Discussion: Transwomen are not women (Part 7)

[Ziggurat]

I don't even know what critical theory is supposed to be, other than a right-wing boogeyman. My views are my own.

'Critical Theory' is a buzzword like 'Postmodernism' - terms that the right like to use to denigrate any views you don't agree with.

This is incoherent. You admit you know nothing about the topic, yet you want to dismiss criticism about it categorically. That makes no sense. If you don't know what it is, you aren't in a position to say anything about criticism of it. You have no basis on which to say what is or is not valid criticism.

 

[Meadmaker]

This is incoherent. You admit you know nothing about the topic, yet you want to dismiss criticism about it categorically. That makes no sense. If you don't know what it is, you aren't in a position to say anything about criticism of it. You have no basis on which to say what is or is not valid criticism.

I remember a Dilbert where the pointy haired boss said, "Logically, if I do not understand it, it cannot be important."

 

[d4m10n]

Left-wing views have been censored and suppressed for nearly a century now thanks to the Red Scare and the anti-communist and anti-socialist propaganda that still lingers today among older generations.

I'm probably going to regret asking this, but is there good reason to believe communist nations were on the right side of history re: trans women in sport?

Turnabout is fair play.

An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.

 

[p0lka]

No, women's sports as you want to keep them will cease to exist.

Personally, I see sports going completely gender neutral in the future, so you think it's bad for you now? Wait until non-binary and genderfluid people start competing more.

I just caught this on the bbc

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/58732146

I agree, sports are going to have to adapt.

edit:
sortofofftopic

trying to fit in to a label can cause issues, just be yourself everyone.

 

[Meadmaker]

No, women's sports as you want to keep them will cease to exist.

Personally, I see sports going completely gender neutral in the future, so you think it's bad for you now? Wait until non-binary and genderfluid people start competing more.

I think you are looking at the sports issue from a decidedly non-sports perspective.


I also think that your previous comment about the WNBA existing in order to keep women out of the NBA suggests that you really aren't living in reality when it comes to sports, and possibly not when it comes to sexual dimorphism in general.


As for the report in general, the main message was that it was impossible, in many cases, to have both inclusion and fairness. It suggessted that sports leagues would have to find a balance. The problem with that is that if you don't have fairness, you don't have sports, and if you don't have sports at all, they can't be inclusive.

 

[Boudicca90]

I'm probably going to regret asking this, but is there good reason to believe communist nations were on the right side of history re: trans women in sport?

You would really have to be more specific. What 'communist' countries are you referring to? They weren't all homogenous.

Even within the Soviet Union, while it was certainly better for LGBTQ+ people there than it was here for the period of time under the Bolsheviks, that all unfortunately came to an end under Stalin.

An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.

While Gandhi may or may not have actually said that, I don't agree with it. I once did, in my more naïve and pacifist days. After serving in the military, and witnessing the rise of Trumpism, I no longer have those views.

 

[Boudicca90]

I think you are looking at the sports issue from a decidedly non-sports perspective.


I also think that your previous comment about the WNBA existing in order to keep women out of the NBA suggests that you really aren't living in reality when it comes to sports, and possibly not when it comes to sexual dimorphism in general.


As for the report in general, the main message was that it was impossible, in many cases, to have both inclusion and fairness. It suggessted that sports leagues would have to find a balance. The problem with that is that if you don't have fairness, you don't have sports, and if you don't have sports at all, they can't be inclusive.

Fairness, like objectivity, is a goal but not a guarantee. Any time there are biological differences, there is a factor of unfairness involved, even among cispeople.

If two cis women ran a race, and I didn't know anything else other than one competitor is 5 feet tall and the other is 6, I would put my money on the 6 foot athlete. It's not a guarantee the 6 foot person will win, but they are more likely to win due to their biology. There are other factors that can overcome this inherent difference of course, which is why her winning isn't set in stone.

Inclusion is more important than fairness, since fairness is an impossible ideal to truly achieve unless we were all born exactly physically equal.

