Cont: Transwomen are not women - part 13

[theprestige]

I don't expect the trans rights folks to answer, but most of those issues looked pretty obvious to me.

1. The right to be included in toilets and changing rooms based on gender rather than sex at birth
2. The right to accommodation in hospitals, refuges, shelters and prisons based on gender rather than sex at birth
3. The right to be included in women-only shortlists, award schemes, grants, etc.
4. The right to be included in women's sports regardless of other considerations such as fairness or safety
5. The right to be included in advocacy for women's rights, e.g. NOW
6. The right to be referred to as girls/women based on gender rather than sex at birth

etc. & so forth

Gender, as understood by TRAs, is functionally meaningless for the purposes of human rights.

All they're actually saying, in each of your bullet points, is "the right for men to enter safe spaces for women just because they say they want to."

And that is not, never has been, and never will be a right. Anymore than killing someone because they disrespected your god will ever be a right, no matter how much some societies think it is one.

 

[Samson]

Here Kellie Jay Keene sternly refutes the notion of accommodating dysphoric/autogynephilic males in female spaces.

https://www.youtube.com/live/bfmmpQARReI?si=TnZtgIvGr4fQvEOs

Early in the comments a man who I will call patrickd thanks her and Matt Walsh for successfully deterring him from physical transition to trans woman.

This, remarkably, is successful gender identity conversion therapy, and a criminal offence in New Zealand and other places. Stella O'Malley made a representation to a New Zealand select committee on this subject here

https://genspect.org/stella-omalley-testifies-about-new-zealand-conversion-therapy-bill/

The then leader of the opposition, Simon Bridges understood her, and went on to be one of 8 of 121 parliamentarians to vote against the bill. There have been no police referrals under the act yet.
Its key proponent, Shaneel Lal, asserts that it is now a criminal offence in NZ for a parent to prevent their child from taking puberty blockers:

From Wikipedia
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conversion_Practices_Prohibition_Legislation_Act_2022


"Lal disagreed with the National Party's assertion that the bill would criminalise parents for advising their children against taking puberty blockers; arguing instead that the bill banned parents from forcibly stopping their children from taking puberty blockers with the intention of suppressing their chose gender identity or expression."

 

[d4m10n]

All they're actually saying, in each of your bullet points, is "the right for men to enter safe spaces for women just because they say they want to."

And that is not, never has been, and never will be a right.

Rights don't exist in some Platonic realm or the mind of Jehovah, they are socially and legally constructed by ourselves and our forebears.

In places like Canada & California, natal males do indeed have the (legal and social) right to enter spaces previously reserved for females, so long as they self-identify as women.

 

[Brainster]

I don't think they do at all. I would rather consider the impact in each context and try to decide based on what the impact is, instead of comparing what category of person is impacted.

So who will be the greater victim in each individual instance? Yeah, that's not relying on victim ranking at all.

 

[Roboramma]

I don't expect the trans rights folks to answer, but most of those issues looked pretty obvious to me.

1. The right to be included in toilets and changing rooms based on gender rather than sex at birth
2. The right to accommodation in hospitals, refuges, shelters and prisons based on gender rather than sex at birth
3. The right to be included in women-only shortlists, award schemes, grants, etc.
4. The right to be included in women's sports regardless of other considerations such as fairness or safety
5. The right to be included in advocacy for women's rights, e.g. NOW
6. The right to be referred to as girls/women based on gender rather than sex at birth

etc. & so forth

Those who are being oppressed are generally lacking some right that is held by their oppressors. Trans people generally claim not that they lack some category of rights that no one else has, but that they lack rights that are held by the rest of society. "Ciswomen get to use the women's changing room, so I, a transwoman, should too!".

But none of the "rights" you list are rights that anyone else has. Its hard to take seriously the claim that transpeople's rights are being trampled upon when they are being treated the same as everyone else.

 

[d4m10n]

But none of the "rights" you list are rights that anyone else has.

Cisgender women have the right to services and accommodations matching their gender identity, along with the right to be included in women-only shortlists, award schemes, grants, etc. In every numbered example, transgender women are asking for the same rights granted to cisgender women, but based on different inclusion criteria.

