Transwomen are not women - X (XY?)

[The Atheist]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

Through my eyes, that's a pretty straightforward question to answer. But the seeming refusal of anyone in this thread to answer it (or to misdirect by keeping coming back to sports/safe spaces/etc) is interesting in itself.

Carry on!

Oh, bollocks.

Again, during the years of this thread I've made the point several times - life is so difficult for trans men that I have no doubt they're 100% genuine in their state of mind.

I also have no issue with trans women who aren't faking it.

We have thousands of years of history of trans women as genuine. The play-acting part of trans is a recent effect, and has only happened since trans women gained some human rights.

And just to go all the way back to the OP - we had a beautiful example of the difference in men's and women's sporting ability tonight when NZ beat Australia at netball. These players are full-time professionals at the very peak of their form, with the Kiwi shooter going 100% as part of an amazingly talented team.

Our team warms up for Australia by taking on the NZ men's netall team - a bunch of complete amateurs who don't even have a proper league in what is an absurdly minority sport.

Yet they whip the women every time they play. Bigger, faster, stronger. No contest.

[theprestige]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

No. Once again, I'm not talking about safe spaces or sport or anything like that.

I'm talking about this:

You and others in this thread have now let the curtain drop and have declared your overarching belief that transwomen are nothing more than males "playing" at being women ("LARPing", to use your charming description). In other words, you deny the fundamental validity of transgender identity when it comes to transwomen. Nothing to do with sport or safe spaces etc per se.

So.... what I'm trying to ascertain is very simple: do you hold the same belief about transmen as well? In other words, do you believe that transmen are nothing more than females "LARPing" at being men? Again, nothing to do with safe spaces or sport etc. I merely ask whether you deny the validity of transmen in the same way that you deny the validity of transwomen.

Through my eyes, that's a pretty straightforward question to answer. But the seeming refusal of anyone in this thread to answer it (or to misdirect by keeping coming back to sports/safe spaces/etc) is interesting in itself.

Carry on!

The asymmetrical parts are well worth discussing as such. The symmetrical parts go without saying, because of symmetry. But here we are.

[theprestige]

Honestly I'm almost tempted to answer LJ's question, just to see what is made of it, if anything coherent.

On the other hand, I know my answer already, so I'm set. I might revisit it if someone introduces some new thinking that might change my answer, but so far I've seen none of that.

[Rolfe]

I don't know what constitutes "genuine" and "not faking it" in this context. Nobody can actually change sex, so it isn't that genuine people have done that. Nobody has a brain of one sex inside the body of the opposite sex, so it isn't that.

We've been over the fundamental reasons for "gender dysphoria" several times, and I don't think the concept of "genuine" and "fake" is terribly helpful. I don't doubt that there are people who will simply pretend to be the opposite sex for reasons of personal gain without any feeling of "wanting" to be the opposite sex, but I don't think this is at all common, although it is probably the case with some of these men who decide they're women to get moved to a women's prison. I certainly think that the overwhelming majority of people who declare a trans identity have some sort of psychological thing going on that is driving them in that direction. Even creeps like Jonathan Yaniv.

It seems to boil down in many cases to a distinction between acceptable behaviour and non-acceptable behaviour. If a trans-identifying person behaves reasonably and is considerate of others' sensibilities and vulnerabilities they are regarded much more favourably than someone like Yaniv who is an aggressive, narcissistic, entitled jerk. But I don't think that makes the former "genuine" and the latter "faking it". That way lies a ruling that classifies polite, considerate trans people as "genuine" and rude, selfish trans people as "faking it", and we land in the place where a genuine trans person can do no wrong, by definition. If they do, they're "not really trans", so their behaviour is considered to have no bearing on the question of restricting access to opposite-sex spaces by trans people, because no "real trans" person transgresses. It's a lovely Catch-22.

This isn't a case of "genuine" and "fake" trans people. They're all genuine in the sense that they feel some degree of incongruence with their sexed bodies. And they're all fake in the sense that they are not and never can be the sex they weren't born as. Some are decent people and some are jerks.

I don't think we can legislate so that the decent people are allowed to do certain things and go in certain places, while the jerks are legally forbidden. How does that even work? People are complicated. Someone can be a decent person 90% of the time then do something really crass. Someone can be a complete jerk and yet still have crippling body dysphoria.

And you know, I've been saying this all along. It boils down to, transwomen are men, all of them, and like all people they display complex and inconsistent behaviour patterns. John periodically comes along and declares something like, oh, you let the mask slip now, we see your real feelings, you don't believe transwomen are women, you bigot.

No, I don't. I don't know how often I need to say it. I am a believer in reality.

[Ziggurat]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Nobody has a brain of one sex inside the body of the opposite sex

Actually, some people might. Mixed sex chimeras could end up with such a scenario, where the nervous system develops from one embryo and the rest of the body another. I doubt that’s a big factor in the whole transgender debate, and it’s not clear what the consequences of such a scenario would be, but it is possible.

[Rolfe]

Find me just one case...

Seriously, I don't think that's even possible. And even if you had such a brain with XX chromosomes, it would then be marinaded in testosterone.

No, really, you're on Fantasy Island with this one.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

the fundamental validity of transgender identity

If we follow Judith Butler, gender is 'just' a performance, and genderfluidity plus non-binary identities routinely trash and cross the binary gender divide. Why the essentialisation of some trans identities at the expense of others?

How can we be certain that transgender identifying people won't experience a shift in their gender identities over their lifetimes? Eddie Izzard seems to have gone from genderfluid and using male and female pronouns to just using female pronouns, as he approached the age of 60. Others seem happy under the broader transgender umbrella and less restricted by the specifics of declaring themselves a transwoman or bothering to transition medically.

There are conversely a non-negligible number of detransitioners, women who once identified as trans men but who now identify as lesbians or simply as women, rather than as trans, the identity they adopted in their teenage years or early adulthood. I can accept all of these identities as 'valid' (as in: use the right name and pronouns), but to call them 'fundamentally valid' seems a stretch when they have changed.

