Cont: Transwomen are not women - part 13

[d4m10n]

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.

An emotional reaction (such as taking offense) is not a valid way to settle the central question of this thread.

Emotions are not arguments; pretending to be confused about this doesn't do anyone any credit.

 

[d4m10n]

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

ARE ANY OF THEM LEFT HERE IN THIS THREAD?

Again, here is my question: "Has anyone here tried to make the traditional usage taboo?"

*LOOKS AROUND*

Honestly, Damion, why are you adopting the fundamental catechism of the TRA playbook?

Using the word "cisgender" to describe people who do not want to change their sex is not the fundamental catechism of that movement.

 

[Ziggurat]

An emotional reaction (such as taking offense) is not a valid way to settle the central question of this thread.

Emotions are not arguments; pretending to be confused about this doesn't do anyone any credit.

You can be smarter than this, when you want to be.

I'm not arguing which position is right. I'm describing why EC took offense. You seem to be doing everything you can to not understand why she took offense. And of course offense isn't an argument, I never suggested otherwise. But you don't have to agree with someone to know why they take offense. So why do you refuse to understand? Again, understanding doesn't require agreement.

 

[Pixel42]

3) Asking that you never put a cis/trans modifier in front of "man" or "woman"

EC is in the third camp

I don't think she is. I don't think she has a problem with describing a biological male who self identifies as female as a transwoman. I think she just doesn't see any need for a new word to describe a biological female who self identifies as female because we already have one: woman. Same with man and transman. Those four words cover all the possibilities. Anyone who sees a need for a cis modifier is fundamentally disagreeing with her on this issue.

 

[Samson]

And who knew that India is stampeding into this insane trans cult.
Here Andrew Doyle interviews the maker of a film about trans widows.

https://youtu.be/VQDO_ChNcmg?si=vGWQSqD-BwylEmGa

 

[d4m10n]

I'm not arguing which position is right. I'm describing why EC took offense. You seem to be doing everything you can to not understand why she took offense. And of course offense isn't an argument, I never suggested otherwise.

Why should it matter if it's not an argument? If she wants to change which terms are allowable in this discussion, I'm going to need arguments, not feelings.

 

[d4m10n]

I think she just doesn't see any need for a new word to describe a biological female who self identifies as female because we already have one: woman.

Either "woman" means "adult human female" (including transmen) or else it means what you describe here, it cannot be both at once. I'm not fussed about which one you use, so long as you're upfront about it.

 

[d4m10n]

In other news, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that UCLA allowed this lecture to happen:





Sent from my SM-G996U using Tapatalk

 

[Pixel42]

Either "woman" means "adult human female" (including transmen) or else it means what you describe here, it cannot be both at once. I'm not fussed about which one you use, so long as you're upfront about it.

Non sequitur.

I prefer the four categories I defined to the traditional two, as it gives trans individuals a separate categorisation which indicates their preferred gender, but in neither case is there a need for the prefix cis, which is what we were discussing.

 

[Ziggurat]

Why should it matter if it's not an argument? If she wants to change which terms are allowable in this discussion, I'm going to need arguments, not feelings.

Stop playing stupid. You expressed confusion about why EC took offense. I explained why. You are not obligated to care about her taking offense. Either you do or you don't, no argument can make you care. But there should be no confusion that it causes offense. That's simply a statement of fact, do with it what you will.

 

[Emily's Cat]

*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.

I'm in the two-and-a-halfth camp. There are situations where it would likely be reasonable to require a modifier in order to draw a distinction. That said, the post in which you used it is not one of those situations.

The net result is that the way in which you used it places you in the camp of those who truly believe that males can be "women". And I find that to be offensive.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Honestly, some days I feel like I'm treading through clay. What happened to the days of my youth, when someone could say "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend. It made sense to me to use that term where I did, and I'm not sure I completely agree with you, but I get where you're coming from" and then we all just go on with our peaceful existence?

 

[d4m10n]

What happened to the days of my youth, when cisgender men would gallantly defer to cisgender women in matters of politeness and linguistics?