 

[Roboramma]

Cisgender women have the right to services and accommodations matching their gender identity, along with the right to be included in women-only shortlists, award schemes, grants, etc. In every numbered example, transgender women are asking for the same rights granted to cisgender women, but based on different inclusion criteria.

They don't actually have that right. The outcome of sex-segregation is that cisgendered women have access to services and accommodations that match their gender identity, but this isn't because anyone is giving them a gender based right, it's simply an outcome of the nature of sex-segregation.

I both identify as and am a Canadian. When I cross an international border passport control treats me as a Canadian, but this because they are acknowledging the legitimacy of what I identify as, it's because they acknowledge the legitimacy of my passport. If another Canadian identified as Chinese when trying to go through passport control into China, he would not have fewer rights than me because Chinese immigration authorities didn't acknowledge his identity. Yes, they treat me in accordance with my identity and treat him in a way that differs from his identity, but both of these facts are orthogonal to their actual criteria, which is simply what passport I have. He doesn't have fewer rights than me, in spite of the fact that I'm treated in accord with my identity and he is not. We are both being treated the same according to an objective criterion that doesn't take identity into account. The fact that my identity happens to line up with my actual nationality isn't the reason that I'm treated as Canadian. The reason I'm treated as Canadian is that I'm Canadian, and isn't related to my identity one way or the other.

The exact same relation holds in the case of gender identity.

 

[Samson]

I am posting this because I may misunderstand the primal forces at work. I consider New Zealand to be worst practice in this field. The article is paywalled, and in general suggests immutable forces:

"Rebecca admits she kept hoping Jay would change his mind. Once in a while, she’d suggest “maybe you could live like a woman?”

“He’d say ‘Mum I know it would be easier but I can’t. I just can’t.”

For the moment Jay’s on puberty blockers so that he won’t develop breasts or hips, and will avoid having to have a double mastectomy.

“He’s quite paranoid about looking like the shape of a woman.”

 

[theprestige]

Cisgender women have the right to services and accommodations matching their gender identity, along with the right to be included in women-only shortlists, award schemes, grants, etc. In every numbered example, transgender women are asking for the same rights granted to cisgender women, but based on different inclusion criteria.

The inclusion criteria being, "because I want to". Which isn't actually a right men have.

 

[Dismember]

“sex is a constructed category, not a biological variable”

From Carole Hooven, posted on (the platform formerly known as) twitter:

“To be clear: this is a call-to-arms. This is not a how-to or a roadmap. We [are] well-positioned to implement this deconstructionist approach in lieu of binary sex frameworks, to move away from this hypersimplistic sex model…’Sex’ is a constructed category, not a biological variable – and our science should reflect that.”

Alarming.

She included this screenshot of the published paper she quoted from.
https://www.flickr.com/gp/138450707@N08/cVqi51DWhn

Editing after the fact to highlight the word “alarming”, which was her commentary on the paper. I didn’t realize it would cause confusion. I don’t have access to the original paper but if I’m not mistaken Hooven’s research has come up before in earlier iterations of this thread and I thought her comment, and the snippet she was commenting on, was worth sharing. Mea culpa.

 

[theprestige]

From Carole Hooven, posted on (the platform formerly known as) twitter:



She included this screenshot of the published paper she quoted from.
https://www.flickr.com/gp/138450707@N08/cVqi51DWhn

To be clear: This is not Carole Hooven's position. She's calling out the paper, "Deconstructing sex: Strategies for undoing binary thinking in neuroendocrinology and behavior", published in Hormones and Behavior, Volume 156, November 2023, 105441 (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0018506X2300139)

It is authored by Megan G. Massa (Emory University), Krisha Aghi (UCLA), and M.J. Hill (UCLA).

The more instutions of higher learning teach and normalize this kind of nonsense, the less convincing LJ's appeal to medical and government authority become. At this point, even acceptance by the mainstream medical community wouldn't be a sign in favor of this kind of thinking. It would just be a sign that too many policy makers are graduating from schools like Emory and UCLA. And all schools are like Emory and UCLA.

---

As an aside, it would be nice if, in debates such as these, we could refrain from lazily citing second- and third-hand sources, Twitter posts and screenshots(!), and get straight to the original material if possible.

 

[gnome]

So who will be the greater victim in each individual instance? Yeah, that's not relying on victim ranking at all.