Historicising gender identities shows that a number of specific trans identities bloomed only very recently, the upsurge of teenage girls identifying as trans boys is extremely recent and has flipped the numbers at gender dysphoria clinics.

But historicising gender identities is also essential to understand how medical interventions have changed and continue to change. Sweden now won't prescribe puberty blockers or hormones to under-18s, a simple comparison between countries shows the Dutch have been more cautious and less uncritically gender-affirming than some English-speaking societies about child and teenage gender dysphoria. It remains to be seen whether transmen continue to identify as transmen for the next 60-80 years or if a lifetime of medical intervention drastically shortens their lifespans, as a matter of actuarial average.

It seems unlikely that there will be as many teenage girls identifying as trans boys in the future as have been doing so in the past 5-7 years, even if the bursting of the bubble doesn't take the number back twenty years. Sweden has already reported a decline in 2018/2019 among girls referred to gender dysphoria clinics, after an upsurge that began in 2013. The graph in the link show quite the decline.
https://genderreport.ca/the-swedish-...transitioning/

It is quite easy to affirm someone's gender nonconformity and place under the transgender umbrella, another to necessarily agree with their specific self-identification under the broader umbrella. I looked up Alex Drummond on Google, she attracted much press in 2015 as a Stonewall rep and a self-proclaimed bearded lesbian. Her Twitter account hasn't been updated since 2017, the profile pic shows a very androgynous mix of long hair, feminine stylings and a beard. She worked as a therapist and some links to her talks discuss genderfluidity and the possibility of switching identities back and forth. The last media mention of her was in 2019, when she was 54. No idea if she passed away in the Covid-19 pandemic or reinvented herself yet again, but her search results look like those of someone who is no longer with us, literally or metaphorically.

Which is a shame, as I'd be very curious to know how she might have felt about the backlash to her self-identification as a lesbian transwoman (with a beard and no surgery). Her genderfluidity and transgender identity is beyond all reasonable doubt, but there's been enough pushback at transwomen trying to breach the 'cotton ceiling' with 'girldicks' that I noticed various trans communities discussing this with eye-rolling while looking down the search results. Transwomen aren't all either androphilic or gynephilic, they include both sexual orientations (as well as many who might become more asexual after transition, as part of relieving their gender dysphoria). But gynephilic transwomen shouldn't be identifying as lesbians, when the very definition of lesbian is someone who rejects men and male genitalia in their sexuality. There are enough other words, including for any lesbians who are persuaded to slide down the Kinsey scale by entering into relationships with transwomen, that they don't need to appropriate that one.

Hopefully, trans communities, LGB communities and the rest of society will look back on the 'cotton ceiling' nonsense as an embarrassing overreach by literally dickish men who got too carried away with their new gender identities back when it all began. No means no, and there is no human right to sex on demand with exactly the people you might want to have sex with, if they don't want to have sex with you.

Similarly, self-ID might work nicely for socially recognising gender non-conforming identities under the broader trans umbrella, and account for the range of transition efforts different trans people undertake, but even if one recognises these identities as a continuum, sooner or later one must exclude some as 'fundamentally invalid'. Such as men preying on women and hiding behind their self-ID as 'women', or paedophiles. The current mess with Mermaids stinks of the 1970s attempts at entryism by paedophile networks into the gay community. It helps no one if the right wing can point to paedophile supporters and rapists who are associated institutionally or by self-identification with the trans community.

Not recognising the possibility of cultural change to identities and further cultural change to identities over time seems like the worst kind of narcissistic presentism.

Transgender identities have drastically changed in the past two decades, and they'll undoubtedly change again in the next two decades. The same goes for lesbian and gay identities over the past 50 years, as well as heterosexual identities. There are shared sexual practices across orientations and genders (e.g. kinks and BDSM) as well as targeted or specialised forms of pornography (TS porn, gay porn, heterosexual porn, anime porn, etc) which have also evolved in the same time-frame, and their influence is far from negligible. BDSM received a massive boost in publicity just over a decade ago and became mainstreamed; that has now ebbed somewhat, and there is greater awareness of how some BDSM practices can be abused (eg in 'sex play gone wrong' defenses if the partner ends up dead after being choked), especially by violent men on women. The right - or lack of social pressure - not to participate in any form of kink and not to be exposed to porn or have to have pornified sex seems like it should be asserted, rather than assuming everyone is on board with YKINMK. It's a hell of a lot easier for the younger generation to be accepting of multiple gender identities, but they also have to work out how to avoid bad sex or indeed a lack of sex, or if they're okay with not having sex, because their gender identity matters more. There also needs to be a lot of change regarding the prosecution of rape and sexual violence, as well as overcoming rape culture. That might dwarf trans inclusion as a social problem, but that in turn doesn't give trans communities an out to brush anything under the carpet.

[Rolfe]

I didn't realise Alex Drummond had vanished from current discourse.

I'm curious to know what prompted the "she" part of that though. Alex is obviously a bloke. Blokes don't become "she" by growing their hair and adopting "feminine stylings", and our fundamental recognition of them as blokes doesn't change either. For me it would take a very definite, conscious effort to use the word "she" for an obvious man, and I wouldn't do it. I'm wondering why you decided to do it.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I didn't realise Alex Drummond had vanished from current discourse.

I looked through results in general and for the past year, the latter were only historical references back to the publicity circa 2015. The lack of updates to Twitter for five years was the ringer for me. Drummond is mentioned a lot even today but really does seem to have vanished, which given the past few years quite probably means passed away.

The publicity for Drummond's role at Stonewall and remarks about women can have beards were in any case literally 6-7 years ago, mostly before Brexit. Almost ancient history.

Quote:

I'm curious to know what prompted the "she" part of that though. Alex is obviously a bloke. Blokes don't become "she" by growing their hair and adopting "feminine stylings", and our fundamental recognition of them as blokes doesn't change either. For me it would take a very definite, conscious effort to use the word "she" for an obvious man, and I wouldn't do it. I'm wondering why you decided to do it.

