Trans women are not women (Part 8)

[Ziggurat]

However, and here's the kicker:

Not all pregnant people are women.

(Do I have to explain why? Please let me know if I do....)

Oh, I think I know why you say that. But given that the truth of this claim hinges upon the definition of a word that is itself under contention here, there's a sort of arrogance in presuming a singular answer as the only possible one. You are begging the question (in the formal sense of the term).

You're also engaging in a stupid form of pedantry, where you're evaluating whether "you can't say X" is true as an absolute statement when it obviously isn't meant that way. What is meant is that the term used to be acceptable in general, but now even by your own explicit admission it's only acceptable in limited circumstances. So you aren't actually proving him wrong, you're just engaging in more policing of language.

 

[Meadmaker]

Ah, you really don't understand this issue properly, do you?

Read my post #616 if you like - it gives an explanation.

Yes. It gives the explanation I thought you would give.

And of course you expressed surprise that you owuld have to explain it. After all, it's so glaringly obvious that only idiots would need the explanation, but you patiently perservered. Very noble of you.


And yet, even after your explanation, many people, including myself, will still think that Tony Blair was making sense.

 

[theprestige]

It's hard for me to take seriously anyone who claims to be a man, claims that being a man is a critical part of their self-identity, and is also pregnant. Mainly because it seems to me that they're not taking it seriously either.

 

[Meadmaker]

I see. Yes, I suppose you could say that the left is equally extreme in their indoctrination if you consider "non-discrimination policies as required by federal law" as an equally extreme position in contrast to the anti-gay animus of the right.


You understand that this is no possible "agnostic" position to take here, right? Trans and gay students exist and will be entering the public school system. These schools either have to decide whether they're going to bury their heads in the sand on this issue and let the chips land where they may, or take a position that discrimination against these students, both by their peers and by the teachers and administration, will not be accepted.

What you call "indoctrination" is simply the routine process of teachers supervising children in their care.

What I could do is talk about what's actually happening, and try to leave spin out of it until we get to the part about whether we think it's a good idea. In other words, first determine what the policies are, then determine whether or not we think those policies are a good idea. On the second part, there will be disagreement, but we ought to be able to at least establish and agree on the first part.

Sadly, though, as happens all too often, we're getting mixed up on the first part. However, let's review.

I said that people on the left were pushing to include topics of homosexuality and transgenderism into official school curriculum materials, including at the primary school level. You called that a "whopper", so I provided a link to an organization that was creating curriculum materials, and suggested google search terms where you could find other organizations doing the same thing. You said it was different, because one side was pushing laws. I presented a link that showed that both sides were pushing laws.

That's reality. That is what is happening. People are trying to make sure that certain ideas are pushed into school curricula, and that other ideas are excluded from school curricula. There are people doing this from the left, and other people doing it from the right.

That's all fairly normal, by the way. It's not like indoctrination via public school curricula is some new thing that was only invented in the 21st century. It is just the topic that has changed.

But it is not "the routine process of teachers supervising children in their care."

 

[TurkeysGhost]

What I could do is talk about what's actually happening, and try to leave spin out of it until we get to the part about whether we think it's a good idea. In other words, first determine what the policies are, then determine whether or not we think those policies are a good idea. On the second part, there will be disagreement, but we ought to be able to at least establish and agree on the first part.

Sadly, though, as happens all too often, we're getting mixed up on the first part. However, let's review.

I said that people on the left were pushing to include topics of homosexuality and transgenderism into official school curriculum materials, including at the primary school level. You called that a "whopper", so I provided a link to an organization that was creating curriculum materials, and suggested google search terms where you could find other organizations doing the same thing. You said it was different, because one side was pushing laws. I presented a link that showed that both sides were pushing laws.

That's reality. That is what is happening. People are trying to make sure that certain ideas are pushed into school curricula, and that other ideas are excluded from school curricula. There are people doing this from the left, and other people doing it from the right.

That's all fairly normal, by the way. It's not like indoctrination via public school curricula is some new thing that was only invented in the 21st century. It is just the topic that has changed.

But it is not "the routine process of teachers supervising children in their care."

I guess the "Drag Queen Story Hour" was just a rhetorical flourish.

There's definitely two "sides" to this, but trying to point them as equally extreme is incredibly disingenuous.

Liberal types want teachers to include age appropriate content about gender and sexuality issues. More precisely, they want to add information about the factual existence of gay and trans people to already existing education materials around sexuality and gender which are taught, in an age appropriate way, to children.

Reactionaries want to make teacher's personally liable if they ever mention the existence of gay people in school.

The ideas that these laws "push" for is that's normal and ok to be gay. I suppose that's controversial in some circles, but it's only extreme if you think being a bigot is the normal position.

 

[Ziggurat]

There's definitely two "sides" to this, but trying to point them as equally extreme is incredibly disingenuous.

No. There are MORE than two sides to this. You are being dishonest by trying to portray the debate as if it was only two sides.

