Cont: Transwomen are not women - part 13

[JoeMorgue]

I'm not confused, I'm asking you to answer a simple question:
Who has been arguing that we shouldn't be allowed to use "men" and "women" in the traditional default way? [/COLOR]

*Very slowly*

Literally every single person who asking us to put a cis/trans modifier on it.

Please pretend like THAT is too complicated.

 

[d4m10n]

The conversation in this thread isn't about what you should be allowed to say, but about what you should say. That's an important distinction.

I'm not the one making the switch between what ought to be said and what ought to be allowed here:

Most people are just men and women in an uncomplicated way, and we're allowed to default to that.

I'm perfectly content to for people to use the new nomenclature or the old nomenclature, so long as I can understand which one they are using at any given time, preferably from context.

And everyone who answered the thread title question in the affirmative (and there are plenty who did) thinks we shouldn't use "men" and "women" in the traditional way.

Take that up with them, if you like. All I'm saying here is that it is acceptable to use adjectives to clarify whether you are talking about people who wish to become another sex (i.e. transgender) or talking about everyone else (i.e. cisgender). Is that controversial to you?

 

[JoeMorgue]

A glib wishy-washy "It's okay if you do, okay if you don't" while ignoring that plenty of people DON'T think it's okay if you don't or do is just... nothing. There's no argument there.

You not caring (or pretending to not care at this point in the discussion) is not evidence that other people don't.

If you're gonna be that much on the sidelines, just leave the field.

 

[Puppycow]

Yeah sterilization for gender change is extremely draconian. It probably emerges from an implicit commitment to sex originalism.

I'm not convinced that's true, because I don't think we're really talking about a gender change. In this case, I think we're really talking about a sex change.

It's confusing as the word 'gender' appears in the article 12 times but the word 'sex' is absent. It appears that the Japanese term being used is 性別, which originally means sex, although dictionaries give both sex and gender as English translations. The change in terminology itself from sex to gender is a key part of the ideological battle.

Isn't it true though that taking cross-sex hormones will in fact lead to sterility in the long term? Does seem like surgical removal of the gonads or whatever may be redundant. Of course, people can freeze their sperm or eggs before beginning this process just in case they change their mind.

Of course, some will then argue that it shouldn't be a requirement to take cross-sex hormones either.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Well yeah the whole "gender/sex" dichotomy/retcon is going to be even MORE a nightmare when we start trying to bring other languages into it.

 

[Elaedith]

Thanks for that. If you've already read it, the video won't add much unless you want to see some of the key figures being interviewed in person. What makes the doco interesting to me is that there seems to be a general vibe shift in what sort of media are being created for general consumption, at least in Europe (see also Hannah Barnes & Stephen Nolan over at BBC).

I get the impression that in the US many more people, including so-called sceptics, will happily accept and regurgitate incoherent and irrational ideas from their 'side', attempt to destroy the lives and careers of heretics who fail to do so, and even uncritically endorse invasive and unevidenced medical practices on minors rather than risk appearing to agree with the 'wrong side' on anything.

 

[Samson]

Elon Musk has made a definitive ruling on cis

IT IS A SLUR!

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1719077000483066319?t=K-_GhN2EGLEwlMKBxABEKQ&s=19

The conversation is entertaining enough.

 

[Samson]

Elon Musk has made a definitive ruling on cis

IT IS A SLUR!

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1719077000483066319?t=K-_GhN2EGLEwlMKBxABEKQ&s=19

The conversation is entertaining enough.

 

[Elaedith]

Did somebody already post this? I thought it was already on the thread, but can't locate it.

Gender-Affirming Care Is Dangerous. I Know Because I Helped Pioneer It

This interview with Finnish adolescent psychiatrist Dr. Riittakerttu Kaltiala discusses the growing discrepancies between approaches in the US and other countries.

"Medical organizations are supposed to transcend politics in favor of upholding standards that protect patients. However, in the U.S. these groups—including the American Academy of Pediatrics—have been actively hostile to the message my colleagues and I are urging. I attempted to address the rising international concerns about pediatric gender transition at this year’s annual conference of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. But the two proposed panels were rejected by the academy. This is highly disturbing. Science does not progress through silencing. Doctors who refuse to consider evidence presented by critics are putting patient safety at risk."

 

[Emily's Cat]

The source they cite is specifically an analysis of minors with a gender dysphoria diagnosis.

"For the analysis of pediatric patients initiating puberty blockers or hormones, Komodo searched for patients with a prior gender dysphoria diagnosis. Patients with a diagnosis of central precocious puberty were removed. A total of 17,683 patients, ages 6 through 17, with a prior gender dysphoria diagnosis initiated either puberty blockers or hormones or both during the five-year period."

The analysis also shows 776 minors aged 13-17 in the US with a diagnosis of gender dysphoria underwent mastectomies from 2019-21, based on insurance claims. Activists frequently assert that this doesn't happen.