In one on one interactions using third person pronouns isn't necessary, as you've pointed out more than a few times now - one can say you or use their name. The 'does he take sugar' style of talking about someone in the third person when they are right there on front of you is weird to begin with. But Drummond isn't here and while it's tempting to write out their name constantly, the third person singular becomes necessary. I would always strive to use someone's current name, and it isn't a huge stretch to use their preferred pronouns. That is the bureaucratic expectation inside most employers, so it's easier to go along with that preference.

Several of the gender-critical authors I've read recently follow the same policy. Kathleen Stock took this approach - using she for self-identified trans women - in Material Girls, but defended those who don't want to be coerced into using sex-incongruent language. Stock also refused to use 'she' for Karen White or other "trans women who assault or aggress women".

I think it's extremely bad social policy to let gender recognition whether through certificates as in the old model, or self-ID, distort statistics-gathering around trans individuals. There are just too many areas where they need to be recorded properly, within healthcare outcomes, mortality trends and crime statistics. Any attempts to dissolve or hide trans women or trans men within their preferred gender should be resisted as unhelpful for trans people themselves in the medium and long term, and unhelpful for society, which wants to know how best to help those with gender dysphoria, not to mention unhelpful for women and other groups in society, whose statistical profiles might be distorted by unthinking 'inclusion'.

[Elaedith]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

I looked through results in general and for the past year, the latter were only historical references back to the publicity circa 2015. The lack of updates to Twitter for five years was the ringer for me. Drummond is mentioned a lot even today but really does seem to have vanished, which given the past few years quite probably means passed away.

I don't think so. Alex Drummond is still listed as an advisor on Stonewall's site.

[Elaedith]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

If we follow Judith Butler, gender is 'just' a performance, and genderfluidity plus non-binary identities routinely trash and cross the binary gender divide. Why the essentialisation of some trans identities at the expense of others?

I was also thinking of this when LJ performed his indignation at the suggestion of males 'role-playing being women'.

According to the version of queer theory that inspires much modern gender identity ideology, gender is indeed performative, and one becomes a man or a woman (or even male or female) by role-playing. Hence the placard spotted at a recent demo proclaiming, 'gender is a performance, and I'm here to steal the show'!

I tend to think attention-seeking gender activists who promote these beliefs are exploiting those with gender dysphoria for their own ends.

[Nick Terry]

The point I was trying to get across with Drummond was, one can accept someone else as gender nonconforming or genderfluid, go along with their creative fictions about straddling binaries, and fully accept them as transgender, but that doesn't then automatically say anything beyond social acceptance and not being discriminated against by employers.

Eddie Izzard identified as a transvestite, then as genderfluid and started mixing his pronouns to alternate between he and she, before settling on she quite recently. The talk was of boy/girl not man/woman, going by the Wiki page section for this. Julian Clary came up as a comedian around the same time, maybe a little earlier, as Izzard, was always effeminate, flamboyantly gay, and cross-dressed from time to time, not just when taking on panto roles (where drag was a longstanding tradition). Clary seems entirely happy as a gay man rather than edging along a gender nonconformity continuum. Before them, Hinge and Bracket were drag queens so when discussing the roles, they might use female pronouns, but were otherwise men. Kenny Everett's Cupid Stunt character might be seen as a drag ancestor for Drummon's grrl Alex, 'bearded lesbian' identity, as Everett dressed in women's clothing but still had his beard.

I've seen some comments recently that transvestitism and drag are being erased from cultural memory, which will pose serious problems for future historians of popular culture, beyond deciding whether so-and-so must be erased for sins that were only defined decades later. There was just too much of it, and we'll have to account for how it paralleled the mainstreaming of gay and lesbian communities as well as how it could be adopted by hetero comedians and actors. The Krankies were a married couple, Janette Tough played what could now be misread as a trans boy, Wee Jimmie Krankie. Pretty sure their direct influence on trans identities must be about zero, but who knows. None of this was exactly compulsory to 'like' in an era before we could hit 'like' buttons on Twitter etc, it was no doubt offensive to all kinds of people for all kinds of reasons, one didn't need to go to their stand-up shows or cabarets, one could change channels or mute the TV, but this was there.

The question is whether more fluid personae and roles adopted in entertainment have mutated into rigid identities. As I've tried to explain, it's quite easy to accept someone's persona and performance of gender non-conformity. This doesn't imply buying into everything Judith Butler argued about gender as performance, but the performative aspect is certainly there with a number of, but not all, contemporary trans identities. There's a difference between the narcissism of a stage performer playing a role, and the narcissism of a trans activist who has a deeply internalised and rigid identity, using social media as a stage.

Drummond got some media attention for claiming that women can have beards and to identify as a lesbian, I'm fairly sure only a few over the age of 45-50 might have connected his/her shtick to Kenny Everett. Even many experienced journalists or commentators wouldn't remember Everett, who died in 1995. By and large, there haven't been too many other transwomen openly wearing beards. If there are, then it's worth keeping track of how many are in the (social) media spotlight.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by Elaedith

I don't think so. Alex Drummond is still listed as an advisor on Stonewall's site.

That's some relief - I didn't want to wish Drummond was actually dead. But they've been remarkably quiet on social media and elsewhere for quite some time, so it's also remotely possible that Stonewall just haven't updated the group list. When looking up academic faculties in US universities and colleges earlier this year, there were more than a few staff lists that hadn't been updated in years despite contrary evidence elsewhere about retirements etc. More likely, Drummond is now around 57, so probably gave up on social media or being too much in the public eye.

[d4m10n]

Originally Posted by Elaedith

I was also thinking of this when LJ performed his indignation at the suggestion of males 'role-playing being women'.

Performative indignation plays such an outsized role in these culture war skirmishes.

Even now, some of the terven are making #womanface trend and they sound pretty pissed.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

Several of the gender-critical authors I've read recently follow the same policy. Kathleen Stock took this approach - using she for self-identified trans women - in Material Girls, but defended those who don't want to be coerced into using sex-incongruent language. Stock also refused to use 'she' for Karen White or other "trans women who assault or aggress women".

I'm just curious as to why people choose to give the trans project a win by over-riding the evidence of their eyes and ears and forcing themselves to use language that is discongruent with their senses. Kathleen Stock has considerations that don't apply to me.