 

[d4m10n]

You expressed confusion about why EC took offense.

Which post was that?

 

[d4m10n]

Non sequitur.

Not at all, since the person I was objecting to previously stated a preference for the definition I mentioned.

You are welcome to your fourfold scheme, of course, but I'm going to keep using my own nomenclature.

 

[Emily's Cat]

What happened to the days of my youth, when cisgender men would gallantly defer to cisgender women in matters of politeness and linguistics?

Oooh, just gonna go straight for the intentional abrasiveness in the face of an olive branch. Yay you?

 

[Emily's Cat]

Which post was that?

Let me refresh your memory of how you ended up in your current hole, and why continuing to dig isn't really going to help you get out of it.

No. They have the right to services matching their sex. That right may coincide with their preferences, but that's a preference, not a right. These are all sex-based rights, not gender-based rights.

If cisgender women say "We have a right to female-only changing rooms!" and transgender women say "We have a right to use changing rooms which match our gender!" only one of them can be correct in any given jurisdiction at any given time. It's not a question which can be settled by appeal to abstract moral reasoning.

Please don't refer to females as "cisgender". It relegates us to the sidelines of our own sex class. And that's extremely insulting and offensive.

Request denied. I need some way to differentiate between transgender women (born male, do not identify as such) and cisgender women (born female, do identify as such) and you have not provided alternative nomenclature which would be more widely understood.

(On a bit of a side note, I find almost any attempt to move the needle by falling on the fainting couch to be unworthy of consideration. This is perhaps an idiosyncratic failing on my part, but I'm trying to treat females as if they have mental toughness equivalent to males.)

So, yeah. I made a polite request, which included the reason for the request. You then proceeded to 1) foist a religion on me and insist that I have a magical gendery soul in the first place, 2) pretend like no alternative language is available to you despite YOU YOURSELF having somehow managed it for 13 iterations of this thread with no confusion, and 3) managed to insert an insinuation that females are just whiny little bitches who need to get over themselves and toughen up and take it like a man instead of getting all offended over a male using denigrating terms for females.

What happened Damion? What converted you to the one true faith of gendery magic?

 

[d4m10n]

I made a polite request, which included the reason for the request.

I politely declined your request to change which terms are allowed in this debate. You ought to either move on or else get the mods on your side.

You then proceeded to 1) foist a religion on me and insist that I have a magical gendery soul in the first place...

I don't recall invoking anything about a "magical gendery soul" at any point, other than to critique the idea itself.

2) pretend like no alternative language is available to you despite YOU YOURSELF having somehow managed it for 13 iterations of this thread with no confusion

Speaking of confusion, I've used the term "cisgender" without complaint in this thread for years now. Here is an early example, drawn from a keyword search; notice that no one objected or tried to introduce new linguistic taboos back then.

3) managed to insert an insinuation that females are just whiny little bitches who need to get over themselves and toughen up and take it like a man instead of getting all offended over a male using denigrating terms for females.

You've yet to show that "cisgender" is denigrating in any sense.

What converted you to the one true faith of gendery magic?

What converted you to the TRA playbook of tabooing words based on feelings?

 

[Ziggurat]

You expressed confusion about why EC took offense.

Which post was that?

This one:

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.

One might argue that the term itself does no such thing, but the problem is that the term is tied to a particular position, that transwomen are women, which arguably does do that. In the abstract, the choice of terminology is arbitrary and we should be able to work with any agreed upon set. But in practice, the choice of terminology isn't actually neutral.

 

[Upchurch]

I don't know why I'm poking the dead horse, but this thread is about transwomen in women's sports being an unfair advantage and not simply transphobia, right?

How does that relate to this story?

(For those who don't want to go onto twitter, and I don't blame you, a ciswoman refused to play against a transwoman in the finals of a pool tournament. Because it's twitter, most of the comments praised the ciswoman. When a few people asked what physical advantage a transwoman has over a ciswoman, they were either laughed at or told it was a matter of principle.)

Is it a matter of unfair advantage or is it a matter of principle? If it is a matter of principle, what is that principle?