I feel like you are deliberately misunderstanding. I aim to compare WHAT is happening and its impact, not to choose based on who I favor overall among who it is happening to. I am supporting the opposite of what you are saying.

 

[gnome]

The feminist push for women's rights was absolutely a category-impact based activism.

The push for trans rights is absolutely a category-impact based activism. It is also an activism that objectively places trans rights above women's rights. It is also an activism that has widespread popularity and support among progressives.

Please let us know when you're done playing the #notallprogressives card. The fact that you apparently don't follow the knee-jerk mainstream would be more heartening, if you ever got around to argue for your preferred context-impact based positions on public policy for trans rights.

I have already, if you've been paying attention. For example, I lean towards restroom access being based on self-selection, but that sports would usually not be valid for that.

 

[Pixel42]

I lean towards restroom access being based on self-selection,

What gives you the right to decide whether or not biological females should be obliged to accept biological males into their safe spaces, based solely on the male's wishes and regardless of their own?

Lest we forget: women have been quietly allowing genuine transwomen to use their restrooms for decades. Pushback only started when TRAs began stridently demanding they be given no choice in the matter.

 

[d4m10n]

They don't actually have that right. The outcome of sex-segregation is that cisgendered women have access to services and accommodations that match their gender identity, but this isn't because anyone is giving them a gender based right, it's simply an outcome of the nature of sex-segregation.

This condition only holds true in the parts of the world where public policy segregates by sex rather than by gender identity. In other parts of the world (e.g. Ivy League swimming, Korean spas in California) they do things differently. Your analogy to citizenship is instructive here; nation states are free to socially deconstruct and reconstruct it as they please.

 

[theprestige]

The appeal to current law is facile and lazy. This is a debate about the should of public policy, not the is of public policy.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Lest we forget: women have been quietly allowing genuine transwomen to use their restrooms for decades. Pushback only started when TRAs began stridently demanding they be given no choice in the matter.

*Raises hand* And the difference between a genuine and non-genuine transwoman is... what exactly?

How do you "No Trues Scotsman" a matter we keep getting told is 100% a matter of pure personal identity and nothing else?

Again you can't just functionally make the two sexes "Rapist" and "Non-Rapist."

 

[Pixel42]

*Raises hand* And the difference between a genuine and non-genuine transwoman is... what exactly?

Genuine was probably the wrong word to use. I'm thinking of cases where women know and trust someone who is trans, and are comfortable with letting them into their safe spaces. That trust is earned, it can't be demanded as a right.

 

[gnome]

What gives you the right to decide whether or not biological females should be obliged to accept biological males into their safe spaces, based solely on the male's wishes and regardless of their own?

Lest we forget: women have been quietly allowing genuine transwomen to use their restrooms for decades. Pushback only started when TRAs began stridently demanding they be given no choice in the matter.

We're probably playing chicken-and-egg here, but my perception is that pushback started when people started arguing that status quo was unacceptable and wanted to force even "genuine transwomen" to use the restroom matching their biological sex.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Genuine was probably the wrong word to use. I'm thinking of cases where women know and trust someone who is trans, and are comfortable with letting them into their safe spaces. That trust is earned, it can't be demanded as a right.

That's fair. Again this is a very hard discussion to put into the kind of nuance people are trying to put into words and that's not always easy. The last thing I'm gonna do is poo-poo some less than 100% perfect wordage.

As to your point I mean I get it (and I mean that 100% honestly without snark) but how is that supposed to functionally work?

We're talking public bathrooms filled with strangers. How does the "good" transwoman get vetted? Do the women just know? This is not a snark question or a setup for a "gotcha."

Now cards fully on the table I'll admit I'm carrying a little bit of baggage into this because, as I've said, often the whole trans "thing" sometimes comes across a weird coded message of "Okay I'm a guy but... ya know I'm not a guy-guy, you can trust me" or where "transwoman" is nothing more than "a man who doesn't want to get lumped in with all the other men" or "a man who's not a rapist and/or toxic male douchebag."

Regardless of the technical dictionary according to the Hoyle and DSM-IV definition of the terms "cis" and "trans" have always held a slight context of "bad" and "good" respectably in this discourse.

"I have a penis but women can feel safe around me" is an unworkable definition for "transwoman" but it's also sort of the one we keep landing on functionally.