I certainly won't do it now, that one of the criteria proposed for recognising someone as a woman in Scotland is to be "uses feminine pronouns". That must mean, compels others to refer to him using feminine pronouns. I won't be co-opted as part of that.

[theprestige]

I mean, if gender really is a social construct, then your gender identity is whatever others identify, not what you tell you wish they would identify.

[Rolfe]

I was discussing regret, and speculating that it was a lot more common than the TRAs propose. This twitter thread is absolutely heartbreaking, especially if you read to the end. [Trigger warning. Do not read if liable to be disturbed by suicide.] That poor young man. He looks hardly more than a boy. It sounds as if he never talked the whole thing through with anyone, just "thought it was the next step".

https://twitter.com/redpilledhomo/st...18183509053440

Quote:

I have autism and many learning disabilities. I was not aware what was happening. I was just getting surgery to be a girl because I think girls are pretty.

[Spelling and grammar tidied up by me.]

There are internal contradictions but if this is a fake it's a very good one. I suspect a fake would not have included the contradictions.

Thoughts about having a phalloplasty because of regret after MtF surgery are even more disturbing than the reports of the girls on the detransitioners Reddit who are asking if (or how long it will take for) their breasts to re-grow once they stop testosterone.

But now, saying anything to someone who wants to transition that might be construed as advising against it is being made a criminal offence.

That poor boy could have dressed up as whatever he wanted to dress up as. Lots of people do. He didn't have to destroy his life.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I'm just curious as to why people choose to give the trans project a win by over-riding the evidence of their eyes and ears and forcing themselves to use language that is discongruent with their senses. Kathleen Stock has considerations that don't apply to me.

I certainly won't do it now, that one of the criteria proposed for recognising someone as a woman in Scotland is to be "uses feminine pronouns". That must mean, compels others to refer to him using feminine pronouns. I won't be co-opted as part of that.

Sure, when Kathleen Stock published her book she had yet to resign from the University of Sussex, so the prevailing culture in academia likely influenced her decision. It also influences my choice, which is largely abstract because trans people are just not very visible in my everyday life or work. I think I've used preferred pronouns twice in the past four years, and only for one-off occasions.

Interestingly I think Kathleen Stock slipped up with Judith Butler, who plumped for non-binary they/them pronounds, but is routinely called she/her in most gender-critical books, even if the authors use preferred pronouns for trans individuals. They/them is actually a lot more annoying to use.


Not knocking your choice, btw, I read your posts arguing for this as a new change in recent years and it makes sense for you.

I do wonder however what is most critical here. Stock makes the convincing argument that society - actually an interlocking network of multiple western societies, thanks to the internet - is now 'immersed in a fiction' around trans identity, since she argues that people can't literally change sex. The British GRA of 2004 created a legal fiction - some other commentaries have noted how the language of the statute includes 'deemed' - around gender recognition, and employers plus other public spaces are insisting on perpetuating the fiction that biological men are trans women and vice versa. On one level, which is the social transition level, using new names and pronouns reinforces that fiction, but it's also relatively easy to do. Suspending disbelief is something we learn from a very young age, along with tolerance for others - this allows us to enjoy drama, films, and novels and to rub along with other people.

The problems start when the fact/fiction distinction collapses entirely and someone argues for the literal truth that 'trans women are women', or when the assertion of identity as a trans woman or man creates genuine conflicts over rights, as it does with sports, single sex spaces, etc. Calling Lia Thomas Lia doesn't cost anything; Lia Thomas being allowed to compete in women's swimming competitions costs much more because of the inevitable conflicts in rights.

Kathleen Stock's book was surprisingly more sympathetic to trans people than might have been expected from the run-up to her resignation, or if one only read her Twitter account. I do think she was trying to extend some olive branches and be more conciliatory, despite firm red lines in her own positions and arguments over gender versus biological sex. Her closing advice included recommendations like 'be more non-binary', which I can wholeheartedly get behind, to get out of some of the weirdly essentialist positions in gender identity theory.

[LondonJohn]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I'm just curious as to why people choose to give the trans project a win by over-riding the evidence of their eyes and ears and forcing themselves to use language that is discongruent with their senses. Kathleen Stock has considerations that don't apply to me.

I certainly won't do it now, that one of the criteria proposed for recognising someone as a woman in Scotland is to be "uses feminine pronouns". That must mean, compels others to refer to him using feminine pronouns. I won't be co-opted as part of that.

Indeed.

Fortunately, the rest of the "western" world - save for a very small band of obsessive reactionaries who zealously strategise in a pathetic and discriminatory attempt to fundamentally deny transgender identity* - has progressed in the meantime. Your views are as irrelevant and unpleasant as those of people who, in the period when progressive governments were adopting gay rights legislation, steadfastly refused to accept homosexuals as anything other than deviants with mental health disorders.


* Including extreme right-wingers, hardline religious nutters of most denominations and faiths, and (in the UK) Daily Mail readers......

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

The problems start when the fact/fiction distinction collapses entirely and someone argues for the literal truth that 'trans women are women', or when the assertion of identity as a trans woman or man creates genuine conflicts over rights, as it does with sports, single sex spaces, etc. Calling Lia Thomas Lia doesn't cost anything; Lia Thomas being allowed to compete in women's swimming competitions costs much more because of the inevitable conflicts in rights.

I would argue that referring to a known masculine object by feminine pronouns (or vice versa) is not without cost. The gendered (or non-gendered) use of the third person singular has been shown to be the most hard-wired thing we have from our own native language, and the most difficult thing to re-learn when adopting another language.

I would argue that stopping to think which pronoun you should use in your native language rather than just speaking naturally certainly does cost. It's like speaking French where you're constantly having to stop and mentally check whether a table or a door is masculine or feminine. French people don't have to do that. It takes work. It is also a denial of reality and a big win for the trans lobby when someone does it.

Pronouns are Rohypnol

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

Indeed.

