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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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463 replies

AnotherDayAnotherView · 02/06/2023 10:39

https://twitter.com/stevenmarkryan/status/1664437068838363141

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https://twitter.com/stevenmarkryan/status/1664437068838363141

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Sadless · 05/06/2023 18:07

Why can't even women say what a women is?
Is it not to offend or are people really stupid?

Sal

FlirtsWithRhinos · 05/06/2023 17:48

@DemiColon

This idea that conservatives and especially religious conservatives think gendered social roles are somehow separately set down from embodied causes and are really arbitrary is really mistaken

Does anyone think that though - I mean, does anyone actually think that "conservatives and especially religious conservatives think gendered social roles are somehow separately set down from embodied causes"?

I'd say rather:

C&RC people believe gendered social roles are simply the natural expression of the innate embodied differences of sex

GC people think C&RC people are mistaking gendered social roles as natural when they are in fact entirely socially constructed

From the GC POV, both Genderists and C&RC are wrong in taking gendered social roles as innate

From the C&RC POV, both genderists and GC/Feminists are wrong in believing gendered social roles exist arbitrarily outside embodied sex (ie your dualism)

But just because C&RC think gendered social roles are the natural expression of embodied differences innate to sex, that doesn't mean they think it's impossible to be gender non-confirming. They do recognise, as MW does, that not everyone of a sex will embody those differences to the same result. However, where TRAs see these people as proof of innate gender outside sex (and GCs as proof that gender is all made up), C&RC see these people as within their sex, but acting against their own nature. (Which as an aside is often blamed on their being mislead by the malign influence of the Not-C&RC).

I do agree with you that the mass position is probably closer to "there are innate character differences due to sex" than the GC view though.

maltravers · 05/06/2023 17:38

And it goes hand in hand with this approach of only “the oppressed” having a legitimate voice. I want oppressed people to have a voice, but also everyone else too and I don’t want people to aspire to victim status as giving them special validity.

maltravers · 05/06/2023 17:34

I worry that along with destigmatizing mental health issues (a good thing) we have somehow encouraged a situation where mental health frailties like trans/cutting etc are fetishised so as to make you “special”, almost fashionable and worthy of notice.

DemiColon · 05/06/2023 16:48

Theladyinluna · 05/06/2023 13:52

I think if we root out this ideology fewer kids would need mental health services

I think its the other way around. The evidence is clear that the mental health of our children and young people is worsening, and especially so over the past 15 years over a range of domains. Schools surveys I have seen show that children with gender incongruence have by far the worse mental health and health risking behaviours across every domain measured. I think children with mental health issues are latching onto, and being encouraged by perhaps well-meaning but misguided, people online to attribute all their problems to gender identity issues. I think, at least initially, declaring a gender identity is often a symptom rather than a cause of mental ill-health, but can become a contributor to increased mental ill-health as people start to transition, especially if they go down the medical route, as then they continue to have all their original problems, plus those being caused by the medical interventions.

I think you are right about mental health getting worse and worse.

I have come to think that gender ideology though is part of a larger set of ideas that kids are absorbing, that is really negatively impacting their mh.

It's not the only thing by any means, I also would implicate social media and the general lack of freedom children have from a young age now.

But I had the experience a few years ago of one of my daughters, who has always been more naturally emotionally labile, getting all kinds of ideas from her school and particularly classes that touched on mental health questions, and almost it seemed being overwhelmed by them. What were fairly normal feelings for a teenage girl, were very much pathologized, and a lot of time was spent on different negative behaviours. There was a while where it was a new thing every few weeks - some came from tictok (tics) while others came from the school (cutting and food restrictions.)

All with this demand for therapy, and a "diagnosis" which apparently would solve all her problems.

I ended up taking her out of school for half a year, and it made a significant difference to her health.

These mh issues aren't arising from nowhere, they are being caused by something our society is doing. I think we have inadvertently done away with some practices and beliefs that protected people against this kind of problem.