I stand corrected. And now I need to sit down because giving a 7 year old puberty blockers is downright insane and unethical.

 

[Emily's Cat]

All I can say is that this take is far from universal. I sense some straw. Personally I've only heard of it from opponents.

You're mistaking the reflection of the sky in the lake at night with the heavens themselves.

More specifically... you're conflating the pithy name given to a phenomenon with the actual phenomenon. The progressive stack is apparent throughout almost every element of progressive politics and progressively-motivated academia. They just don't call it that. They provide Bulter-esque paragraphs that obscure what's going on with bombastic phrases that make it near incomprehensible while sounding highbrow. Other people, who had a lower tolerance for rhetorical BS gave it a short hand name that captured the concept more accurately.

 

[Emily's Cat]

And yet you've failed to provide alternative nomenclature to substitute for cisgender and transgender.

What, you mean other than the terms that I and many others have consistently used throughout this discussion? Male versus female when the topic is sex, with a subset of males being specified as transgender identified when it is necessary to separate them from their normal male counterparts?

I don't find it demeaning to be called cisgender, and I don't much care if others do. Any attempts to manipulate my choice of words by taking umbrage will go unheeded, unless you can convince the mods to intervene on your behalf.

I'm happy that YOU don't find it demeaning. YOU and your sex haven't been the target of non-stop insistence that females who wish that other people would see them as male are just as much of a "man" as you, and that there's no meaningful difference between them and you, and therefore any time you refer to "men" in general, it must be assumed that this also includes some females who take exogenous hormones to grow beards.

FFS, this is like if you said "I don't find it demeaning to be called spic". That's great - you don't have to be offended by it. But to take it that next step and make the assumption that because YOU aren't offended, then nobody should be offended is absurd.

It's especially absurd when you're adopting language that has been framed and designed by one group of people (transgender identified males) specifically because their feelings get hurt if you don't use the language they prefer. Why do you support protecting their feelings, and feel free to ignore mine?

If transgender identified males exist, so do cisgender identified males.

Sure sure. If Napoleon-identified people exist, then cisNapoleon people also exist.

The problem is that by adopting the term "cisgender", you are implicitly accepting that everyone has a gender identity - that some magical inner essence that makes a person "feel like" a set of stereotypes is a universal thing that everyone has.

This is no different from a religionist making the implicit assumption that everyone has a soul, and therefore even atheists must believe in souls, and that souls are incontrovertibly real.

I do NOT identify as the gender "woman", I actively reject the regressive and oppressive stereotypes that make up that concept. I don't accept them, and I definitely don't feel some inner alignment with the bimbo/housewife/broodmare/porn-object that is all wrapped up in what the trans movement means when they say "woman". **** that **** all the way off the cliff into a lake of magma.

 

[Emily's Cat]

There is no linguistic reason to assume ____women are not women. Alderwomen are women, bagwomen are women, chairwomen are women, Englishwomen are women, firewomen are women, guildswomen are women, kinswomen are women, laundrywomen are women, mailwomen are women, newswomen are women, policewomen are women, servicewomen are women, tradeswomen are women, vestrywomen are women, etc.

Holy cow. Okay, I see you've landed on the side of preaching that males who have magical "girly" souls are just as much women as females are, and that there's no objective or material difference between Darren Merager and your mom.

I can't believe you're actually in here arguing that because someone invented a linguistic term, it is transmogrified into objective ******* reality.

 

[Emily's Cat]

It's not a bait-and-switch, it is a direct reply to EC's claim that "transgender identified male" is acceptable terminology but both "cisgender identified male" and "cisgender identified female" are so offensive that they ought to be tabooed in discussions such as this one, on account of the leading adjective.

I'm perfectly content to be referred to as a "cisgender man" as well, and as with the above phrases I'm not seeing why it ought to be considered taboo.

Nothing that you've written here addresses the point of contention between EC and myself. Why exactly should "transgender identified male" be acceptable but "cisgender identified female" considered taboo?

When you decide that you're perfectly content to be referred to as a "cisgender man" or a "cisman", you are accepting that the category of "man" unquestionably includes a group of "men" who were born with vaginas, ovaries, cervixes, and fallopian tubes. You're implicitly buying in to the idea that the word "man" refers to a magical subjective inner essences that overrides objective reality.

 

[Emily's Cat]

In order to persuade someone to change their own language, the person being persuaded ought to understand why that language is considered harmful. Since I do not see the harm, I will not make the change.

Just because YOU don't see any harm TO YOU doesn't mean that no harm befalls other people who aren't you.

Lots of white people didn't see any harm in the use of the N-word to refer to black people. Lots of straight people didn't see any harm in the use of the term "fag" to refer to homosexual people. Lots of american people didn't see any harm in the term "chink" to refer to people of chinese decent.

