Trans women are not women (Part 8)

[shuttlt]

Sure, but you have to remember that as far as shuttlt is concerned, "men have already been steamrollered by feminists for 60 years".

I'm not sure I would describe it like that except talking loosely, allow me to clarify. Effectively the 2nd wave feminists ideas turned into the mainstream on the basis of an appeal to equality and individual liberation. There were men who were against this, just as there were women who were against this. Typically the thing being steamrolled plays a pretty passive part in the process, so in that sense they were steamrollered - men have never really been organised as a class or had the organized vanguard that women had.

Just as with women's liberation, there are trans people in favour of the trans-activists demands and there are trans people against them. You have the same liberation demand. Women are organized as a class so they are pushing back much harder.

Arguments about unintended negative consequences of shared changing rooms strike me as rather conservative, reactionary arguments. There is that old Robert Conquest quote - "Everyone is conservative about what he knows best".

 

[Emily's Cat]

Very much enjoyed the spectacle of Forstater getting shredded in court this past week. Couldn't have happened to a nicer specimen of humankind.

Your idea of "shredded" differs from mine.

Ben Cooper: So when claimant says gender identity does not change reality, you find it offensive because she's denying other people's reality?

Luke Easley: Yes.

Ben Cooper: You conflate identity and reality - claimant thins the opposite. Is this fair?

Luke Easley: Identity is reality - without identity there's just a corpse.

Ben Cooper: I suggest that you are struggling with this because you can't step outside your own views.

 

[Emily's Cat]

It's not an appeal. It's the continuation of her case against her former employer. She won her appeal, which established that gender critical beliefs are protected (meaning that people cannot be discriminated against simply on the basis of such beliefs). CGD decided not to appeal against that finding, so she is now proceeding to the main stage of the tribunal for wrongful dismissal. Regardless of the outcome, gender critical beliefs remain protected.

Honestly, I'm still a bit taken aback by an employment court having to take the position that "sex is real" is a protected "belief".

 

[Emily's Cat]

After going through this thread for a long time, I realized that when someone says, "trans women are women" or "trans women are not women", they are not making a statement about trans women. They are making a statement about the definition of a word.

I ran across a rephrasing that I've adopted: Dysphoric males are males.

 

[Emily's Cat]

I particularly enjoyed when Forstater corrected the opposing QC's misgendering.

Yeah, that had me giggling.

Granted, I'm only getting snippets from twitter, but still. That right there should have been the end of the whole thing. Clearly the opposing side knows which are males and which are females. The rest of the argument is moot right there.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Keir Starmer, Labour leader trying to find a third way:
https://twitter.com/DalgetySusan/status/1502560003164680193/photo/1

You guys' politicians have seriously lost touch with reality. It's absurd to watch the various politicians and party folks trying to tap-dance around this, avoid giving any response to what a woman is... and well, that whole thing with that one guy saying that gender dysphoric males who have vaginoplasties grow cervixes.

On the other hand, I REALLY do love the dinosaurs running rampant throughout the UK.

 

[Emily's Cat]

More horror stories out of Texas trying to criminalize parents of trans children, including one where the state is investigating "child abuse" claims against the parents of a trans person who is now an adult.

The approach being taken by Texas is absolutely ridiculous. I'm fairly opposed to any kind of medical transition for minors, but this is just absurd.

 

[Emily's Cat]

I don't dismiss anything. Making accommodations for minorities is often inconvenient. Such is the cost of living in an inclusive society.

I recall much grousing about the requirements of the ADA for example. Making sure people with disabilities can access society is often an inconvenience to the able-bodied, often coming with considerable additional expense. I suppose what is "reasonable" is a judgement call.

This is a very good analogy. Let me tell you why.

We make reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities, while also recognizing that some accommodations would not be reasonable.

We don't change sports so that people with disabilities can play, rather we set aside special olympics and paralympics which exclude able-bodied people from participating so that those with disabilities can.

Not all of the stalls in a restroom are wheelchair accessible. Not all entrances to a building have an access ramp. Some historical buildings are exempted from needing access ramps. Many amusement park rides aren't accessible to people with physical disabilities.

And there are a lot of disabilities and medical conditions that are NOT accommodated in ways that would make a difference. Police lights & sirens, fire alarms, and lots of other warning systems are extremely unfriendly to people with epilepsy. But the desire to provide notice to many people is considered to outweigh the very real health risk to a few.

The same should be true when it comes to accommodations for dysphoric people. There are a lot of things that I think are completely reasonable and supportable, that I think we absolutely should ensure so that people with dysphoria can participate in society. But there are also things that I think are NOT reasonable to demand. Access to female-only spaces, where females are particularly vulnerable or at risk, are one of those elements that I do NOT think should be accommodated.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Because? The trans-activist claim, though it's obviously much more focused on women, is that they are the trans-women and women, trans-men are men and that in all cases they should be treated as such. That feels like a general principle.

It's a propagandistic catechism that relies on a bait-and-switch in definition. It starts with viewing "men" and "women" as being terms exclusively referring to social gender roles... but then it swaps those out for cases where "men" and "women" are clearly being used in terms of sex classes.