Fortunately, the rest of the "western" world - save for a very small band of obsessive reactionaries who zealously strategise in a pathetic and discriminatory attempt to fundamentally deny transgender identity* - has progressed in the meantime. Your views are as irrelevant and unpleasant as those of people who, in the period when progressive governments were adopting gay rights legislation, steadfastly refused to accept homosexuals as anything other than deviants with mental health disorders.

* Including extreme right-wingers, hardline religious nutters of most denominations and faiths, and (in the UK) Daily Mail readers......

Do you have anything other than barely-veiled insults to contribute?

I realise you post intermittently in this thread, but what often happens is that you are asked a series of questions, but then the thread moves on without you, and when you return these questions are off the current page. You ignore them, and all you do is post more barely veiled insults and irrelevant comparisons to racism or homophobia, interspersed with "valid lived condition".

I don't think you're contributing anything of value here.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I would argue that referring to a known masculine object by feminine pronouns (or vice versa) is not without cost. The gendered (or non-gendered) use of the third person singular has been shown to be the most hard-wired thing we have from our own native language, and the most difficult thing to re-learn when adopting another language.

I would argue that stopping to think which pronoun you should use in your native language rather than just speaking naturally certainly does cost. It's like speaking French where you're constantly having to stop and mentally check whether a table or a door is masculine or feminine. French people don't have to do that. It takes work. It is also a denial of reality and a big win for the trans lobby when someone does it.

Pronouns are Rohypnol

Perhaps because I deal with multiple languages in largely text form, and because some foreign names befuddle students, I beg to differ. The gendering of objects or concepts is certainly a challenge when learning German, but once you've learned it and have read enough, it's relatively easy. Switching between languages that gender objects differently: one simply learns to look for the declensions.

The gendering of names does contain a few minefields, even without throwing in trans identification. In Italian, Andrea is a man's name, whereas in German, English and several other languages it's a woman's name. There are many other names that somehow befuddle my students, they're pretty clueless with the gendering of Israeli/Hebrew names (which are admittedly hard), but there are a sprinkling of other examples which somehow confuse them so they actually misgender a woman as a man, or vice versa.

Some names have migrated from one sex to the other over time, or are women's names in the US but male names in the UK, for example Robin or Robyn.

Your username Rolfe is so close to the German man's name Rolf that it took me quite a while to realise you were a woman (years ago, reading threads about Lockerbie in all probability). The added -e made me lean that way before you confirmed it directly in whatever post, but it still took a while to be certain

As long as one is just writing a name, then one is going to use the gendered pronoun to match more easily, without the mental check you're talking about. For example, I had a student last year named Miranda, who was a woman, and so that was easy. Everything lined up correctly. I also had a Tom, a Harry, (but no Dick), and all kinds of other names. None were trans so no problem, right?

But the same applies mentally when you receive an email from a man or a woman and know that Marie is a woman's name, so even if you don't need to write she/her in reply, you think of Marie as a woman.

I happen to have known Miranda Yardley tangentially as Peter Yardley, before he transitioned. He was the accountant for the company that owned the music magazine I edited until autumn 2000, and bought the magazine a year or two later, running it as the publisher until circa 2017. I've read a fair bit of Miranda's blog including his rejection of trans woman as an appropriate term for himself - he knows he is male. But it is dead easy to write a sentence beginning with Miranda and slip into she/her thereafter, because Miranda is generally a woman's name. I've never crossed paths with trans Miranda, but saw various pictures on his blog - in thinking about the pictures it was easier just now to use male pronouns, but that isn't guaranteed to hold. Because I referred to his pre-transition name when I actually knew him, and his rejection of 'trans woman' as a label applicable to himself, it was also easier to stick with male pronouns. I wrote a different take on this earlier today then decided not to include it in a post, and because of the way I'd started, it was much more natural to slip into she/her for Miranda Yardley.

One of my sisters is btw named Alex, so it's also easy for me to slip between genders for names that can go both ways, when writing.

As long as trans individuals use clearly gendered names, then they make it very, very easy to slip into using the gendered pronouns of their desired identity and not their biological sex. Miranda Yardley is a very good example of this. It takes effort to remember and/or overcome the conditioning to call someone named Miranda he/him, just as it takes effort to call someone named John she/her. If names are gender-ambiguous, ether in full or diminuitive forms such as Charlie (Charles vs Charlotte), then it can go either way.

OTOH, when I did interact with someone who I'd known as a man then transitioned socially, including adopting a new classically feminine name, there were a few moments of brain paralysis trying to work out the right pronouns. Others were writing about them following the easier-to-write-the-stereotypical-pronouns method, but in person, momentary confusion ensued, more when they stepped away from a dinner table, since it was generally much easier to say 'you' than use their new female name, which hadn't fully sunk in.

[Rolfe]

I know what Miranda Yardley looks like. I have no problem calling him him. I was inclined to think of Anne Lawrence as "she" when he was no more than a name, but after listening to more than an hour of podcast delivered in an undoubtedly male voice and talking about "my penis" and things like that, I now invariably think of him as him.

I know how to check the gender of a noun in German, or French, or Gaelic, but the point is, I have to stop and think about it. Native speakers don't.

It's been shown multiple times that the gendering "rules" of one's native language are the hardest thing to overcome for learners, with people who are utterly fluent in a second language quite often lapsing. Linguists say some people never manage to do it. Not that they can't stop and think and get it right, but that they don't manage it all the time without stopping and thinking. (One example I remember is of a Finnish woman, married to an Englishman and living in England and apparently absolutely fluent in English, who nevertheless frequently referred to her son as she or her daughter as he.)

It takes work. It takes effort.

There is one transwoman I know mainly from online interaction. I've only met her once, or maybe twice in person, and that was fleetingly, in a crowd. Because of the name I still think of her as her, but that could change very easily if I talked to her up close for any length of time. Because my native language is English, and I'm hard-wired to refer to anyone I code as male as he and anyone I code as female as she. So if Lesley codes as female to me online, that's fine. But if the coding changes, my automatic pronoun choice will change.

My username is the name of a cat I used to own, which was originally the surname of his original owners, which stuck. When I first joined the forum I thought it would be interesting to see what happened if people didn't know what sex I was. I gave that up years ago though.

