Cont: Trans women are not women (IX)

[shuttlt]

Sure it can. Ask someone if they're a woman (girl, man, boy, non-binary, whatever). If they say yes, you tick the box that says woman (girl, man, boy...).

The same as if you ask somebody whether they are the Emperor Napoleon I and they say "yes", you can tick the box that says "Napoleon". If we can persuade everybody to treat them like Napoleon, then they will experience true Napoleonness.

Who gives a ****** There's this persistent undertone in this conversation where everyone thinks I'm committed to capitulating to whatever the most obnoxious activists want. I'm not.

OK. There is a war going on over this definition because of an effort to engineer cultural change using language. The whole reason the definition is controversial is that. Coming up with definitions that might have some purpose in a world where that wasn't going on is easy, but pointless. There are plenty of ways that one could come up with a new definition of "woman". The side that want to play language games to do activism would be fools to accept a definition that prevented them doing that. The side that wants to resist this social change would be fools to accept a definition that was acceptable to the activists.

The main thing I want to communicate is that I think there's something to the idea of gender identity (and even something to the idea of innate gender identity), that it really doesn't cost you much to accommodate trans people in most situations if you don't work yourself into a froth about it, and that this idea so often on display in this thead that "I'm right, therefore I get to be as toxic as I want about this" is repulsive.

If you narrow the scope down to a single individual, the definition isn't very interesting. I might call somebody Napoleon who thought they were Napoleon, just to be nice. By reducing it down to what would be nice for this individual, you are excluding the whole controversy.

Your type 2 definition is introduced as a domain specific alternative to the type 1 definition. Type 1 definitions are then read as if they were type 2 definitions - changing laws and norms in the process. The type 2 definition then functionally replaces the type 1 definition. That is what activists are doing. That is what politicians are bending the knee to who refuse to define "woman". That is what is being resisted. The whole thing functions as a motte and bailey.

Arguing about the merits of the definition in the absence of this cultural question is like discussing a map of Waterloo on 17th of June 1815 as if the chief question that the two armies were contesting was the field boundaries.

 

[Aber]

How does "sex or gender" abolish sex?

By in practice expanding any definition based on sex to be meaningless.

 

[mumblethrax]

By in practice expanding any definition based on sex to be meaningless.

It doesn't. It just acknowledges the reality that not all gay men are attracted to cis men.

 

[shuttlt]

It doesn't. It just acknowledges the reality that not all gay men are attracted to cis men.

Do you mean men1 or men2? Do we need gay1 and gay2 definitions?

 

[Aber]

Do you mean men1 or men2? Do we need gay1 and gay2 definitions?

As noted above, Stonewall in the UK has already moved to a gay2 definition.

 

[shuttlt]

As noted above, Stonewall in the UK has already moved to a gay2 definition.

Indeed, but it seemed like mumblethrax was treating gay2 as The definition. This is the process I am talking about. Actually the type 2 definition replaces the type 1 definition, but keeps all the type 1 laws and norms.

 

[Ziggurat]

Who gives a ****** There's this persistent undertone in this conversation where everyone thinks I'm committed to capitulating to whatever the most obnoxious activists want. I'm not.

This isn't about you. I don't care about you. The activists matter because many of our institutions DO capitulate to them, and so what they say has consequences. You standing up to them counts for naught when so many others don't.

The main thing I want to communicate is that I think there's something to the idea of gender identity (and even something to the idea of innate gender identity), that it really doesn't cost you much to accommodate trans people in most situations if you don't work yourself into a froth about it, and that this idea so often on display in this thead that "I'm right, therefore I get to be as toxic as I want about this" is repulsive.

This is a straw man. Nobody here is advocating toxic behavior. No one here has a problem accommodating trans people in most situations. You are working yourself up into a froth here.

 

[mumblethrax]

This isn't about you. I don't care about you. The activists matter because many of our institutions DO capitulate to them, and so what they say has consequences. You standing up to them counts for naught when so many others don't.

This problem is inflated out of all proportion.

