The new religion

I've been thinking about kindness and gender ideology in secular cultures and wondering if that sense of biblical 'kindness' that perhaps one found in a Christian community, or rather in the love of God (the idea of a loving father holding one up spiritually) is missing from people's lives and in an unkind world the desire to seek kindness and to bask in the glory of being seen to be kind by your quasi religious community, is some how replicating that? It's every bit as hypocritical as religious kindness can be because it's often not extended to those who contravene the rules. Apologies for the waffly word dump, but I see similarities in the cruelty of the current kindness movement with religious intolerance.

Well, most feminists say that culturally conditioned rules governing what women can do or be or look like are gubbins, there is no inherent reason why women cannot do or behave the same as men.

So in that sense, the sense of equality of humans, sex does not matter.

However, the reason we campaign is because sex exists and affects women most especially in a system that has evolved to benefit and advantage the male sex.

As I've said many times, in a multicultural, secular society, mutual laws can only be based on material reality, and in material reality, sex exists, and if women are going to have a full share in society, this needs to be reflected in laws and public policy.

Lots of people have lots of different views and beliefs about the place of women, inner identity, personal morality etc. But we are not a theocracy, and no one group's views about such metaphysical philosophies should form the basis of how society as a whole is run.

Believe as you wish. But you have no right to force compliance to your beliefs from others, nor do you have the right to harm children and young people, and indeed women on the basis of those beliefs.

I've no interest in converting Genderists to accepting material reality, tbh. I'm content to just keep them the fuck away from policy and legislation.

And that's enough FWR for today.

What is it that we always say on threads about personal feminism? We never realised our sex mattered until suddenly it did. We learn it the hard way.

We don't all learn it at the same time though. I think that gets missed a lot. They used to say "give me a child until he's seven" and there's truth in that, because what you learn the hard way in those early years sticks.

Yes absolutely "sex doesn't matter" as a concept is similar to some of the aims of feminism, as in, it doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman, you can still be a fighter pilot, PM, go to university etc. And then that is used to make the claim that feminists should agree with trans ideology.

But quite clearly and factually, sexual dimorphism does matter for a specific set of things, and for those things it's extremely important or essential - reproduction, sport, safety etc.

It's obvious to anyone who gives it sone thought that equality of opportunity for the sexes, and necessary protections for the sex is most at risk from the other sex, does not mean and has never meant "there are no sexes".

It's just more of the woolly thinking that is such a problem in this whole issue and that has been very much manipulated and exploited by transactivists. I think that is a key difference in the GC / trans ideology opposition - as a GC person I only want to refer to logic, sense, reality and empirical evidence. That's the basis of why I think what I think, and I'm prepared to debate and reason on that basis all day long, and change my view in the face of evidence if there is any.

Whereas enforcing the trans agenda involves perpetuating lies and misunderstandings.

Yes, Arabella, agreed.

Where did that "sex doesn't matter" idea come from? Feminist theorists never said it; their allies did. It's the mainstream dumbed-down misunderstanding that was popularised and accepted. I see that paralleled all too clearly in genderism.

I've also thought that there is something different about the UK (especially from the US) in terms of our irreverence to political ideologies as a whole. We're not a country that draws big political rallies and marches.

At the risk of getting a telling off, I think it's about skepticism being a characteristic that's, traditionally, widespread in the UK while the US is a country that elevates belief. Religious belief in some cases but not in all, take for example "The American Dream" as an article of belief and countless positivity movements where if you believe something strongly enough it will come to pass. These movements get supporters in the UK but many will scoff which tends to get people in the UK labelled as being negative.

Its mainstream proponents are operating on the principle that "sex doesn't matter" - yes, and there is a blurring here or overlap between some of the aims of feminism (or apparent aims). When feminism has sought equity it has often been seen as 'trying to erase sex difference' - equality of opportunity is easy to confuse with 'sameness'.