Like I said, the terms "cisgender women" or "ciswomen" relegate females to the sidelines of our own sex class, and forces the inclusion of some males into our sex class... and from there it tacitly accepts that those males should also be included in any single-sex provision or service set aside for females.

It's the wedge, and it's not even the thin end, FFS.

 

[Emily's Cat]

She said exactly why she finds "cisgender" offensive; I remain quite skeptical as to whether she is correct. It isn't remotely obvious to me how the term "relegates [females] to the sidelines of [their] own sex class," any more than any other adjective which applies to the vast majority of members of any given class of human beings.

Oh ******* jewish zombie on a pogo-stick.

In what way are males members of the class of female human beings?

 

[Emily's Cat]

I'm not confused, I'm asking you to answer a simple question:
Who has been arguing that we shouldn't be allowed to use "men" and "women" in the traditional default way?

To prevent confusion on your end, I'll ask in a different way:
Has anyone here tried to make the traditional usage taboo?

(If so, I'm against it.)

THE TRANS ACTIVISTS HAVE BEEN ARGUING THAT FOR AT LEAST AS LONG AS THIS THREAD HAS BEEN AROUND.

That's the cornerstone of the entire discussion. TRAs insist that any use of the term "woman" must include males who feel like they want to be included. TRAs argue that the term "woman" by default includes males, and therefore anything labeled "women", such as changing rooms and showers and prisons, is where a subset of males rightfully belongs... and therefore it's a violation of the human rights of those particular males to exclude them from those provisions.

Honestly, Damion, why are you adopting the fundamental catechism of the TRA playbook? What has convinced you that males with penises and dangly scrotum who like spinny skirts are rightly and appropriate considered "women"?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Isn't it true though that taking cross-sex hormones will in fact lead to sterility in the long term? Does seem like surgical removal of the gonads or whatever may be redundant. Of course, people can freeze their sperm or eggs before beginning this process just in case they change their mind.

It's not that straightforward. For males who have gone through their normal pubertal process, estrogen will reduce their ability to create viable sperm. But in males, the creation of sperm is an ongoing process. For the overwhelming majority of those males, if they stop taking estrogen, they will begin to produce viable sperm again.

For males who were prevented from going through their normal pubertal process, they may be permanently sterilized. Less so because of the estrogen though, and more so because they were prevented from developing the ability to produce sperm.

For females, it's a different story completely. We're born with all the eggs we will ever have; we don't produce any new ova during our lives.

Testosterone actively destroys ova. A very low dose might only damage some ova, and leave many of them undamaged. A moderately high dose might destroy some, damage others, and leave some untouched. A very high dose is likely to destroy most ova and damage the rest. All of those cases at a minimum reduce fertility, and many of them result in sterilization.

Testosterone taken after puberty is less likely to complete destroy ova, although I don't really understand the mechanism. If taken during pubertal development, the risk of sterilization is significantly higher.

 

[Ziggurat]

I'm not the one making the switch between what ought to be said and what ought to be allowed here:

You're reading him too literally, and I think deliberately when you know better, or should know better. What's actually allowed here on this forum is determined by the moderators and the membership agreement, and so far they don't care about cis/trans labels on women/men (though they do care about preferred pronouns). Joe was quite obviously meaning "allowed" in a more metaphorical sense, in terms of what's considered not offensive.

I'm perfectly content to for people to use the new nomenclature or the old nomenclature, so long as I can understand which one they are using at any given time, preferably from context.

And that's fine, but that too isn't the issue. EC wasn't objecting to the fact that you don't object to any nomenclature. She objected to you choosing to use one set of nomenclature over another, because again, that choice is directly connected to the central question of this thread. And you seem to be taking a position on that question, namely that transwomen are women, which she finds offensive.

If you are taking that position, well, that's your conflict with EC, and you shouldn't be confused about it. If you are not taking that position, consider changing your terminology to more obviously reflect your actual position. Because the terminology you are using is strongly associated with the trans rights activists, and at this point you can't reclaim it for any sort of middle ground or neutral position. If you object to that, well, as you say, take it up with them.

None of this is a mystery. Pretending to be confused about it doesn't do you credit.

 

[d4m10n]

Literally every single person who asking us to put a cis/trans modifier on it.

*Very very slowly*

Can you see the difference between the following three requests:

1) Asking that you always put a cis/trans modifier in front of "man" or "woman"
2) Asking that you use cis/trans modifiers as you see fit
3) Asking that you never put a cis/trans modifier in front of "man" or "woman"

EC is in the third camp, with respect to "cisgender" in particular, which she finds offensive.

I'm in the second camp, allowing people to use language as they see fit without attempting to emotionally manipulate them by taking offense.

No idea who is in the first camp, but you seem to think at least some people are making this ask.