 

[xjx388]

So Pansexual means they don’t see gender and are just attracted to people. Omnisexual means they see gender but are attracted to people of all genders. Polysexual is more of an umbrella term for people who are attracted to multiple genders -bi- pan- and Omni- for example.

This all only reinforces my view that the new labels for gender and sexuality are mostly idiosyncratic expressions of ego and are mostly employed by narcissistic people. They have just got to have their own special label that tells the world how special they are. It used to be LGBT. Then LGBTQ. Then LGBTQIA+. I’ve seen LGBTQIA2s+. We will eventually reach a point where we might as well include every English letter and Arabic number. I’m serious! Why can’t I get my own label for “kind of effeminate male who identifies as a man but sometimes dresses in ways that could look feminine-adjacent, isn’t really “manly,” who is really only attracted to large breasted brunettes who are smart and usually wear glasses, but isn’t afraid to admit that some men are attractive even if I don’t want to sleep with them (but hey, get me drunk enough and I might fool around) but these days doesn’t really feel much gender/sexual feeling at all?” I demand my own label!!

I guess my point is that it’s useless to try and label people by sexual attraction and gender expression because we are all pretty individual when it comes to those things. I reject those labels just as much as I reject racial labels.

Having said that, I fully acknowledge the differences between biological males and females and there are good reasons for some thing to be segregated along those lines. Everything else is just narcissistic wankery.

Why isn’t it enough for those of us who don’t buy in to the validity of such labels to simply say, “I don’t care how you identify or who you sleep with, just leave me out of it and I will give you respect and leave you alone.” Why must we unquestioningly accept that transwomen are actual women and that there factually is a female penis?

As Boudicca90 said earlier, “You do you, boo.”

 

[Ziggurat]

Inclusion is more important than fairness, since fairness is an impossible ideal to truly achieve unless we were all born exactly physically equal.

What does inclusion even mean? And why isn't having transwoman compete against cismen inclusion?

I think it's because they wouldn't have an advantage, and would often have a disadvantage. And you don't want transwomen to be on the receiving end of unfairness. But you don't care if ciswomen are.

 

[lionking]

Fairness, like objectivity, is a goal but not a guarantee. Any time there are biological differences, there is a factor of unfairness involved, even among cispeople.

If two cis women ran a race, and I didn't know anything else other than one competitor is 5 feet tall and the other is 6, I would put my money on the 6 foot athlete. It's not a guarantee the 6 foot person will win, but they are more likely to win due to their biology. There are other factors that can overcome this inherent difference of course, which is why her winning isn't set in stone.

Inclusion is more important than fairness, since fairness is an impossible ideal to truly achieve unless we were all born exactly physically equal.

No idea of sport at all. You will deprive biological women who play professional sport of their livelihood. Your dismissal of the idea of fairness for ideological reasons is telling, and dare I say it, bigoted.

No I do say it. I find the idea that women’s sport needs to disappear (as you have stated) bigoted.

 

[theprestige]

No, women's sports as you want to keep them will cease to exist.

Personally, I see sports going completely gender neutral in the future, so you think it's bad for you now? Wait until non-binary and genderfluid people start competing more. : D

I don't think you realize just how misogynistic this sounds.

 

[Boudicca90]

No idea of sport at all. You will deprive biological women who play professional sport of their livelihood. Your dismissal of the idea of fairness for ideological reasons is telling, and dare I say it, bigoted.

No I do say it. I find the idea that women’s sport needs to disappear (as you have stated) bigoted.

I don't think it needs to disappear, I just think segregating the sexes and genders in sport was a bad idea to begin with, and done for sexist and misogynistic reasons.

I'm not advocating anything like complete integration though, since the status quo is acceptable as long as we aren't excluded from playing with the gender we belong with. That's the only thing I care about.

 

[xjx388]

I don't think it needs to disappear, I just think segregating the sexes and genders in sport was a bad idea to begin with, and done for sexist and misogynistic reasons.

