter of that.
|
| So-called "anti-trans" politics is actually more sensitive to
| the needs of real transsexuals while the transgender movement
| makes life harder for women, homosexuals, and transsexuals
| primarily for the benefit of non binary and transgender people
|
| TERF is a slur used by transgender activists against anyone who
| understands the difference between sex, gender, transsexuality,
| and transgenderism, and refuses to deny certain biological
| realities, like the fact that only women produce ova.
|
| The fact that you don't realize it's a slur shows how
| uneducated you are on this topic. You're going to need to do
| better next time.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| I would suggest that it is a slur because it is used as a term
| of disparagement that often doesn't even accurately describe
| the target. The label gets thrown at women who are not RF, and
| sometimes women who, for whatever reason (for example, a
| religion they adhere to) would be reluctant to even call
| themselves F. At that point, I don't see how the word is any
| different than people e.g. referring to any Arabs as "camel
| jockeys".
| rootusrootus wrote:
| What a tough problem to solve. My current thought on the gender
| identity issue is that society should default to the absolute
| minimum amount of categorizing people by their gender. What you
| identify as only matters to the extent that we divide people.
| Nobody would care if you used the women's bathroom, if such a
| thing did not exist. And when it is absolutely necessary for a
| distinction to exist, then we can spend the effort required to
| justify why, and along with that justification we should be able
| to clearly identify how it applies to transgender individuals.
|
| This would mean throwing out a lot of the more epheremeral
| complaints "I feel unsafe if there is a man in the bathroom."
| Why? Let's fix that part, then. Because there are going to be
| scary women too.
|
| I don't know. I don't have a really good answer I feel
| comfortable with. I do think a significant part of the problem,
| however, is not ideological, it is technological. It's way, way
| too easy to pile on with very little effort.
| iammisc wrote:
| > This would mean throwing out a lot of the more epheremeral
| complaints "I feel unsafe if there is a man in the bathroom."
| Why? Let's fix that part, then. Because there are going to be
| scary women too.
|
| You realize having a woman's bathroom was a thing many early
| feminist groups fought for right?
| LatteLazy wrote:
| I sympathise. Sadly society seems to be moving the other way
| recently: my gym and pool both have significant women's only
| hours and classes. My previous employer had women only sessions
| with the ceo to promote more women faster.
|
| There was a brief moment a few years ago when the government
| here (limey Britian) said people would be allowed to pick their
| gender without involving doctors/bureaucrats. I liked the idea,
| it's equality on steroids. Long queue for the ladies? Identify
| as a man for 5 minutes! Accidently go to the gym at 7 on a
| Wednesday? Be a girl for 90 minutes so you can work out!
|
| Link for when the policy was dropped
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/sep/22/uk-governmen...
| dang wrote:
| Trolling will get you banned here. Please don't do this on
| HN.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| > Long queue for the ladies? Identify as a man for 5 minutes!
| Accidently go to the gym at 7 on a Wednesday? Be a girl for
| 90 minutes so you can work out!
|
| I like this.
|
| I've already identified to my employer that I'm partially
| Black even though, to the best of my knowledge, I'm not.
|
| They can't deny it and it only benefits them (they can
| increase their ratios of minority employers which is public
| data).
|
| I can choose to identify as black if I like.
| long_time_gone wrote:
| ==I can choose to identify as black if I like.==
|
| What is the benefit for you? Is it trolling?
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Let us say that the OP believes in reincarnation and
| believes that his soul is black, used to live in black
| bodies, and was mistakenly reincarnated into a white body
| on this occasion, but still feels black and carries
| memories of being black.
|
| Quite a lot of people on Earth believe in reincarnation
| and would find such a situation entirely possible. The
| question is, is a Western country obliged to respect a
| religious argument like this?
|
| Maybe yes. After all, race is said to be a social
| construct. Why not add reincarnation into the mix.
| long_time_gone wrote:
| This person willfully admitted they are not black, which
| is far different than your criteria of someone who
| "believes that his soul is black, used to live in black
| bodies, and was mistakenly reincarnated into a white body
| on this occasion, but still feels black and carries
| memories of being black." The analogy falls apart because
| the stance is based on trolling, not actual beliefs.
| LatteLazy wrote:
| I'm not OP.
|
| I generally answer the ethnicity question randomly. This
| is because:
|
| * I don't like be lumped into "white British"
|
| * the whole question is rude imho (why does the gym need
| to know my race and sexuality!?)
|
| * services I use shouldn't shouldn't lose "points"
| because of my colour/religion/sexuality/shoe-size
| zo1 wrote:
| There are race-based laws in some countries that
| incentivize, prioritize and make legal the practice of
| hiring certain races over others.
|
| E.g.:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Economic_Empowermen
| t
| HideousKojima wrote:
| Federal government gives small business grants and loans
| preference based on race and gender? I am now a black
| female.
| LatteLazy wrote:
| I have a terrible problem: I actually am gay.
|
| But I hate identifying so at work because I don't want to
| be "the gay guy". I don't want to be promoted early to
| boost the company stats. I don't want people thinking I was
| promoted for that reason either.
|
| I don't know why anyone would want those things. I'm gay,
| but I'm here because I'm good at my job and I work hard.
| I'm taking your bonus, but not using my genitals, using my
| impressive mathematical skills!
|
| I am very happy to just be dumped into the same pool as
| everyone else (metaphorically and for swimming)
|
| /rant
| HideousKojima wrote:
| >"I feel unsafe if there is a man in the bathroom." Why?
|
| Because men (biological males if we're being pedantic) are
| statistically overwhelmingly more likely to commit rape and
| other forms of sexual assault (and other violent crimes) and to
| be horny creepy perverted sex pests in general. Add to that the
| fact that men are much more physically strong than women (a
| ~5th percentile male is about as strong as a ~95th percentile
| female) and the options a woman has to defend themselves
| against such a creep are severely limited.
|
| But if you insist on creating a New Soviet Woman that isn't
| afraid of men, be my guest. Just do it far away from me in a
| different country, please.
| makeworld wrote:
| Can't violent men just enter these bathrooms or dress up as
| women anyway? Rape is already a crime, no matter what gender
| you are. I don't see what a bathroom bill would meaningfully
| solve. Plus bathroom bills have already been shown to force
| trans men into women's washrooms.
| HideousKojima wrote:
| Sure they still can, but without such a bill the women in
| the bathroom can't take actions like calling security until
| the man actually starts doing something
| violent/criminal/creepy/whatever. With such a bill their
| mere presence is enough.
| makeworld wrote:
| What if that man turns out to be a trans man, who's just
| obeying the bathroom bill?
| HideousKojima wrote:
| I think you're highly overestimating the rate at which
| trans people pass. In the rare cases that might happen
| it'd be easy enough to handle
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| IMO bringing statistical likelihoods into it is a dangerous
| road to go down and could lead to some seriously problematic
| outcomes.
|
| For example, what if people in certain socioeconomic groups
| are more likely to commit rape? Or people of certain
| ethnicities?
|
| Would it make sense to require them to use separate
| bathrooms? Or is it only ok to slice and dice the stats based
| on certain characteristics? To me it's kind of a scary idea--
| just because a certain demographic is more likely to commit a
| crime doesn't mean we should make life difficult for all
| members of that demographic. Even if their facilities are, in
| theory, separate but equal.
| HideousKojima wrote:
| My rule for any of these things are all or nothing, in the
| margins lie chaos. I think a private business should be
| able to have as many or as few bathrooms for as many
| categories and groups as they feel like. But if you're
| going to block them from doing that, you'd better block
| them from splitting up bathrooms on _any_ basis, otherwise
| all sorrs of special interest groups and lobbying groups
| will be looking to make special exceptions and cutouts that
| help their group and hurt their enemies, it 's inevitable.
| bluGill wrote:
| All bathrooms should be a single private stall, first
| come first serve. If you need more than one stall, then
| install them.
|
| On average females take twice as long males in the
| bathroom. Sometimes some events have a disproportionate
| ratio of male/females. Both are evidence that having the
| same number of stalls for each of the two genders is
| wrong - even before talk about more than two genders.
| [deleted]
| stickfigure wrote:
| From a statistical perspective, black Americans _are_ more
| likely to commit violent crimes than white. Yet we got rid of
| white /colored restrooms, and claiming "I'm afraid of blacks"
| is rightly considered racist and offensive.
| CapmCrackaWaka wrote:
| The counter argument to this is that African Americans are
| more likely to commit crimes because they are, on average,
| more poor because of systemic racism, not because they are
| biologically predisposed to committing crimes.
| dang wrote:
| Please don't post ideological flamewar comments to HN. We're
| trying for a different sort of internet here, to the extent
| possible.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| exporectomy wrote:
| I agree except that I don't think we understand which ways of
| dividing ourselves are really biologically (including
| psychologically) important and which are just cultural and can
| be changed with the right environment. Culture often encodes
| biological needs that we don't really understand.
| freemint wrote:
| I would rephrase it as: "Culture often encodes biological
| needs that we are not sure we did understand because nothing
| like that was written down and today we have a very good idea
| of our biological needs and can probably design more
| consistent or at least more utilitarian rules of culture"
|
| Do you think you could agree with that?
| IncRnd wrote:
| > This would mean throwing out a lot of the more epheremeral
| complaints "I feel unsafe if there is a man in the bathroom."
| Why? Let's fix that part, then. Because there are going to be
| scary women too.
|
| Do you recognize that there are actual reasons that a woman
| might not want to go into a bathroom with 5 men in it?
| Udik wrote:
| That they peed all around the toilet?
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| I recognize that. But isn't that also a form of
| discrimination? The suggestion is that all men are capable of
| being perverts, using their camera phones inappropriately,
| bathroom harassment, etc.
|
| To build gender-specific bathrooms because of that
| generalization of men is hypocritical of the entire gender
| discrimination movement. Reverse discrimination.
| LatteLazy wrote:
| Careful, it sounds like you might be banning 99% of a
| minority because 1% behaved badly. I know that's not what you
| intend.
|
| :)
| distrill wrote:
| There are other solutions than what you're describing. I've
| been in a number of bars with unsexed bathrooms, where the
| sinks are all in the open and there are private secure
| individual stalls. I don't know that this is the best
| solution, but it does remove the gender distinction from the
| bathrooms and it certainly isn't "a bathroom with 5 men in
| it".
| tomp wrote:
| It took a lot of mental self-awareness on my part, and
| reading a lot of such statements, to recognise how strongly
| I've been mentally programmed (brainwashed) by society to
| think of _men_ as _evil_ , and not even flinch when I used to
| read statements like the one above (implying / assuming that
| men are, by default, extremely violent and dangerous, and
| that everyone is _justified_ by judging _every_ man as such).
|
| It's easier to see if you replace " _men_ " (currently a non-
| favoured demographic) by e.g. " _black_ " (currently a
| favoured demographic).
|
| _> Do you recognize that there are actual reasons that a
| white person might not want to go into a bathroom with 5
| black people in it?_
| CapmCrackaWaka wrote:
| This is a sore subject, but the difference here is that
| rape is an evolutionary artifact left over from when it was
| advantageous (from a reproductive standpoint) to do so. It
| was, quite frankly, an evolutionary advantage for men to
| rape women. I personally doubt this urge is different based
| on race. In fact, women's fear or rape is one of the only
| times I find it acceptable to use phrasing like you
| described.
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| We are already so far into hating men that we're fine
| with basically saying the desire to rape is evolutionally
| wired into all male brains? No complaints about sexism or
| anything?
| CapmCrackaWaka wrote:
| You can acknowledge that premise without 'hating men'. I
| am a man, and I have no problems admitting that rape was
| a legitimate tactic for our ancestors to pass their
| genetics along. It's a fact that we'll have to deal with.
| On the other hand, when it comes to issues of race, I'm
| hard pressed to believe there are massive
| evolutionary/biological differences that need to be
| accounted for.
| IncRnd wrote:
| Classes of people are different from each other. That's not
| to say that one person is better than another. It's also
| not saying that any class of person is better than another.
| It is saying that all people are different, and there are
| classes of people, such as men, women, blacks, whites,
| trans, cis, and all sorts of classifications that differ in
| aggregate.
|
| The reason we humans can get through life is by
| discriminating, in the sense of distinguishing, classes of
| people. This is NOT prejudice but is sensible. After all,
| there is a difference between discrimination and prejudice.
|
| Please consider this: "Honey, stay here. Don't play with
| those 5 men at the end of the block." Are all strangers
| bad? Are all men bad? Are older people bad? Are all people
| at the end of the block bad? No, of course not. But, we
| need to remain sensible to circumstances and sensitive to
| people's situations.
| bjoli wrote:
| I am a man, and I don't want to go in to the same bathroom
| as 5 other men, especially not of they are a group and
| drunk. The reason is simple: I have found it much more
| common for men to take pleasure in having power over other
| people by threat of violence.
|
| They are assholes of course, but that shit is pretty
| common. I would even claim that anyone that says otherwise
| probably never did more than 4 pub rounds. Or went to a
| public school.
| read_if_gay_ wrote:
| There's also actual data that black people commit an
| outsized percentage of violent crime in the US yet any
| statement like this with "black" substituted for "men"
| would be downvoted into oblivion. The common argument is
| that it's really society's mistreatment of black people
| which is to blame for the criminality. Why is that same
| argument not applied here?
| motohagiography wrote:
| One shouldn't expect courage from The Economist, but it's always
| wise to bet on their prudence.