 

[Meadmaker]

I guess the "Drag Queen Story Hour" was just a rhetorical flourish.

Correct. (And...a fairly good one, I think, but that's a rather subjective judgement.)

Liberal types want teachers to include age appropriate content about gender and sexuality issues.

So do conservative types. It's just that conservative types think that the age appropriate content about sexuality for ten year olds is no content at all or, at most, the very basic elements of anatomy and reproduction. Liberal types don't think that's enough, so they demand more information be presented.


And of course, as Ziggurat noted, there are more than two sides, and not everyone is part of a "side", and, as strange as it may seem, some people don't choose their positions based on which "side" they are supporting, but what they think of that position. This results in some people being on one side on one aspect of the issue, and a different side on another aspect.

Realistically, every year there are fewer and fewer of those latter sorts. America seems in the grip of partisan hysteria, with people adopting positions based on their party, rather than supporting a party based on agreeing with the positions.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Correct. (And...a fairly good one, I think, but that's a rather subjective judgement.)



So do conservative types. It's just that conservative types think that the age appropriate content about sexuality for ten year olds is no content at all or, at most, the very basic elements of anatomy and reproduction. Liberal types don't think that's enough, so they demand more information be presented.

It's pretty clear that they consider "age appropriate" to mean heterosexual and hetero-normative expectations be taught. They clearly see homosexuality or other queer identities as some degeneracy that ought not be mentioned. As you said before "Heather has two mommies" will never be considered age appropriate the same way that discussing male-female relationships will be.

And of course, as Ziggurat noted, there are more than two sides, and not everyone is part of a "side", and, as strange as it may seem, some people don't choose their positions based on which "side" they are supporting, but what they think of that position. This results in some people being on one side on one aspect of the issue, and a different side on another aspect.

Realistically, every year there are fewer and fewer of those latter sorts. America seems in the grip of partisan hysteria, with people adopting positions based on their party, rather than supporting a party based on agreeing with the positions.

That's the thing with reactionaries trying to force their will on the broader population, it narrows things down into two sides. You have reactionary bigots trying to censor teachers and you have everyone else.

That's what this "dont say gay bill" will do. There's no difference between some centrist lib and some avant-garde SJW type, any teachers who dares suggest that being gay is normal or acceptable risks being sued.

It's important to remember that there was already a system in place where local communities could decide, within the bounds of civil rights laws, what material was appropriate for their local schools. This extreme right wing legislation is a repudiation of that process, instead threatening schools and teachers with top-down censorship if they don't toe the line.

 

[Ziggurat]

It's important to remember that there was already a system in place where local communities could decide, within the bounds of civil rights laws, what material was appropriate for their local schools.

And that system was being deliberately and systematically subverted. Are you really surprised that there's a backlash?

 

[TurkeysGhost]

And that system was being deliberately and systematically subverted. Are you really surprised that there's a backlash?

If you say so.

Seems to me that right wing cranks who find themselves in the minority in certain hyper-local communities and can't convince the other members of the community would rather have the state come in and swing their dick around.

 

[LondonJohn]

Given that you've not read the interview, you don't know the context of the quote and yet are supremely confident about what Blair is doing.

So a directly-worded quote of

But equal rights doesn’t mean you can’t use the phrase ‘pregnant woman’

Can be taken out of context, can it?

Perhaps in your world Blair actually said "But equal rights doesn’t mean you can’t use the phrase ‘pregnant woman’....when you're referring to an unspecified pregnant person who might be of either gender"

Do you think something like that was the full context, and that the Times chose to quote Blair shockingly out of context in its own Twitter thread on the interview?

Because in every other conceivable context (especially since he used the singular word "woman"), Blair's claim is ignorant and wrong.

Or perhaps you'd like to hand me back a little of my own medicine by suggesting to me a context in which Blair's words actually made sense, bearing in mind that a) a ciswoman who's pregnant is still being termed a "pregnant woman" without a shadow of a doubt, and b) there is such a thing as a pregnant man.

I await your attempts with interest.


ETA. I'll help you out though (even though this is something you could easily have done yourself if you were that invested in the (infinitesimally small) possibility that Blair was quoted out of context). Plenty of other publications re-quoted the more..... interesting.... parts of his Times interview.

You're not going to like it when I show you the full quote, including the "before" and "after" - Blair delightfully doubles down by suggesting that his former constituents* would think you were "bonkers" (= "mad"/"idiotic") if/when you told them that "you can't use the phrase "pregnant woman":

Referencing the transgender debate, Blair said: “Of course, we shouldn’t be transphobic and we should have equal rights for trans people. But equal rights doesn’t mean you can’t use the phrase ‘pregnant woman’. If you went to Sedgefield and had that conversation, they would think you were bonkers.”

https://lesbianandgaynews.com/2022/...about-lack-of-support-from-labour-leadership/


Any questions?

