Cont: [ED] Discussion: Trans Women are not Women (Part 5)

[Meadmaker]

"One thing that XYZ has not misrepresented is my opinion on the subject of the thread title "Gayers are mentalists". I do indeed say that homosexuals are mentally ill when they believe they're sexually attracted to other people of their own sex.

"I have no objection to being labelled homophobic on that account, if it makes anyone happy to do so. If this be homophobia, then let's make the most of it."


(NB: this is not my own actual opinion - in fact it's quite the opposite. Just so that's clear....)

Maybe Godwin will help.

"One thing that XYZQ has not misrepresented is my opinion on the subject of the thread title "Nazis are bad". I do indeed say that Nazis are bad when they murder Jews.

"I have no objection to being labelled Naziphobic on that account, if it makes anyone happy to do so. If this be Naziphobia, then let's make the most of it."

So, anyone who says that I am a bad person because I don't think trans women are women is doing the exact same thing that white supremacists do when they insult Nazi haters.


Note: Some of you are going to have trouble parsing this out, because you aren't used to the analogies.

What just happened was that I said something about my beliefs related to transgender people and to the word transphobia. London John took those words, and, using word substitution at important points, made an analogy to someone who dislikes gay people, and the word homophobia. Get it? People who think transwomen are not women are exactly like people who don't like gay poeple....or at least so the word substitution would suggest.

So, I took his word-substituted quote, and the normal thing to do would be to equate homophobes and Nazis. That would be a Godwin's law sort of thing. But instead, in the place of "transwomen are not women", and "Gayers are mentalists", which are statements of belief, I put "Nazis are bad", which is a statement of belief. With me so far?

Then I made up a word for people with that belief. It's "Naziphobes". That would be people who hate Nazis.

"Nazis are bad" is to "transwomen are not women" as "Naziphobe" is to "transphobe". and "Transwomen are not women" is to "Gayers are mentalists" as "transphobe" is to "homophobe".

Therefore anyone who is homophobic is exactly like anyone who hates Nazis. And calling someone a Nazi should be a hate crime. And there is no place for hate in our society anyway.

And.......the sad thing is that anyone who would ever use the analogy argument equating opposition to trans rights activists with homophobia won't understand the analogy anyway.

 

[caveman1917]

I do not. In point of fact, I think that is a rather silly proposition to spend our time chasing down, given that there are far more pressing and concrete issues to address such as who gets the opportunity to play rugby in the female leagues.

Yeah I'm sure answering the question of whether transwomen should be given the opportunity to play rugby in the female leagues is going to be helped quite a lot by not having definitions for "transwomen" nor "female."

Keep telling yourself that while HR politely explains why you're being let go for strictly using pronouns associated with birth sex.

Your point being? If HR wants to politely explain to me that I'm being let go for refusing to participate in the reinforcement of gender stereotypes (ie refusing to "expect people to perform masculinity/femininity") then they are free to do so. Why should I care what random crap some nutter at some random so-called "progressive corporation" spouts?

If you want to show circularity in my definitions it would help to actually cite them.

Why? Can't remember your own definitions? "Woman = generally expected to perform femininity" + "generally expected to perform femininity = referred to as she" + "referred to as she = self-identifies as a woman (gives of conscious signals of such)"

=>

"Woman = anyone who self-identifies as a woman"

 

[TomB]

Here's the problem with those definitions, and it isn't just wordplay.

No transwoman thinks she produces eggs, nor does she have "an internal image" of being able to produce eggs. Whatever it is that she thinks makes her a female, it isn't egg production, nor indeed anything about reproduction or genitalia.

ETA: However, they do have the right to produce eggs.

Sorry, for clarification, I was provided the definitions of male and female as seperate things. The idea is that a trans-woman's self image is that she is a female, not that she thinks she is female. It is consistent with, and the very definition of, gender dysphoria.

 

[caveman1917]

Sorry, for clarification, I was provided the definitions of male and female as seperate things. The idea is that a trans-woman's self image is that she is a female, not that she thinks she is female. It is consistent with, and the very definition of, gender dysphoria.

If "my self-image is X" isn't equivalent to "I believe to be X" then you need to define the term "self-image."

 

[TomB]

Ok. So they have a feeling that they can produce eggs, but they know they can't produce eggs? I don't think that's it, and here is the thing that matters about that.

OK, I know this wasn't in direct reply to my post, but maybe a bit of clarification is in order. I provided the definitions of the sexes, because they were referred to in the definitions of gender. The ability to produce eggs is a component of the physical female sex. (And obviously there are exceptions.)

