Lady Brain Science

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Hello. I have searched but cannot find an article I recall which thoroughly debunked some of the brain science research. Would be most helpful if anyone can locate it for me.

I came out as GenderFree on Facebook and a friend has linked about 10 articles and I'd like to give her a comprehensive rebuttal.

Thanks in advance

I wouldn’t bother attempting to rebut the science as they are clearly not trying to start a good faith discussion with an aim of arriving at the facts, they’re trying to get you to shut up.

Also they come across as pompous and arrogant af. I had friends like this. ‘Had’.

Thanks for that pdf OldCrone.

Since I gave her my evaluation (quite detailed) she has gone quiet.
So all who have helped me here, thanks. I think her condescension is annoying but I'm not taking it personally. She is a friend of my son's who I helped and supported a great deal when she was a teen and young mother. She looked up to me and I think it might be the first time she's had to face the propaganda and mis-information that is commonly swallowed without the deeper grounding in feminism.

The other young adult (male) who has been piping in has come at me from different angles. Primarily going on about how misgendering and improper use of pronouns is so harmful. I just calmly say I don't mind using the pronouns. So now, he says the biology isn't important. (good). And he dismissed my comment about girls in sports with something like "the sports thing isn't an issue for most transpeople" Like of course it's all about them and what concerns them. He's 25ish, antifa, actually a darling boy, the son of a lesbian friend who is a nurse. These are both smart and I hope my little bit of education has put a crack in their wall. Peace

In the end, here is my new strategy:

medium.com/@JonahMix/an-open-letter-to-the-guy-on-twitter-who-wonders-if-biological-sex-is-real-58d2cb4403f5

Discriminating against and oppressing transgender people based on your opinions/ fears/ discomfort is the same as discriminating against people based on the color of their skin and frankly [my name], it's beneath you.

I'd be inclined to pull her up on this and point out that being pro women is not the same as being anti trans. Unless she thinks that a man's right to have their gender identity validated by society is more important than women's safety.

Ask her what rights are trans people denied that are available to the rest of us.

I think it's FPFW that has the data on gender reassignment having no impact on male patterns of offending.

Is she concerned that self ID could be open to abuse which would put women at risk from predatory males?

That Jonah Mix article is excellent.

Grabtharshammar I found your posts incredibly helpful and crystallised something I've been trying to find words for.

One is that the research in this whole area is really small, and one article or even 10 proves nothing either way, its the collective weight of the body of knowledge that matters - and we're not there yet, either from a science or a social science perspective. Yes, lived experience matters but personal stories and journal articles are different types of discussion.

The second is that I was given a book for Christmas called "We are our brains" by Dutch neuroscience researcher Dick Swaab, and there were a few pages on differences between "transexual" brains (quoting his word) and others. It was a small sample size but you can read that and think, ok, there's a basis for further research on those lines. But brain science does not then determine a social response - because actually our brains are not everything, the rest of our bodies matter and so does history and society as it is now. Women aren't raped or put in menstruation huts because of their brains.

Further: Swaab's research is 10-20 years old, and reading it I became clear that even 10 year old science cannot be mapped to our social debate today. He was talking about m2f being 1 in 10,000 of the population and f2m being 1 in 30,000 - which doesn't map onto the huge increases of young girls at the Tavistock for example. The transgender umbrella wasn't an organising concept when that research was carried out, therefore any research about people diagnosed with gender dysphoria 15 years ago cannot be used as an input for policy changes in response to the "transgender umbrella". If there was an MRI scan that could diagnose gender dysphoria, that would be huge. I would be delighted to see more research on the area, and I cannot fathom how the Tavistock can be taking on such a huge volume of young, vulnerable patients when they know that the research base is so thin, and results from older studies not relevant to the huge uptick in young girls presenting at the clinic now.

But also I saved that cartoon because that said it all far more concisely than I have done!

This is really worth reading:

'Collective narcissism and identity politics: No empathy required.'
Posted on April 7, 2019 by leftinnewzealand

leftinnewzealand.wordpress.com/2019/04/07/collective-narcissism-and-identity-politics/

‘Dick Swaab ’ sounds like a test for VD.

I have his book but I can’t remember the material on transsexuals. I’ll have to dig the book out again.

R0wantrees

Jeez, that last picture

When research shows that fully transitioned transwomen go on to commit the same number of crimes as other males do, I think we can conclude that their brains stay the same.

I'll see if I can get some with my .ac email address.
How shall I get them to you?

there were a few pages on differences between "transexual" brains (quoting his word) and others.

But if there is a difference between transsexual brains and others, it just proves the point that there is no such thing as a 'male' or 'female' brain. If it is true that some men have a brain which is more like a typical female brain (and vice versa), it just proves that both male and female traits can exist in men and women. Not that those men actually are women.

Always coming home haha yes it does sound like that!

I wouldn't want to promote Dick Swaab as some great thinker here - I was just using his work as an example of how any one piece of research can't be treated as revealed truth. There was lots I found problematic in his book - e.g. in those few pages on "transsexual" (his word) brains, he admits he only got to study one FtM brain because they are so rare to find - for a scientist to generalise from n=1 is quite something! And he is an adherent of lady brainz in general, which I gather has been well debunked in the other books mentioned here which I haven't read. My mum started reading it when she was staying here and said "this sounds like bollocks" as she put it down, and said it was a man seeking scientific backing for patriarchal views. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt but even so the best I can say about Swaab is that he makes sweeping statements which might be moderately interesting to see if better quality research lets those claims stand up.