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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   24902 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 30, 2023

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But really, the thing that keeps hitting me with dissonance isn't even the above points, which I can at least countenance reasonable counterarguments to, but the incongruity with the belief that gender itself is a mere social construct that is fully malleable to an individual's stated preference.

Isn't the current thinking something like the following:

  • The gender we each feel ourself to be is something we don't have control over.
  • The preferences we feel are also something we don't have control over.
  • Both are externally given to us, whether as a result of biology or socialisation or a complex mixture of factors. The only choice we are able to make is how we ask people to regard us.
  • In both cases, gender and sexual preferences, people should be allowed to seek to resolve any mismatch by changing their outer actions to line up with their inner realities.
  • Seeking to change one of these inner realities, however, is discouraged because gender and sexual preference are supposed to be basic, fundamental human qualities that will eventually push themselves to the fore and create inner turmoil if denied.

Not sure what I think about these issues personally but I'm not too sure if any of the the above statements contradicts any other.

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