The only debate to be had
Hmmmm, really?
Morning @Womans_Place_UK . Being transgender is an innate part of the human condition. The only debate to be had about that is how best to deliver trans rights and healthcare.
You can have a thousand sweaty meetings in secret locations, and that will never change.
— Aidan Comerford (@AidanCTweets) May 23, 2019
Being transgender is an innate part of the human condition? So everybody is trans – which is pretty much the same as saying nobody is trans. If everybody is trans we just carry on as before.
But if that is true, why were we never told it before? Why in all this time, when humans were inventing agriculture and trade and alphabets and yoga and the Mars Rover, did no one tell us that being transgender is an innate part of the human condition?
Dear “Aidan”:
Being male or female is an innate part of the human condition. The only debate to be had about that is how best to create an equitable world for both. You can make a thousand sweaty statements from the comfort of your armchair, and that will never change.
Ew.
Just sayin’.
That ‘inate’ line is pure sophistry, and only works if one accepts that there are strictly gendered male/female traits and roles. I doubt that there is a single hyper-male or hyper-female on the planet, not a one who conforms to all of the expectations of their sex and none of the opposite. If that is what he’s saying, that there are strict gender roles, and to slip out of then qualifies one as trans then yes, a man who makes himself a coffee is performing a specifically female role, therefore he’s slipped onto the transgender ‘spectrum’. A woman replaces a blown fuse? Man’s job; transgender.
But the trans agenda isn’t about policing traditional gender norms. They tell us so all the time. Whilst, erm, policing gender norms.
This. This is the point so few seem to get. We are the ones that are breaking the gender binary, not the trans people who become female because they like to wear nail polish, and try to change their voice to sound submissive.
I was going to disagree with you on this, sort of, because my brother. Then I was going to point out that he works very hard to make sure he never steps over the line into “female” roles.
But then you said this:
My brother actually does this occasionally. Though I will say, he always accompanies it with a statement about how all the great chefs are men.
Yet somehow it expresses itself in no other animal on the planet… Yet being gay does…
Seems legit… /s
BKiSA, I think there are trans activists who believe this is seen in sex-changing fish. I don’t think it’s the same, myself, because they change sex in relationship to the loss of a male, for instance, and they are fertile when they change.
There are also the hyenas, where the female has such expanded genitals that it resembles a penis. I’ve heard that cited.
Not the same thing, but then, neither is intersex and that gets used as an argument all the time.
When I try to think of a possible example of a genuinely “cis” woman the name “Kardashian” always pops up…but in all fairness I bet even they don’t live up to every single stereotype on the list.
It’s impossible to check off every item on the list. They are arbitrary and self-contradictory.
Woman are all about nurturing. Women prefer cats to dogs. (But cats are independent and require far less attention and “mothering.” For the system to be consistent, women should be assumed to prefer dogs.)
Men are terrible at nurturing. Men prefer dogs to cats. (But dogs require lots of attention and understanding, almost like a child. Shouldn’t men prefer those supposedly aloof, independent cats?)
There are probably hundreds of examples of this stuff. None of it makes sense.
Ophelia, #7; whenever I think ‘hyper-female’ the name that comes to mind is Barbie, but just as with the Kardashians, the name alone is its own brand, a brand that earns a fortune. That is where the K’s (and Barbie) cross the gender boundary – they are women making their own money.
I would say that the closest to the hyper-genders today are the Quiverful types and other religious extremists, but even then the men admit to being subservient (only to a god, but it counts) and the women tend to dress in sacks. Not that there’s anything wrong with that if it’s their choice, but hyperwoman should be sassy and sexy, dagnammit!
I very much doubt that any of the Kardashian women are 100% submissive at all times.
In the event some of you haven’t seen this: a brilliant article by Sophie Allen, Jane Clare Jones, Holly Lawford-Smith, Mary Leng, Rebecca Reilly-Cooper, and Kathleen Stock, addressing the fallacious arguments used in criticizing radical feminist and gender-critical views.
https://medium.com/@kathleenstock/doing-better-in-arguments-about-sex-and-gender-3bec3fc4bdb6
“Radical feminist and gender-critical philosophers challenge their opponents to avoid some obviously bad argumentative moves.”
I was RTing that this morning.
Ben @#8
Well… dogs can be commanded, cats can only be convinced. Makes perfect sense now, right? /s
(On a not-entirely-related note, for some reason this sort of nonsense keeps bringing to mind one of my favourite Terry Pratchett quotes: “For sheep are stupid, and have to be driven. But goats are intelligent, and need to be led.”)
On that we certainly agree :-/
#6 iknklast
I find it interesting / tragic that the people citing those sorts of things will also rubbish Jordan Peterson’s lobster analogy for human behaviour – things like “how the hell can a lobster possibly work as a model for human behaviour?? – without realising that the logic is exactly as fatal to their own citations.
#7 OB
And of those few that might be an exact match for either hypermasculine/feminine, it is possible (though unconfirmable) that some of those behaviours might be performative rather than of their own inclination. And how many men and women would love to transgress and do the male/female associated thing, but refrain out of fear of social backlash? The idea that there are behaviours innate to a masculine / feminine role rely on an incredible pile of assumptions.
“Transgender” is an umbrella term with no precise meaning. It can refer to people with gender dysphoria who transition. It can refer to Butlerian gender performance accompanied by no dysphoria at all. A “transgender person” can be a gender dysphoric child, a 40 year old autogynephile, a young gay transvestite hustler, a teenage girl with ROGD.
If “being transgender” is “an innate part of the human condition”, so is “feeling icky” and “being cool.”