|
| I don't read The Economist for facts or details so much as to get
| a sense of what topics a current establishment can no longer
| afford to ignore. The details are secondary to the neccessity
| that a writer, a sub-editor, and a senior editor with tremendous
| personal stake in maintaining access to the circles that define
| establishment media, have collectively recognized that to remain
| relevant as a publication, the risk/reward on any ensuing
| controversy still means the magazine has to acknowledge which way
| the wind is blowing.
|
| When The Economist says something is just starting, it means it's
| been brewing for at least several years and they need to comment
| on it. I don't think direct discourse on the topic improves the
| discussion on gender because the participants use a critical
| theory in which the promise of discourse is just bait to corner
| political targets for their mobs. However, we (and even The
| Economist) can recognize that popular tolerance for these tactics
| has finally reached an inflection point, and this change in
| attitude is what will finally allow real analysis and insight by
| thoughtful people into topics about gender.
| yuy910616 wrote:
| Can't agree more - on both of your points.
|
| It is interesting to look at the Economist like their BigMac
| index - an encapsulation of something complex that is weirdly
| reliable
| karaterobot wrote:
| As an Economist reader who sometimes scratches his head at how
| late they are to the party, I love your framing here. I
| appreciate their sobriety though.
| worik wrote:
| The Economist has been talking about this for many years.
| pas wrote:
| Could you link something worth reading from them on this?
| plank_time wrote:
| I think we should accommodate trans people as much as we can, up
| to and including letting them be legally be considered the sex of
| their belief as long as they have transitioned to some degree, by
| taking hormones or surgery.
|
| However, I disagree with getting rid of biological sex. It's
| absurd. Even down to the genetic level there is a biological
| definition of male and female and to say there isn't is anti-
| science. We shouldn't destroy science over this.
|
| Because of that I also don't believe that trans women should be
| allowed to compete in competitive sports especially those that
| have dedicated their lives towards it. To put it in perspective,
| Serena Williams, one of the greatest if not the greatest tennis
| athlete of all time. She and Venus Williams were destroyed in her
| prime by the 200th ranked tennis player. The male tennis player
| felt like they were equivalent to a 600th ranked male player. The
| point being, you can't make up for some genetic differences
| between men and women.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| >I think we should accommodate trans people as much as we can,
| up to and including letting them be legally be considered the
| sex of their belief as long as they have transitioned to some
| degree, by taking hormones or surgery.
|
| See as they make up a smaller minority than most minority
| people in the US, I personally think that helping poor and
| working class people first would uplift them a lot quicker than
| letting trans people be trans. I mean it's great an all you get
| to be your own gender, but everybody will despise you knowing
| you got that way by tax payer money. If you got that way
| through working and paid for it yourself but were able to via
| worker protections and rights, the cultural stigma around it
| would be significantly far less vitriolic.
| plank_time wrote:
| I don't think there's an if/else clause. Allowing trans women
| to legally be claimed as women is really just an adjustment
| in a database, as well as just treating people the way they
| want to be treated. It doesn't cost anything to be respectful
| to people regardless of who they are.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| The comment stated:
|
| >up to and including letting them be legally be considered
| the sex of their belief as long as they have transitioned
| to some degree
|
| What you're suggesting is something simple. What the parent
| was suggesting was 1% of the population multiplied by $40k+
| in surgeries and drugs leading up to $120million for
| funding people transitioning meanwhile telling lower class
| people who work at crappy general labor jobs "yeah just
| pull yourself up by your bootstraps."
|
| Universally we can agree, helping all of the working class
| helps out all minorities seeing as most minorities
| are...working class.
| anoncake wrote:
| > I think we should accommodate trans people as much as we can,
| up to and including letting them be legally be considered the
| sex of their belief as long as they have transitioned to some
| degree, by taking hormones or surgery.
|
| Why do you think it's any of your business what other people do
| with their body?
|
| > To put it in perspective, Serena Williams, one of the
| greatest if not the greatest tennis athlete of all time. She
| and Venus Williams were destroyed in her prime by the 200th
| ranked tennis player.
|
| Looks like she is only the 201th greatest tennis player.
| adventured wrote:
| The same has occurred in regards to race.
|
| For _decades_ the ideological left preached, quite aggressively
| and consistently, that we must move to a post racial society,
| that race should not matter. This was the clear majority belief
| on the left as recently as the beginning of Obama 's first term.
| My entire childhood was filled with that preached gospel: a
| person's character is what matters, do not pay attention to their
| skin color, look beneath that, their skin color is not what's
| important, what is important is what's on the inside. And so on.
| That ideology made tremendous sense to me.
|
| Now they are saying the exact opposite 24/7. Their messaging has
| entirely changed. Now race is paramount, the color of a person's
| skin matters in a huge way, everyone is to be divided by race,
| everyone is to be treated differently depending on their race.
| Society must be splintered by race. They're segregating everyone
| into tribes and pitting them against eachother.
|
| So was the former ideology bullshit, or is the new ideology
| bullshit. Their credibility is shot, not that anyone cares. Next
| week they'll switch it again if it serves their pursuit of power,
| and proceed to memory hole whatever the last ideology was that
| they were pushing as though it never happened.
| wetmore wrote:
| I think the "they" in your post is actually a bunch of
| disparate groups. You are acting like there is internal
| inconsistency, but that's because the conflicting beliefs came
| out of different camps.
|
| Anyway, I think most people in support of the "new" ideology,
| as you call it, would say that the "old" ideology was flawed.
| Some might say it was bullshit, some might just say it was
| misguided or overly hopeful.
|
| Ideas change over time, I'm not sure why you think society's
| views on race should remain static, especially considering that
| the Civil Rights Movement was only a few generations ago. Every
| generation our theories of race change.
|
| The ideological right has also changed its stance on a lot of
| things. Do you also think that makes them have no credibility?
| jollybean wrote:
| It doesn't matter if the ideas are nuanced, we know they are.
|
| It's deeply hypocritical and exposes lack of intellectual
| consistency if morally shaming people into doing 'XYZ' for
| several decades, then castigating them as _literally_
| 'Upholding White Supremacy' for doing those very same things
| some time later.
|
| The 'internal conflict' that will arise in anyone of those
| people will be insurmountable, and the 'New Camp' will never
| have legitimacy in their eyes, just the opposite in fact,
| even if there is some validity in their ideals.
|
| This is borne largely out of the absolution, radicalism, lack
| of self awareness, inflexibility and binary thinking of the
| 'New Camp' (it's usually that way with 'New Camps') and
| because those who are 'just a bit older' have the life
| experience to reflect back on their own experiences of being
| 'too black and white' and can therefore contextualize any of
| the supposedly 'New' ideals at least in terms of individual's
| own life progress.
|
| The assumption by the 'New Camps' is that they are the
| righteous inheritors of the fairly unambiguous social
| victories of the 1960's, that among them are the MLK's and
| JFK's who will have statues made and words etched in stone as
| the new moral impetus etc. - but this would be wrong. Despite
| some obvious things that can and will be improved, most of
| today's social populism is nowhere near unambiguously on the
| right side of history.
|
| And finally: I'm not discounting any single idea presented by
| any individual or group acting in good faith. I'm discounting
| whether or not they should or will be recognized universally,
| and pointing out the problems with their assertive posture.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > Anyway, I think most people in support of the "new"
| ideology, as you call it, would say that the "old" ideology
| was flawed. Some might say it was bullshit, some might just
| say it was misguided or overly hopeful.
|
| While there are of course real injustices, which different
| people think motivate different responses, what we're talking
| about here feels manufactured in (mostly) American
| universities. Nothing like deliberately splitting people
| along the lines of immutable characteristics to create
| problems for social scientists to "solve".
| dang wrote:
| We detached this subthread from
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27608388.
| [deleted]
| tabtab wrote:
| I suspect you are confusing using characteristics to correct
| for existing bias versus using characteristics for
| discrimination itself. Specific scenarios may help us explore
| this better.
| jpttsn wrote:
| Okay, how about Michael Jackson's "Black or White?" Is this
| scenario "correcting for existing bias" or "discrimination
| itself?"
| mudil wrote:
| May I also add that prior to the current wave, educators were
| of opinion that kids need to be protected, at any cost, even to
| the point that grading system discriminates against kids, it
| can make them feel inferior. Now they basically shove every kid
| into corner, either as an oppressor or a victim.
| at_a_remove wrote:
| That's been my feeling -- _one_ of them had to be wrong. And if
| you 're wrong once, you can be wrong again, so perhaps it would
| be wise to be less certain of oneself.
| blacktriangle wrote:
| By the reasoning of today's left, MLK's I have a dream speech
| is white supremacy.
| oofabz wrote:
| I don't think gender ideology is an appropriate topic for HN.
| There is little to be gained and much to be lost from discussing
| it here. Little to be gained because it has nothing to do with
| software development, and because gender issues are thoroughly
| covered elsewhere. Much to be lost because gender issues are so
| divisive that we risk alienating members of our community.
| oramit wrote:
| I agree that this isn't the most productive HN thread ever,
| with a lot of comments repeating tired talking points or going
| for quick jabs instead of reasonable discussion. However, I
| would prefer to keep this topic open because it signals to me
| that there is still so much work to be done to educate people.
|
| Trans people are a tiny minority that is only now coming into
| the public consciousness. We're going to have to work through a
| lot of ignorant discussions and bad faith actors to get to a
| healthier place.
| nyczomg wrote:
| "it has nothing to do with software development,"
|
| So the next time one of my co-workers suggests we should do
| more to be inclusive when our software asks a user if they are
| male/female, I should tell them that gender has nothing to do
| with software development?
| fiftyfifty wrote:
| I have 3 kids in college right now, actually one just graduated
| with a computer science degree. All 3 of my kids have talked
| about how much gender ideology has creeped into the classroom
| at the college level, to the point where virtually every class
| including computer science, engineering and science courses,
| has to start off with addressing pronoun preferences. It is a
| political hot-topic for sure, and those often go horribly in
| online forums but to say that it's not related to software
| development and startup culture is a bit disingenuous. It is
| effecting higher education in a big way, and it is creeping
| into corporate culture.
| eropple wrote:
| _> has to start off with addressing pronoun preferences_
|
| To which I can only respond: "so?".
|
| There are a decent number of folks in my circles who are
| gender-nonconforming. I'll bet, sans decades-plus of social
| pressure, there are more in your kids' classes. What's the
| problem with asking? And why does asking make you
| characterize the effect upon higher education as "big"?
|
| How is it "bigger" than a prof or a TA asking if I want to be
| called Edward, Ed, or Ted?
| oramit wrote:
| Can you expand on what Gender Ideology in the classroom looks
| like for your kids? Is there more to this than addressing
| pronouns?
| mdoms wrote:
| I don't believe anyone here was holding off discussing any
| particular topic until we got the go-ahead from oofbaz. You
| don't get to decide what we discuss. If you don't want to
| discuss it you can close the tab and move on.
| dang wrote:
| Please don't be a jerk on HN. It only makes things worse and
| you can make your substantive points without it.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| ping_pong wrote:
| If you don't want to read the topic, ignore it and move on. I'm
| not interested in Django but I don't try to stifle
| conversations on it.
|
| Why are there so many gatekeeping people around that want to
| prevent discussions on topics that they aren't interested in?
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Certainly I am finding it very difficult to be heard. As a
| member of the trans community I've tried to be kind and helpful
| in my comments in this thread but I'm getting downvoted to
| hell.
|
| I just really want people in this thread to learn about
| emotional labor and to consider what they're asking of
| marginalized people when they want to "discuss" the validity of
| their needs.
| dang wrote:
| Yes, that's not good. I will take a closer look. Thanks for
| remaining kind and helpful, even when it's not easy.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Wow thanks I appreciate it. It had been an upsetting
| experience and this helped.
| supernintendo wrote:
| Trans people are a hot button issue these days but it feels
| like we don't really have a seat at the table in that debate.
| The healthiest thing you can do for yourself is just live
| your life, surround yourself with people who make you feel
| safe, valued and loved, and stop trying to convince random
| strangers online that you're worth something. I take a lot of
| inspiration from the ball room / drag culture - how it
| creates families for LGBTQ folks where none exist and uses
| expression as a form of activism. It's not my place to change
| anyone's mind; all I can do is live my life and hopefully
| others will grow as a result of observing me.
| arkaniad wrote:
| This is the goal and the ideal and what I myself choose to
| manifest, but it does bring me sadness to see a place I go
| to lurk on the tech and science grapevines and stay away
| from the 'discourse' start featuring threads articles
| debating how many rights I should have and in which ways
| should I be segregated from the people that need to be
| protected from me, particularly when honest attempts to
| reach out and foster understanding and sort out confusions
| get talked past.
|
| I'm a trans individual. I celebrate this and all the
| healing and personal growth that's come from coming to
| terms with this fact and so does mostly everyone I've ever
| been close with, and I live far outside the 'liberal
| bubble' of SV/etc. I am comfortable with having discussions
| and educating, but merely existing and advocating for one's
| own safety and happiness seems to be enough to start
| debates, even here. I don't want to have a 'culture war' or
| participate in a 'gender agenda', but as an adult human who
| wishes (i'd argue that it's somewhat of an obligation) to
| have an active role in civil society I must also advocate
| for myself and people like me.
|
| I urge people to listen more if they haven't been through
| it themselves. I know there's a lot of information out
| there about trans individuals that has inspired a lot of
| confusion and concern. It can be a confusing topic! Trans
| people tend to know a lot about it by necessity but seem to
| be listened to the least when the topic comes up. I
| personally think there's more intellectual curiosity to be
| had in the meta-conversation around why this discourse is
| the way it is given the fact that we have plenty of
| testimony, data and research to indicate the talking points
| being wheeled into the discussion are mostly facile and
| misconstrued to stoke fears, much like we did already over
| homosexuality?
