This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The gender identity which has a lot more people born with 🌮 than with 🍆.
It was revealed to me in a dream.I can make an educated guess; in the absence of indicators of bad faith, I give them the benefit of the doubt.So not only is a woman "anyone that identifies as a woman", not really answering the question of what a woman is, what they're identifying with is an identity, thus also not telling us anything about what the act of identifying is supposed to be, and also the type of identity they're identifying with is a gender identity, "gender" being the category that encompasses men and women.
In other words: a woman is anyone who identifies with identifying as a woman.
I appreciate the efforts to come up with a coherent answer in the aftermath of Matt Walsh's documentary, but I think you guys still have a long way ahead of you.
What would be an indicator of bad faith?
It's not turtles all the way down; the first step, the foundation, comes from the peaks of the bimodal distribution: there are a large number of people who have XY chromosomes, a 🍆 between their legs, a higher T/E ratio, and a certain mental aspect that (if they have it at all) is of a certain type; there are a similar number of people who have XX chromosomes, a 🌮 between their legs, a lower T/E ratio, and a different type of that mental aspect (if they have it at all).
To a first approximation, we call the first group 'men¹' and the second group 'women'. Then, we sort out the edge cases, including those in which the various characteristics do not align with each other, and those in which they impart a visceral feeling of wrongness to their possessor.
There was a time when the Abolitionists had a long way ahead of them.
The following account is an attempt to construct the strongest possible such indicator:
Henry has a long history of opposing gender transition, same-gender relationships, and gender-nonconforming behavior, especially among men. He has multiple criminal charges for harassing and assaulting men, and women he thinks are men, for not living up to his standard of masculinity, including three assault charges for attacking gay couples, one assault charge for trying to hit a coworker's hand with a hammer when the coworker came in wearing pink nail polish applied by his daughter, one assault charge for shoving a visiting Scotsman into a wall for wearing a kilt (Henry wound up in hospital), one charge for leaving a wood-chipper (with an "Insert groomers here" sign) on the front lawn of a local bar owner who hosted a (21+) drag show, and two charges for beating up women who were attempting to use the men's lavatory (one trans, one when there was a long line for the ladies' room).
A public referendum is held on the question of whether trans individuals ought to be allowed to use the WC of their identified gender; Henry campaigns vehemently against it; despite this, or perhaps because of it, the referendum passes with a clear majority,
The next day, Henry announces: "I now identify as a woman; therefore, you either have to let me use the women's room, or make the [redacted]s use the men's room! Either way, they'll get what's coming to them if they don't man up, ha ha ha!"
I would state with a minimum of 95% confidence that Henry is acting in bad faith.
¹Originally we called them 'were-men' and the other group 'wif-men'; 'man' without prefix was gender neutral.
Yeah, I picked up on you setting up the "core" group with the biological definition, but we were discussing the edge cases, and I specifically asked what would they be identifying with. You didn't say they're identifying with female physical attributes, or even female psychological traits, you said they'd be identifying with their "gender identity". I even asked about the burly lumberjack scenario, so we could discuss a specific instance, and make sure this isn't just a misunderstanding or a question of poor phrasing, and your answer indicated that literally none of these things are required, only "gender identity" is. This is pretty "turtles all the way down" as far as I can tell, and puts into question whether the "core" group is even necessary for the definition.
That's what pedophile rights advocates say as well.
Uh sure, someone explicitly stating "I have been acting in bad faith this entire time!" while villainously twirling their mustache does seem like a reliable indicator of bad faith, I'm frankly surprised even with that you set your confidence at only 95%. It seems like in any realistic scenario, where they don't loudly declare their intentions, the bad faith actor will be given free rein.
I don't know specifically what gender identity means more specifically, because I do not personally experience it. If I woke up tomorrow in a body with the opposite plumbing, I would consider myself to be a different gender from what I had previously been; other individuals would experience acute dysphoria and be strongly motivated to reverse the change.
That was something I forgot to mention; not only are most people with a certain mental aspect born with 🌮, but a sizable number of the remainder have a strong sense that they should have been, and mutatis mutandis for the other common type of that aspect and 🍆.
That is why we call those types 'man' and 'woman' instead of 'veeblefetzer' and 'wakalix'.
So now we have the question of "Are the transgender activists more like the former, or the latter?". I believe that the relevant distinction is "Does this thing hurt anyone?"; to borrow a phrase from Thomas Jefferson, "Does it pick my pocket or break my leg?". A legalisation of the sexual abuse of children would be harmful; the abolition of slavery was not harmful; a more nuanced understanding of gender is not harmful.
A minimum of 95%.