My actual name is very obviously feminine - if you speak Gaelic. A bit like having a name ending in "e" in German. (I did wonder for a while if that might cause people to think that "Rolfe" was female, but apparently not. The avatar looks like a boy cat to most people, and that's the way they go.) If not, well, I do get misgendered online quite often. I do remember someone saying to me once that they couldn't get their head round "Andrea" because it means "man" and you know I'd never even thought about it that way, but they were right.

But this is off the point. If I am referring to someone I can easily see or hear is male, I am not automatically going to refer to them as "she". If I were to try to do that it would be a conscious choice that would take work. It is not without cost. It's even weird when someone else does it. I was on a Zoom call with friends and someone referred to Eddie Izzard as "she" and my brain did a complete double-take. When others referred to him as "he" there was no disconnect, no need to get past the "what the hell did you just say?" reaction.

[Nick Terry]

I think you've slightly slid past one key point, which is that when *writing* about someone with a conventionally female first name (Victoria, Miranda, Louise, etc) or a first name which is shared by both sexes (Alex, Charlie, etc), then slipping into she/her is incredibly easy. On this point we agree:

Quote:

So if Lesley codes as female to me online, that's fine.

This may be true for a lot of people even if they know someone is trans, just when *writing*, because of semi-automatic gender declensions (Victoria goes with she, etc).

Quote:

If I am referring to someone I can easily see or hear is male, I am not automatically going to refer to them as "she". If I were to try to do that it would be a conscious choice that would take work. It is not without cost. It's even weird when someone else does it. I was on a Zoom call with friends and someone referred to Eddie Izzard as "she" and my brain did a complete double-take. When others referred to him as "he" there was no disconnect, no need to get past the "what the hell did you just say?" reaction.

'See or hear': yes. This is precisely when it takes extra mental effort, as I noted when discussing a dinner with a recently transitioned man.

But when *writing*, one might not be seeing or hearing someone.

Eddie Izzard likely gets called she a little more frequently because of the diminuitive - I was thinking about this earlier and remembering Edie Brickell the folk singer, versus how impossible it would be to call an Edward a 'she', just as one would not call a Charles a 'she', but there are countless Charlies who absolutely are 'she'.

It is also easier to *write* the opposing pronouns after just reading someone else use the preferred pronouns. I looked up Eddie Izzard's Wiki page and the relevant section promptly slipped into 'she'. I mentioned earlier Judith Butler's non-binary they/them, and over the length of her Wiki page, the consistent use of they/them is exhausting. Note how Judith codes as a woman's name so using 'she' here is just a lot easier even if one doesn't have a picture of her (an obvious adult human female) in mind when writing.

There are then the conscious and unconscious stances of 'preferred pronouns' versus 'use the pronouns of their biological sex'. There are accusations of misgendering versus the inevitability that someone will simply mix up he/she because the new name doesn't match the face, etc.

Those who work in organisations that insist on preferred pronouns have to be cautious and conscious about it, those who don't can afford to take a different position, until they're in an environment where this is insisted on (eg courts, it would seem).

[LondonJohn]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

I know what Miranda Yardley looks like. I have no problem calling him him. I was inclined to think of Anne Lawrence as "she" when he was no more than a name, but after listening to more than an hour of podcast delivered in an undoubtedly male voice and talking about "my penis" and things like that, I now invariably think of him as him.

I know how to check the gender of a noun in German, or French, or Gaelic, but the point is, I have to stop and think about it. Native speakers don't.

It's been shown multiple times that the gendering "rules" of one's native language are the hardest thing to overcome for learners, with people who are utterly fluent in a second language quite often lapsing. Linguists say some people never manage to do it. Not that they can't stop and think and get it right, but that they don't manage it all the time without stopping and thinking. (One example I remember is of a Finnish woman, married to an Englishman and living in England and apparently absolutely fluent in English, who nevertheless frequently referred to her son as she or her daughter as he.)

It takes work. It takes effort.

There is one transwoman I know mainly from online interaction. I've only met her once, or maybe twice in person, and that was fleetingly, in a crowd. Because of the name I still think of her as her, but that could change very easily if I talked to her up close for any length of time. Because my native language is English, and I'm hard-wired to refer to anyone I code as male as he and anyone I code as female as she. So if Lesley codes as female to me online, that's fine. But if the coding changes, my automatic pronoun choice will change.

My username is the name of a cat I used to own, which was originally the surname of his original owners, which stuck. When I first joined the forum I thought it would be interesting to see what happened if people didn't know what sex I was. I gave that up years ago though.

My actual name is very obviously feminine - if you speak Gaelic. A bit like having a name ending in "e" in German. (I did wonder for a while if that might cause people to think that "Rolfe" was female, but apparently not. The avatar looks like a boy cat to most people, and that's the way they go.) If not, well, I do get misgendered online quite often. I do remember someone saying to me once that they couldn't get their head round "Andrea" because it means "man" and you know I'd never even thought about it that way, but they were right.

But this is off the point. If I am referring to someone I can easily see or hear is male, I am not automatically going to refer to them as "she". If I were to try to do that it would be a conscious choice that would take work. It is not without cost. It's even weird when someone else does it. I was on a Zoom call with friends and someone referred to Eddie Izzard as "she" and my brain did a complete double-take. When others referred to him as "he" there was no disconnect, no need to get past the "what the hell did you just say?" reaction.

I'm afraid this is very much at odds with your previous statement of defiant blanket refusal - conscious refusal - to refer to transgender people using those people's preferred pronouns.

I don't think anybody (including most transgender people themselves) is concerned about unconscious misgendering. What is concerning, however, is when people hold views such as your previously stated view: that you consciously and deliberately refuse to comply, on the grounds of an ideological denial of transgender identity.

[Nick Terry]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

What is concerning, however, is when people hold views such as your previously stated view: that you consciously and deliberately refuse to comply, on the grounds of an ideological denial of transgender identity.

Explain, then, why Kathleen Stock, who deliberately recognised transgender identities in using preferred pronouns in her book, was hounded out of her job at the University of Sussex as 'transphobic'. (Have you read the book?)

