Quick question about ethnic identity and gender

There have also been a few other cases I have read about where a white man identifies as both a woman and another race; news reports usually accept the identifying-as-a-woman bit as absolutely fine but the trans-racial/trans-abled bit as weird and unacceptable, whereas to me they are clearly part of the same psychological phenomenon.

I hope this makes at least some sense. It is very confusing to have two very different schools of thought running along side each other like this.

Even more confusing when they often seem to be regarded as the same by the commentariat - so right wing people view both as ‘identitarianism’ - demanding special treatment on the basis of identity, and some left wing people don’t seem to have a problem with CRT (which I think is often used as a general term for any race based class analysis) but also support queer theory which rejects a similar analysis of sex.

@Ellabella222
I’m going to give this a go. Wish me luck 🥴
Broadly speaking, the main difference between the current conceptions of gender and race is that they are underpinned by different ideologies-race by Critical Race Theory and gender by Queer Theory- and these two ideologies have very different understandings of what is meant by “identity” and, specifically, who belongs in their core group.
Critical Race Theory is a, very American, school of thinking that seeks to challenge ideas in society that are overtly and covertly racist. One of the main ideas of CRT is that “blackness” is something that is put upon someone by society and has to be reclaimed as a positive identity; it isn’t really something you can just choose to identify with. One of the reasons that “blackfishing” is so upsetting to many people is that it “cherry picks” the socially rewarding parts of what has historically been, and to a certain extent still is, a negative identity which “blackfishers” can then choose to drop if anything bad happens. Transracialists are seen as doing this. Another key issue is that if you seek to make the world a better place for a specific group of people then you have to know who does and does not belong to that group of people: some gatekeeping has to happen. Adding “ambiguous”/not so ambiguous people to the mix makes the edges fuzzy and so undermines the entire aim of CRT; it stops help getting to those who need it, especially when racists have no trouble at all distinguishing between skin colours.
Queer Theory is very different. Queer Theory originated out of post-WW2 deconstructionist thinking and puts the idea forward, very broadly, that the “status quo” and any behaviours/traditions associated with it are preventing social progress and so need to be undermined; this is known as “queering the discourse”. Unlike CRT in which “fuzzy edges” are a problem, in QT “unique” identities are encouraged-the further you are from the status quo and the more chaos this causes the better. An identity is something you choose/is a key part of who you are and how you see yourself and any “rules” that get in the way just need to be “queered”. This is why being transgender (or trans-age, trans-species etc) is not only fine, but a good thing, within modern gender discourse. It’s important to understand that in postmodern theory, the extent to which a person’s inner identity matches with the “real world” is largely irrelevant. Many postmodern thinkers argue that a person’s “inner world” is the closest that it is possible to get to any actual Truth-if your identity doesn’t line up with the world then your identity is more correct. Categories like “race” or “sex” don’t actually mean anything outside of a person’s inner identity.
I hope this makes at least some sense. It is very confusing to have two very different schools of thought running along side each other like this.

It makes no sense that one can change sex, or gender, whilst one is unable to change race. It also make no sense that one is able to legally change sex regardless, it is no more possible from a scientific perspective (for humans) than being able to change species.

And yet apparently the government can determine your nationality but is unable to work out which sex you might be...

Amnesty also say women who don't agree that transwomen are women, and don't want their daughter getting changed alongside men who say they are women, should have their right to vote removed and media should silence them. Amnesty campaigns for women who belief in biology to be completely disenfranchised.

They also have a pimp on the board.

Amnesty also legitimise prostitution as "sex work" and believe there is a marked distinction between what they seem to see as 'the vast majority' of prostitutes who apparently freely consent to selling their bodies as a commercial business enterprise and all those other nasty kinds of prostitution that are nothing to do with that whatsoever.

IIRC Amnesty also argued that female prostitution is actually necessary for equality, because it facilitates disabled men's access to sex, which is apparently a human right that Amnesty was seeking to protect by ensuring provision of women's bodies for men to use as 'necessary'.

It doesn't surprise me at all that Amnesty have forgotten to ask women how they experience gender before publishing their gender identity pamphlet - they seem to centre men in everything they do.

I 'll leave it to you to think about why those rich, powerful people are willing to put so much effort and money into changing the socially-agreed boundary of the grouping of men and women to the point where it effectively has no meaning.