Having the self-image of being that sex does not require the belief that one has the physical characteristics of that sex. Actually, the knowledge of the lack of those characteristics would contribute to dysphoria.

If a trans-person believed they could produce eggs, have periods, etc. they would not feel dysphoria, they would just be delusional. It's a mismatch between the physical and the mental, not a belief that the physical is something it is not.

 

[caveman1917]

OK, I know this wasn't in direct reply to my post, but maybe a bit of clarification is in order. I provided the definitions of the sexes, because they were referred to in the definitions of gender. The ability to produce eggs is a component of the physical female sex. (And obviously there are exceptions.)

Having the self-image of being that sex does not require the belief that one has the physical characteristics of that sex. Actually, the knowledge of the lack of those characteristics would contribute to dysphoria.

If a trans-person believed they could produce eggs, have periods, etc. they would not feel dysphoria, they would just be delusional. It's a mismatch between the physical and the mental, not a belief that the physical is something it is not.

This is a mess. If there is no belief that the physical is something it is not then how is there a mismatch between the mental and the physical? How does having the self-image of having the physical characteristics of a sex not require the belief that one has the physical characteristics of that sex?

 

[Meadmaker]

Sorry, for clarification, I was provided the definitions of male and female as seperate things. The idea is that a trans-woman's self image is that she is a female, not that she thinks she is female. It is consistent with, and the very definition of, gender dysphoria.

So we're back where we started. "Woman", by your definition is anyone who has a self image as a female.

Let's apply that to transwomen. They don't think they are female, but they are in fact women. They are women because they have a self image of themselves as female, even though they know they are not female.

Ok. It might not be circular. On the face it seems to be that way. It also doesn't define womanhood in terms of behavior, so it doesn't include tomboys. It avoids the most common traps.

Let me think about this for a bit. I must confess, my impression is that it's a totally vacuous and useless definition, but it avoids the obvious traps. I'll think about this one. I'm trying to figure out how this might be useful in deciding whether or not someone is a woman.

 

[caveman1917]

Let me think about this for a bit. I must confess, my impression is that it's a totally vacuous and useless definition, but it avoids the obvious traps. I'll think about this one. I'm trying to figure out how this might be useful in deciding whether or not someone is a woman.

It's because "self-image" is implicitly taken to be something other than belief and left undefined. In particular, the statement "my self-image is of having physical characteristics X" is taken as not equivalent to "I believe myself to have the physical characteristics X."

 

[Collin237]

So we're back where we started. "Woman", by your definition is anyone who has a self image as a female.

Let's apply that to transwomen. They don't think they are female, but they are in fact women. They are women because they have a self image of themselves as female, even though they know they are not female.

Ok. It might not be circular. On the face it seems to be that way. It also doesn't define womanhood in terms of behavior, so it doesn't include tomboys. It avoids the most common traps.

Let me think about this for a bit. I must confess, my impression is that it's a totally vacuous and useless definition, but it avoids the obvious traps. I'll think about this one. I'm trying to figure out how this might be useful in deciding whether or not someone is a woman.

Just about everything a Skeptic would be dealing with has something to do with a flawed perception. And only now, after almost 17 years, you're finally beginning to understand what that means?

ETA: https://skepticalinquirer.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/29/2019/03/Issue-04-9.pdf
Starting at page 392.

 

[TomB]

If "my self-image is X" isn't equivalent to "I believe to be X" then you need to define the term "self-image."

Awful nit-picky, aren't we?

For the purposes of the definition I gave, self-image would refer to how you picture yourself in your internal dialogue, not how you perceive yourself in the mirror. A non-delusional person would be aware of both the mental and physical images and how they differ.

My self-image, the way I tend to think of myself, is along the lines of myself at 30. I'm 52. I know that I'm about 50 pounds heavier and a step slower and need to pee more often. But I still think of myself the same way I thought of myself when I was thirty.

If I believed that I actually still weighed 150 pounds instead of 200 pounds, that would be delusional.

 

[TomB]

So we're back where we started. "Woman", by your definition is anyone who has a self image as a female.

Let's apply that to transwomen. They don't think they are female, but they are in fact women. They are women because they have a self image of themselves as female, even though they know they are not female.

Ok. It might not be circular. On the face it seems to be that way. It also doesn't define womanhood in terms of behavior, so it doesn't include tomboys. It avoids the most common traps.

Let me think about this for a bit. I must confess, my impression is that it's a totally vacuous and useless definition, but it avoids the obvious traps. I'll think about this one. I'm trying to figure out how this might be useful in deciding whether or not someone is a woman.

Oh, it's not particularly useful. I keep saying that I find the whole definition chasing thing to be a pointless exercise.

