Discussion: Transwomen are not women (Part 7)

[Emily's Cat]

She deserves nothing better. And hopefully the same will be done to all gender-critical (TERF) bigots.

Keep your transmisogyny to yourself or face consequences, just like with any other prejudice.

Can you elaborate on *why* Stock deserves to be harassed and threatened? What has Stock done that you feel merits such behavior?

 

[p0lka]

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.

'the speed of light in a vacuum' is how it's normally stated.

science does a good job of modelling refraction and what not.

this doesn't have anything to do with biology though.

chopras quantum of the quantumness in the quantuming of the quantumed bit notwithstanding.

 

[Emily's Cat]

If a lesbian falls in the forest, does it make a sound?

Nope. Lesbians don't sploosh for wood.

 

[Emily's Cat]

You identify as the label that best fits you. Sexual orientation, like most things, is on a spectrum. And a person can fall anywhere on that spectrum.

A person can have same-sex or opposite-sex attraction, or a combination of both, or neither. I never found 'homosexual' to be an accurate label for me, but I used it because there was never anything more accurate at the time. You were considered either gay, straight, or bi, when there are a wide variety of orientations out there. Now there is a term that fits me: Polysexual

This is an entirely personal question, and you are of course free to decline answering

What does polysexual mean to you? Setting aside anatomy, and accepting that you are a woman with respect to this question, are you sexually attracted to both males and females? Are you sexually attracted to people who have a mix of masculine and feminine characteristics, such as pre-op transmen or pre-op transwomen?

 

[Emily's Cat]

No, a person has same-sex attraction, but they have to decide for themselves if that makes them strictly homosexual.

And these are medical terms, no one is going around calling themselves 'homosexuals'. Gay, queer, etc. but not homosexual. It's considered a slur.

Yeah... um... nobody is going around calling themselves "cis" either. It is also considered a slur by those to whom it gets forcefully applied.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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.

The amount of relish you express toward the idea of squeezing females out of sport is disturbing.

You wish to be accepted and treated as a woman and as effectively female... and yet you demean and denigrate females on a regular basis.

 

[Emily's Cat]

No, bisexuality doesn't cover anything well. That's why we have labels like pansexual, polysexual, and omnisexual now, which many of us find fit far better than bisexual.

What are the differences in those three?

 

[Emily's Cat]

I'd personally be more than fine if I didn't have to deal with all the Olympics crap every 4 years.

Unless it's being held in your city, you don't have to deal with it at all. I don't. I pick up bits and pieces of news here and there, but I haven't actually watched any of it in ages. There are multitudes of other options.

 

[Emily's Cat]

What's the difference between pansexual and omnisexual?

Are we getting to the point where the terms for sexual attraction are just as undefined and useless as the terms for gender identity?

Do I really need to start identifying myself as "cismale bearsexual"? Meaning I'm a male who's sexually attracted to other males who are relatively large and hirsute? Isn't that already adequately covered by "homosexual" in most circumstances? It's not like the ladies hitting on me at the bar need to know that not only am I gay, but I'm also trying to filter out otters and twinks.

What is an otter?

 

[Emily's Cat]

At least Boudica90 seems to have gotten one thing right. I think Dr. Stock really is a TERF.


(Used with it's actual meaning, TERF isn't really an insult.)

IIRC Stock is not a radical feminist.

 

[Emily's Cat]

If her 'conclusions' do nothing but harm trans people (trans women in particular)? Absolutely.

I would have the same opinion if a researcher wanted to bring 'scientific racism' or other similarly harmful theories back.

How do you feel about researchers bringing back scientific sexism?

 

[theprestige]

Can you elaborate on *why* Stock deserves to be harassed and threatened? What has Stock done that you feel merits such behavior?

Stock signaled a crypto-TERF agenda in the abstract of one of their papers, apparently.

 

[theprestige]

What is an otter?

Anyone who identifies themselves as an otter ; )

 

[Emily's Cat]

But people don't identify as something, they ARE something. I don't identify as heterosexual, I simply am the sexuality that I am. I am attracted to women. Maybe a device of some sort could discover that I am also attracted to some specific subset of men, and the strict definition of heterosexual might not fit me in this case while bisexual would be to vague, but at no point does identification enter into it. It's just a failure of the language that we use to adequately describe my personal circumstances, and there is unlikely to be a reason to use a more specific term in my case.

I would suggest that one can only "identify as" something that they are not. If I were to say that I am vegan, you would be right to expect that I do not eat any animal products. On the other hand, if I were to say that I "identify as" vegan, it very likely would suggest that I feel some resonance with vegan concepts, but that I still consume animal products.

In reality, I am quite clearly an omnivore. I don't "identify as" an omnivore, I objectively eat both plant and animal materials regularly.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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.

That's exactly what the scientific method is intended to counter. One must have a testable hypothesis, and the very first hurdle is to prove that the hypothesis is statistically significantly different from the null hypothesis.

I will grant that a lot of social sciences don't employ the scientific method, and are notoriously shoddy in their research. It's also true that some people do crappy science and try to foist off bad work.

But you get very little of that in the hard sciences. At a minimum, other scientists are always happy to find the flaws in ones approach.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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 incorrect. Critical Theory is an academic approach, and is almost entirely a progressive view toward knowledge and society.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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.

Segregating sports by sex was done for FEMINIST reasons, in order to ADVANCE THE EQUALITY OF THE SEXES. Eliminating that sex segregation produces a situation in which ONLY males get to play sport.

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.

Sure. The only thing you care about is allowing males to compete against females. The fact that this approach results in sports becoming a single-sex endeavor where only males get to compete... that doesn't matter to you at all.

Repeatedly throughout this discussion you have demonstrated a complete lack of care and compassion toward females. You have repeatedly expressed that you do not care if females are disadvantaged, displaced, endangered, or made uncomfortable... as long as males who identify as women get to have what they want.

It's very difficult for me to come to any conclusion other than that you believe male feelings are more important than female rights, dignity, and safety. Females are something you're willing to see sacrificed for your ideology.

And yet you insist that you are "female" in all the ways that "actually matter".

I would say that you are "female" in all the ways that males are female.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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

To *whom* would it have been fair?

 

[Emily's Cat]

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?

I suspect it's in the same sense that a toddler uses "fair" when they're complaining that it's not fair that they have to go to bed at their bedtime and they don't get to drink beer.

 

[Emily's Cat]

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

Based on what? Why do you think this is true?