And why they're not so interested in the boundaries for race.

It makes no sense that one can change sex, or gender, whilst one is unable to change race. It also make no sense that one is able to legally change sex regardless, it is no more possible from a scientific perspective (for humans) than being able to change species.

Could it possibly be an extension of blackface v drag? I’ve heard quite a few people on here say that the two are not comparable because of their very different origins. Is it possible that the trans race and trans sex argument are merely borrowed from the acceptability of their dress up cousins?

Amnesty also say women who don't agree that transwomen are women, and don't want their daughter getting changed alongside men who say they are women, should have their right to vote removed and media should silence them. Amnesty campaigns for women who belief in biology to be completely disenfranchised.

They also have a pimp on the board.

I am sure coco will be along any minute to address these points lovelyrice.

Maybe it will go along the lines of …

hateful women don’t deserve political representation or to be able to voice their hateful (yet scientifically proven and accepted) views…. feminists are the nurturers of the world and should never be unkind enough to point out reality where it is not wanted.

And

a pimp… sex work is work. And whether it is coercive doesn’t matter, look at OxFam out there doing such good works….

I've never seen a satisfactory explanation from proponents of gender ID but not race ID. They are always attempts to rationalise a decision that's already been made.

I actually think race identification is going to become more acceptable, and you already see lots of people insisting on "self ID" for it, and disabilities.

But the practical effect of that is it becomes a power test - if you're powerful enough, people will be criticised for calling you out. If you become weak, then people more powerful than you will be able to do so. Weird sort of mob justice.

James Lindsay attempted a detailed explanation here, but it's one of his longer and more rambly podcasts.

Why You Can Be Transgender But Not Transracial

One of the more peculiar features of the Theory of Critical Social Justice for many people is why it is acceptable under Theory to be trangender but absolutely forbidden to be transracial. The short answer to this question, which is sometimes given (usually after someone steps on the landmine of thinking they can pull off a transracial argument or identity), is that Critical Race Theory and Queer Theory approach the issue of identity differently. This is correct on a superficial level but facile to the way that the overarching Critical Social Justice ideology thinks about power and its interaction with identity. Understood more deeply, both Theories are doing the same thing in different ways. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, James Lindsay goes through all of this heavy Theoretical detail to explain why it is, from within Theory, that you can be transgender but not transracial. He then shifts to explain how and why these Theories likely developed the way that they did by investigating the proximate incentive structures that motivated their developments.

They are different because sex is binary and race is not

That's a good thing to point out - although not in the way the poster intended. There is much less difference between different races than between males and females. Also, people are often a mix of races whereas sex is binary. This make it much more logical to recognise identifying as a different race as valid than identifying as a different sex.

But where a society chooses to give resources (scholarships, sports opportunities, separate spaces) to a particular group for whatever reason (eg offsetting inequality due to discrimination, or else safety) then it's as a society that the boundary of that group is defined.

For the grouping of sex, there are a lot of very powerful, rich people who want to identify into the group of women and have created powerful lobby groups to try to make that social change.

That hasn't happened for race. That's the only difference.

[quote cocomump]Don't worry about the typos. If you're genuinely curious and interested to learn, the Amnesty International site has a good introductory article that can explain the basics:
www.amnesty.org.uk/LGBTQ-equality/gender-identity-beginners-guide-trans-allies[/quote]
Amnesty also say women who don't agree that transwomen are women, and don't want their daughter getting changed alongside men who say they are women, should have their right to vote removed and media should silence them. Amnesty campaigns for women who belief in biology to be completely disenfranchised.

They also have a pimp on the board.

[quote cocomump]Don't worry about the typos. If you're genuinely curious and interested to learn, the Amnesty International site has a good introductory article that can explain the basics:
www.amnesty.org.uk/LGBTQ-equality/gender-identity-beginners-guide-trans-allies[/quote]
Unfortunately the explanation on the Amnesty site is rather sexist so you will have to explain further.

For instance

"a gender identity and umbrella term for people whose gender differs from, or does not sit comfortably within, the gender they were assigned at birth."

Gender is cultural expectations of how somebody should behave and present, based on their sex, so for women, whether they should be allowed to vote, go to school or wear practical clothes, have short hair or speak up in meetings.