I guess this is why I see a lot of comments from more right wing quarters about, say, Suzanne Moore, saying 'you created this problem'. Feminism gets the blame for gender ideology, the two things are seen as entwined and dependent, by many.

Sexual dimorphism is physical reality, and it will always exist and keep mattering. So attempts to erase it and say it doesn't matter cannot erase it. Women will just organise on the basis of sex and campaign and fight again for sex-based rights.

You can organise on the basis of race, even though that is not at all binary in terms of physical differences, and on the basis other physical characteristics such as disabilities. Sex isn't going away, and we will organise on the basis of it. Not because of a need for identity to be validated, but for safety, equality and fairness.

I've just been watching Kellie-Jay's interview with Bret Weinstein, and they covered the religious aspect and other related things. Check that out.

Our species reproduces via sexual dimorphism. 'Gender' ideology is apparently trying to get round or past or beyond this very basic fact.

Its mainstream proponents are operating on the principle that "sex doesn't matter". There are certainly some proponents of genderist theory who are well aware that it does - how could it not, when our minds are moulded by our experiences? - but in my experience they usually fail to do the necessary material class analysis of the results - this ideology was founded to help males yet its widespread acceptance is causing far greater harm to females.

I think this does come down to cognitive dissonance and all our other psychological defence mechanisms. We're all inclined to ascribe a higher truth-value to our own perspective and ignore things that undermine our sense of self; not everyone is mindful of these basic human tendencies.

As to what's different about the UK, it's probably worth considering what's different about the US. Acceptance of religiosity in politicians is one big difference - fire and brimstone fervour is generally viewed as highly suspect over here. Seeing a holy war play out on home territory in living history is probably another major factor - 9/11 shocked the hell out of them but for us it was old (yet terrible) hat. Cultural identity plays a part too - we take pride in our capacity to take the piss out of ourselves better than anyone else.

It's also interesting how the right to be validated by everyone in your evidence-free beliefs has become central to trans ideology, so refusing to live and let live is actually a functional, active part of the process.

Long ago, MTF transsexuals like for example Jan Morris would probably not have (at least I don't think so) attempted to be part of every group set up for women or females, or tried to become representatives of women/females as a group, or demanded to play on women's sports teams or take women's literary prizes. Out of a basic understanding that while they wanted to be women and tried to "live as" a woman, and were even legally entitled to call themselves a woman, they did not share the same experiences and bodies as females, and trying to grab everything for themselves that was designated as being for women would be inappropriate and pushy.

I think this allowed for a kind of mutual respect whereby women could accept them as "honorary" women without having to believe that they were somehow as female as us in every sense.

Now, because such thinking is sacrilege, it's important to many MTFs to push into women's spaces as much as possible, even where they really have no reason to and it's not a good idea, like working at a rape crisis centre or being a woman's officer. And if they are not accepted in that, and ideally selected before and above biological women in order to prove that you validate them, there is hell to pay in the form of bullying, cancellation and violent threats.

I agree it's fucking depressing, stressful and bloody scary. I sometimes have to take a break from even thinking about it before I return to the fray. It's horrible experiencing that frustration and alarm when perfectly sensible people who just want to be nice can't see how awful and dangerous all this is, and you have to watch what you say everywhere.

But, I do think sense will prevail. Honestly. This will be exposed, it will become understood, irt will be consigned to history and ultimately it will serve sex-based rights, because it will clarify and strengthen them. The religious cultery of it ultimately helps with that process - it's so extreme, it will come to be seen for what it is.

The GC position can also be broadly summed up as:

Live how you want
Be who you want and be happy
You're perfect as you are
The limits of anyone's rights are the boundaries of other people's rights and consent
Values such as kindness, inclusion, the right to name themselves, to have their own beliefs, should be things that are extended equally to all people instead of being owed by some to others with no reciprocation
Add new and more diverse/needed spaces to existing provision - as much as is wanted and needed.
Please do not forcibly take and redesignate female words, language, spaces, laws, these are needed for the half of the human race who are born female, and should be specific to them.
It is possible to live and let live.