PaleBlueMoonlight · 05/06/2023 16:46

DemiColon · 05/06/2023 12:04

I am not so sure that argument is really clear. After all, it's not the political right where you see parents and individuals falling prey to this in large numbers.

I also think that GC feminists really over-estimate the extent to which people have a hard belief in gender being something that could or should be abolished,while at the same time tending to over-state how rigid people, especially conservatives, think that gender roles should be or are.

I think the vast majority of people believe what GC feminists seem to think is a conservative position: that on average, there are some temperamental and behavioral differences between male and female humans (just like most other mammals,) which are biologically based, but also that there is quite a lot of overlap.

That differences like reproductive role and physical differences also tend to lead somewhat to different ways of behaving and thinking, because we are embodied beings.

And that taken together, these temperamental differences, and the consequences of things like pregnancy and motherhood, do lead to an overall somewhat different set of social processes that are common around the life of men and women. That doesn't mean there aren't lots of variation, or that people are compelled to do anything in particular, or that anyone should be barred from any particular career choices or whatever. It just means that there won't ever be a society that isn't in some way shaped by the differences that come out of reproductive role, and that is ok, and can even be in some ways supportive.

Matt Walsh might be somewhat on the harder end of this spectrum, though I don't think spectacularly so, and in many ways I suspect his view is closer to that of the vast majority of moderate people than the GC view is.

These people, and I would include Matt Walsh because he is really taking what is a perspective that comes out of the Catholic view of the body-soul unity, don't see that these differences mean you can "be born in the wrong body." Because that's backwards - the differences, although they become culturally reflected in various ways, are essentially the differences that tend to emerge from the kinds of bodies people actually have. It's not some kind of Platonic abstraction. A woman who likes car mechanics or Rush is not a man just because some of her interests are more typically shared by men, or even a woman who really hates being around children. It's about having a female body, which may mean she is less likely to be a big Rush fan, but would certainly mean she is necessarily subject to different material realities than a man particularly around her reproductive role and all the things that touch on that. And that's significant, and for many many women will shape their lives and decisions differently than if they were male.

This idea that conservatives and especially religious conservatives think gendered social roles are somehow separately set down from embodied causes and are really arbitrary is really mistaken. That kind of dualism is from a quite different source, I think, and not one particularly exclusive to the political right or conservative thinking - it seems to belong at least as naturally to the left, and the idea that the sexes can completely transcend embodies differences is a significant example of it. It's part of why people like Walsh tend to see feminism as having led people down a garden path.

This is really well explained and accords with how I see it. Thank you

KalimbaMoon · 05/06/2023 16:28

He’s getting an online kicking from the Twitterati… more negative comments than supportive ones.

NutellaEllaElla · 05/06/2023 16:17

I seem to recall he used to be blindly TWAW

IcakethereforeIam · 05/06/2023 15:57

Omid Djalili tweeted a link to the film. It's still not clear what side of the dispute he's on though. He's desperately clinging to the fence, but he's sticking up for the film and MW in part.

https://twitter.com/omid9/status/1665237814764613633?s=20

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IcakethereforeIam · 05/06/2023 14:26

*scolders

IcakethereforeIam · 05/06/2023 14:25

It's not like the audience for MW's have been led to it by this little corner of the internet or even by the wider GC feminist movement. It's much more likely that people are looking for something to explain or even push back against gender ideology as they see it and as it affects them.

Much as I'd like to think that the solders were truly concerned for our purity and the health of the GC movement Hmm, they're here to virtue signal, get screenshot and put off casual readers. MW will still keep MWing if we all disappeared tomorrow up our own virtue spiral.

All the anti abortion, homophobic, transphobic or, even, fascists that glom onto the pushback are doing so for their own reasons. Because they see the wrong in GI, because they see an angle for their own causes, or both. It's tras that are raising his profile. He wouldn't even have made the film if it wasn't for them. And Doc Stock would still be a relatively unknown (albeit awesome) Professor in a sleepy English University.

