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I think we're so many decades down from moral education that people believe at least some of it. Which seems to function as being forced to profess belief in all of it because you cannot deny bits and pieces of the blank slateism without being at risk of destruction.
People don't want female firefighters or Marines, but the inability to be honest without threatening the apple cart makes it impossible to check people who exploit the legal system to push us just one step further (unless something truly absurd happens like a Lia Thomas situation that cannot be ignored - but even in that case people are likely benefitting from Title IX being explicitly about sex so these attempted redefinitions can run into a hostile court).
Groups are actively leveraging this. It's very common with the trans stuff. There's constant claims that black women will suffer from going back to sexed bathrooms (yes, the new left wing take is that black women are so manly banning men will keep them out). Similarly, a common line of attack is that you're an essentialist and being essentialist is bad because what next? Race essentialism? If sex is real, why wouldn't someone argue race is real?
If they never believed in any of this none of this would have force. That poor professor who got fired for being frustrated at how badly her black students are doing wouldn't have been frustrated or have any cognitive dissonance at all.. You think Amy Wax is losing sleep over it?
That's why it's so difficult to dislodge this gender ideology stuff. Everyone is trapped in the same lie. No one can stand outside of it in the simplest, most expedient manner ("men are men and women are women and, frankly, the government shouldn't be involved") robs them of their own tools and stories.
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