As far as I can see - correct me please if I'm wrong, I'm always hoping to be wrong about this because it seems awful to me - this represents an intolerable position of hatred and hostility. It's like the Tudor restoration: except instead of every abbey being burned out, the inhabitants scattered, every item of value claimed and every building redesignated, it's every word, space, law or group that was for female people. And resisting this or even speaking up for female needs is regarded as an act of war.

I don't understand. I wish I did. The stress and distress of this is relentless and terrible.

This was an interesting watch in the more general terms of how Liberalism has replaced religion in Western Society.

The phrase 'religious intolerance' has come to me a lot in the past few weeks. There is an inability to tolerate agnostics or atheists. There will be no living alongside, no mutual respect, no acceptance that one believes this and another believes that, and that the two can live alongside each other without this being a cause for conflict and resentment.

And the fact I'm writing and re writing this to try and avoid being deleted or crossing the line of how I'm allowed to speak, shows the severity and the extent of this intolerance to dissent to the One Faith.

Yep, definitely functions as a religion.

I'm inclined to look at things from a psychological perspective, and genderism functions exactly as other faiths do. Both on a personal and a societal level. (In fairness feminism frequently operates in this way too; all ideologies do.).

Trans = god's chosen. T*rf = the devil incarnate. That's how the world looks to the genderist mind.

Reading with interest cos I could write a bloody dissertation on this!

Could be, Floral.

I've started to think the differences between male and female is such a fundamental crux to our existence that that is why this particular topic is so fascinating/reactive/touchy/febrile/excitatory.

Our species reproduces via sexual dimorphism. 'Gender' ideology is apparently trying to get round or past or beyond this very basic fact. I suppose it's akin to flat earthers, or gravity denial or something. It's such an incontrovertible fact that some people can't resist trying to argue it. I also see traces of a sort of group ODD (oppositional defiance disorder) in this - a collective denial of basic reality. The more wildly removed from reality the beliefs that are required, the stronger one identifies with the movement and so tribalism is reinforced, bonded and validated.

Underneath that, of course, is some enormous cognitive dissonance, perhaps why the extreme statements about punching/killing women who disagree - defensive, hysterical fear of the truth.

But this is maybe not relevant to your point, OP.

Yes I've been pondering this for a while - but what's really worrying is that it's not just a religion or a cult, but one that's trying to take over state law. Usually, at least in free democratic societies, non-believers and people of different religions can co-exist, and respect each other while not sharing each other's beliefs. So I can be an atheist who has two christian friends and a muslim friend, and that doesn't upset anyone. Even if someone is a member of a cult and gets cut off from outsiders, they don't usually think everyone else has to believe the same as them. And you don't generally try to have rational arguments with people about religion, because it's accepted that it's not about evidence and so rational argument isn't really relevant.

Trans ideology is like a cult religion that thinks it should be believed by everyone and also get to decide the law. On the basis of beliefs that are not based on evidence or material reality, and are not provable.

I strongly believe that the reason it has been able to affect laws and policies, is because of the way the status of "trans", which used to mean transexual, has been attached to the fight for LBG rights, which are a totally different thing. Everyone modern, sensible and fair-minded these days generally agrees that you shouldn't be persecuted for being LGB, and it's enshrined in law totally reasonable. Being non-straight is just a preference and lifestyle, not a belief involving souls and demanding the reduction of others' rights.

But the extreme trans agenda has used that affiliation - which was always IMO inappropriate and shouldn't have existed - to bully people into thinking that denying a transactivist demand is akin to being a homophobic bully - and the trans lobby pushed that false parallel at every opportunity.

So people who haven't thought it through and/or who want to be inclusive and nice (or just to make sure they appear inclusive and nice) are likely to think it's the same kind of issue. When it's actually a very different thing with a whole range of dangerous implications.