| dang wrote:
| HN is for topics that gratify intellectual curiosity, not
| "software development". Please see the site guidelines:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
|
| You're certainly right that this is an inflammatory topic with
| strong political and ideological overlap, and as the guidelines
| explain, we don't want flamewar here, and we don't want
| ideological or political battle. The site exists for
| intellectual curiosity, and those things aren't compatible.
| There's a great deal of established moderation practice around
| this, if anyone wants to read past explanations:
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...
|
| That doesn't automatically make a story like this off topic for
| HN. It depends on whether there's enough new information in a
| story to support a substantive discussion. In this case, the
| topic is not just "gender ideology", it's ongoing developments
| at universities and in the discourse at large. All of these are
| significant and interesting phenomena. For that reason I turned
| the flags off on this submission. That's also established
| moderation practice (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page
| =0&prefix=true&que...). It requires a judgment call, of course,
| and we don't always make the right calls--but not making any
| would be an even worse call.
|
| Of course it's commenters' responsibility to stick to the side
| guidelines if posting in such a thread. That means curious,
| thoughtful conversation and respect toward other commenters
| (and other people generally). Flamewar, flamebait, snark, name-
| calling, personal attacks and so on are not ok. People
| sometimes think that just because a topic is inflammatory it
| means they get carte blanche to spew what they will (e.g. "if
| you don't want me to post like this then you shouldn't allow
| this thread in the first place"). I call that argument "the
| topic made me do it", and not only is it false, the opposite is
| true: commenters here are under a _greater_ obligation in cases
| like this, as the site guidelines make clear: " _Comments
| should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a
| topic gets more divisive._ "
| bachmeier wrote:
| > HN is for topics that gratify intellectual curiosity
|
| I think that's the problem with a topic like this on HN.
| There will be little learning going on, with many statements
| made with certainty by individuals that have never studied
| any of these concepts in any detail. The level of dismissal
| in the comments is itself a reason to pull the plug.
| IshKebab wrote:
| You don't have to read the comments. The article itself was
| very good I thought.
| dang wrote:
| That's certainly a big problem, but HN can't be a site for
| intellectual curiosity and at the same time exclude every
| story with political or ideological overlap. People
| sometimes imagine that that would be better, but only in
| the context of a specific story or thread they don't like.
| If you try to imagine it as a general policy it breaks down
| altogether. Nor would this community accept such severe
| restrictions on the range of topics. I don't think we have
| any choice but to patiently work together at having more
| thoughtful conversation.
|
| I've written extensively about this: https://hn.algolia.com
| /?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so.... Some good
| threads to start with might be
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21607844 and
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22902490.
|
| If anyone has a question that hasn't been answered there,
| I'd like to know what it is, and if you know a better way
| for HN to relate to political topics while fulfilling its
| mandate of curiosity, I'd really like to know what it is.
| Just please familiarize yourself with the past material
| first, because if it's something simple like "just ban
| politics" or "just allow everything", I've answered many
| times already why it won't work.
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| It feels like why subreddits or /pol/ exist: to segregate
| that to a place where people are most interested.
| dang wrote:
| HN is a non-siloed site, meaning we don't have
| subreddits, or any of the other ways that large
| communities segregate themselves. Here we're all in one
| big room together, like it or not. It's always been that
| way and I think it's part of its DNA.
|
| This has advantages and disadvantages, as with all such
| design choices, but it's good to be conscious of what
| one's design actually _is_ , since otherwise one might
| end up fucking with the DNA, which doesn't seem like a
| great idea.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?query=silo%20by%3Adang&dateRange=
| all...
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23308098
| Nicksil wrote:
| >fucking with the DNA
|
| This is the first time I've "heard" you curse.
|
| I don't know, it was just a little jarring. Not in a bad
| way. Just... different, I guess. Well done.
| dang wrote:
| Predictability is bad for curiosity :)
|
| I was going to link you to https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRa
| nge=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... but it looks like most
| of those are quoting other people.
| Miraste wrote:
| Looks like he started using "fuck" outside of quotes in
| 2016.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=4&prefix=true&
| que...
|
| Understandable.
| pomian wrote:
| I wanted to express thanks to Dang for the moderation of this
| site, precisely because we can learn, discuss, and evaluate
| difficult topics like this, without flame wars, and rudeness.
| There are a lot of good comments here today, that satisfy and
| stimulate, our moral, cultural, ideological and biological
| curiosities. Thanks Dang!
| pseudalopex wrote:
| Most of the discussion is the same old talking points.
| Probably because the only new information in the article is
| scant detail about a handful of disconnected events. The
| likes of which have gone on for years. The title is
| inflammatory too. Multiple ideologies are involved but only 1
| is called that.
| bendbro wrote:
| Insightful, thanks. Great moderating!
| joe_the_user wrote:
| I too like nuanced discussion on HN and I generally don't shy
| from political questions.
|
| That said, HN is the watering hole for people with multiple
| political approaches on a fairly wide spectrum.
|
| I think debate between these people is best facilitated by
| prompts and articles which raise multiple nuanced questions.
| And I think we do have useful debates at this point.
|
| What isn't useful is something like an overt manifesto for
| one or another "side" on this political spectrum. And HN
| generally avoids such things.
|
| But there's a kind of article, like this one imo, that is
| more or less a manifesto - an article that stake out a
| position and only give apparent gestures at balance. These
| have the same low-quality potential as manifestos. In
| important questions, it's unfortunate have a lot of
| uninformed posts even when they aren't flame bait.
|
| In the case of the present article, I don't think readers of
| the article will come away with any greater understanding of
| "Gender Theory" and what gives rise to it and so it's not
| really a generator of good quality discussion even when
| people are not shouting at each.
|
| Edit: Another thing I should add is that in the case of
| article that are effectively manifestos, upvotes and
| downvotes are going to gravitate to being just around the
| popularity of various positions and that too lowers the
| quality of discussion.
| casion wrote:
| Hacker news is not about software development.
|
| See: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
|
| n.b. "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."
| f38zf5vdt wrote:
| For a while I'd really enjoyed HackerNews for the lack of
| politics. It was great not to hear about Trump during the Trump
| presidency, but since then and COVID times I find more and more
| highly politicized editorials being propelled to the top of the
| front page.
|
| I'm pretty close to no longer visiting here.
| bosswipe wrote:
| I agree. There also seems to be more right-wing outrage-of-
| the-day bubbling up here.
| supernintendo wrote:
| Yeah, I just tend to avoid political posts and threads
| altogether. Speaking as a trans woman who doesn't use Twitter
| or most other social media, it can feel like I don't have a
| voice and I'm just seeing this debate play out. But in a way
| I'm fine with that. Online it's like people either hate me
| because I'm trans or hate others on my behalf because they're
| not trans-inclusive enough. My lived experience is nowhere
| near as extreme. To most of my friends, family and coworkers,
| I'm the only trans person they know and the topic of gender
| rarely comes up. Aside from a few friends and family who
| disowned me early in my transition, I've found that people
| are generally respectful. Strangers can sometimes be mean /
| scary / creepy and dating isn't easy (most guys aren't into
| trans girls or if they are it's usually a fetish thing) - so
| I just try to avoid situations where I'm unsafe or feeling
| bad vibes.
|
| I know that was a bit off-topic but I guess what I'm trying
| to say is, it's okay to create distance between you and the
| things that bring you down. I've found so much interesting
| content through Hacker News and it would be a shame to throw
| that away just because the politics here don't always align
| with my own.
| hotz wrote:
| You're not alone.
| dang wrote:
| This is normal fluctuation. People have been saying such
| things since the early years of HN--see
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869.
|
| There was a great deal of Trump discussion here, too. Such
| perceptions are prone to sample bias.
| zuminator wrote:
| I'm not sure why you couldn't simply skip the topics that you
| don't like, and completely avoid them, regardless of whether
| the reason for your lack of interest is politics or just that
| you never owned a ZX Spectrum or whatever.
| arkaniad wrote:
| True, but a counterpoint: One may not like the topic but it
| may be best to be aware of what the conversation is should
| one find oneself someday blindsided by some political
| decision with negative consequences informed by these
| discussions.
|
| Supporting evidence: I've gotta keep tabs on which places I
| shouldn't travel to in my own country where I was born and
| raised because people keep trying to make it illegal to use
| the bathroom safely [1] after getting scared by
| conversations such as the ones I've seen in this thread.
|
| [1] - https://www.ncsl.org/research/education/-bathroom-
| bill-legis...
| simonh wrote:
| I think HN is an excellent forum for this topic. It's not just
| about development here, it's also about the business of
| building tech companies. It's not an accident HN was built on
| the side of Y-Combinator. Also if we can't have a productive
| and civil discussion about it here, where can we? Sure we get
| trolls and wing nuts here, but fortunately there are enough
| adults that even divisive issues can get discussed
| productively. Not always, not on every topic, but it happens.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| For what it's worth, I _like_ that we discuss controversial
| topics here if only because it 's the only online forum I'm
| aware of where this stuff can be discussed with any degree of
| productive dialogue or without a constant barrage of bad faith
| (which isn't to say there aren't bad faith commenters here, but
| the signal/noise ratio is much higher here).
| maybeOneDay wrote:
| In my experience browsing HN almost daily, over the last year
| it has become something of an echo chamber for "anti woke"
| lines of thinking. I've seen little to no healthy discussion
| on the topic - by which I mean productive disagreement. It's
| usually just a top comment decrying twitter/etc and then a
| pile on of agreement.
| weakfish wrote:
| I'm in the same boat. Its a bit tiresome and I feel it's
| getting worse (?)
|
| Fwiw, current college student. My school isn't particularly
| "woke" beyond having a LGBT support center, but that
| strikes me as common decency rather than wokeness.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| I disagree with this only because I frequently get
| downvoted for comments that don't "fit the narrative."
| Could I be a little less brash in the way I word it? Sure,
| but I keep vulgarities at a minimum to at least come across
| as somewhat refined.
|
| People like me are very much liberal, left leaning, and
| dislike fascism. But as of now, it feels like freedom of
| speech is more of "freedom to speak about only certain
| things." Simply because so many people are kowtowing to
| these zealots. Of course you're going to get more vocal
| people opposed to this line of thinking. It's the exact
| same thing left leaning people like myself got away from in
| our psychotic religious upbringings. Only for us to see the
| exact same thing on the left, but with even more drastic
| and unfair measures.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Oh, the silent downvoting, I noticed it once than more.
|
| And on two occassions, it seemed as if somebody was so
| vindictive as to visit my comment history and downvote
| tens of older comments from threads that were a few days
| old. At least I cannot explain the unexpected loss of
| precisely 1 karma point from multiple comments in
| multiple threads at once.
|
| I wonder how such people look into the mirror without
| feeling even a slight pang of doubt about themselves.
| fagbag123 wrote:
| > HN ... an echo chamber for "anti woke" lines of thinking
|
| Nigger are you retarded
| zo1 wrote:
| It's entirely plausible that most were thinking that but
| didn't say anything for fear of backlash. If so then the
| mere act of them speaking what's really on their mind is,
| what I would argue as, "healthy discussion".
|
| Either way, I've been finding a lot of what's being said
| here today as interesting and mentally engaging on some
| level.
| shkkmo wrote:
| I would disagree. I think that there is a strong pro free
| speech group, most of who are also literally woke, but who
| also want to keep the overton window broad.
|
| There are, of course, some pretty reptitive comment
| threads, but you can collapse those and generally find more
| interesting discussion somewhere (don't forget there are
| often multiple pages of comments.)
| pc86 wrote:
| > What to Submit [0]
|
| > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting.
| That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to
| reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that
| gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
|
| > Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports,
| unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon.
| Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If
| they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
|
| Yes, gender ideology is pretty political (should it be?). But
| learning about it can obviously gratify one's intellectual
| curiosity if they're approaching it in good faith. So I don't
| think you're necessarily able to just make a blanket statement
| like "this isn't appropriate."
|
| As for having much to lose, if you feel alienated by a good
| faith intellectual discussion -- regardless of topic -- that's
| your problem. This sort of thing is discussed daily in liberal
| arts programs across the US and in most of the world. You have
| to be able to discuss and learn about topics, even divisive
| ones, without losing your shit.
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
|
| Edit: And it looks like in the period of time it took me to
| type this half a dozen other people said the same thing.
| metalman wrote:
| My personal experience of living and working,traveling
| with,family,friends,etc of all kinds of people including
| trans,gay,all the variants has left me with no conclusions
| whatsoever. On occasion someone would comment on another "that it
| takes all kinds to make the world go around" and I have never
| agreed,quite,my take is that there ARE all kinds and the world
| goes around anyway,and if you think that you are adjusted and are
| good with everyone then you dont get out much,cause if you are
| out there meeting new people in new situations well outside of
| your core group ,then you will find that there is no damn normal
| and a great deal that is just plain incomprehensible. Gender has
| become a team sport,and I have heard it said while with friends
| that so and so is "profesionaly gay" in that they have employment
| as a cultural sensitivity officer in a large organization and
| tend to become insuferable to all. I have also heard anicdotaly
| that F to M tranies often bail out of the "therapy" and come out
| with a new respect for men,in that having testosterone in thier
| system drives them to rage and anger and violence and they are
| astounded that men are not much much much worse that we are.
| Backlash you bet,and a good bit of it is comming from good honest
| people who are not strait and gendernormative. We need peace and
| prosperity for all,and pronouns will not supply that.
| theknocker wrote:
| The word TERF is not a fucking "slur."
| zwieback wrote:
| I think the courts are the right place for this battle, some
| fundamental free speech rights for both sides need to be
| enforced. I didn't think this would the necessary in academia but
| with universities turning into service industries it seems
| inevitable.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| As an adult return student in college currently, while I could
| engage in "free speech," the college is also free to expel me
| for creating a hostile environment for my views (I'm speaking
| generally here).
|
| Everybody hates Illinois Nazi's. But if a group them sprouted
| up at your school, can you really say it's fair freedom of
| speech-wise to shut them down at a publicly funded institution?
| No you can't. Not only that, but instructors can at whim grade
| you based on if they like you as opposed to legitimately
| getting good grades.
|
| Ultimately it just creates a system to be gamed by those wise
| enough to survive it. It's never been about education in the
| US. It's always been about "who can navigate the waters without
| getting labeled."
