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Cont: Transwomen are not women part XII (also merged)

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Emily's Cat said:
Chanakya, I'm not saying that a desire for inclusion is a completely fraudulent argument. What I am saying is that even if the *initial* argument is heartfelt and sincere...
1) there is no way for us to tell that it was sincere - it's unverifiable, and
2) it provides a loophole by which insincere people can exploit the goodwill of others - in this case, given the lopsided nature of physicality by sex, the result is that insincere males have gained a way to exploit the good nature of females and of sporting authorities.
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lionking said:
...The motive of transwomen wanting to compete in women’s sports doesn’t matter to me. Their participation disadvantages women, and in contact sports, hurts them. It’s pretty clear to me that transwomen should not compete at elite and sub elite levels in women’s sport.
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Fair enough. Like I'd said earlier on in this thread, it seems to me --- not off of any expertise I myself bring to the table, but merely basis a quick read of some of the things that I've seen others say here! --- that there are three separate arguments, whether for or against, as far as the transwomen-in-sports question:

(a) The question of fairness ---- of which, I'd say, this safety issue is a subset; or, of course, you can treat it as a separate and fourth argument, that's fine too;

(b) The matter of inclusion; and

(c) What the paying public is willing to pay to watch.


What I suggested there addresses only the middle thing, the inclusion argument. Agreed, even should it be shown that the plea for inclusion is a sincere one and not a sham, even then that isn't the end of the whole question, about whether transwomen should get to compete in women's categories, not by a long shot.
 
Emily's Cat said:
Does this mean that you think that transwomen and ciswomen are totally the same, they're both equally women? They're just different subsets of the group of women, just like tall women and short women, just like blond women and brunette women?
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No. Trans women are male and cis women are female. (Thought you knew that was my position)
 
Emily's Cat said:
Chanakya, I'm not saying that a desire for inclusion is a completely fraudulent argument. What I am saying is that even if the *initial* argument is heartfelt and sincere...
1) there is no way for us to tell that it was sincere - it's unverifiable,
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That's just the thing. It does seem to me there's a way to tell whether it was sincere. It does indeed seem verifiable. Not for some specific individual, obviously (for that we'd need mindreading devices!), but in the aggregate. That's what I'd spelled out in the rest of the post you've quoted from.

(Like I said, just an off-the-cuff idea of mine, that I'm not in the least in love with, and am happy to discard summarily if shown wanting! But still, as far as I can see so far, it does makes sense.)

It's a simple idea. I'm repeating myself --- for the very last time, promise! and that only because you didn't address this part of it from my post, and may have missed it --- but here's what it amounts to: Don't just limit yourself to newspaper and news-site reports, which obviously will generally cover only the more elevated levels of sports events. Doing which isn't meaningful, for reasons that you've yourself argued out very rightly, about transmen not being able to do well in men's categories, and not being able to reach those higher levels at all. Instead, do a comprehensive sampling thing down at the humblest levels of sports participation, both amateur sports and professional sports as well, right down to the very basic level at which someone who has a notion of competing might start out competing. Do that, and don't worry about whether they're winning or losing anything, just look at whether or not substantial numbers of transmen are competing in men's categories. If the answer is Yes, then that's verification, right there, that in the aggregate the inclusion plea is sincere. If not, then we have evidence that, in aggregate, the inclusion plea is a lie.
(Generic "you", obviously. Not asking you to do it, obviously, or immediately provide that data! Just suggesting a way how "we" might, how someone might, some research team might, go about verifying this thing, and assessing whether in aggregate the inclusion argument is sincere.)


and
2) it provides a loophole by which insincere people can exploit the goodwill of others - in this case, given the lopsided nature of physicality by sex, the result is that insincere males have gained a way to exploit the good nature of females and of sporting authorities.
Click to expand...


See my post just prior, addressing both this part of what you've said, as well as lionking's post. Agreed, it isn't as if the inclusion argument is the only one. There are other arguments as well, absolutely, other arguments that are independent of this one.
 
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LondonJohn said:
Come back to this discussion if and when mainstream medicine decides that a person identifying as a race/ethnicity different from their birth race/ethnicity has a valid lived condition, rather than (as is the case currently) considering it to be a mental health disorder.
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What mental health disorder does Rachel Dolezal have?

