Financial Times interview with Judith Butler

82 replies

RoyalCorgi · 09/03/2024 14:15

The FT has carried a really rubbish interview with Judith Butler. The interview refers to her as "they" throughout and doesn't challenge her on any of her most ludicrous statements.

Take her statement that it's fine to put trans women into women's prisons because they [trans women] are "not uniquely risky" and that "male prison guards are a risk, so are other female inmates." Obviously absurd, but anyway. She then goes on to say (as summarised by the interviewer): "And if trans women are placed in male prisons, they 'will be raped and they will be hurt.'"

So having just spent most of the interview saying that biological differences between the sexes aren't important, and that female inmates can be as much of a risk to other female inmates as male inmates, she then claims that trans women would be raped in male prisons! She completely undermines her entire argument.

Why didn't the interviewer challenge that particularly glaring failure of logic? I'm enraged at the stupidity.

Unfortunately, comments are now closed otherwise I'd have said as much.

https://www.ft.com/content/cfe35ca1-9dbd-4a83-a3a9-372967ab5fac

Gender theorist Judith Butler: ‘What are they frightened of exactly?’

The philosopher on what defines a woman, the scapegoating of trans people — and why it’s OK to stumble over pronouns

https://www.ft.com/content/cfe35ca1-9dbd-4a83-a3a9-372967ab5fac

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Merrymouse · 09/03/2024 15:32

I thought it was a really good interview.

He just lets her talk.

No more is necessary.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 09/03/2024 15:30

In the UK, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak taunts the opposition Labour party by claiming that it doesn’t know what a woman is. “He’s imagining that they look ridiculous . . . In fact, the history of feminism dating back to the 19th century always posed the question: what is a woman, and why do we assume that women should be defined just by their reproductive capacities?”
What is a woman? “I don’t answer that question, but I point out that that question is looking for a kind of certainty, and in that way it’s trying to stop history, or it fails to recognise the category of women has gone through many changes and hopefully will go through some more.”
How exactly has the category of women changed? Butler refers to the emergence of muscular female tennis players starting with Martina Navratilova. “There was a time when, if you were a woman playing tennis, you didn’t look like that.”

I can’t quite work out if Butler has shifted the goalposts of the question.

I can help you out there, FT journalist. Butler did indeed shift the goalposts. Most spectacularly in the last para there. Navratilova is indeed muscular. She's also undoubtedly a biological woman. Given Navratilova's stance in the gender wars, that's an odd example to use.

IHaveNeverLivedintheCastle · 09/03/2024 15:29

Ereshkigalangcleg · 09/03/2024 15:06

Are there any articles with Judith that aren't rubbish?

No. The only thing to admire about Butler is how she has managed to get away with it for long. And be paid for it.

pronounsbundlebundle · 09/03/2024 15:22

Why on earth the FT, or any legitimate journalist, would interview Butler is beyond me.

She can't construct even a vaguely logical argument as OP notes. E minus, do better FT.

Fenlandia · 09/03/2024 15:10

The comments and top likes, if you can see them, are worth a look. Most people very much on the side of reality, more than I had expected given the previous lack of coverage in the FT and the business-focussed angle of much of its other content.

Ereshkigalangcleg · 09/03/2024 15:06

Are there any articles with Judith that aren't rubbish?

lonelywater · 09/03/2024 14:46

surely Butler has for years been filed under "flat earth nutter". I would no more pay attention to whatever she said than some random street loony. Why she still has a job remains a profound mystery.

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