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Right or wrong courts pretty much always lag popular consensus
| in a democracy so the debate will happen elsewhere first.
| throwawaysea wrote:
| This is great news, because gender ideology has corrupted free
| inquiry and discourse in society as a whole, not just at
| universities. For example, the Royal Academy of Arts just issued
| an apology to an artist whose work they had removed from their
| shop due to pressure from trans rights activists (https://www.the
| guardian.com/artanddesign/2021/jun/23/royal-a...). There was also
| the case of Maya Forstater, who was allegedly let go from her job
| because of tweets saying that biological sex is real - she
| initially lost her case about employment discrimination but won
| upon appeal (https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-57426579).
|
| The trend in universities fighting for free speech and free
| inquiry is welcome and necessary. I have been concerned that
| things were going in the other direction when I saw the phrase
| "academic transphobia" appear, which was being used to de-
| platform certain people or stop certain research (see
| https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/stonewall-and-the-silenc...
| or https://www.starobserver.com.au/news/university-of-
| melbourne...). Apart from the linked Economist article, another
| related recent positive news is that Open University launched a
| "Gender Critical Academic Research Network"
| (https://thecritic.co.uk/the-new-network-for-gender-
| critical-...).
|
| PS: if you support free speech in academia, check out FIRE
| (https://www.thefire.org/). Since the ACLU is less focused on
| free speech issues these days
| (https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/the-
| disinte...), FIRE has become the new defender of basic civil
| liberties.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| Gender politics is a cancer on the left, even though I agree with
| it, it takes up so much time and energy away from things that
| would benefit everybody including trans people, like universal
| healthcare, better employee protection laws and better, more
| available education. Such a small percentage of the population
| has been the center point of so much discussion and debate, and
| for what benefit? All I see it doing is give the right-wing more
| ammunition to harden their bases.
| ixacto wrote:
| Yeah I'm not on the left any more and now an independent due to
| the left trying to use identity politics for political
| engagement. Still support what Bernie/Yang are doing though
| with trying to universalize healthcare and income though.
| busterarm wrote:
| > it takes up so much time and energy away from things that
| would benefit everybody including trans people, like universal
| healthcare, better employee protection laws and better
|
| Distraction working as intended then? Neither political party
| has really shown any clear legislative intention on delivering
| on those things you ask for.
| istorical wrote:
| The same could be said for most wedge issues. In the US, gun
| rights and and abortion also become a focal point of US
| politics despite the existence of issues that deal with
| millions of preventable deaths (automobile safety, obesity
| epidemic, poverty), issues that deal with hundreds of thousands
| of displaced peoples and killed civilians (Afghanistan and Iraq
| war, war mongering over Syria, Libya, Iran, etc), and climate
| change, which our brightness minds continue to tell us could
| lead to not insubstantial percentages of all forms of life on
| our planet going extinct and billions or trillions of dollars
| of economic cost.
|
| But we just focus on emotional trigger point issues. See focus
| on and mass protests because of police brutality (hundreds of
| deaths a year) compared to zero widespread action on the
| injustice of the prison system (hundreds of thousands of lives
| ruined, literal slavery and imprisonment in cages over
| antiquated unequally applied drug laws).
| shigawire wrote:
| Difference is it is fairly clear cut to say that the state
| does not need to murder people already in custody.
|
| It is harder to get a clear consensus on how to handle crime
| and imprisonment in general. It's a problem without a single
| good solution.
|
| Whereas the solution to police brutality incidents like
| George Floyd should be pretty simple in comparison.
| edrxty wrote:
| There's truth here, feels-over-reals is very much a problem
| in US politics. That said, feelings/perceptions have
| consequences if left unchecked. A few hundred people being
| "made an example of" by the police each year can functionally
| oppress an entire ethnic group in a country.
|
| All that said, in light of the previous example, it makes the
| abortion fight seem particularly...whimsical...given the
| stakes. The evangelicals believe they themselves are going to
| heaven regardless of what the non-evangelicals do and those
| getting abortions don't care so it's rather hard to point to
| a group being oppressed by their beliefs here.
| bob_roberts wrote:
| > Such a small percentage of the population
|
| That's not a good argument for the left to stop defending trans
| people's rights.
| dgb23 wrote:
| It's almost like those who are opposing acceptance are
| slowing things down for little reason.
| edrxty wrote:
| Gender politics are interesting because they are mostly just a
| source of in-fighting within various factions of the left [1]
| but because they cover a set of topics that seem so foreign to
| the right, it gives them lots of ammunition for cruel memes to
| distract themselves from their own internal struggles.
|
| That said, it's a nuanced issue that touches a lot of aspects
| of life and effects more people than one would initially
| assume. It's very much worth sorting out, but it's the kind of
| issue that's easily going to be derailed by toxic personalities
| because much like guns and religion, it's an attack on one's
| self image. If you're a billionaire wanting to cause havoc to
| prevent wealth taxes or environmental regulation, throwing
| money at either side of this cause seems like a pretty good way
| to get high political-chaos ROI.
|
| [1] - https://xkcd.com/1095/
| tdeck wrote:
| This is the same thing people said about gay rights 15 years
| ago.
| nepeckman wrote:
| One thing I find very troubling about articles like this is the
| tendency to frame hot political topics as essentially academic,
| while they are in fact very practical. Across the US and England,
| trans people are being denied access to health care, medically
| necessary operations, and effective therapeutic treatment. But
| this article doesn't discuss those issues, it only discusses the
| ramifications of this political reality.
| mdoms wrote:
| This article also doesn't discuss the plight of the Uyghurs,
| bee colony collapse or the atmosphere of Venus. Because that's
| not what this article is about.
| nepeckman wrote:
| The plight of the Uyghurs does not relate to the political
| oppression of trans people. Political oppression of trans
| people is inextricable from the discussion of anti trans
| ideology on college campuses. To make an analogy, this
| article is like writing about the Uyghur genocide, but
| instead of discussing concentration campus or the Chinese
| government, focusing instead on one individual who wasnt
| allowed to speak because they said "China has done nothing
| wrong." Do you see the problem? Instead of focusing on actual
| tragedy, I have derailed the conversation by framing the
| plight of this poor pro China individual as the real issue.
| Now the comments are debating the subjects of academic free
| speech and cancel culture instead of the real issue at hand.
| weeblewobble wrote:
| This article is the number one most active post on Culture War
| (Hacker) News today. I'm not sure what that says about this forum
| but it's not good.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| A relative of mine taught at a small art college a few years ago.
|
| The situation for college students, at least a certain segment,
| is that people with the transgender identity are far more common
| than they once were. That's the base reality, not the product of
| any ideology. And whatever it's point of origin, this reality for
| these isn't going to change.
|
| Now, you can object to various qualities of current gender
| ideologies and I'm not necessary uncritical myself. But these
| ideologies also mechanisms for accommodating the ability of
| transgender people existing minimally in the world. If someone
| intends to simply discard entirely these processes, they are
| essentially taking aim at this ability of transgender people to
| minimally exist.
|
| It's active question, to say the least. Transpeople today have a
| significant and growing chance of being murdered for being trans
| [1]. The attention put on this by the right wing also has
| resulted in violence masculine-appearing women.
|
| It should be noted that the Economist was talking about debate
| concerning whether transwomen should be put in men's or in
| women's prisons. How much do you think that's a matter of
| survival for these people?
|
| I'd love to see the details of gender ideology, the complex
| choices involved with hormones and surgery, etc debated more
| deeply but when the "debate" allows the question "should we allow
| these people to continue living?", you will see people willing to
| completely shut down discussion.
|
| [1] https://www.hrc.org/resources/fatal-violence-against-the-
| tra...
| neartheplain wrote:
| >The situation for college students, at least a certain
| segment, is that people with the transgender identity are far
| more common than they once were. That's the base reality, not
| the product of any ideology. And whatever it's point of origin,
| this reality for these isn't going to change.
|
| A significant number of people who identity as trans later
| return to their original gender identity. This is known as
| "detransitioning:"
|
| https://www.thestranger.com/features/2017/06/28/25252342/the...
|
| It's a controversial topic, as many trans people see the
| existence of detrans people as a threat to the validity of
| their own identity. For their part, many detrans people resent
| the medical practitioners who they feel didn't adequately
| provide council or obtain informed consent before facilitating
| their transition, sometimes involving expensive, painful, and
| irreversible medical procedures. Some research also indicates
| most (!) children who identify as trans abandon this identity
| post-puberty:
|
| https://www.kqed.org/futureofyou/441784/the-controversial-re...
|
| The Blocked and Reported podcast, which I generally find to be
| fair-minded and evenhanded, recently interviewed a detrans
| person who had worked at a SF gender transition clinic. I found
| their experience illuminating:
|
| https://barpodcast.fireside.fm/50
|
| The BBC and 60 Minutes have also produced reporting on this
| issue.
| joe_the_user wrote:
| _A significant number of people who identity as trans later
| return to their original gender identity._
|
| Whatever the percentage of people who chose to do this, that
| situation doesn't actually change my point - that significant
| number of trans people exist and their situation is quite
| threatened.
|
| And the way that you (and other) think that this is a
| "counter argument" is something of a demonstration that
| people making these points aim to threaten the existence of
| transpeople, which is why such points get a lot of flak.
| cryptica wrote:
| My view on gender is the same as anything else. We should accept
| the cards we're dealt and focus on our strengths.
|
| Nobody is making you focus on your problems, you can choose what
| to focus on. If you were born as the wrong gender, why would you
| focus on that? You will probably never win that battle. You can
| never be satisfied because you will never have what most other
| people have. You should try to focus on other things where you
| actually have a reasonable chance of success; of feeling
| satisfied.
|
| Most people are deepy dissatisfied with certain aspects of
| themselves and if you ignore these things long enough and focus
| on other things intensely, eventually, after a decade or two you
| may stop caring about your complexes completely.
| syngrog66 wrote:
| excellent to see. its been one of the more Orwellian trends I've
| seen in the US in recent years. I wouldnt say its even a top 5 or
| top 10 problem, but it is bad. its been increasingly unpleasant
| having to always worry whether any given sentence or idea shared
| on social media will be jumped on by an indoctrinated online mob,
| blind to all nuance.
| kelvin0 wrote:
| We should focus on giving ALL humans a nurturing environment and
| allow them to grow to achieve their full potential and in turn be
| able to share their talents to help others.
|
| There is pain, sorrow. There is also place to grow and live a
| meaningful life and be happy.
|
| Anything else is just nitpicking and a red herring. Creating an
| infinity of subcategories of humans is not the solution, because
| it incentives the us-them paradigm, and of course polarization of
| discourse.
|
| Intolerance in any forms is destructive in nature.
| mabub24 wrote:
| One thing I find quite odd is how the study of gender emerged out
| of an approach that demanded a critical understanding of
| _assumptions_ and the things society insist upon (that there are
| only 2 genders, that gender is essentially related to biological
| sex rather than something that is manifest in social behaviour,
| ect.) and yet that view has twisted into a sort of all or nothing
| view that is extremely antagonistic to critical inquiry. The
| tendency for a number of trans activists and talking points to
| revert back to a kind of gender essentialism; the logical
| inconsistencies in the idea that one identifies a _private_
| gender identity, rather than a personal desire to transition or
| live as another gender; the insistence that a trans person has
| special insight into the concept of gender --- raise up any of
| these points and you bear the risk of being labelled a
| "transphobe" even though you are entirely committed to the
| protection of a trans persons rights and dignity.
|
| A small, extremely vocal minority insists that anyone that voices
| the slightest hesitation in accommodating trans people into
| gender/sex segregated social functions _must_ be a transphobe or
| be complicit in the violence against trans people. It makes the
| entire conversation exhausting.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| I dunno if I'd agree that it's a small vocal minority, zero-
| tolerance to anybody questioning the current dogma is seen
| everywhere where trans acceptance is a focus. Ten years ago I
| was told, by trans people, that there are physical differences
| between trans and cis brains. Say that today, and you get
| kicked out of LGBT spaces for being a transmedicalist or
| truscum.
|
| I have no idea whether it's true or not because you can't even
| find _research_ on the subject because of how absurdly
| politicized the topic is.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| "Truscum" being the word for someone who thinks that changing
| one's gender and sexual characteristics might not be the
| greatest idea ever unless you actually _have_ , like, gender
| dysphoria. Never mind the many, many people who are now
| pursuing "detransition" after going one step too far. I mean,
| what could possibly go wrong?