Theladyinluna · 05/06/2023 13:52

I think if we root out this ideology fewer kids would need mental health services

I think its the other way around. The evidence is clear that the mental health of our children and young people is worsening, and especially so over the past 15 years over a range of domains. Schools surveys I have seen show that children with gender incongruence have by far the worse mental health and health risking behaviours across every domain measured. I think children with mental health issues are latching onto, and being encouraged by perhaps well-meaning but misguided, people online to attribute all their problems to gender identity issues. I think, at least initially, declaring a gender identity is often a symptom rather than a cause of mental ill-health, but can become a contributor to increased mental ill-health as people start to transition, especially if they go down the medical route, as then they continue to have all their original problems, plus those being caused by the medical interventions.

ScrollingLeaves · 05/06/2023 13:47

Clymene · Today 13:05
Thank you for the correction about the writer’s name in The Critic review of the film. My apologies to Victoria Smith for my slapdash misreading of your post.

I agree that overall she is right about him oversimplifying how boys and girls are different not only physically but socially.
Nevertheles, his remark that it’s fine for a four year old boy to play with a doll’s house may mean there is at least a small chink on his approach.

Also, I agree with Maltravers that his film is more likely to attract the understanding and sympathy of people who do not know much of what has been happening under the radar with gender ideology, and who might get muddled and bored by the ‘there is no such thing as gender it’s all stereotypes’ sort of argument - which on first sight seems to be exactly what Transactivists are saying too anyway
(especially because of the sex/gender word confusion).

Thinking back to some of those interviews in the film, it’s odd to see how even though Transactivists are saying biology doesn’t count for anything, it is only what’s in the mind that is significant, they then also want ‘trans affirming’ surgery and hormones in order to mimic biology (which they say does not matter).

Theladyinluna · 05/06/2023 13:39

NotTerfNorCis · 05/06/2023 08:04

The fundamental problem here is that:

The right-wing have found genderism a useful tool to attack the left, because it's so obviously ridiculous.

Left-wing 'woke-bros' have found right-wing criticism of genderism a useful tool to attack feminism, because they can accuse feminists of allying with the right.

It's a tricky situation for feminists.

Well summarised.

Theladyinluna · 05/06/2023 13:35

TraumatisedGooner · 05/06/2023 07:05

I certainly can’t speak for all people that are pro trans rights but… I believe gender is a social construct. I don’t think that’s an unusual point of view either.

You certainly can't as I suspect most on this thread are pro-trans rights. We just don't think women's rights were privileges to be removed when they inconvenience another group. Men who identify as women have rights as trans people. They don't have rights as women.

maltravers · 05/06/2023 13:07

We don’t want purity spirals, we want to win the argument. If TRAs are saying “GC feminists shouldn’t be on the same side as Matt Walsh” it’s because it suits them to divide and rule. TRAs are not trying to safeguard the purity of our reputations, are they? So if in your view MW is mansplaining (rather than covering and amplifying a story we want covered and amplified) - i don’t care if he reaches men’s ears more easily than GC women.

Clymene · 05/06/2023 13:05

@ScrollingLeaves - ha, we cross posted. I checked - the dr Phil thing was filmed before she wrote the review (the article is by Victoria Smith incidentally, I just wanted to credit Serena for posting it). So I guess her assumption is wrong although I think it's a pretty fair one considering how the film ended.

ScrollingLeaves · 05/06/2023 12:45

Clymene thanks for The Critic review of the film. It cleverly puts the questionable aspects very clearly and well.

But as it happens, her own implication at the end of her article, that her own three sons having played with a doll’s house would be a problem for Matt Ealsh, seems not to be true.

As I wrote above, on a Phil show about pronouns, MW said about a four year old boy saying he was a girl, that on further questioning you’d find he just wanted to play with the doll’s house. He added, “Fine. Let him play, but he’s still a boy.”

