Book Review: Shon Faye & Helen Joyce

[MiladyBerserko]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/fb7ea1ac-0585-11ec-9bf4-46b41c0cb5c4?shareToken=092b4ac490d84a875beca16b17049e99

Don't think Shon is going to be happy.

She thinks, for example, that prisons should be abolished. So should the police, because of their “complicity with white supremacy”. She objects to a “binary prison system based on genitalia” and thinks that “the neat binary” of male/female is, in any case, “a western way of thinking about gender variance”. She wants the complete decriminalisation of sex work. She is less enthusiastic about trans people working in the army because she finds it “difficult to accept that service in the military of a western power is inherently honourable”. Oh, and she wants to abolish capitalism. “There can,” she says, “be no trans liberation under capitalism.

Well, this all sounds perfectly sensible.

Has Shon based Shon's book on this well-loved manifesto from Action For Trans Health?

edinburghath.tumblr.com/post/163521055802/trans-health-manifesto

Terry

She thinks, for example, that prisons should be abolished. So should the police, because of their “complicity with white supremacy”. She objects to a “binary prison system based on genitalia” and thinks that “the neat binary” of male/female is, in any case, “a western way of thinking about gender variance”. She wants the complete decriminalisation of sex work. She is less enthusiastic about trans people working in the army because she finds it “difficult to accept that service in the military of a western power is inherently honourable”. Oh, and she wants to abolish capitalism. “There can,” she says, “be no trans liberation under capitalism.

"I want an OOmpa LOOpa! I want you to get me an OOmpa LOOmpah right away!!!!!"

. Other belief systems — religious, philosophical, metaphysical — are held privately. Gender self-identification is a demand that other people believe what you believe.

That's not quite true, though, is it? Some belief systems do demand other people believe what you believe. Some actively proselytise, some will come to your door with leaflets, even.

@ArabellaScott

. Other belief systems — religious, philosophical, metaphysical — are held privately. Gender self-identification is a demand that other people believe what you believe.

That's not quite true, though, is it? Some belief systems do demand other people believe what you believe. Some actively proselytise, some will come to your door with leaflets, even.

Perfectly true. The significant difference being, none of those religions have the legal recourse to force compliance, nor the realistic possibility of getting it.

This is one of the reasons intellectual dwarves like Shon will tell you it's definitely not anything like a metaphysical belief system, because if they can cosplay as a human rights campaign, the legal demands don't look quite such an absurd, authoritarian over-reach. But objectively, Shon is peddling a neo-religion, so the same rules should apply to Genderist beliefs as they do to Catholic, Muslim or JW beliefs. Believe it if you want. But no one else is compelled to do likewise.

Joyce gets to the root of the matter, so is, in a literal sense, radical.

In the other common meaning of the word, revolutionary, we could point to an editoral in The Vote: The Organ of the Women’s Freedom League:

The truth! But it is just the truth that cannot be known of the multitude, for truth is revolutionary.

news.google.com/newspapers?id=b-I6AAAAIBAJ&sjid=6ikMAAAAIBAJ&pg=1109%2C7717440

For completeness sake, I found that via here: quoteinvestigator.com/2013/02/24/truth-revolutionary/

@FloralBunting

I'm going to read it.

I'm intrigued to see if Shon makes the proclamation that the there can be no trans liberation under capitalism, or if they make the actual case for it.

Because it seems to me that Genderism functions on an engine which is pure consumerist capitalism. Have great swathes of people believe there is something they need and don't have, that their bodies or physical reality is wrong in such a way that can only be seen if they either pay to alter themselves or buy special identity items to signal to others who they are. And get all this legally enforced so that everyone is compelled to play along with the scheme?

Surprise me Shon.

I'm actually tempted to, inspired by this review, read Faye's book alongside Joyce's. With some pencils for the margins.

I'm intrigued to see if Shon makes the proclamation that the there can be no trans liberation under capitalism, or if they make the actual case for it.

iirc, Jess Bradley and co make similar claims with the remainder handwaved under luxury communism. Who can forget the photograph of Owen Jones and Bradley on a train, drinking champagne?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3554112-Owen-Jones?msgid=86181213

If this review encourages people to read both books, then I'm all for it. The compare and contrast will be very interesting.

If Shon has managed to come up with a reason to support transgenderism other than be kind, then I'd like to hear it. Because I never have.

From the review it would appear that it's just a stream of anecdotes. Which is exactly what happens on here. A long guilt trip of a post followed by a pissed off flounce because no one buys it.

So if anyone does read it, perhaps you can post on here your conclusion?

What a stroke of genius to read and review both those books together. It's very evident from the article that the writer isn't impressed with Shon Faye's ideological and outlandish vision, compared with Helen Joyce's clear and intelligent arguments that persuade the reader to accept her points.

It's always nice to see people draw their own conclusions when they really read transactivist material and compare it with the 'gender critical' or feminist arguments.

As said by a previous poster, it's similar to the ploppers we get on these boards that drop by with their mad accusations and guilt tripping - no reason or intelligent discussion from their side. And the lurkers can see the difference for themselves.

@FloralBunting

I'm going to read it.

I'm intrigued to see if Shon makes the proclamation that the there can be no trans liberation under capitalism, or if they make the actual case for it.