| dang wrote:
| Please don't take HN threads further into flamewar. We're
| trying for a different sort of internet here, to the extent
| possible.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| a_conservative wrote:
| Its interesting that you didn't actually tell the poster
| what they did wrong.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| I'm also genuinely puzzled by dang's remark. I had tried
| to limit the unpleasantness in my comment as far as
| possible, while providing clarifying info and staying
| accurate to (i) what the trans activism movement _itself_
| seems to be stating internally, as well as (ii) the
| easily foreseeable consequences of these attitudes, if
| stated only obliquely for the sake of general politeness.
| If even that counts as "furthering a flamewar", this has
| some remarkably unpleasant implications about the overall
| debate re: gender issues.
| dang wrote:
| As I read it, your comment fit the genre of boilerplate
| ideological rhetoric and that is the last thing we need
| here.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| OK, I'll just agree to disagree then. I understand that
| boilerplate ideological rhetoric is an unavoidable hazard
| in a thread about gender issues (or indeed, politics more
| generally) and I'll keep trying to write comments that
| are as far as possible from any 'boilerplate'.
| anoncake wrote:
| "many, many people" -- do you have numbers as to how many
| people detransition, not due to being pressured but because
| they aren't trans after all, and only after making
| irreversible changes?
| busterarm wrote:
| The idea that you can even detransition is fairly recent.
| Before then you just had to live with it...and the
| suicide rate historically has actually been 20 times
| higher post-op.
|
| You might want to look up what Danielle Bunten Berry,
| rest in peace, had to say on the matter. The important
| quote is on her wikipedia page.
| yownie wrote:
| Seems like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detransition
| might be a point to start. YMMV with how much weight a
| controversial topic like that on WP should carry.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| I do not know anything about the subject of the linked
| article, nor her views. Did not venture past the
| pay/registration wall. I have no opinion about her.
| zero-tolerance to anybody questioning the current dogma is
| seen everywhere
|
| Generally, of course dogma should be questioned.
|
| However, academic freedom does _not_ mean that universities
| must provide a platform to literally anybody that wants one.
| Their resources are finite and choices need to be made.
|
| Surely, we can agree that some discussions by their very
| nature are harmful or at least deeply insulting. Imagine
| discussions such as "should women be allowed to vote?" or
| "are $ETHNICITY people worthwhile of being treated like other
| human beings?" or "was Hitler right?" or some other such
| topic.
|
| I would certainly not say such speech should be banned, but
| it is equally clear to me that no institution should be
| obligated to provide a _platform_ for such ideas.
|
| It's worth noting that "teach the controversy" is the
| disingenuous rallying cry of creationists seeking to wedge
| anti-evolution religious dogma into US public school systems.
| Those people know that merely giving creationism a figurative
| seat at the table serves to legitimize it to some extent.
| They also hope to wear down their opposition (in this case,
| already-overworked educators) by consuming massive amounts of
| their time and energy. Well, such religious teachings
| _should_ be denied a seat at the table, at least in publicly-
| funded secular schools.
| freemint wrote:
| I am not sure if your definition of academic freedom
| applies equally all over the world. I understand Humboldts
| definition of "Freiheit von Forschung und Lehre" an
| university is obligated to support you once you have been
| taken on and to fire people because of their research alone
| would violate it.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| In this specific case she was a guest of Essex University
| and not a tenured professor there, so they were under no
| specific obligation to provide a platform for her.
| Jo Phoenix, a professor of criminology at
| Britain's Open University, was due to give a
| talk at Essex University
|
| To your point though, I wouldn't find it good for a
| tenured professor to lose their job for such a thing.
| However, even the idea of tenure really is meant to be
| more like "freedom from interference" and not "unlimited
| freedom without consequences", right? And of course the
| tenure track prior to tenure is of course a period of
| intense vetting.
| MeinBlutIstBlau wrote:
| Why are publicly funded institutions allowed to decide
| who's opinion matters and whose doesn't? Assuming the
| discussion is poised and not straight up slandering
| nonsense, what harm does it do? Are we trying to curtail
| freedom of speech? They shouldn't be allowed to take a
| stance because they are the government. Although for some
| reason colleges can operate as some separate entity that
| just happens to siphon government funds...
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Why are publicly funded institutions allowed to
| decide who's opinion matters and whose doesn't?
|
| At a very minimum, there are real-world constraints at
| work.
|
| There are a limited number of lecture halls and
| auditoriums. It costs money to run the facilities. Staff
| is required to maintain them. Somebody has to sweep the
| floors. There are heating and cooling bills to be paid
| and new boilers to be purchased every few decades. There
| are a limited number of hours available in students'
| academic careers.
|
| A university cannot provide platforms for an unlimited
| number of professors and guest speakers; a student cannot
| _attend_ an unlimited number of talks /lectures.
|
| Therefore it is obvious. Choices must be made. One could
| even say that this curation is one of the most elementary
| duties of an educational institution.
|
| What's _your_ alternative? Should publicly funded
| institutions make zero curatorial choices whatsoever?
| Should literally anybody be able to teach there? If that
| is not your position, then you surely accept that _some_
| curation needs to occur.
|
| This is not incompatible with the wishes of the people
| nor does it suggest that educational institutions should
| have dictatorial carte blanche. They must make choices,
| but must also be accountable to the public.
| Are we trying to curtail freedom of speech?
|
| No.
|
| Nobody is arguing that the subject of the linked article
| should be barred from expressing her views. This is
| strictly a question about who should (or should not) be
| obligated to give her a soapbox and a megaphone.
| They shouldn't be allowed to take a stance
| because they are the government.
|
| There would be considerable benefits to getting the
| government out of the education business entirely. The
| downsides would be considerable as well.
|
| It would be worth looking for examples of times and
| places when government kept its nose out of education
| entirely. I do not think you will enjoy the correlation
| between "governments disinterested in education" and...
| well, anything good.
| a1369209993 wrote:
| > Their resources are finite and choices need to be made.
|
| By your own description[0][1], choices had _already_ been
| made, and resources had already been committed.
|
| 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27609417
|
| 1: > Jo Phoenix, a professor of criminology at Britain's
| Open University, was due to give a talk at Essex University
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Yes. Decisions are made all the time. Sometimes they are
| reconsidered and sometimes even reversed. That is not
| _inherently_ a bad thing, particularly when new
| information comes to light subsequent to the initial
| decision.
|
| What are you getting at? I can guess, but these things
| work better if we don't make assumptions or guesses about
| what others are saying.
| [deleted]
| randcraw wrote:
| Given that reproduction in mammals is inescapably binary, and a
| really big fraction of social interaction in humans is shaped
| by courtship, both overt and covert, it's hardly surprising
| that our historical perspective on gender roles has been
| predominantly binary too.
|
| I think another reason "things are different now" is that more
| of us think abstractly today than in years past. Many of the
| perspectives and possibilities we entertain today would have
| been alien to more of us 50 or 100 years ago, when the world
| was more conventional, more black and white.
|
| Finally, with the multitudes of voices that no longer remain
| hidden behind mainstream media outlets, we're more aware of
| nontraditional, complex, and nuanced POVs today. That helps us
| realize that many psychological variations exist "between the
| lines", not as pathology but as a matter of natural variation.
| Moodles wrote:
| > The arguments the two sides put forward, in other words, are
| complex and debatable. But many trans activists think that any
| disagreement is tantamount to hate speech and try to suppress it.
|
| This is 100% my personal experience also. Even on HN last week
| someone said I should try to be a "better human" and compared my
| _suggestion_ that _maybe_ someone might oppose transgender women
| in women 's spaces for reasons other than pure hatred or phobia
| of trans people, to segregation of blacks and whites. It's just
| absolutely impossible to have any disagreement with them without
| them trying these inane mob bully tactics. Being outraged should
| not be your only argument.
|
| Take the case of Fallon Fox
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallon_Fox): a mixed martial
| artist transgender woman (who didn't even disclose she used to be
| a he while she was competing against women), or Laurel Hubbard,
| the New Zealand transgender olympic weightlifter in the news this
| week. Even mentioning these cases which _clearly_ have more to
| them than pure hatred or phobia of trans people, still get
| lambasted with abuse.
|
| What's really frustrating is that they don't really listen to
| what you actually say, but instead "read between the lines" and
| assume everything you say is just a ruse hidden behind some
| immense hatred and bigotry. How about no? Just take what I say at
| face value. No, I'm not full of hate. Yes, I know being
| transgendered must be hard. Yes, I do know some transgendered
| people (why is this relevant?). Yes, I am cisgendered myself. No,
| I really do think transgender women have an advantage in combat
| sports. No, again, I'm not full of hate... It's quite ridiculous.
|
| ... OP was flagged because...?
| dang wrote:
| It looks like your account has been using HN primarily for
| ideological battle. Can you please not do that? It's against
| the rules here because it destroys the curious conversation
| that HN is supposed to exist for. We ban accounts that do this,
| regardless of what their ideology happens to be. See [1] for
| more explanation.
|
| If you wouldn't mind reviewing
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the
| intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
|
| [1]
| https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
| Moodles wrote:
| Is this rate limiting on commenting ever going to be lifted
| or is it permanent?
| dang wrote:
| We're happy to take off rate limits if people give us some
| reason to believe that they sincerely intend to follow the
| site guidelines in the future.
| Moodles wrote:
| Ok I promise. My last topics I posted on were about this,
| a security blog post, the news, Simone Biles and accents.
| I do actually talk about lots of topics on HN but I tend
| to get drawn into political discussions which are replied
| to a lot more. Also it's hard for me not to respond when
| someone calls me a bigot, etc. I'm definitely not on HN
| just to troll about politics. I really think it's unfair
| to say I'm on HN to "battle" anyone. I don't think my
| comments here have been particularly confrontational?
| threatofrain wrote:
| But why would you discuss someone's medical suffering by
| leading with a topic on trans elite sports, which focuses on an
| extreme niche and elite phenomena?
| Moodles wrote:
| Because I am making the point that _even mentioning something
| as extreme as that_ still gets me lambasted with abuse. So if
| we can 't even discuss that civilly, how on Earth are we
| meant to discuss more nuanced issues?
| threatofrain wrote:
| So you are saying you choose to lead with elite trans
| sports, a niche phenomena of a niche phenomena, in order to
| demonstrate that you will be lambasted with abuse?
|
| And that is how you choose to lead with your speech?
|
| And you are saying if we can't discuss elite trans sports
| with nuance with civility, then how can we discuss an even
| more nuanced topic than trans elite sports?
|
| So did you want to discuss trans elite sports or were you
| trying to demonstrate that people cannot handle a
| conversation with greater nuance? Or both at the same time?
| Moodles wrote:
| > And you are saying if we can't discuss elite trans
| sports with nuance, then how can we discuss an even more
| nuanced topic than trans elite sports?
|
| That's all i'm saying. It's pretty obvious having an
| objection to Fallon Fox fighting biological women has
| more to it than pure hatred and bigotry towards trans
| women. If the gender ideology crowd can't acknowledge
| that or debate that civilly, I really see no chance of
| debating less clearcut topics. I deliberately chose it as
| the most extreme example I could think of to demonstrate
| how unreasonable and emotional I think that segment of
| the political spectrum is.
|
| > So did you want to discuss trans elite sports or were
| you trying to demonstrate that people cannot handle a
| conversation with greater nuance? Or both at the same
| time?
|
| The latter, but if you want to talk about the former we
| can do that too.
| threatofrain wrote:
| What do you have to say about the primary phenomena of
| clinical suffering? Its etiologies and its course in
| medical debate across the west? That is a discussion
| which hits squarely on "What is trans?"
|
| But when you lead with Joe Rogan, I'd have to ask, is Joe
| Rogan the best you have?
| loopz wrote:
| Good discussion is give and take. There should be no
| competition, even if someone decides to bring up sports
| as an example.
|
| Maybe if people tried to listen and understand more, they
| could ask followup questions and try to get what the
| other person had in mind, instead of trying to tear down
| opponents?
| threatofrain wrote:
| In order to partake in give and take, you have to have
| something to give.
|
| When you pick up the microphone, that is your chance to
| make an offering of what you have to give. What we have
| here an offering of Joe Rogan debates.
|
| > What do you have to say about the primary phenomena of
| clinical suffering? Its etiologies and its course in
| medical debate across the west? That is a discussion
| which hits squarely on "What is trans?"
|
| The response is "I think clinical suffering is bad?"
| Moodles wrote:
| You ask me "what do you think of suffering?". I honestly
| have no clue what you expect as a response. Yeah, it's
| bad. I don't want people to suffer. What is your point?
| What has this got to do with what I was saying?
|
| And again, the only person who keeps bringing up Joe
| Rogan is you. What has this got to do with anything? Can
| we just focus on actual points being made here?
|
| My OP was about how impossible it is to have sensible
| debates about trans issues without being lambasted. Where
| is this thread going now? What direction are you taking
| it?
| threatofrain wrote:
| I'm mostly bothered by the focus on trans elite sports,
| because I find it to be a niche phenomena, and it
| suggests the curation of those who lead with such an
| argument.
|
| By tactical argument, I mean an argument you make which
| you don't think is your leading argument, but you make it
| anyway because you want to demonstrate an effect.
|
| Discussing trans elite sports warrants a broad biological
| and medical discussion on sex. The trans phenomena
| includes those who have received clinical classification
| under gender dysphoria to hormonal differences with
| sexual effects.
|
| You keep wondering why I bring up Joe Rogan. It's because
| I don't think any discussion here will rise above the
| playground of arguments made by Joe Rogan, a major player
| on the conversation of trans elite sports.