Accepting 'transgender identity' can be as surface as using preferred pronouns and the current name, which is also encouraged/enforced in many organisations. 'Transgender' is a huge umbrella and one can accept individual and group identities as 'trans' very easily.

People who have gone out of their way to some varying extent to identify as the gender opposite to their natal sex will almost always be distinctive (they may or may not pass), but the collectively agreed social fiction that they are women or men is not difficult to encourage - e.g. with preferred pronouns and current names.

The expected acceptance of 'transgender identity' doesn't however seem to stop there.

[LondonJohn]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Do you have anything other than barely-veiled insults to contribute?

I realise you post intermittently in this thread, but what often happens is that you are asked a series of questions, but then the thread moves on without you, and when you return these questions are off the current page. You ignore them, and all you do is post more barely veiled insults and irrelevant comparisons to racism or homophobia, interspersed with "valid lived condition".

I don't think you're contributing anything of value here.

That's interesting, because I don't think that you and your fellow transgender denialists are contributing anything of value here.

And I'm not interested any longer in answering "a series of questions", because I don't care any longer about what my would-be interrogators think. Once it became clear that almost all people in this thread who were talking about female safe spaces and female sports were actually using that as a Trojan Horse* for a blanket fundamental denial of transgender identity itself, I realised just how bigoted and unpleasant** the prevailing POV in this thread was.

As I said before: please feel free to carry on with the denialism in this toxic mess of a thread. Sensible and rational people are right to be ignoring it. Maybe that should be telling you something.....


* It's perfectly feasible and rational to hold an affirmatory view on transgender identity but to have concerns about things such as female safe spaces or female sports. I personally have previously stated that I'd want to see policy revisions or reversals if it turned out that natal females were being subjected to significant additional personal risk on account of pro-transgender policies, and I've also previously made my position very clear on transwomen in women's sport (that transwomen should not be allowed to compete in elite or sub-elite levels of women's sport, and that transwomen should also not be allowed to compete in any level of women's sport where there are clear safety risks to natal females, eg in rugby).

** And the transgender denialists' knee-jerk mantra of accusing anyone supportive of transgender rights of being a misogynist is also a huge tell.

[LondonJohn]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

Explain, then, why Kathleen Stock, who deliberately recognised transgender identities in using preferred pronouns in her book, was hounded out of her job at the University of Sussex as 'transphobic'. (Have you read the book?)

Uhm, maybe because she did an awful lot more anti-transgender agitation in other areas, and zealously/ideologically doubled down (thereby placing her academic institution in an invidious position) rather than accepting that she should not be using the pulpit and privilege of her academic status to be broadcasting anti-transgender animus. Maybe?

[shuttlt]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

** And the transgender denialists' knee-jerk mantra of accusing anyone supportive of transgender rights of being a misogynist is also a huge tell.

While I was on timeout I encountered a claim that TERFs were motivated by misogyny and the patriarchy, since trans-women are women and TERFs were seeking to exclude such women based on traditional (and therefore patriarchal) notions of what a woman is. Is that also telling?

The accusations of misogyny are a little bit of an "if all you have is a hammer" situation. Of course misogyny and patriarchy are invoked, that is the default go to claim against people who disagree with feminists. I don't think there is much of a tell by misogyny coming up beyond telling you you are dealing with feminists. It would be like a communist in 1905 blaming the bourgeoisie, well obviously that is their explanation, what would you expect?

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

I'm afraid this is very much at odds with your previous statement of defiant blanket refusal - conscious refusal - to refer to transgender people using those people's preferred pronouns.

I don't think anybody (including most transgender people themselves) is concerned about unconscious misgendering. What is concerning, however, is when people hold views such as your previously stated view: that you consciously and deliberately refuse to comply, on the grounds of an ideological denial of transgender identity.

I refuse to edit the language I use to accommodate someone else's desire to be spoken of in gendered language that is at odds with the sex I perceive them as.

If there is an occasion where, because I have inadequate information, I perceive them as the sex they are not, similarly I'm not going to consciously edit my language the other way.

I will use the language that comes naturally to me, which includes referring to people I recognise as male as "he", regardless of their desire to compel me to use the language they dictate.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by Nick Terry

I think you've slightly slid past one key point, which is that when *writing* about someone with a conventionally female first name (Victoria, Miranda, Louise, etc) or a first name which is shared by both sexes (Alex, Charlie, etc), then slipping into she/her is incredibly easy.

I wasn't sliding past it. It just wasn't what I was talking about. If all I have to "code" someone's sex is a name, then what you say is true. But in that case I know very little about that person indeed. Once I have the name "Anne Lawrence" attached to a very masculine voice going on about his penis, I'm never going to think of that person as "she" again, regardless of the name.

I did think, and it's probably true in a way, that if my friend Ashley had changed his name when he decided to transition, I might have been able to sneak a "she" in there. But really, I know Ashley, and he went from a man who occasionally cosplayed female characters to a man cosplaying "woman", so probably not.

Of course it's possible to code someone as the sex they aren't, if you have very limited contact with them, or limited information, or a misleading photograph. In that case you'll automatically use the wrong pronouns without thinking about it. But once you know them well enough to perceive their actual sex, that will change.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by shuttlt

While I was on timeout I encountered a claim that TERFs were motivated by misogyny and the patriarchy, since trans-women are women and TERFs were seeking to exclude such women based on traditional (and therefore patriarchal) notions of what a woman is. Is that also telling?

The accusations of misogyny are a little bit of an "if all you have is a hammer" situation. Of course misogyny and patriarchy are invoked, that is the default go to claim against people who disagree with feminists. I don't think there is much of a tell by misogyny coming up beyond telling you you are dealing with feminists. It would be like a communist in 1905 blaming the bourgeoisie, well obviously that is their explanation, what would you expect?

There is pretzel-reasoning and to spare among the TRAs. Sometimes the only reasonable response is a pitying smile.

[shuttlt]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

There is pretzel-reasoning and to spare among the TRAs.

Things like that always make me think of the Mandy Rice-Davies line that I'm sure you are familiar with. They would say that, wouldn't they.