(Oh and in the same interview, Blair also demonstrated further reactionary ignorance - which someone in his position simply shouldn't be doing - by parroting the fatuous nonsense that a situation now exists where "women can't talk about being women". Again: any questions?)


* British prime ministers are also members of Parliament, representing a parliamentary constituency (and they must - obviously - win their own constituency in a General Election to be eligible to be PM). Blair was parachuted in, as a fairly young man, to the pretty rough North-East England constituency of Sedgefield (a very safe Labour seat), and ended up being the elected Sedgefield MP for over 20 years. Blair himself probably couldn't be all that much further removed from his average constituent, so it's *interesting* to hear him appealing to their, uhm, absence of liberal intelligence....

 

[theprestige]

I think you are right about it being cosplay.

I forgot all about that aspect of it.

I think maybe Dustin Hoffman answers that question better than I ever could:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPAat-T1uhE

What is it about Hoffman's answer that struck you as insightful or true or germane to the other questions I've asked?

Full disclosure: I engage much better with the written word than with video. I'm not going to sit through Hoffman's soliloquy waiting for him to get to whatever point you think he's making that's relevant to our discussion here.

 

[Meadmaker]

So a directly-worded quote of




Can be taken out of context, can it?

Well, yes. That's the nature of "context".

Or perhaps you'd like to hand me back a little of my own medicine by suggesting to me a context in which Blair's words actually made sense,

J. K. Rowling being castigated in the media, especially in social media and by activist groups, with subsequent real world consequences, because she ridiculed the idea of a conference for "people who menstruate" instead of "women".


Which was the context of Blair's comment.

(ETA: In the original link LJ posted, the "pregnant women" post was in a section called "On JK Rowling and culture wars:" I don't know the exact words spoken before and after the quote.)

ETA. I'll help you out though (even though this is something you could easily have done yourself if you were that invested in the (infinitesimally small) possibility that Blair was quoted out of context.

Do you think you'll ever grow bored with it?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Yes. We're all just fine with fundamentalist Christian Sunday Schools battering kids' idea of self-esteem and self-confidence with the wages of sin and the eternal damnation of anyone who doesn't adhere assiduously to the rules written in a book of bronze-age middle-eastern stories.

Yeah, that's all good, right? That's healthy and liberal, isn't it?

Interesting strawman. NOBODY in this thread is "just fine" with fundie anything. So... You're arguing against a perspective that does not exist in this discussion.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

Well, yes. That's the nature of "context".




J. K. Rowling being castigated in the media, especially in social media and by activist groups, with subsequent real world consequences, because she ridiculed the idea of a conference for "people who menstruate" instead of "women".

Rowling seems to enjoy a fair bit of support for her anti-trans positions as well, especially in the UK press. She seems fully aware of the controversial waters she's wading in. Surely you don't mean to strip her of her own agency in these matters.

 

[Emily's Cat]

LOL
Imagine your surprise when the realisation finally dawns on you, in hindsight, that the basic reasonable people were not in fact the people who hold your sort of views...

(People who vehemently opposed gay rights and black civil rights also used to labour under the delusion that they were the "basic reasonable people". A few of the nasty old bigots probably still do.)

I still can't really wrap my head around males who advocate vocally and aggressively that males should be *entitled* to 1) strip naked in front of females without the consent of those females or 2) ogle naked females without the consent of those females or 3) share sleeping and bathing accommodations with females without the consent of those females.

I'm taken aback by the sheer number of males who are gung-ho for removing the right of consent from females.

If that's the "right side of history", then No Thank You.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Thankfully we've got someone here to mansplain what the radical feminists really mean, without bothering to quote any of them.

I do love it when males tell females what females mean, what females believe, and what females *ought to* believe, especially when it's paired with condescension and aggression.

Did the last century just fall in a hole somehow?

 

[AmyStrange]

What is it about Hoffman's answer that struck you as insightful or true or germane to the other questions I've asked?

Full disclosure: I engage much better with the written word than with video. I'm not going to sit through Hoffman's soliloquy waiting for him to get to whatever point you think he's making that's relevant to our discussion here.

Sorry, my kitty died early this morning, and i'm not in a good place today

 

[Meadmaker]

Rowling seems to enjoy a fair bit of support for her anti-trans positions as well, especially in the UK press. She seems fully aware of the controversial waters she's wading in. Surely you don't mean to strip her of her own agency in these matters.

You are changing the subject again.

John was talking about what "context" surrounded the Tony Blair quote. The context was J. K. Rowling being lambasted on social media for making fun of the phrase "people who menstruate", or possibly for similar comments.

That's it.



Now, you might say that she ought to have been lambasted for saying it, but that's a different conversation.

 

[Meadmaker]

Sorry, my kitty died early this morning, and i'm not in a good place today

Well....that's just horrible.

Is that her in the avatar photo? She looks just like my cat....which I suppose is true of most black cats, but I would be heartbroken to lose mine. As much as they have in common, each one has their own special traits that make them unique. My condolences.