Judith Butler has spoken

[lionheart]

Damn.

www.newstatesman.com/international/2020/09/judith-butler-culture-wars-jk-rowling-and-living-anti-intellectual-times

'If we look closely at the example that you characterise as “mainstream” we can see that a domain of fantasy is at work, one which reflects more about the feminist who has such a fear than any actually existing situation in trans life. The feminist who holds such a view presumes that the penis does define the person, and that anyone with a penis would identify as a woman for the purposes of entering such changing rooms and posing a threat to the women inside. It assumes that the penis is the threat, or that any person who has a penis who identifies as a woman is engaging in a base, deceitful, and harmful form of disguise. This is a rich fantasy, and one that comes from powerful fears, but it does not describe a social reality. Trans women are often discriminated against in men’s bathrooms, and their modes of self-identification are ways of describing a lived reality, one that cannot be captured or regulated by the fantasies brought to bear upon them. The fact that such fantasies pass as public argument is itself cause for worry.'

I was surprised by the way they're treating the interviewer too. Surely all political interviewers ask questions from the opposite point of view so that the interviewee can explain their opinions. I didn't get the impression that the interviewer here was particularly sympathetic to the gender critical side. If anything, it was Butler who chose to go on the attack.

It does show the combative mindset at work here.

Yes......fantasies

One thing is certain ? isn't a very good communicator as that sounds like a load of waffle to me.

@sith789

Judith Butler is a superior intellect, her effortless takedown of the likes of JK Rowling is stunning. Love the way she took apart the clueless reporter too.

lol

That is all.

So that’s Judith ‘Worzel Gummidge’ Butler eh?

I realise this is just a fantasy of mine, but imagine if, just once, a transactivist addressed the points women were making, rather than inventing a hyperbolic list of false accusations and dismissing us as bigots, based on things we didn’t say.

And this is one of America’s best minds? Now THAT is scary.

Surely all political interviewers ask questions from the opposite point of view so that the interviewee can explain their opinions.

Where there isn't someone present arguing the oposing side, yes.

It's become very common for far right and far left groups to characterise any interviewer asking remotely challenging questions as the 'enemy' and that by being arsey the interviewee has scored some kind of 'victory'.

There is a very funny one where Ben Shapiro does this to Andrew Neil from the first question. After a couple more questions he rants about the biased left-wing media not giving him chance to speak and walks out in a strop. The problem is that AN is famously right wing but just able to conduct an interview like an actual journalist, so he looked like a twunt.

Joining this thread late...but the poster who summed up Butler as a windbag really sums Butler’s writing up. What a boring, impenetrable load of dross Butler writes. (Or maybe she would prefer me to say womxn). What I’d really like to know Is, who promoted her BS into the shitshow we find ourselves now. Surely she was talked over, ignored, leered at, made to make cups of tea for the menfolk who didn’t know their arse from a kitchen sink back in the day. How is it that her genderwoowoo was pushed to the front and then taken on board by the social media cult. How did her opaque non-sensical words become so powerful when normally people just need a few characters and an emoji to cancel someone.

How is it that her genderwoowoo was pushed to the front and then taken on board by the social media cult. How did her opaque non-sensical words become so powerful when normally people just need a few characters and an emoji to cancel someone.

Because men are still the point of it.

@sith789

sorry that wasn't English : I meant to say: Butler was perplexed by the reporter's narrow views

The journalist asked: "What do you have to say about violent or abusive language used online against people like JK Rowling?"

What 'narrow views' are implied by this question?

Surely all political interviewers ask questions from the opposite point of view so that the interviewee can explain their opinions.

Yup. It strikes me that a lot of TRAs don't usually read political interviews (or indeed anything very much) so they have completely misinterpreted what was going on in the interview. Of course, they have a history of reacting to any perfectly straightforward question as if it's an act of aggression, so for them an ordinary, journalistic interview probably feels like being attacked by a machine gun.

My feeling about Butler after reading the interview was that she was completely out of touch (Terf isn't a slur?) and unable to understand basic logic.

it does not describe a social reality

This bit just made me more sure than ever that Judith Butler isn't very intelligent, if she's arguing that only she gets to say what a social reality is. Which I think is exactly what she's arguing here. It's not a sustainable intellectual position, a bit 'low 2:2' for effort maybe but inside you want to fail it for being shit.

😂

"Your superior intellect is let down somewhat by the use of "the likes of" says Escapeplanning. It might be informal but it's correct. First you include an uncalled for ad hominem and then you point out an imagined fault. As a person of colour I find this offensive

Separately, it is funny how these sections laud Emma Hilton, who at best, is a very junior scholar, her expertise being in a certain kind of frog and bladders (human) and who is pretty much viewed as a crank at the University of Manchester, but cannot see Judith Butler's worth. Her work can be dense but a lot of theoretical scholarship is like that. In any case, you cannot fault the clarity of her prose in that interview even if you disagree with its content

Many of the most intelligent people I know can get entangled in an argument and fail to get to the gist of it.

Many of the insecure people I know rely on difficult words and jargon to avoid being questioned and called out for inaccuracies.

I'm not entirely sure that you're posting in good faith Sith but even so I'm trying to understand your meaning. What are you trying to say?

Judith = intelligent?

Us = dim

Douglas Murray on Judith Butler.

The one thing that all the purveyors of the ideologies of social justice and intersectionality have in common is that their work is unreadable. Their writing has the deliberately obstructive style ordinarily employed when someone either has nothing to say or needs to conceal the fact that what they are saying is not true. Prose this bad can only occur when the author is trying to hide something

Separately, it is funny how these sections laud Emma Hilton, who at best, is a very junior scholar, her expertise being in a certain kind of frog and bladders (human) and who is pretty much viewed as a crank at the University of Manchester, but cannot see Judith Butler's worth.

It's almost as if the way to understand sex is to study biology rather than writing endless pages of postmodern word salad.

I keep hearing "trans women are discriminated against in men's facilities" but have never actually seen an example of this. There have been many cases of trans women going into women's facilities and being chased out by women defending their space, or they're attacked by men assuming they're there to perv on the women and girls and wait outside to catch them afterwards, but I've never seen any case of a trans woman being harassed or attacked in the men's. And there's been plenty of posts from trans women like Fionne Orlander and crossdressers like Hope Lye saying they've never had any trouble in the men's.

I can well imagine that’s there’s been a concerted effort to paint Dr Hilton as a crank. Doesn’t make it true, though.

@NotDavidTennant

Separately, it is funny how these sections laud Emma Hilton, who at best, is a very junior scholar, her expertise being in a certain kind of frog and bladders (human) and who is pretty much viewed as a crank at the University of Manchester, but cannot see Judith Butler's worth.

It's almost as if the way to understand sex is to study biology rather than writing endless pages of postmodern word salad.

Not to mention, there's an uncalled-for ad hominem if ever I saw one.

Is judith butler a #nodebate person?

of course sometimes when it is nearly impossible to tell what is being said, almost anything can be said and exceptionally dishonest arguments can be smuggled in under the guise of complexity. This is one of the reasons Butler and others write so badly. If they wrote clearly, they would attract more outrage and ridicule.

Bovary Douglas Murray expresses my experience so much more eloquently than I did. Thank you!

Yo Old Crone:
"The journalist asked: "What do you have to say about violent or abusive language used online against people like JK Rowling?"
What 'narrow views' are implied by this question?"

As Butler's reply shows, reporter only appears to care about abuse hurled at Rowling to the exclusion other far more vulnerable actors ie transgender people themselves.

*about insecurity and word salad that is