|
| You might look to the entire discussion stemming from the
| article to see if anything ever rises to this level of
| discussion.
| Moodles wrote:
| > I'm mostly bothered by the focus on trans elite sports,
| because I find it to be a niche phenomena, and it
| suggests the curation of those who lead with such an
| argument.
|
| The reason I mentioned combat sports is because it's
| literally the _clearest_ example I can possibly think of
| where one can have objections to transgender women in
| women 's spaces without having hate in their heart, and
| yet _still_ one gets lambasted for bringing it up. So my
| overall point is about the lambasting, as the Economist
| article talks about.
|
| > By tactical argument, I mean an argument you make which
| you don't think is your leading argument, but you make it
| anyway because you want to demonstrate an effect.
|
| My leading argument is: "the gender ideology community
| lambast people way too much. Here's an obvious example of
| something which they shouldn't lambast about but they do
| anyway.". I honestly don't know how I can be any clearer
| here. There is no hate. No hidden agenda. Just what I've
| actually said at face value multiple times. Please stop
| trying to read between the lines.
|
| > You keep wondering why I bring up Joe Rogan. It's
| because I don't think any discussion here will rise above
| the playground of arguments made by Joe Rogan, a major
| player on the conversation of trans elite sports.
|
| I find this ironic since you're the one bringing down the
| quality of discussion with all the red herrings. What do
| you actually want to discuss? Where am I going wrong and
| what do you want to convince me of?
| threatofrain wrote:
| This is an invitation to track the course of medical
| debate through the west. That's a very open platform from
| which to discuss transgenderism, its etiologies and its
| impacts.
|
| >> What do you have to say about the primary phenomena of
| clinical suffering? Its etiologies and its course in
| medical debate across the west? That is a discussion
| which hits squarely on "What is trans?"
|
| And surely you don't think we're the only conversation in
| town. Look at this entire post and see if there's
| anything which rises above the Joe Rogan level of debate.
| It won't.
|
| > I find this ironic since you're the one bringing down
| the quality of discussion with all the red herrings. What
| do you actually want to discuss? Where am I going wrong
| and what do you want to convince me of?
|
| I don't accuse you of hate. I accuse you using the topic
| trans elite sports as an intellectual point to push
| around.
| Moodles wrote:
| I have no idea what you're saying.
|
| I think clinical suffering is bad? I have not mentioned
| Joe Rogan. I have no idea what point you're trying to
| make.
| pixxel wrote:
| Like racist, nazi, or phobe, Joe Rogan is used by certain
| types as a dismissive. They had that one locked and
| loaded without looking at the target.
| Jotra7 wrote:
| Anyone listening to Joe Rogan is showing the quality of
| their brain.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| I think threatofrain is proving your point. Their
| approach seems to be to try to find something, _anything_
| , that they can argue, no matter how unrelated to the
| point at hand, and to keep arguing forever. Points that
| they can't answer get silently dropped, with no admission
| that the other side has a point.
|
| I've seen this pattern before. At best it's someone so
| committed to a position that they are determined to do
| battle rather than actually have a conversation. At worst
| it's someone arguing in bad faith.
|
| Or, I suppose, most charitably, it's someone who lost the
| thread of the conversation and replied to the wrong
| person.
| threatofrain wrote:
| > Because I am making the point that even mentioning
| something as extreme as that still gets me lambasted with
| abuse. So if we can't even discuss that civilly, how on
| Earth are we meant to discuss more nuanced issues?
|
| I'm not the person who setup a discussion by leading with
| a tactical argument. If you want an argument on
| substance, you should lead with a proposition that you
| have something of substance to give, not that you have
| tactics to offer because you don't trust real
| conversation.
|
| There are very few cases of transgender elite sports.
| Leading with that discussion implies that you have very
| little to say on actual transgenderism, and it implies
| your taste in curation or how you choose to lead in a
| discussion.
|
| > What do you have to say about the primary phenomena of
| clinical suffering? Its etiologies and its course in
| medical debate across the west? That is a discussion
| which hits squarely on "What is trans?"
|
| I asked a question to invite display of expertise on the
| underlying primary subject -- actual transgenderism. The
| response is that medical suffering sucks.
|
| So far this debate has never elevated past the Joe Rogan
| level of discourse. You can look at any other branching
| thread to see the intellectually inspiring quality of
| opening discussion with trans elite sports.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| You're the person who entered the discussion by assuming
| that the original post was a tactical argument, rather
| than a good-faith post of a reasonable position.
|
| And, _what on earth_ does Joe Rogan have to do with the
| original topic? _You_ keep bringing him up, and he 's
| irrelevant to Moodles' point. What on earth does clinical
| suffering have to do with the original topic? _You_ keep
| bringing that up, and it 's irrelevant to Moodles' point.
|
| You're giving off this _really strong_ "only here to do
| ideological battle" vibe. That's not what HN is for.
| threatofrain wrote:
| You can choose not to offer people your faith. In this
| case it was validated by an admission that an argument
| was tactically made.
|
| > Because I am making the point that even mentioning
| something as extreme as that still gets me lambasted with
| abuse. So if we can't even discuss that civilly, how on
| Earth are we meant to discuss more nuanced issues?
|
| >> So did you want to discuss trans elite sports or were
| you trying to demonstrate that people cannot handle a
| conversation with greater nuance? Or both at the same
| time?
|
| > The latter, but if you want to talk about the former we
| can do that too.
|
| But you're still focused on whether we afford good faith
| to tactical arguments.
|
| You're accusing me of bad character while espousing
| whatever it means to offer faith, but whether anyone is
| here to do ideological battle is easily confirmed by
| simply clicking on their account history.
|
| And what does Joe Rogan have to do with discourse on
| elite trans sports? He's a benchmark for conversation
| quality and focus and a major player in discussing trans
| issues. There are other branching threads here. See if
| anything ever rises above Joe Rogan's playground of
| debate.
|
| > What on earth does clinical suffering have to do with
| the original topic? You keep bringing that up, and it's
| irrelevant to Moodles' point.
|
| And surely one does not ask, "What does transgenderism
| have to do with transgendered people in elite sports?"
|
| > What do you have to say about the primary phenomena of
| clinical suffering? Its etiologies and its course in
| medical debate across the west? That is a discussion
| which hits squarely on "What is trans?"
|
| This is what I wanted to discuss. An open invitation to
| discuss the course of medical debate across the west, one
| which squarely hits at "What is trans?"
| Moodles wrote:
| > In this case it was validated by an admission that an
| argument was tactically made.
|
| Huh? Essentially all I have said is this:
|
| "I agree with the Economist article. This is my personal
| experience also. Here's an example."
|
| Tactually made? What does this even mean? Do you think I
| have a hidden agenda of bigotry towards trans people or
| something? What exactly am I doing wrong in your eyes? Is
| there any actual specific sentence I have written you
| disagree with?
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| From your original post:
|
| > > The arguments the two sides put forward, in other
| words, are complex and debatable. But many trans
| activists think that any disagreement is tantamount to
| hate speech and try to suppress it.
|
| > This is 100% my personal experience also.
|
| And it's looking a lot like your experience here. You're
| getting told that you can't have put forth your comments
| in good faith, that it was "tactically made". (Which I
| interpret as meaning that it's to push an agenda rather
| than in good faith. I could be mistaken, but threatofrain
| is not clarifying what that accusation means.)
|
| So, yeah, I stand by my statement that this whole thread
| proves your point...
| Moodles wrote:
| Yeah, so perceptive to have read between the lines and
| seen the darkness in my soul. \s
| yownie wrote:
| I see no part where OP mentioned Joe Rogan?
|
| Am I mistaken here?
| Moodles wrote:
| I'm so confused. I never mentioned Joe Rogan. But even if
| I did say "Joe Rogan said X", then let's talk about X?
| How is the fact that Joe Rogan said something
| automatically invalidating the argument itself? I don't
| even like the premise that it's a bad thing to even speak
| the guy's name.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| People don't like their identity being debated. Bringing up
| trans women in sports as a talking point would be pretty
| upsetting to most trans women as it is likely to feel like
| you're invalidating their personal experience of being
| trans.
|
| There's this thing with marginalized communities where
| people outside of the communities "just want to have a
| discussion" but the stakes of that conversation are way too
| high for marginalized people. Trans people's existence is
| not for you to challenge or debate. The best thing to do in
| situations like this is to let the marginalized people
| figure out what they need and then quietly listen to their
| conclusions. It's not really something that's there for you
| to "discuss".
| Moodles wrote:
| I'm sorry, but this is a classic example of what I'm
| talking about.
|
| > People don't like their identity being debated.
|
| But this is reframing. I'm not debating that someone is
| trans or should be treated with respect or anything like
| that.
|
| > Bringing up trans women in sports as a talking point
| would be pretty upsetting to most trans women as it is
| likely to feel like you're invalidating their personal
| experience of being trans.
|
| Ok? Feelings might be hurt. Feelings are subjective.
| That's not an argument. It's also pretty upsetting for
| the women who are now competing at a biological
| disadvantage. Particularly in combat sports where there's
| potentially dier consequences for losing. What about
| their feelings?
|
| > Trans people's existence is not for you to challenge or
| debate.
|
| Again... That's not what I'm challenging or debating at
| all. I'll be honest, I _fucking hate this_ debate
| switcheroo. I 'm not challenging someone's existence.
| _Listen to what I 'm actually saying_. This is so
| annoying to me.
|
| > The best thing to do in situations like this is to let
| the marginalized people figure out what they need and
| then quietly listen to their conclusions
|
| No, it isn't. Not when it affects more than just the
| marginalized community. If their actions affect others
| (e.g. women) then it's not primarily up to just them to
| figure out what they want to do.
|
| Again, _this is nothing to do with hate or bigotry_. I 'm
| not "debating their existence". I literally don't know
| how much clearer I can be here.
|
| Sorry, I can't respond anymore since my account has been
| rate limited.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| You can say you're not debating their existence till
| they're blue in the face, but I'm telling you that's how
| it will feel to 9/10 trans people when you try to discuss
| this topic with them.
|
| You can ignore their feelings but that's the problem. You
| don't care that it's upsetting. To you it's just some
| abstract intellectual thing to discuss but to them it
| could be a source of trauma and pain. I don't think
| you're appreciating what you're asking a trans person to
| do when you bring up topics that relate to trauma they've
| experienced.
| Moodles wrote:
| > You can say you're not debating their existence till
| they're blue in the face, but I'm telling you that's how
| it will feel to 9/10 trans people when you try to discuss
| this topic with them.
|
| Indeed. Though I'm honestly not sure if it's "9/10 trans
| people" or just the gender ideology crowd. Regardless,
| having strong feelings doesn't win the debate. I can give
| platitudes all day about how sympathetic I am to people
| with gender dysmorphia or any other difficulties in life,
| but when it comes to debating issues, we need to be more
| dispassionate as my original point and the point of the
| Economist article is that these topics are nuanced and
| shutting down the conversation as "hate speech" is not
| productive at all.
|
| > You can ignore their feelings but that's the problem.
| You don't care that it's upsetting.
|
| No, in my view, this type of comment is the problem.
| You're assuming I don't care at all just because I
| disagree. Please just take my comments at face value. I
| said in my original comment I have sympathy for trans
| people.
|
| > To you it's just some abstract intellectual thing to
| discuss but to them it could be a source of trauma and
| pain
|
| Take the women in mixed martial arts. To them, it's a
| source of actual, physical pain.
| mike00632 wrote:
| But people are literally proposing a separate a set of
| laws and class of citizen for trans people over a fear
| that, as you admit, something that happens so seldomly
| that it's irrelevant.
|
| The same thing happened with the "debate" about gays in
| the military. Bigots brought up the problem of shared
| showers in the military even though most gym showers are
| individual stalls. Still, this was used actually used as
| a rational to keep a ban on gay people, not recognize gay
| marriage (which means less pay for gay people in the
| military) and more.
|
| Now we have proposals to ban trans people from public
| facilities, outlaw medical procedures for trans people
| and defund any publicly funded trans-related medical
| drug. And what is fueling this "discussion"?: bullshit
| stories about trans women assaulting people in bathrooms
| and sports being dominated by trans athletes (both of
| which are demonstrably false).
| textgel wrote:
| Yes funnily enough those who wanted to "Just have a
| discussion" were the ones who forced us into this mess in
| the first place.
|
| People might not like "having their identity being
| debated" but people also don't like having their
| opportunities taken away or being forced into situations
| they don't feel comfortable in or ones that threaten
| their safety.
|
| I think the best thing for you to do in situations like
| this is quietly listen to the counter points being given
| to you and gently and wholesomely get your hands off of
| the people and their lives that you are reaching for.
| It's really not something you are entitled to have or
| control.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Trans people are not "reaching for" anyone's lives they
| just want to be able to exist in society without being
| harassed.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Everyone here agrees that they oughtn't be harassed. We
| disagree on whether or not folks who disagree with trans
| activists have the right to speak on the matter.
| textgel wrote:
| And the definition of harassed
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > There's this thing with marginalized communities where
| people outside of the communities "just want to have a
| discussion" but the stakes of that conversation are way
| too high for marginalized people.
|
| Presumably the "high stakes" are that they might fall out
| with the majority population, right? In that case why not
| do all you can to engage productively with them? There
| was a time when civil rights activists _wished for_ good
| faith participation.
|
| > The best thing to do in situations like this is to let
| the marginalized people figure out what they need and
| then quietly listen to their conclusions.
|
| There are a couple of problems here.