Why would you assume that anyone is assigned a gender identity at birth? Why would you assume that anyone would identify with it? Why would you assume that this is a helpful way to categorise humans?

Thing is, it's not entirely unreasonable to identify as an ethnicity outside your genetic heritage. Ethnicity is entirely a social construct based mostly on skin colour and culture. If you grew up in a culture but don't have the usual skin colour or features, is it really unreasonable to identify with that group?

Whereas sex affects your skeletal structure, muscle mass, height, blood oxygenation, pain tolerance, ability to read non verbal cues, susceptibility to various illnesses, which organs you have, which gametes you produce, whether you can bear children, muscle fibre types and many other things.

Most of the cultural aspects (gender) of sex are false stereotypes. The ones that aren't are usually oppressive and often directly linked to sex differences like strength.

Thus it's always utterly meaningless to 'identify' as another sex except in terms of gender stereotypes.

I think it's utterly fine for Jessy Nelson to dress like she's from another culture, but it's also fine for people to think she's crass and silly. What's not fine is dressing up to mock other cultures. It wasn't fine for Rachel dolzeal to gain advantage by pretending to be black.

Similarly it's fine (often positive) for people to dress in ways which subvert gender stereotypes. Done in a crass way, it's fine for others to think that person a fool. It's not fine to dress up to mock women or to try to gain advantage (e.g. access women's sports or prisons).

2 above may seem incredible. I think (hope) it's rare. It's not unknown, though. Daily Mail link here: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2366260/Body-Integrity-Identity-Disorder-Chloe-Jennings-White-58-disown-legs.html There are others if you want to avoid the Mail. Search for Chloe Jennings-White.

Sometimes it's clearer if you look at it in terms of who has power and who hasn't.

1. White person with olive skin and naturally curly hair decides henceforth to identify as mixed race, and acting on this (but without spelling out that it's an adopted identity) gets a job or political position where being mixed race or Black is either a prerequisite or seen as a very useful background to have. Clearly this individual is appropriating the experiences of a group that has less power and has taken a job/position that was meant to go to a genuine member of said group, who grew up in a racist society and knows first-hand what that has meant to their family/friends/neighbours. (Rachel Dolezal is the best known example here, but there have been others.)

I think we all know what would happen if a white supremacist regime were to gain power in their country. This individual would revert asap to being white. This is not a possibility for those who are genuinely not white.

1. Person who is actually in pretty good health with full use of limbs etc identifies as being disabled and requires others to assist with daily living/push person around in a wheelchair, and so on. Person is insistent that this is not a psychological problem, their body should be affected in the way they pretend it is. This is incredibly insulting to people who actually do have a disability of one kind or another or who live with chronic pain or a chronic health problem. There is no identifying in or out of a genuine physical health problem.

Should said person find themselves in a dangerous situation, e.g. a fire, I'd be very surprised if the assumed identity stopped them jumping out of the wheelchair and running for safety.

1. Men/women. Who has more power in society? We all know the answer to this. We all also know there is no identifying out of one reproductive role and into another one.

There have been some revealing comments on social media over the years from males who claim a trans identity but still dress and present in a conventionally male way at work as to do otherwise would affect their careers. Generally speaking, women can't do this. An employee who becomes pregnant has a strong chance of being overlooked for promotion and so on, even if the employee identifies as a transman.

According to Kathleen Stock's former trade union, their members can identify as black,disabled and a member of the opposite sex.

Imagine there was a white man who had a fetish in presenting as someone of another race. He does this and gets off on it. How acceptable would that be:
in public,
in his workspace, or
in a space that people of that race tend to view as their space?

Do you think that such behaviour would be viewed as so unacceptable he'd have to restrict it to his own home and to dedicated spaces for this activity?

That question is never answered.

People do everything they can to shame anyone asking it though.

Like the live demonstration on this a thread it seems…

It makes it even more ridiculous.

They are different because sex is binary and race is not. There is a long history of mixed race people 'passing' or trying to pass as the race with power (we recognise this as different to the cultural appropriation of various pop stars). See also the dutch journalist who wanted to change his age from 69 to 49 (again, age is not binary and lots of people appear younger or older than their actual age).