I'm hugely interested in religious apologetics and see the parallels between that and gender apologetics as being so strikingly obvious that it blows my mind how others can't see it. The way TRA accuse people of hating transpeople and denying their existence because they want to reinforce "cis privaledge" (huge laugh), really reminds me of Christians accusing atheists of hating/being mad at God because they want to keep sinning. There's a phrase that prominent Atheist speaker Matt Dilahunty often uses which is "theists, we don't hate you, we just think you're wrong" and this basically sums up the GC position if you swap theist for TRAs.

The insistence of saying "gender" instead of "sex" to deny the reality of human sexual dimorphism also sounds the same to me as religious apologists who insist on saying "kinds" instead of "species" in order to deny evolution.

There are soooo many more, but I'll come back with them later when I have more time.

Arabella, I think the charismatic leader aspect is diffused via youtube/tumblr social conditioning influencing myself.

I've been deleted before for using the c word as a comparator, but I do think it's an interesting parallel. The things that make a thing c like are actually quite common within groups and therefore movements - fundamentally a tendency to 'other' anyone outside of the group, which of course we see in extreme form in the way 'heretics' and 'non believers' are cast out, vilified and threatened with annihilation. Apostates, in the form of detransitioners, are also often targets for extreme anger.

Usually there are charismatic leaders, however, and I can't really see any ...

One issue about the comparison between gender-believers and religion regards respect owed or denied.

We owe respect to all people, even those whose beliefs differ from ours. But we are not under the same obligation to respect those different beliefs. However, some religious people try often successfully to conflate the two in the public conscience. A similar move is common with gender-believers; usually this is what underlies 'no debate'.

For instance, The Charlie Hebdo cartoons affair was spun as showing lack of respect for Muslims (wrong), as opposed to what it actually was a lack of respect for Islamic beliefs (perfectly fine).

Likewise, long ago with Monty Python and Christianity. We can show respect for Christians whilst mocking their beliefs.

We can respect those who hold the (foolish, contradictory) belief that a man can become a woman, just as we can respect those who hold the (foolish, contradictory) belief that a human can live after death. It does not follow we should respect either belief: a man obviously cannot be a woman; a dead person obviously cannot be alive.

Can you be a religious believer and gender critical? Of course. But if you are, please do not demand respect for your religious beliefs. Doing so plays into the hands of the no-debaters.

I have been becoming more and more aware that the small but vocal TRA groups increasing resembe a Trojan horse as they infiltrate area after area. They may well be unaware of how they are being used, of course - it's highly likely - but it will be the patriarchy in some form that steps out of the shadows to reap the benefits.

I'm quite deliberately not posting in FWR much these days, but this is definitely my area, and I've posted a lot about over the past couple of years. This is a thread from earlier this year that might be helpful.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3881259-To-be-valid?pg=1

Arthur Miller's play 'The Crucible' has dropped into my head lots of times, regarding this ideology, so I'm really interested in this thread. The fact that it was an imperative to get this stuff in law but under the radar, says there are two strands. The one which is political and associated with critical race theory, enabling the other which is emotional and aligned to religion. With both strands it becomes difficult to know how this will be tackled.

In terms of the law, we now have some sunlight, so we are very watchful and our media and politicians are looking more carefully (because in its pure forms CRT is destructive). The emotional quasi religious strand might become more and more bizarre and eventually burn itself out.

If these two things happen, we will see some sense immerge but how this will affect women's rights is another matter. Will we become stronger?

Cults usually make a lot of money for someone ditto a lot of religions. Follow the money often works. However we have also seen mainstream religions infiltrated and hijacked by those with political agendas sometimes of an extremist terrorist nature. I’m wondering if the whole TRa is a movement designed to attack women’s rights and possibly even gay peoples rights ( transition being more acceptable in some communities than being gay) using the Trojan horse of a supposed liberal cause. The no debate smacks of political religious oppressive regimes and religion being adopted for terrorist purposes. The TRaliban