It doesn't help us tell who is or is not a woman, because it relies on gender being an internal thing, divorced from the physical things we can directly measure. We have no current means of directly evaluating that.

It may be that at some point a test can be done for genetic markers that are present in cis and trans women bot not in cis and trans men. The only thing we have is psychology, and indirect evaluation.

The only thing my definition is good for, maybe, is illustrating dysphoria: internal image does not match up with external image. Operating system does not match with hardware.

But I don't think we need a definition of woman if we think that gender dysphoria is real. Trans-women are/are not women is, in my mind an unsolvable problem that distracts from how to handle real world situations. Answering the question only leads to all-or-nothing stances on both sides which I find unreasonable.

 

[Matthew Best]

Is that supposed to be a joke?

Not at all!

 

[Collin237]

Not at all!

Then why are you calling me a TERF?

 

[lionking]

Then why are you calling me a TERF?

My guess is that when others have posted opinions similar to yours (like Emily’s Cat) they have been referred to as TERFs.

 

[Collin237]

My guess is that when others have posted opinions similar to yours (like Emily’s Cat) they have been referred to as TERFs.

From what I gather, Emily's Cat believes that trans women belong with men, and trans men belong with women, because that's what they "are". I believe they deserve a space of their own in prisons and shelters.

Also, Emily's Cat is a feminist (which is what the F in TERF stands for). I'm a man, and I've already objected to her brand of feminism and gotten a snappy reply from her.

I've alluded to my fondness for women by mentioning the danger of someone smuggling a camera into a Korean spa. That makes me a non-ally to feminists, which Emily's Cat acknowledged by putting a smile after the words "strip clubs".

ETA: I also said that nudity in locker rooms should be minimized, whereas Emily's Cat apparently believes that nudity among women is harmless.

I don't think she really agrees with me as much as she claims. I think she just said that because she was trying to inveigle me.

 

[Matthew Best]

Then why are you calling me a TERF?

lionking has it. It's because you've espoused positions that are likely to get you called a TERF:

The right to deny intimate services to a person on the basis of their sex
Separate housing in prisons for trans people
Separate tallies for trans people in sex-based positions, scholarships, grants etc
Separate tallies for trans people in honorifics such as "woman of the year" or "most highly paid woman CEO"
Separate housing for trans people for high vulnerability populations such as rape shelters and domestic violence refuges
Access to subsidized health care for gender transition treatment only by official diagnosis.
No access of minors to puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, or surgical procedures without parental consent

These appear to me to be all TERF positions.

Don't worry about the "feminism" part - the label TERF has outgrown that and now applies to anybody who espouses the positions you hold, regardless of whether they are feminists or not.

 

[LondonJohn]

Maybe Godwin will help.

"One thing that XYZQ has not misrepresented is my opinion on the subject of the thread title "Nazis are bad". I do indeed say that Nazis are bad when they murder Jews.

"I have no objection to being labelled Naziphobic on that account, if it makes anyone happy to do so. If this be Naziphobia, then let's make the most of it."

So, anyone who says that I am a bad person because I don't think trans women are women is doing the exact same thing that white supremacists do when they insult Nazi haters.


Note: Some of you are going to have trouble parsing this out, because you aren't used to the analogies.

What just happened was that I said something about my beliefs related to transgender people and to the word transphobia. London John took those words, and, using word substitution at important points, made an analogy to someone who dislikes gay people, and the word homophobia. Get it? People who think transwomen are not women are exactly like people who don't like gay poeple....or at least so the word substitution would suggest.

So, I took his word-substituted quote, and the normal thing to do would be to equate homophobes and Nazis. That would be a Godwin's law sort of thing. But instead, in the place of "transwomen are not women", and "Gayers are mentalists", which are statements of belief, I put "Nazis are bad", which is a statement of belief. With me so far?

Then I made up a word for people with that belief. It's "Naziphobes". That would be people who hate Nazis.

"Nazis are bad" is to "transwomen are not women" as "Naziphobe" is to "transphobe". and "Transwomen are not women" is to "Gayers are mentalists" as "transphobe" is to "homophobe".

Therefore anyone who is homophobic is exactly like anyone who hates Nazis. And calling someone a Nazi should be a hate crime. And there is no place for hate in our society anyway.

And.......the sad thing is that anyone who would ever use the analogy argument equating opposition to trans rights activists with homophobia won't understand the analogy anyway.