Also, this article states that "Changing one’s stated race over time had no association with poor mental health".
 
Francesca R said:
No. Trans women are male and cis women are female. (Thought you knew that was my position)
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Trans is used there in the sense of "transitioned to" whereas Cis is used in the latin sense of "on the same side as". the latin sense of trans is "on the opposite side to"

Using trans in the same way as cis would mean a trans woman is a woman who wants to be a man.

Is the use of trans and cis in different ways deliberate?

Probably.
 
Lplus said:
Trans is used there in the sense of "transitioned to" whereas Cis is used in the latin sense of "on the same side as". the latin sense of trans is "on the opposite side to"

Using trans in the same way as cis would mean a trans woman is a woman who wants to be a man. Is the use of trans and cis in different ways deliberate?

Probably.
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Pure Alice in Wonderland now.
This thread is the gift that keeps on giving.
 
Matthew Best said:
No, it isn't. Also, it doesn't matter if it is or not.
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Looks to me like it is, though. I hope this isn’t about the “substantial”? Because in that case you misunderstand me, and the misunderstanding is easily resolved.

And while I can see how it might not matter, sure; but that would depend, surely?
 
TurkeysGhost said:
I see we've reached the "the founder of Planned Parenthood was a eugenicist" level of discourse. Top quality.
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If a "terf" was also into eugenics you'd be all over it and would think it was a valid point to make, don't pretend otherwise.
 
JoeMorgue said:
If a "terf" was also into eugenics you'd be all over it and would think it was a valid point to make, don't pretend otherwise.
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If it were relevant to the modern day advocacy of TERFism, sure. If not, no. There's plenty of nutpicking that could be done from their side that, while humorous, is admittedly not relevant and I don't engage in.
 
Lplus said:
Trans is used there in the sense of "transitioned to" whereas Cis is used in the latin sense of "on the same side as". the latin sense of trans is "on the opposite side to"
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Right. Just like a transatlantic flight must mean you're already on the other side of the Atlantic.

Are people being intentionally obtuse?
 
Without starting yet another sub-debate a lot of the issue is that we lump two (to me anyway) very different things under the vague term "trans."

I've always said that a biological X who defines as Y and is actively going through steps to make actual physical changes to their body; reassignment surgery, hormone treatment, etc makes absolutely 100% perfect sense because it recognizes that actual, objective, physiological changes have to be made to turn from an X into a Y.

We could quibble over whether or not it "counts" or whether or not any amount of effort really can fully change a pure X into a pure Y, but at least they are acknowledging that actual, real, objective, non-internal change has to happen.

"I'm an X but now I'm a Y and that change occurred the moment I changed my completely internal self identity and I have no intentions of making any changes beyond that and still demand to be literally thought of as a Y" is where my issue has always lay.
 
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Chanakya said:
Looks to me like it is, though. I hope this isn’t about the “substantial”? Because in that case you misunderstand me, and the misunderstanding is easily resolved.

And while I can see how it might not matter, sure; but that would depend, surely?
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A desire to be included among members of the opposite sex, no matter how sincere, is not a valid justification for letting someone cross a sex-segregation boundary. The whole point of sex segregation in sports, the whole reason women's sports actually works, is because it's about separation, not inclusion.

A man's sincere desire to be included among the women, in sports (and other places sex segregation makes sense) suggests to me not an entitlement but a mental health issue.

---

In fact I've been assuming it's about inclusion all along anyway. We can take trans folks at their word on this, and my conclusion doesn't change: Fiat self-ID is not a valid basis for transcending sex segregation.
 
mumblethrax said:
Right. Just like a transatlantic flight must mean you're already on the other side of the Atlantic.
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At least the other side of the Atlantic is a place you can actually get to, by one of a variety of proven successful methods. There is no method for getting to be the opposite sex.

I'm just barely open to the possibility that there might be a way to become the opposite gender. I just need someone to explain what a gender is, what the opposite gender would be, a method for transitioning from one to the other, that is not either (a) actually about sex, or (b) actually a mental health issue.

Are people being intentionally obtuse?
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Probably, yeah.
 
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