[Rolfe]

Originally Posted by LondonJohn

That's interesting, because I don't think that you and your fellow transgender denialists are contributing anything of value here.

And I'm not interested any longer in answering "a series of questions", because I don't care any longer about what my would-be interrogators think. Once it became clear that almost all people in this thread who were talking about female safe spaces and female sports were actually using that as a Trojan Horse* for a blanket fundamental denial of transgender identity itself, I realised just how bigoted and unpleasant** the prevailing POV in this thread was.

As I said before: please feel free to carry on with the denialism in this toxic mess of a thread. Sensible and rational people are right to be ignoring it. Maybe that should be telling you something.....


* It's perfectly feasible and rational to hold an affirmatory view on transgender identity but to have concerns about things such as female safe spaces or female sports. I personally have previously stated that I'd want to see policy revisions or reversals if it turned out that natal females were being subjected to significant additional personal risk on account of pro-transgender policies, and I've also previously made my position very clear on transwomen in women's sport (that transwomen should not be allowed to compete in elite or sub-elite levels of women's sport, and that transwomen should also not be allowed to compete in any level of women's sport where there are clear safety risks to natal females, eg in rugby).

** And the transgender denialists' knee-jerk mantra of accusing anyone supportive of transgender rights of being a misogynist is also a huge tell.

I don't know why you bother.

People can have whatever "identity" they like. It's not up to me to police the insides of their heads. Or, indeed, what they wear or what medical interventions they have. It's literally a non-issue.

It becomes a very real issue when these people start to demand that what's going on inside their heads (with or without the medical interventions) is more important than external reality.

Single-sex spaces and provisions are not a "Trojan horse", they are the place where fantasy meets reality. A man can think of himself as a woman and believe himself to be female to his heart's content. I don't have to affirm or deny this, it just is. However, when "acknowledging transgender identity" comes inextricably linked to the demand that male people be given legal access as of right to women's intimate spaces and protected categories, even if the women object to this, then we have a problem.

Be yourself, be transgender, wear what you like, behave as you please. But when it comes to single-sex spaces and provisions, use the ones that fit your actual, real, immutable sex.

[Ziggurat]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Find me just one case...

Seriously, I don't think that's even possible.

Of course it's possible. Why wouldn't it be? The nervous system develops from one set of cells, and if embryos fuse to form a chimera, those cells could come from a different embryo than the gonads. As for finding a case, most chimeras never even learn that they are chimeras, so there's very little data available. Furthermore, given the current climate, nobody is ever going to fund research into examining the possibility of any connection between mixed sex chimeras and transgenderism. It's taboo.

Now, maybe there isn't a link. Maybe you're right that an xx brain growing up surrounded by testosterone will be an ordinary male brain. But nobody actually knows that. Nobody has tested that. It isn't actually a given.

[shuttlt]

Originally Posted by Ziggurat

Of course it's possible. Why wouldn't it be? The nervous system develops from one set of cells, and if embryos fuse to form a chimera, those cells could come from a different embryo than the gonads. As for finding a case, most chimeras never even learn that they are chimeras, so there's very little data available. Furthermore, given the current climate, nobody is ever going to fund research into examining the possibility of any connection between mixed sex chimeras and transgenderism. It's taboo.

Would discovering trans-women really do have female brains be taboo? It sounds like the kind of result there would be every incentive to find.

[Rolfe]

Spoiler. They don't. If what Ziggurat proposes is even possible (which I still seriously doubt) there is no known case of it. Plenty transwomen brains are available to medical research. If they didn't check the karyotype along with all the more complex studies they did, I'd be very much surprised.

[shuttlt]

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Spoiler. They don't. If what Ziggurat proposes is even possible (which I still seriously doubt) there is no known case of it. Plenty transwomen brains are available to medical research. If they didn't check the karyotype along with all the more complex studies they did, I'd be very much surprised.

That's what I assumed, but really... for chimeras to be remotely common enough to be relevant, you'd be seeing people with one blonde eyebrow, or completely different skin tone on different sides of their face every time you went to the shops.

[Rolfe]

Long ago I watched a TV programme where they followed a research team trying to prove that transwomen's brains were "female". Yes, they had that bias built-in from the start. I'm not saying they had hundreds of necropsy samples but they did have enough to do a bit of a study. It was extremely obvious that there was no way to tell a male brain from a female one, never mind to assign the transgender brain to the "wrong" sex.

There were differences at statistical level of course. Male brains on average are bigger and heavier, because male bodies on average are bigger and heavier, but there is an overlap. Everything they looked at, there was an overlap. They got very excited by one particular region of the brain where they said the transwomen's brains resembled women's brains more than they resembled men's brains, but again it was statistical and they couldn't have correctly assigned an unknown brain with more than maybe a 70% chance of being right.

What I'm not sure if the programme went into (it was a long time ago) is the possibility that even differences of that nature are acquired rather than innate. If you marinate a man's brain in oestrogen for years, does that change things?

[Ziggurat]

Originally Posted by shuttlt

Would discovering trans-women really do have female brains be taboo?

First of, even if this is a thing, it's likely not an explanation for all trans people, but only a subset. But more importantly for your question, it runs counter to self ID. If there's a biological, testable, objective basis for trans identity, that runs counter to everything that the trans activists are trying to do. That's absolutely taboo.

Originally Posted by Rolfe

Spoiler. They don't. If what Ziggurat proposes is even possible (which I still seriously doubt) there is no known case of it. Plenty transwomen brains are available to medical research. If they didn't check the karyotype along with all the more complex studies they did, I'd be very much surprised.

What fraction of trans women have had their brains tested for genetic markers? It's not close to 100%.

I'm not suggesting that this sort of chimerism is the cause of most, or even many, trans people. Chimerism is rare, and the specific split I'm suggesting would be a rare subset of chimerism. So if, say, 1% of trans people have this condition, is it really hard to imagine it would have escaped notice thus far?

This is the sort of thing you're only likely to find out if you specifically search for it. And nobody is going to search for it, because nobody is going to get a grant to search for it, because it's taboo.