(Unless the Phil Show came after this Serena Partrick Critic piece last year, MW read it and saw the error of his ways just in time to quickly adapt for the show!😀)

BernardBlacksMolluscs · 05/06/2023 12:41

ScrollingLeaves · 05/06/2023 12:31

DemiColon, many thanks from me too.

Me 3, useful and thought provoking

OMG12 · 05/06/2023 12:40

MalagaNights · 05/06/2023 11:37

I think feminsts were talking about this long before anyone else and have been the ones responsible for pushing the debate into the open and I'm very grateful for them for that.

They were certainly the ones who raised my awareness years ago.

But now it is in the open they should be pleased men and people across the political divides can see how evil this is and they are taking the message even further than the feminists have been able to.

Instead of carping online that they don't like the people now agreeing with them and they said it first.

Also the message that is taking hold with the public is that this is wrong, harmful and goes against reality. It's not the GC argument that's winning people over.

Most people aren't GC. Most parents think like Matt Walsh does that there are on average differences between their sons and daughters.

So when feminsts are waiting for only complete agreement with their GC beliefs in order to challenge these damaging practices they're going to be waiting for ever whilst children are harmed.

As this is taking traction in public it's becoming clear to me that many feminists are more interested in the purity of agreement with their GC views than with preventing harm to kids.

In that form GC feminism is just another ideology prepared to allow harm to kids to protect their world view.

I think this is an important point. The TRAs have been successful in part with their campaigns with easy soundbites thst sound so plausible.

Most parents do see a difference between the natures of boys and girls. But it just needs reiterating that just because a boy plays with his sisters toys and likes stereotypical girls stuff he is still a boy.

The general public aren’t interested in ideologies surrounding nature v nurture. They just want easy to understand common sense sounding points.

Arguing over ideological points will turn most people off.

ScrollingLeaves · 05/06/2023 12:31

DemiColon, many thanks from me too.

Merrymouse · 05/06/2023 12:26

Demicolon thank you for taking the time to write a long and thoughtful reply.

I don’t think the American right wing can be easily mapped on to any part of U.K. politics, because we don’t have the same starting points on attitudes to religion, healthcare or individual vs state.

Having said that the American left also seem to start from a standpoint that is alien to me.

We are very much two countries separated by a common language, and I wish their politics would stay more separate.

Clymene · 05/06/2023 12:15

Serena Partrick on Twitter reposted this great piece from Victoria Smith from when the film was first released last year. It's bang on the money

thecritic.co.uk/mansplaining-womanhood/

GailBlancheViola · 05/06/2023 12:14

And now they've got me wondering, how many men prioritise "stand up to pee" over "have sex"? A survey just waiting to be done!

Vague recollections of some medical research being sone that said it was better for men to sit down and pee, something to do with emptying the bladder better?

I reckon your survey would be 100% for one option....

ScrollingLeaves · 05/06/2023 12:11

Merrymouse · Today 09:50
You think all UK tax payers are individually doing more to combat gender ideology than Matt Walsh?

Obviously some people in the UK really agree with gender ideology, and we all have to pay taxes which fund health care, but then Walsh isn’t exactly against the idea of pink and blue brains, so that is a difficult question to answer.

Re: but then Walsh isn’t exactly against the idea of pink and blue brains, so that is a difficult question to answer.

He did let Jordan Peterson say vehemently, passionately - almost shouting - (me trying to remember so may not be word perfect):

“You get feminine boys and masculine girls. What are you going to do? Cut them up?”

So I do not think MW believes a feminine boy is not a boy, or that he is trans; or that a masculine girl is not a girl, has a blue brain, and should be transed.

He could so easily have cut that scene with JP saying what he did in the ‘What is a Woman?’ film, but he chose to let it stand in a prominent way. As I remember it closed the shot.

Also in this clip at 13:59 of Matt Walsh talking about pronouns on the Phil show he explains that if your 4 year old boy says he is a girl, what he really means is that he wants to play with a doll’s house. M W clearly and emphatically, says,

“That’s fine. Let him play with the doll’s house. But he’s still a boy.”