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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 17, 2023

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Does treating transgender people as their transitioned gender in X circumstance make those people happier with little damage done to the rest of society? Because if the answer to that question is yes, then who gives a damn what the Truth of their gender is.

My favorite Scott essay ever covers this better than I can. Forcing people to believe false things is inherently destructive, even if the truth doesn't matter at all. Sometimes the repression is worth the squeeze, because the falsehood is load-bearing for the functioning of society. Reducing suicide rates for perhaps 1% of population doesn't qualify. Meanwhile, the truth regime required to force everyone else to believe a man is a woman — or at least pretend they do while never ever letting the mask slip — boggles the mind.

Could you get me down with "Transwomen are men, and we all know that, but for therapeutic purposes we will pretend they are not"? Maybe. But that's not what they're demanding.

Arguably the loadbearing structure was the gender roles and sex binary the gender movement is currently torpedoing.