I.... just.... had.....a.......feeling you'd handwave away the (obvious and pertinent) analogy in this way. In a way, I'm glad I wasn't surprised


ETA: I can't decide whether to view it as laughable or offensive when you try to ridicule (in a post which is dripping with patronisation) my analogy by equating "Nazis are bad" (a statement that is universally accepted and universally endorsed by every relevant authority) with "Transwomen are not women" (which is not only a statement that is not universally accepted/endorsed, but a statement that is wholly contradicted and refuted by every relevant authority. (And this, of course, is why "Gayers are mentalists" is a pertinent analogy, while "Nazis are bad" is not.)


ETA2: Oh, I just noticed your weasel attempt to move the goalposts! You're now trying to claim that what you were doing was nothing more than "(expressing) opposition to trans rights activists"! But that's not what you were doing, were you? In fact, you were stating that you subscribe to the view that transwomen are not women. I wonder why you tried to disguise that in your condescending rebuttal?

 

[LondonJohn]

So we're back where we started. "Woman", by your definition is anyone who has a self image as a female.

Let's apply that to transwomen. They don't think they are female, but they are in fact women. They are women because they have a self image of themselves as female, even though they know they are not female.

Ok. It might not be circular. On the face it seems to be that way. It also doesn't define womanhood in terms of behavior, so it doesn't include tomboys. It avoids the most common traps.

Let me think about this for a bit. I must confess, my impression is that it's a totally vacuous and useless definition, but it avoids the obvious traps. I'll think about this one. I'm trying to figure out how this might be useful in deciding whether or not someone is a woman.

Gosh. From what you're stating as truth, it's obvious then that the World's pre-eminent psychiatrists and psychologists - the people whose cumulative experience and expertise actually gives them the authority to analyse/assess these sorts of conditions (in a way that neither we nor any politician will ever be able to) - must have looked at all the evidence and concluded along the lines of "Pffft, how can a male validly think he's a woman (or vice versa)? This is clear nonsense. Gender dysphoria and transgender identity are nothing but mental health aberrations or illnesses, and people who claim to suffer from these conditions should be classified as broken and should be offered treatment accordingly"


Oh, what's that? *puts finger to ear* I'm just hearing that the actual position of the World's expert community is diametrically opposite to that. We'll be back after this short commercial break.

 

[LondonJohn]

Oh, it's not particularly useful. I keep saying that I find the whole definition chasing thing to be a pointless exercise.

It doesn't help us tell who is or is not a woman, because it relies on gender being an internal thing, divorced from the physical things we can directly measure. We have no current means of directly evaluating that.

It may be that at some point a test can be done for genetic markers that are present in cis and trans women bot not in cis and trans men. The only thing we have is psychology, and indirect evaluation.

The only thing my definition is good for, maybe, is illustrating dysphoria: internal image does not match up with external image. Operating system does not match with hardware.

But I don't think we need a definition of woman if we think that gender dysphoria is real. Trans-women are/are not women is, in my mind an unsolvable problem that distracts from how to handle real world situations. Answering the question only leads to all-or-nothing stances on both sides which I find unreasonable.

It's a relief, then, that the people who are actually qualified to pass judgement on this matter have definitively done so.


(And I think it's still fashionable in certain quarters to look for the "gay gene" as a way of quantifying homosexuality.....)

 

[LondonJohn]

I have been reliably informed that they are not delusional. They are not able to produce eggs. If they had an internal image of themselves as egg producers, that would be a delusion.

Yes it would. But gender identity has nothing whatsoever to do with biological reproductive function. It's entirely to do with sociological and societal expectations and preconceptions.

Let me illustrate this with reference to "house husbands". 30-ish years ago, in countries such as UK or USA, where it applied to male-female couples raising young children, it would generally have been viewed as a) extremely strange, and b) somehow indicative of a deficiency on the part of "the man", if the male chose to stay at home and rear the children, while "the woman" went out to work and earn money. And conversely, the "normal" role of "the woman" in this scenario was to stay at home and raise the children while the male went out to work and earn - and that "the woman" would be implicitly criticised if she chose to "abandon" her young children to go out to work, leaving her "henpecked" male partner to raise the children.

Can you perhaps see, in just this one example, how sociological and societal expectations applied dramatically differently between the "man" role and the "woman" role? Fortunately, of course, there's been a significant re-setting of this particular differential over the past few decades, to the point where it's no longer seen as emasculating for "the man" if he's the one who stays home to raise children while "the woman" goes out to work and earn; and likewise, it's no longer seen as deficient on the part of "the woman" if she chooses to accept a situation where she goes out to work while leaving her male partner to raise the children.


(NB: apologies for all the quotation marks: but they're somewhat necessary here, since I'm using "the man" and "the woman" to refer strictly to gender expectations as they apply to the man and the woman respectively.)