You want proof? Go figure out what exactly those activists mean when they say "woman". Figure out what transwomen are supposed to share in common with females that they do NOT share in common with males.

Indeed. Separate, but equal and all that. In any argument about equality you always have the side asking for equality, and the side explaining how this is a special case and that segregation is justified for this or that social good. I fail to see what is special here beyond it being women who are at the receiving end of the equality demand.

It isn't "separate but equal". It is "separate because unequal". Females have sex-exclusive spaces BECAUSE males and females are NOT equal in terms of physical attributes, aggression, and violence.

 

[Elaedith]

Your idea of "shredded" differs from mine.

ETA: edited because I saw that you already posted what I quoted, apart from this:

BC: Is your point that claimant must not express belief in importance, relevance, immutability of sex at all - because you think that's denying some people's reality?

LE: yes that's my view

Of course we already know this, but it's rarely stated that plainly.

This is a cult for people who pretend not to be religious.

 

[p0lka]

I certainly think a lot of that is going on. I think a big factor in that is that if you accept the "trans women are women" position, then so many things make sense. Of course they should be in women's sports. They're women. Of course they should use women's changing rooms. They're women. Then there's nothing to argue about.

What happens next, though, is that some of us still say that regardless of the language, there are still differences between the people formerly known as women, and the people formerly known as men, and when we talk about those differences, there is simply no way to refute it, so it devolves into sniping and "gotcha: stuff.

After going through this thread for a long time, I realized that when someone says, "trans women are women" or "trans women are not women", they are not making a statement about trans women. They are making a statement about the definition of a word.

But behind that word there has to be some sort of reality. Saying "trans women are women" does not take away their muscles, or their ability to impregnate the other sorts of women. Saying "men can have babies" does not change who can have babies.

When all is said and done, there are still two sexes, and while most of us don't really care how you dress or what you call yourself, there comes a point where the anatomical differences between the two sexes actually matters, regardless of how this new word "gender" might be used for someone.

Re: the hilighted
That's the solution then, surely.

man woman? it's gender based, be what you want.

Male female? It's in your genes and non negotiable.

Which would mean transwomen are women, but they're not female. Also transmen are men but they're not male.

 

[Meadmaker]

I ran across a rephrasing that I've adopted: Dysphoric males are males.

I like it.

 

[Meadmaker]

Re: the hilighted
That's the solution then, surely.

man woman? it's gender based, be what you want.

Male female? It's in your genes and non negotiable.

Which would mean transwomen are women, but they're not female. Also transmen are men but they're not male.

Works for me, but I don't think you will get LondonJohn to go along.


More importantly, I think there are some very influential policymakers who would not go along, from school boards to the White House.

 

[Rolfe]

The word "woman" is taken. Men can't have it.

 

[Meadmaker]

Re: the hilighted
That's the solution then, surely.

man woman? it's gender based, be what you want.

Male female? It's in your genes and non negotiable.

Which would mean transwomen are women, but they're not female. Also transmen are men but they're not male.

The word "woman" is taken. Men can't have it.

And, there are plenty of people on "my side" who wouldn't go along either.

People understand that redefining, or more accurately, undefining, "woman" is a ploy. E. C. described it a few posts ago.

 

[theprestige]

Re: the hilighted
That's the solution then, surely.

man woman? it's gender based, be what you want.

Male female? It's in your genes and non negotiable.

Which would mean transwomen are women, but they're not female. Also transmen are men but they're not male.

But then what even is the point of saying transwomen are women? It doesn' mean anything. It doesn't tell what accommodations they should have in public policy. It doesn't even tell you what their preferred pronouns are.

 

[Aber]

Granted, I'm only getting snippets from twitter, but still.

Try here

https://twitter.com/tribunaltweets?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

 

[Distracted1]

del

 

[Distracted1]

But then what even is the point of saying transwomen are women? It doesn' mean anything. It doesn't tell what accommodations they should have in public policy. It doesn't even tell you what their preferred pronouns are.

Indeed, it just backs up a step for no reason.
"transwomen" should then be "transfemales" and we begin the go round all over again.

Unless, of course, the goal is to separate words from their meanings in order to win every argument. Which I believe it is.

 

[Rolfe]

Ah, aren't local elections empowering.

I just had a candidate at the door. He is standing for a party known to be lost to the woke. He seemed a lovely man, and my impression was he probably agreed with a lot of what I was saying, but I know how it works. You get elected, you have to toe the party line on policy matters. So despite him agreeing with me about the iniquity of forcing schoolchildren to use mixed-sex toilets (he has two daughters), he'd vote as he was told to vote.

I wanted to let him know how I felt, and now he knows. If more people understood what's going on, he'd be getting an earful like this at every second door. I see Nicola Sturgeon (she/her) has taken her pronouns out of her twitter bio. This suggests to me she knows that people are catching on and that it's a pivotal issue. It also suggests to me that she is not acting out of principle, because if this was a principled stance she'd keep the pronouns even if they were causing voter blowback.

There is a tide turning at the moment, and people like LJ are going to be quite surprised when it happens. In other news, it seemed to me that Maya Forstater's legal team just elicited clear evidence of unfair dismissal, so that could get interesting too. Although no doubt if that is the ruling LJ will declare that it was only a technical issue.