This is a straw man. Nobody here is advocating toxic behavior. No one here has a problem accommodating trans people in most situations. You are working yourself up into a froth here.

I didn't say they were advocating it. They're enacting it. And I rather think the people who think there's a conspiracy to replace women with men, driven by the same extinction anxieties that serve as an organizing principle for other replacement theories, are a bit frothier than I am.

 

[d4m10n]

My definition would be something like:

1. an adult human female
2. an adult human who identifies as a woman1

If an 15-y.o. boy sincerely identifies as an adult human female, does this mean they should be legally eligible to do all the things grown women can legally do, e.g. vote, drive, pose nude on OnlyFans?

ETA: I'm asking b/c all this (re)definition mongering is ultimately about driving changes to culture, policy, & law.

 

[mumblethrax]

If an 15-y.o. boy sincerely identifies as an adult human female, does this mean they should be legally eligible to do all the things grown women can legally do, e.g. vote, drive, pose nude on OnlyFans?

No.

ETA: I'm asking b/c all this (re)definition mongering is ultimately about driving changes to culture, policy, & law.

This isn't how the world works. Linguistic determinism is bunk. Forty something years ago all the forms changed from "sex" to "gender". And everyone just started treating it like it meant sex. The same thing would happen if anyone actually succeeded in changing sex to gender everywhere. Euphemism treadmill. Most people just don't really care about it all that much, beyond trying to be approximately polite.

The problem is with the ability of dogmatists to enact professional consequences.

 

[d4m10n]

No.

Okay, so sometimes people should not be expected to allow identity to override reality.

This isn't how the world works.

Uh huh.

 

[mumblethrax]

Okay, so sometimes people should not be expected to allow identity to override reality.

Me calling someone what they'd like to be called does not override reality.

Uh huh.

I didn't say cultural change doesn't happen. It just has next to nothing to do with what we call people.

 

[d4m10n]

It just has next to nothing to do with what we call people.

Lia Thomas disagrees.

 

[theprestige]

The operation is to ask someone if they are a woman.

That's not how I understand "operational definition".

I understand it to be a definition adopted for some specified practical application ("operation").

So "adult human female" and "anyone who identifies as a woman" could both be operational definitions for women in sports - women doing sports being the operation in question.

But whatever. I now understand you are trying to thread a semantic needle, rather than address real public policy dilemmas in practical terms. I'll leave you to it.

 

[mumblethrax]

Lia Thomas disagrees.

She's making an appeal that will be adjudicated on whether people think it's fair or not for her to compete. Which is the same process that determines whether or not people are willing to call her a woman. A does not cause B, C causes A and B.

 

[mumblethrax]

That's not how I understand "operational definition".

Then you don't understand operational definition.

 

[theprestige]

No.


This isn't how the world works. Linguistic determinism is bunk. Forty something years ago all the forms changed from "sex" to "gender". And everyone just started treating it like it meant sex. The same thing would happen if anyone actually succeeded in changing sex to gender everywhere.

Lia Thomas falsifies this prediction.

Admiral Rachel Levine, hailed as the nation's first female four-star admiral, falsifies this prediction.

 

[mumblethrax]

Lia Thomas falsifies this prediction.

Admiral Rachel Levine, hailed as the nation's first female four-star admiral, falsifies this prediction.

No. See above.

 

[d4m10n]

She's making an appeal that will be adjudicated on whether people think it's fair or not for her to compete. Which is the same process that determines whether or not people are willing to call her a woman.

Not at all.

She is arguing that once you've accepted the mantra "Trans women are women," you have already made the decision about whether it is fair for her to compete. It's not just a redefinition, it is a moral commitment as well, but the linguistic shift comes first.

ETA: There are those (like LondonJohn and myself) who are more than happy to grant her womanhood in a social sense, but take exception to the idea that high-stakes sports must be sorted accordingly.

 

[mumblethrax]

Not at all.

She is arguing that once you've accepted the mantra "Trans women are women," you have already made the decision about whether it is fair for her to compete.

And nobody in particular will be persuaded by that.