|
| The first is that "their conclusions" are often the
| conclusions of certain activists and not the marginalized
| people in question (e.g., "defund the police"). I find
| this to be the most repulsive kind of rhetoric, because
| it exploits marginalized groups to the harm of everyone
| else and to the exclusive benefit of the activist and
| their ideological comrades.
|
| The second is that it dehumanizes everyone else: others
| are to simply keep quiet and listen to the marginalized
| group's needs; to acquiesce. We are all (aspirationally,
| at least) equal participants in a free society, and we
| need to find something that works for all of us. Debate
| is how we do that, even if the topic hits closer to home
| for some than others.
| burnished wrote:
| Without doing a deep-dive into the way you communicate I'd
| recommend that you broadly reconnect on shared values, like the
| importance of human dignity and compassion, before trying to
| proceed further in a conversation where it is starting to feel
| like other parties are treating you like a faceless adversary.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| I'd like to see some introspection here. Can you imagine why
| they would respond so strongly? I'll tell you.
|
| The trans experience is one that is in many ways beautiful and
| joyous but is sadly also fraught with trauma. Trans people
| experience a lot of pain that stays with them. Much of that
| pain has to do with people who refuse to accept who they truly
| are. Or people will "just want to have a discussion" where they
| try to see invalidate the persons identity.
|
| When a cis person enters a discussion like this, to the cis
| person it's just an intellectual discussion. But to the trans
| person it can be threatening and it can trigger memories of
| past trauma they've gone through.
|
| So yes, trans people get upset when you bring things like this
| up because you're bringing up a topic that may have been used
| as a "gotcha" to invalidate their identity, and it can be
| unclear if that's what you'll try to do. This makes the whole
| conversation upsetting to them.
|
| Imagine if a man who didn't believe in women's rights wanted to
| discuss it with a woman who has been discriminated against.
| That would be a difficult conversation and it wouldn't be
| surprising if she got upset and didn't want to have a "rational
| debate" about her rights.
|
| What you're doing when you bring up difficult topics to a
| marginalized person is you're forcing them to re live traumatic
| memories in order to educate you. I learned this from learning
| about the experiences of people of color. (If you're white) DO
| NOT go ask a random black person to explain to you the everyday
| racism they feel, because inevitably it won't make sense to you
| and when you challenge something they say it will become a lot
| of emotional labor for them to try to make it make sense. Sure
| some people are fine explaining this stuff but not everyone.
|
| Instead what people of color say about this is: go do the
| learning on your own. Go find out what people in this
| marginalized group say about your issue without making one of
| them explain it. Their identity is not up for you to debate.
| But you can read articles written by people within the
| community or listen to YouTube interviews. You can find the
| answers without making a marginalized person re live their
| trauma to educate you.
|
| This is all surrounding the topic of "emotional labor".
| Debating someone's trauma requires huge amounts of emotional
| labor for them to stay civil and most people don't have the
| energy for that, so you should not ask that of them. There are
| other better ways to educate yourself.
|
| EDIT: Folks, I'm trying to honestly tell you the experience
| I've had. I had to learn this stuff too. I know that this
| community hates being told they have to change their behavior,
| but I'm kindly and honestly explaining what I know and you're
| downvoting me. Please stop.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| People who have had trauma have my empathy, but I really
| don't think there's a tenable path forward besides
| dispassionate debate. How do we work through a conflict
| without dispassionate debate? If trans people insist that the
| only parties to the debate are trans people or those who
| already agree with them (ignoring that trans people aren't
| the homogeneous entity that activists make them out to be),
| then how are they going to gain acceptance in society more
| broadly? By fiat?
|
| Yeah, it sucks that individuals in the majority don't have
| the same emotional skin in the game as in the minority, but
| progress of any kind requires that we can talk through stuff.
| For those of us with trauma (i.e., my trauma isn't "trans
| trauma"), we should excuse ourselves when the debates hit too
| close to home too often. We explicitly cannot use our trauma
| to discredit others (e.g., to conflate their criticism with
| 'hate') is not going to garner sympathy even if a lot of
| people who are already "allies" upvote our post on social
| media or wherever.
|
| And indeed, if it's not in the best interest of the
| legitimately traumatized to use their trauma to silence
| others, who in their right mind would allow their "allies" to
| use their trauma to bludgeon others? What rational person
| would let someone else spend their credibility in
| contradiction with their own best interests? If the
| traumatized person overreaches, it might be overlooked on
| account of the trauma, but what excuses can we make for the
| mere "allies"?
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| > I really don't think there's a tenable path forward
| besides dispassionate debate. How do we work through a
| conflict without dispassionate debate?
|
| I will explain my understanding of the answer. I do not
| claim my answer is the right one, but it is what I see.
|
| Let's say there are two groups. One group we will call a
| marginalized minority and another group we will call the
| majority or dominant group.
|
| The answer is not for the marginalized people and the
| dominant group to debate directly. Imagine people from the
| black civil rights movement debating whether or not they
| should be guaranteed the right to vote with no
| interference. What really was there to debate?
|
| Instead of direct debate I see it like this. First, both
| groups recognize their position. Trans people have been
| marginalized by a broadly cisgendered society. If you learn
| a little bit about the murder of trans people throughout
| the last 5 decades and the lack of investigation, I think
| that is evidence enough that they are a marginalized group.
|
| Okay so step one is recognize the power dynamic. Step two
| is for the people in the dominant group to listen, without
| challenge or debate, what the people in the marginalized
| group want.
|
| Step three: the people in the dominant group discuss with
| themselves how to make those changes. How do we make sure
| trans people feel welcome and comfortable in bathrooms and
| sports? How do we make sure trans kids grow up feeling
| welcomed by society as their whole self?
|
| Fourth, the people in the dominant group discuss their
| difficulties they have with the changes, and they do their
| best to work it out on their own.
|
| Five, some members of the marginalized group who have
| agreed to discuss this will talk to people in the dominant
| group and try to address their questions.
|
| Six. Having made some changes, the people in the dominant
| group ask for feedback, and the process repeats.
|
| At no point in that course of action do random members of
| the dominant group need to discuss these changes with
| members of the marginalized group. As a white person I
| simply do not challenge what people of color say. There is
| no need for me to challenge them and I recognize that as a
| member of the dominant group it could be emotionally
| distressful for them to have to discuss it with me.
|
| Anyway that's my answer. I hope it helps. Sorry I didn't
| answer the rest of your post but I found this the part that
| felt most salient to me.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| I appreciate your perspective. I agree with a lot,
| including that trans people are legitimately marginalized
| in our society in some measure (certainly the extent to
| which authorities fail to investigate murders of trans
| victims is abhorrent).
|
| > The answer is not for the marginalized people and the
| dominant group to debate directly.
|
| To be clear, this isn't "trans people" vs "non-trans
| people". There are lots of trans people who don't think
| it's appropriate to change our bathroom policies and non-
| trans people who think we should change those policies.
| The parties to the debate are different ideologies, not
| different trans/non-trans identities.
|
| With respect to your steps vs debate, I think your steps
| describe a national debate, except for the earlier caveat
| that the debate isn't "trans vs non-trans" but rather
| different ideological positions and also that at any
| given moment different individuals in the debate (on any
| side) are at different "steps" in the process, and also
| that individuals on all sides vary in their willingness
| to listen or participate in good faith.
|
| So basically a debate is a mess because people aren't
| uniformly acting in good faith nor are they uniformly
| disciplined about listening before speaking nor are they
| acting in synchrony (everyone within a group meets to
| listen to an ambassador for the other group, and then
| carefully considers together, and so on). However, over
| the course of months or years, things do tend to converge
| in a direction that _most people_ feel pretty good about.
| That 's what progress looks like.
|
| > At no point in that course of action do random members
| of the dominant group need to discuss these changes with
| members of the marginalized group. As a white person I
| simply do not challenge what people of color say. There
| is no need for me to challenge them and I recognize that
| as a member of the dominant group it could be emotionally
| distressful for them to have to discuss it with me.
|
| With respect, I disagree in the strongest possible terms
| here. No doubt you mean well, but black people and white
| people are equal, and race doesn't confer anyone with
| either authority or fragility with respect to having
| their positions criticized. If any given black person or
| white person feels triggered (in the clinical, not
| pejorative, sense), they are certainly not obligated to
| engage with the criticism, but to assume that someone is
| fragile on the basis of their race is the height of
| racism (however well intended).
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| I appreciate the thoughtful response. I'm in the go so I
| will try to make a quick reply.
|
| > The parties to the debate are different ideologies, not
| different trans/non-trans identities.
|
| I think the concept of intersectionality is useful here.
| Ideology is one component but identity is another. If we
| treat this like a simple ideological debate the potential
| trauma of the marginalized group could be ignored,
| potentially causing the mere act of the debate to re
| traumatize people in that group.
|
| > No doubt you mean well, but black people and white
| people are equal, and race doesn't confer anyone with
| either authority or fragility with respect to having
| their positions criticized.
|
| Respectfully I think this is a misunderstanding of my
| view. I learned to keep my mouth shut not because people
| in marginalized groups are fragile. I learned to keep my
| mouth shut because I learned that my outsider status
| means a lot of things marginalized people say night not
| make immediate sense to me. Trying to interrogate
| (neutral sense) their reasoning can be a traumatic
| experience for them. I learned this when I asked women at
| Google to explain their sexual harassment to me. A female
| friend took the time to explain to me that even asking
| the question could cause distress in women. Now when
| someone says something I disagree with I stay silent and
| I go and google the thing and learn more about it on my
| own.
|
| Certainly in some cases the person wants to discuss the
| thing with me, but I don't assume that to be the case.
|
| I also learned this from a person of color who did not
| appreciate similar questions from me. While there is a
| LOT of worthwhile criticism of Robin DiAngelo, her talks
| helped me understand that concept better.
| pqs wrote:
| The proof is that this article, a "The Economist" article, has
| been flagged. It shows [flagged] next to the title.
| recursivedoubts wrote:
| The idea is to set up rhetorical either-or's and then browbeat
| the majority into silence:
|
| Either you support unlimited immigration or you are a racist.
|
| Either you are 100% on board with the entire vaccine schedule
| or you are an anti-vaxxer.
|
| Either you say that Covid was a natural occurrence or you are a
| conspiracy theorist (and probably a racist too).
|
| And so on.
|
| Say what one will, but it's effective.
|
| I think one reason it works so well in the US is our puritan
| heritage, which has always had a strong manichean current in
| it. As the elites lost their religion, they retained this
| characteristic and it now manifests itself in the secular
| realm.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| Sometimes the either-or's are not just either-or's, they're
| catch 22's. Trans people are suffering from gender dysphoria
| and denying that is transphobic, but if you say trans people
| are suffering from gender dysphoria you're a transmedicalist
| truscum. Checkmate atheists!
| underseacables wrote:
| Transgender is a psychiatric disorder with potential
| medical treatment. The problem is that it's also a lifeline
| for people who are seeking an identity, and they become
| hyper sensitive to any questioning of something that,
| again, is all in their heads.
| anoncake wrote:
| Being transgender is as "curable" as homosexuality.
| have2throwaway wrote:
| For many years I experienced gender dysphoric feelings.
| Did that make me "transgender"? I used to believe that I
| was, even though deeply closeted.
|
| I didn't seek help. I didn't transition. I wanted to seek
| help but was too scared. What happened?
|
| Well, after some years, the gender dysphoric feelings
| went away.
|
| That happens sometimes - gender dysphoric feelings can
| spontaneously remit, go away by themselves. I don't have
| them any more.
|
| I know from the literature I am not unique, see e.g.
| https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10929795/
|
| If it can happen spontaneously, is it impossible that
| sometimes therapy might speed that spontaneous process
| along? Would that be a "cure"?
|
| I have struggled with obsessive behaviour ever since I
| was a child. I probably have undiagnosed ASD (I have many
| other traits of ASD than just obsessions). I'm actually
| on a waiting-list to see a psychiatrist for an ASD
| assessment. Some of my obsessions are more ASD-like
| (pleasurable rather than anxious), others more OCD-like
| (anxiety-driven), so sometimes I wonder if I might have
| OCD too. I'll let my psychiatrist work that one out, when
| I see him. But what I realise now is that my gender
| dysphoric feelings were just another one of these
| obsessions. And like most of my obsessions, with time
| they fade and get replaced with new ones. If I had this
| self-understanding 15, 20 years ago, I think my gender
| dysphoric feelings might have remitted faster.
|
| If I'd sought help back then, would they have helped me
| gain that self-understanding of my own obsessiveness? Or
| would they have encouraged me towards transition? I'm
| glad I never transitioned, I think I'd be in a far worse
| place now if I had. But I worry with this idea of
| "affirmative care", people like me may be encouraged in
| that direction whether it is the right thing for them or
| not.
|
| What about your comparison with homosexuality? Does
| homosexuality ever "spontaneously remit" in the same way
| that gender dysphoric feelings sometimes do? I honestly
| have no idea. My feelings about my birth gender (male)
| have waxed and waned, but a constant for me has been
| attraction to women with never more than fleeting
| feelings for men; given that, the equivalent question for
| homosexuality is beyond my personal experience.
|
| (Sorry for the throwaway. I hope one can understand why.
| I wish I had the courage to talk about this stuff under
| my real name. I hope that one of these days I will, but
| not today.)
| progman32 wrote:
| > If it can happen spontaneously, is it impossible that
| sometimes therapy might speed that spontaneous process
| along? Would that be a "cure"?
|
| I think we need to be careful and precise when using the
| word "cure". Is one outcome preferable over another?
