Lies all around
The Times yesterday on the male CEO of Edinburgh Rape Crisis:
The head of one of Scotland’s largest rape crisis centres has claimed that “bigoted” people seeking help from her organisation could be “challenged on their prejudices” in an apparent comment on trans rights and women-only spaces.
Not a great lede – the waters are muddied already. The head of that rape crisis centre is a man, but nobody who didn’t already know that would realize the waters have been muddied. It’s not “her” organisation. I know we’re under strict orders to use the pronouns that match the lie, but if we do that we mislead the people we’re supposed to be informing.
Mridul Wadhwa, a trans woman and former SNP parliamentary candidate, was appointed chief executive of Edinburgh Rape Crisis in May, a job that was advertised as being reserved for a woman.
Which he’s not. Jobs that are reserved for women should not go to trans women, even if you believe that trans people should be obeyed and flattered and chucked under the chin. Trans women shouldn’t even try to get jobs that are reserved for women. Why is it that we’re supposed to give them everything they demand while we get nothing? Why don’t they have the basic decency to realize that they shouldn’t be grabbing jobs running rape crisis centers and that their “identities” aren’t what matter in that situation?
Some feminist campaigners claimed she had no gender recognition certificate and has not undergone gender reassignment surgery so is not legally entitled to be classed as a woman.
And even if he were legally entitled under some stupid set of stipulations he still shouldn’t be, because he shouldn’t have that job. It’s fucked up. It’s rapey.
But just think how affirming and validating it is for “her” to get that job! Why, all trans women should be given jobs running rape crisis centers — it would do wonders for their treatment and happiness. If not enough such jobs exist, we should create new ones!
I’m serious. Why don’t they see how trivial their desire for validation is compared to women’s needs in the wake of being raped? It’s not amusing.
I know. Obviously their desire for validation is utterly trivial. I was mocking it.
And obviously women’s needs in the wake of being raped are hugely important.
One has to wonder about the board that made that appointment
Probably because they believe their own fantasy. They are a woman — it’s not something they feel, or believe, or identify as. It’s who they really are, an inner knowledge so deep that denying it would be like denying their own existence. This is the story, the hype, what they tell themselves and get applauded for telling by the appreciative bubble of followers eager to throw themselves on the embodiment of the Next Great Civil Rights Cause. And, as a woman, they just have so much empathy to give.
Not only do they think women who see them as men are bigots no different than racists, they probably underestimate both how threatening they are and how many rape victims are uncomfortable. It’s got to be just one or two bad apples influencing others, because hey — women adore them. All the time. They’re told how stunning they look, how well they pass, how every little halfway competent thing they do is wonderful. Someone recently pointed out that many women seem to treat transwomen like slightly disabled children: praise, praise, praise.
Anyone would eat that up with a spoon. If the recipient is rather insensitive to begin with, if not narcissistic, they’ll likely see themselves as the answer to an abused woman’s prayer. The poor battered victim will come round. You’ll see. Tears of gratitude and a shiny new attitude, courtesy of the Stunning and Brave.
Sastra, you should probably publish that.
Sastra, that’s a good analysis, but one thing always bothers me. If they really believe they are a woman, why the hell do they need validation? If you are a woman, you know you are a woman even if someone else doesn’t see it. I know, because my mother refused to believe I could be a woman the right way, and therefore was not a woman. She didn’t think I was a man, obviously not, but something…different. Weird. Mutated. Unnatural. But still I knew I was a woman.
I suspect the reality is they don’t actually believe their fantasy. When they put on their lipstick, their mirror tells them the truth. When they brush their hair, the mirror tells them the truth. When they slip their size eleven feet into toe squishing, heel blistering shoes, the truth is too obvious. And when they pee…well, let’s just say, no woman looks quite like that, no matter how small a one they might have.
So they need validation from women, because we actually know what it means to live as a woman. If they can convince us, they can convince themselves…at least until the next time they look in the mirror. And if we have to fake it to say TWAW, they’re okay with that, as long as we never say we are faking it.
I doubt I’m their target audience (well I’m actually positive I’m not) but I’ve been listening to, enjoying and learning from the Female Dating Strategy podcast (their interview with Gail Dines is terrific). Their most recent podcast was about ‘mistakes women make when communicating with men’. The first mistake they identify is expecting men to care about you (or any woman), or expecting men to modify their behaviour toward you for ethical reasons. This line of argument simply has no effect–‘they’re not socialised to care’. Blunt but probably largely true.
It strikes me that there are many cases where the main goal of any kind of change is not “I am an X” but “other people treat me as an X”. Like, getting a doctorate not because it facilitates research or enables a job, but because people defer to those with doctorates in certain ways. Or, becoming a police officer not because you can help people or fight crime, but to have people obey you or give you the respect you think is due. People impersonate PhDs and police officers for these reasons as well.