I do not support allowing either a genuine trans-woman or a cis-man pretending to be a trans-woman to do anything from which we forbid a cis-woman. On the other hand, if Mr Burly Lumberjack claims to be a trans-woman in order to go into the women's room, do his business, wash his hands, and leave without bothering anyone, I would prefer him to the Karen insisting on inspecting between the legs of any woman she thinks is insufficiently feminine (many of whom are cis-women).
It's a bit weird then to define "man" or "woman" by it. For all you know no such thing exists. Even if it does, we have no way of telling whether the "gender identity" possessed by trans women actually matches that of actual women, or whether it's just a man's idea of how a woman feels.
I believe that convincing adolescent autists to block their own puberty, pump themselves full of exogenous hormones, and surgically remove healthy body parts, does actually hurt them quite a lot.
None of the drama is related to trans women being allowed to do what cis women aren't, so this seems irrelevant.
Mr Burly Lumberjack entering a women's boxing tournament, demanding a Brazilian wax, or demanding to be put into a women's prison seems plenty problematic to me, whether he's "pretending" to be trans, or actually is. Even the toilet thing obviously causes discomfort, or else the issue wouldn't be so controversial.
Somehow we managed to achieve sex segregation all these years without resorting to that, so I don't see why we would need to start now. I also haven't seen Karens demanding it.
Other people's reported experiences point to it existing.
Yes, there is a possibility that they are all lying; there is also a possibility that everyone is lying about the existence of Finland.
I assign an extremely low probability (P < 0.001) to both.
Other than using the toilet without being given the third degree regarding what ought to be no one else's business.EDIT: misread aboveYou stated that Mr B-L had not received, nor did they desire, hormone treatments. If (amount of testosterone in Mr B-L's bloodstream) ÷ (amount of estrogen in Mr B-L's bloodstream) yields a number greater than that observed in any cis woman, then Mr B-L may be categorised with men for the purposes of women's sports.
You stated that Mr B-L did not have surgery. If Ms Below-the-Waist Cosmetologist removes hair from vulvae, but not from scrota, she is justified in categorising Mr B-L with men for the purpose of genital waxing.
Put him/her with other trans-women. He/she won't be able to get to cis-women, cis-men won't be able to get to him/her.
That proves too much; letting Black people use the same water fountains as everyone else caused discomfort too.
We don't need to. If someone isn't harassing or assaulting other restroom-users, the rest of us can mind our own business.
Does that mean that it isn't happening? Because I haven't seen anyone pretending to be trans in order to prey on people in public restrooms.
But the people reporting it's existence aren't any better at defining or describing it than you are.
Isn't that forbidding trans women from what we allow cis women to do, rather than forbidding cis women from what we allow trans women to do?
And if you meant the former, didn't you just say you would exclude them from sports, prisons, etc.?
Your original definition made no mention of hormone levels, nor did you say it's context dependent. At this point your approach is just more complicated and confusing, while offering no benefits.
But trans activists want to keep the segregation, thus agreeing the discomfort is valid (or if they have other reasons for maintaining it, I haven't heard them).
The whole situation is more like if the Civil Rights movement wasn't about equality, but about maintaining segregation, while positing a class of people who should be considered white, despite their dark skin, ans African ancestry.
Then argue for the abolition of segregation entirely rather than for forcing all of society to redefine one if the most basic words in usage.
Yes. I can link you articles about bathroom sexual assaults. You can argue these cases aren't representative of trans people as a whole, but you can't argue they don't happen. I, on the other hand, have literally never even heard of Karens demanding genital checks. The idea is a pro-trans shibboleth.
Well, they're closer to it, so they have a better view, and their statements are the best data I have.
I reread your comment, and I apparently mis-interpreted it. I apologise for the error.
Then whence the concern about a man claiming to be a trans-woman 'being given free rein', if he is not doing anything wrong with the acceptance given to him?
We don't, or at least shouldn't, tolerate cis-women harassing other cis-women in the restroom; thus, if trans-women aren't allowed to do anything cis-women aren't, then trans-women, or cis-men claiming to be such, are not being given 'free rein' to harm anyone.
Those are circumstances under which I would compromise from the pro-trans maximalist position. That is not the same thing as endorsement of the anti-trans maximalist position.
"For most purposes" means that some contexts might call for a different definition.
Other than being fairer to certain people who, to be honest, are having a terrible enough time of it already.
("Other than that, Mrs Lincoln, how was the play?")
Are there trans activists who have rejected offers of 'gender-neutral bathrooms for everybody, as long as the wash their hands'?
I don't know how else one would enforce the bathroom bills being proposed in the red states, given the overlap between, at a minimum, the most female-presenting quintile of trans-women and the least female-presenting quintile of cis-women.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link