I'm not advocating anything like complete integration though, since the status quo is acceptable as long as we aren't excluded from playing with the gender we belong with. That's the only thing I care about.

Here is your confusion; segregation in sport is based on sex, not gender. If one is a transwoman, there is nothing stopping them from competing with other biological males and vice versa.

One can always do what Caitlyn Jenner did: compete as a male and transition after the sports career is over. I think if one chooses the sporting life, there are a lot of sacrifices that go along with that. There is absolutely no issue with being a transwoman and competing with males. Now imagine if Jenner had fought back then to compete with the females…aside from the cultural zeitgeist at the time, do you think that would have been “fair.”

 

[Paul2]

Yes, knowledge and research are never truly objective as long as humans are involved. Objectivity is a goal that we should strive for, but we always bring our conscious or unconscious biases with us.

Maybe completely bias-free research would be possible if it was entirely AI-driven, but there is always a bias when people are responsible.

How much are you questioning objectivity? Are you trying to make objectivity do way too much? There are plenty of things that are clearly and uncontroversially truly objectively true.

Now, science and research is a human endeavor, and comes with all human foibles. But science is designed to ferret out those foibles and biases, and it succeeds over time, if not immediately.

Furthermore, the projects that scientists and researchers decide to work on can easily reflect biases and social influences, neither of which is neutral or objective in that sense. But that doesn’t call into question the objective truth of science or research insofar as it is done properly otherwise.

 

[Ziggurat]

How much are you questioning objectivity?

I think you misunderstand what she is doing. The point isn't to deny objectivity. The point is to deny that critical theory denies objectivity, and thus make it seem more reasonable than it is.

 

[Boudicca90]

Here is your confusion; segregation in sport is based on sex, not gender. If one is a transwoman, there is nothing stopping them from competing with other biological males and vice versa.

One can always do what Caitlyn Jenner did: compete as a male and transition after the sports career is over. I think if one chooses the sporting life, there are a lot of sacrifices that go along with that. There is absolutely no issue with being a transwoman and competing with males. Now imagine if Jenner had fought back then to compete with the females…aside from the cultural zeitgeist at the time, do you think that would have been “fair.”

If she started transitioning back during her career and competed as a woman back then, it would have certainly been fair.

Just as it was for Renee Richards when she competed (and yes, I know she has jumped off the 'gender critical' deep end too).

 

[Boudicca90]

How much are you questioning objectivity? Are you trying to make objectivity do way too much? There are plenty of things that are clearly and uncontroversially truly objectively true.

Now, science and research is a human endeavor, and comes with all human foibles. But science is designed to ferret out those foibles and biases, and it succeeds over time, if not immediately.

Furthermore, the projects that scientists and researchers decide to work on can easily reflect biases and social influences, neither of which is neutral or objective in that sense. But that doesn’t call into question the objective truth of science or research insofar as it is done properly otherwise.

Even things that are thought of as objectively true are typically only true if no other variables exist.

It's objectively true that the speed of light is 186,000 miles per second. But that speed is in a complete vacuum. When the distance between atoms within a medium become closer, the speed of light slows down. So that speed becomes subjective to its surroundings.

Hell, most concepts in physics we thought were objectively true were completely thrown on it's head with the discovery of quantum physics, and scientists are still searching for a unified field theory to explain it all.

 

[d4m10n]

If she started transitioning back during her career and competed as a woman back then, it would have certainly been fair.

Do you mean "fair" in the sense that the physical advantages resulting from male puberty would've been reduced to effectively zero, or do you mean it in a different sense?

 

[Boudicca90]

Do you mean "fair" in the sense that the physical advantages resulting from male puberty would've been reduced to effectively zero, or do you mean it in a different sense?

Not effectively zero, but through HRT any difference would be minimal enough to still be fair.

 

[Meadmaker]

Not effectively zero, but through HRT any difference would be minimal enough to still be fair.

The people who wrote that report in the UK disagree with you.

What do you know that they don't?