| Preferable to who, and why? What, precisely, are we
| curing? What effect does using the word "cure" have on
| people? Anecdote: When I realized I had dysphoric
| feelings, my mental health _improved_ overnight and has
| stayed that way. I took up piano. Became more expressive.
| I even began working out! What would my cure be?
| Everyone's different - as you seem to suggest (correct
| me), pushing for self-understanding is a good way to
| navigate this. I think my personal positive outcome is in
| no small part due to key people in my life making it
| clear that no outcome is preferred over another, and that
| they'll support me no matter what I find. I count myself
| as extremely privileged in this regard, and by my
| reckoning anything we can do to foster this kind of
| support is time well spent.
|
| > But what I realise now is that my gender dysphoric
| feelings were just another one of these obsessions.
|
| That may be. And that's OK. Very few people figure
| everything out the very first try. And people can
| sometimes change over time. But equally, sometimes they
| don't. In any case, we can't expect people to understand
| themselves if we take away the tools to learn. In some
| sense, aren't these transient obsessions a vehicle for
| experimentation and learning? For mine, they are.
|
| You, have2throwaway, are valid. Here's to your journey.
| have2throwaway wrote:
| > Is one outcome preferable over another? Preferable to
| who, and why?
|
| For me personally, I believe the outcome in which these
| feelings went away without me acting on them (by which I
| especially mean hormones and surgery) is much better _for
| me_ than one in which they stuck around and I did act on
| them. And I 'm sure I'm not the only person for which
| this true.
|
| On the other hand, I totally accept there are other
| people for whom the feelings are unlikely to ever go
| away, and for those people, if they believe that acting
| on them is the best option for them, it isn't my place to
| disagree with them.
|
| The problem is how do we tell the two groups apart? How
| do we help people having these feelings work out which
| group they belong to? I don't have any confidence that
| the current system is good at doing that. Part of the
| reason why, is that those who transition have their
| stories celebrated by much (of course, not all) of the
| culture, while those who remit without transitioning (or
| who detransition) are mostly hidden in the shadows. That
| ends up presenting the former stories as more valid than
| the later, something which I see as problematic.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| > Say what one will, but it's effective.
|
| Yes and no. Yes, it's effective at shutting people up. No,
| it's not very effective at convincing people that you're
| right. It's more effective at convincing people that you're
| completely unreasonable, and that it's better to just not
| talk to you at all.
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| "Yes, it's effective at shutting people up. No, it's not
| very effective at convincing people that you're right."
|
| I see things differently, through the lens of power and
| influence. How much power does the opposition have if it's
| been effectively silenced? Members of the other side
| certainly aren't convinced of your cause, but what
| difference does it make? You've already gotten them to
| submit.
|
| As time goes on the younger people will pretty much only
| hear from the intolerant folks because the people who were
| silenced can't propagate their worldview effectively.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Fair point - _if_ it continues for long. I 'm hoping that
| the pendulum swings back before we get to that point...
| but maybe I'm just a crazy optimist.
| [deleted]
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| > Either you say that Covid was a natural occurrence or you
| are a conspiracy theorist (and probably a racist too).
|
| Interesting how media coverage completely changed. Under the
| previous administration it was considered racist to even
| mention the theory and it's proponents were considered
| racists or conspiracy theorists. Why such a sudden change?
| China certainly didn't change its position on the issue...
| layoutIfNeeded wrote:
| You're onto something... Keep lurking!
| Udik wrote:
| > Why such a sudden change?
|
| Trump is gone. Since he was the main proponent of the idea,
| and he was despised by half of the nation, they had to
| despise the idea too, even if it was quite fitting in the
| context of the anti-China rhetoric of the last few years.
| Now Trump is gone and the other half of the US is free to
| pick up his ideas.
| [deleted]
| omegaworks wrote:
| >trans-exclusionary radical feminist, a slur
|
| Bigots offended at being called out on their bigotry.
| alfl wrote:
| I think in 10 years we'll look back at what is now contemporary
| discourse as a reaction formation[0].
|
| Essentially the left-wing version of homophobic closeted
| Republicans.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaction_formation
| twirligigue wrote:
| There seems to be a new background assumption that one's identity
| can be chosen, whereas I think in reality it's inherited.
| ed25519FUUU wrote:
| How do you define "identity"?
| bob_roberts wrote:
| You shouldn't assume that nonbinary and trans people "choose"
| their identity. They might choose to acknowledge it, to
| themselves or to others. At least, that's been my experience.
| It was a realization, not a choice.
| dgb23 wrote:
| It's not really a choice, rather than an often very difficult
| process of discovery, if they manage to accept it at all. A
| good friend of mine struggled for years with their self
| acceptance and I only realized that in restrospect. But coming
| out liberated them and an avalanche of happiness, productivity
| and positivity happened.
|
| It's a real struggle, and by belittling or ignoring it we can
| only make it worse. It's time to listen, respect and embrace.
| ausbah wrote:
| so you can't gain an identity by choosing to do certain things?
| I can't identify as a runner because I didn't inherit the genes
| that make me in the top 0.1% of all runners?
| [deleted]
| anoncake wrote:
| So if you're female, it's because your parents are female?
| rasengan0 wrote:
| LGBT+ are humans. And humans rights are for all. I tend to ignore
| articles about squabbling but groups influence change and
| adaptation is key to getting along [1]
|
| I learned new terms in the article like TERF and gender-critical.
| I'm sure there will be more jargon and terminology to fill the
| DEI consultancy industry. Not sure of the downstream effects but
| so far my USB cables are not gender fluid, but maybe that is not
| a good thing. Meanwhile, the globe is warming.
|
| [1] https://www.npr.org/2021/06/02/996319297/gender-identity-
| pro...
| jeffrallen wrote:
| All fundamentalism is bad. Including this comment.
| ixacto wrote:
| Freedom of expression/free speech doesn't mean freedom not to be
| offended or that you have to agree with the views.
|
| If we do not support even the most offensive speech then we risk
| a very slippery slope leading to censorship and 1984.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| There's no historical reason to think that not supporting
| extreme speech will lead to fascism. There are historical
| reasons to think that curbing extremist speech protects
| democracy (see the Weimar Republic).
| ixacto wrote:
| What exactly is extreme speech? I don't recall for advocating
| for illegal speech.
|
| Everything up to imminently calling for violence in the US is
| protected so if that is what you are saying then I'd agree
| with you.
|
| However what is "hate" or "intolerant" depends on the person
| and identity group. E.g. "All lives matter, marriage is
| between a man and a woman, men can't get pregnant, Muhammad
| was a pedophole, flipping the bird to a police officer" all
| would offend different groups of people but are protected
| speech.
| tarboreus wrote:
| Why focus only on fascism? What about authoritarianism? Look
| at the USSR and the modern CCP.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| Because the west and especially the US has, very
| specifically, a fascism problem.
| dang wrote:
| It looks like your account has been using HN primarily
| for ideological battle. Can you please not do that? It's
| against the rules here because it destroys the curious
| conversation that HN is supposed to exist for. We ban
| accounts that do this, regardless of what their ideology
| happens to be. See [1] for more explanation.
|
| If you wouldn't mind reviewing
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and
| taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart,
| we'd be grateful.
|
| [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&typ
| e=comme...
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| There are also historical reasons to think that tyranny has
| to suppress free speech in order to survive. So even if
| extreme speech can lead to tyranny, free speech can lead you
| back out - _if_ you can keep the tyranny from destroying the
| free speech.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| That's an "if" so big I don't know what your point is.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| My point is to keep track of the order of cause and
| effect. Unlimited free speech may create a tyranny. But
| tyranny always at least tries to limit free speech. So
| when you see a limiting of free speech, you should ask
| "Is this really in defense of liberty? Or is it just
| tyranny trying to preserve and extend itself?"
|
| Note that tyranny trying to preserve and extend itself
| almost always _says_ that it 's in defense of liberty...
| jl2718 wrote:
| > Unlimited free speech may create a tyranny.
|
| Citation required.
| Natsu wrote:
| The usual citation is the Paradox of Tolerance but that
| posited a right to protect against people using _fists or
| pistols_ , rather than ideas, to debate and premised it
| on the right of self-defense from physical harm.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| tetranomiga's claim, not mine. I merely acknowledged that
| I wasn't claiming to refute it.
| tetranomiga wrote:
| "Is this person defending free speech in favor of
| liberty? Or because his anti-liberty extremism won't be
| tolerated otherwise?".
|
| It works both ways so this isn't a practical way of
| looking at implementation of free speech. You can't keep
| a system that doesn't protect itself free forever -
| propaganda travels faster and further than truth, and I
| doubt the founding fathers wrote the first amendment with
| mass media in mind.
|
| You can start the argument of who gets to decide what
| should be allowed and what shouldn't, and in the current
| political climate (at least in the USA) the answer to
| that is obviously nobody. Ideally those decisions would
| be made during a time of cultural unity, where a whole
| nation can say "These are our values that we want to
| write in stone", like Germany did with the new
| constitution in the 20th century where it put well-
| defined limits on what kind of speech should be
| forbidden.
|
| It's doubtful if that kind of unity is even possible in
| the USA anymore, so I'm worried that, on a long enough
| time-scale, unfettered free speech will inevitably lead
| to tyranny of a kind because there is no system in place
| to protect it.
| waterhouse wrote:
| > There are historical reasons to think that curbing
| extremist speech protects democracy (see the Weimar
| Republic).
|
| You think the Weimar Republic is a point in _favor_ of that
| claim?
|
| _In my research, I looked into what actually happened in the
| Weimar Republic and found that, contrary to what most people
| think, Germany did have hate-speech laws that were applied
| quite frequently. The assertion that Nazi propaganda played a
| significant role in mobilizing anti-Jewish sentiment is
| irrefutable. But to claim that the Holocaust could have been
| prevented if only anti-Semitic speech had been banned has
| little basis in reality. Leading Nazis, including Joseph
| Goebbels, Theodor Fritsch, and Julius Streicher, were all
| prosecuted for anti-Semitic speech. And rather than deterring
| them, the many court cases served as effective public
| relations machinery for the Nazis, affording them a level of
| attention that they never would have received in a climate of
| a free and open debate.
|
| In the decade from 1923 to 1933, the Nazi propaganda magazine
| Der Sturmer -- of which Streicher was the executive publisher
| -- was confiscated or had its editors taken to court no fewer
| than 36 times. The more charges Streicher faced, the more the
| admiration of his supporters grew. In fact, the courts became
| an important platform for Streicher's campaign against the
| Jews.
|
| Alan Borovoy, general counsel of the Canadian Civil Liberties
| Foundation, points out that cases were regularly brought
| against individuals on account of anti-Semitic speech in the
| years leading up to Hitler's takeover of power in 1933.
| "Remarkably, pre-Hitler Germany had laws very much like the
| Canadian anti-hate law," he writes. "Moreover, those laws
| were enforced with some vigour. During the 15 years before
| Hitler came to power, there were more than 200 prosecutions
| based on anti-Semitic speech..._
|
| https://www.cato.org/policy-report/may/june-2015/war-free-
| ex...
| tetranomiga wrote:
| An American libertarian think-tank is not a source of
| historical interpretation I'm going to trust at face value
| and neither should you. I'll reply more thoroughly to this
| after work.
| hodgesrm wrote:
| This is a great comment. It seems to me that some in the US
| far right and left wings have an analogous view of using
| the political system as a way to garner publicity rather
| than governing. It's less obvious in the court cases. Many
| of the people associated with the Jan 6 attack on the
| Capitol folded pretty rapidly once they were indicted.
| onemoresoop wrote:
| I did not know that, thanks for pointing out.
| briandear wrote:
| We've already skipped so far down the slope that it's
| unrecoverable. We're in the midst of a Cultural Revolution.
|
| It's bonkers how being gender-critical can get you fired or
| silenced or violently protested. Or how being anti-Marxist
| makes you a racist. Or how even having traditional values is
| worthy of being firebombed.
| staplers wrote:
| Being pro-marxist 70 years ago meant jail time. It's always
| been this way, just for a different sect of people.
| busterarm wrote:
| > Or how being anti-Marxist makes you a racist.
|
| Especially given the historical record on empowered Marxists
| and saying/doing things that are extremely racist and
| homophobic.
| Jotra7 wrote:
| This comment right here shows where discourse is at with the
| right wing. Screaming and crying about some imagined
| persecution while controlling everything. I'm so sick of it.
| afpx wrote:
| Should teachers be allowed to say anything they want to
| students, regardless if it offends them? If a student asks a
| teacher not to call them something that offends them, is the
| teacher required to stop using the slur?
| ixacto wrote:
| Yes they should offend their students because history is
| offensive.
|
| We should also teach about the Holocaust and read the
| uncensored version of huckleberry Finn, even though it may be
| offensive.
|
| People (students) will be offended but they will learn how
| history has changed, be able to think for themselves, and not
| fall into ideological line. If this scares the left/right
| establishments that is a great thing.
|
| Living in a 1-party state would suck.
| seph-reed wrote:
| When I was in high school, we read both "1984" and "Brave New
| World."
|
| At the time I kind of thought: "liberals are more like BNW with
| drugs and 'karma' and such, and conservatives are more like 1984
| with endless wars and refusing to acknowledge things."
|
| At some point in my life, it feels this has flipped.
|
| I now see conservatives as consuming soma (tv) to lull them into
| a false and simple world, and liberals as enforcing wrong-think.
|
| Obviously, life is much more complex than two books, and
| similarities can be drawn in any direction. But I still find it
| interesting having watched my perceptions flip.
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