Iknklast wrote:
I think it can actually be both: they sincerely believe their fantasy and they don’t really believe their fantasy.
Back when I was concentrating my time and attention on the Skeptic Movement, I was particularly interested in the psychology behind why ordinary people not only believed weird things, but seemed capable of accepting contradictions. Turns out we’re all capable of accepting contradictions because the human mind processes and sorts information among multiple pathways — and then comes up with ways to weave it together.
The most obvious example is religion, of course. People who say they have no doubts that God exists may really believe they have no doubt that God exists. Skepticism just isn’t on their radar. But they often don’t behave the way we’d expect people who are completely confident would behave. As Sackbut points out, they want to be treated like someone who knows the truth — as if they’re shoring up a fantasy. And, when push comes to shove, their unmitigated confidence that God is in charge is mitigated.
Maybe. Or Wadhwa might just be a jerk who likes to jerk women around. That happens, too.
Are there really that many people who do this? I suppose some do, but every one I went to my doctorate with was dedicated to the education and the research. Maybe because that’s the field – environmental science – which is not a field in which you will get either money or respect. It’s one of the least prestigious of the hard sciences (maybe because there are so many women?) even though it is not one whit easier…harder in some ways. But the assumption is that anyone can get the equivalent by spending two hours on Wikipedia. No one defers to people who have a Ph.D in Environmental Science.
Now, I have had students who were becoming medical doctors for money and prestige, and didn’t give a flying fig about helping people or improving society.
Re #12
I don’t think there are many who do this, for a bunch of reasons. But some do (including some lawyers and medical doctors), and there are certainly people who WANT to do this. I used to be one; I didn’t realize until years later that “authority” and “prestige” were parts of the reasons I was considering a doctorate I never obtained. Those who are aware of the hard road for getting academic research or teaching jobs know this is folly, but not everyone thinks of such things. I certainly didn’t.
It’s also true at lower levels of academic achievement: majoring in X so you have credentials to wave about regarding X, or getting a degree at school Y so you look impressive, not because you actually benefitted educationally.
Regardless, my point is that people are sometimes attracted more to how others perceive them than to how they perceive themselves, and gender identity is not the only example of this.
Further to Sastra:
As so often, the analogy with religion is revealing. Throughout the entire portion of my life in which I was old enough to recognise religion for the nonsense it was (certainly more than forty years) right up until his death last year, my dad was a very committed Christian. Church warden, prayer meetings, all that. My mother is equally committed. My sister…. Well, the less said about her the better. She was an actual missionary for years. As far as I know, she’s a member of an evangelical church of one sort or another; you know the drill, people rolling around in the pews. gibbering in ‘tongues’, competing to see who can shout “amen” the loudest and at the least appropriate times. Her kids… I’m not even going to talk about them, it makes me profoundly sad just thinking about the poor buggers.
Anyway, all three of them firmly believe, and have always believed, that I will burn in hell for all eternity as a heretic. But since I reached about 14 years old, not one of them has so much as suggested that I might want to think about the old presto-changeo repenting lark and save my soul from damnation at the hands of Satan and all his devils. So either they don’t care about me at all (not an unlikely possibility, all things considered) or they have so compartmentalised their belief that it is no contradiction to ‘know’ that someone they supposedly care about will be infinitely tortured and simultaneously to not lift a finger to do the slightest thing about it.
I’ve often said that it’s a very good job the religion didn’t catch hold with me. I can imagine all too well what kind of monster I might be if it had. There’s certainly no way I could compartmentalise that way; if I thought everyone else were going to burn in hell, then I could not sit idly by.
But compared to those monumental acts of self-delusion, a man’s being able to simultaneously believe he’s a woman and need constant validation as scaffolding for that belief, seems like a walk in the park.
Or even actively side with the torturist. If that’s their idea of “caring”, I don’t need their “care”.
Well, yes, but… This is exactly what many atheist activists have been advocating. Accept that we are going to be infinitely tortured, according to your beliefs, and do not under any circumstances lift a finger to do anything about it, because we do not share your beliefs and your acts of “caring” are incredibly annoying interference in our lives. Care all you want, fret all you want, worry all you want, but leave us alone, let us live our lives as we wish.
Sackbut:
For sure, but I was just talking about the ease with which people embrace such apparent contradictions. I certainly don’t want my family calling to beg me to repent. I’m pleased that they have accepted that I’ll never listen. And regardless of our relationship, I don’t want them – or anyone – to have so much as a moment’s discomfort when contemplating the fate of my non-existent immortal soul.
I’m just pointing out a comparison between my family’s both believing and weirdly not caring about my eventual fiery downfall and someone’s firm belief they’re both the opposite sex and that the world should turn inside out to convince them of the thing they genuinely believe.
It’s irrational, but I don’t think it’s anything new.