Because it seems to me that Genderism functions on an engine which is pure consumerist capitalism. Have great swathes of people believe there is something they need and don't have, that their bodies or physical reality is wrong in such a way that can only be seen if they either pay to alter themselves or buy special identity items to signal to others who they are. And get all this legally enforced so that everyone is compelled to play along with the scheme?

Surprise me Shon.

I agree. Shon seems quite uninformed as to what that demand actually means in practice. There's research showing that the more individualistic a society is, the higher the numbers of late-onset transitioners. Because communist societies place the collective good above the individual good, no resources would, for instance, be put into trans needs for what are mostly cosmetic surgeries. You wouldn't even be able to argue for it without repercussion, because that would be deemed too focused on personal gain, too individualistic. Too selfish. (That applies across the board. If meeting your needs means diverting resources away from the greater good, it simply wouldn't fly.)

This type of society asks you to subordinate your own wishes and desires and focus meeting the needs of the many. At all times. There's not even paying your dues and waiting your turn. Your turn never comes.

Like I couldn't apply for the course I wanted to do, because the powers that be had decreed there was no need for it. There was however a need for civil engineers, so that's what I applied for. And if you were lucky enough to be accepted, on graduating you had to work where they sent you (for a few years). So my dad had to move to a godforsaken village to teach there for three years. Nobody cared that they hated newcomers or that this took him far away from home. You couldn't even complain because that would be ungrateful after having been given the privilege of a university education.

Mind you, the problem of people in the West really not understanding what communism and socialism mean in practice is most definitely not limited to Shon. I had a lovely chat once with members of the Oxford Socialist Society who graciously informed me that I did not know what communism/socialism is because no one who lived in Eastern block countries had any real experience of living in a communist/socialist society. Coz we did it all wrong.

Deluded fools. They displayed precisely the attitude our leaders did.

There was much merriment a few weeks back on Twitter where a load of Shon types were responding to a thread with what they would do after the revolution.

A lot of the answers were like this. Remarkably few seemed to be planning to do any serious work.

'teaching classes on my farm' - oh excellent. Husbandry?

Haven't quite understood the concept of communism there then.

Anyway back to the article, it was really good, and clearly laid out the difference between the two. Trans being a well researched book, t'other being an emotive one sided piece of work.

members of the Oxford Socialist Society who graciously informed me that I did not know what communism/socialism is because no one who lived in Eastern block countries had any real experience of living in a communist/socialist society.

Wild. I had an Asian colleaque years back who was told (by white western students) that she was racist for writing about Asia. I can't remember the exact reasoning, but it was twisted, ridiculous and horrible. She was subject to a Twitter pile on for not doing 'ethnicity' correctly according to these American brats.

Faye is the product of a very "If..." style expensive boys private school, and is very vague about their higher education. "Studied Law," but no indication of where or for how long.

Faye went to Oxford. Articles Faye wrote for Cherwell while studying there are still available online.

Anyway back to the article, it was really good, and clearly laid out the difference between the two. Trans being a well researched book, t'other being an emotive one sided piece of work.

Mmm, but isn't that sort of joint review super super problematic?

It's a violent non-consensual co-platforming with an extreme bigot. At the very least!

Thinking of Helen at this difficult time.

The “there can be no trans liberation under capitalism” thing is laughable - as Floral and others point out, trans ideology is inherently Western and capitalist: individualist, couldn’t exist without a history of Greek idealism and Christian religious dualism, essentially consumerist and reliant on surgery and quite literally buying the right accessories, medicines and procedures. It literally couldn’t exist without all these, which makes the claims that gender binaries are oppressive Western colonialist ideology really pretty laughable.

Just like trans ideologues attempt to co-opt other cultural practices that aren’t really like transgender thinking at all (two-spirit, Hijra, etc.). This is nothing but pure Western cultural appropriation whilst simultaneously trying to argue that they are the anticolonialist, anticapitalist ones!

Faye might have studied law, but that isn’t in practice a discipline which lends itself to much critical thinking about the wider history of philosophy, to be honest. And Faye clearly doesn’t understand the first thing about Marxism (like many other woke “anticapitalist” internet warriors who throw terms about to look clever).

Marxism is at its root completely antithetical to transgender ideology, as are the various manifestations of practical and ideological communism. You couldn’t be a real Marxist and also believe in gender ideology - it just doesn’t work; the one undoes the other! Helen Joyce’s work is much more purely Marxist (most GC feminism is ultimately Marxist influenced at the base).

@terryleather

If Shon's book doesn't have a randy budgie pecking a mirror on its front cover I will be sorely disappointed....

Much amusement

I agree. Shon seems quite uninformed as to what that demand actually means in practice. There's research showing that the more individualistic a society is, the higher the numbers of late-onset transitioners. Because communist societies place the collective good above the individual good, no resources would, for instance, be put into trans needs for what are mostly cosmetic surgeries. You wouldn't even be able to argue for it without repercussion, because that would be deemed too focused on personal gain, too individualistic. Too selfish. (That applies across the board. If meeting your needs means diverting resources away from the greater good, it simply wouldn't fly.)

This type of society asks you to subordinate your own wishes and desires and focus meeting the needs of the many. At all times. There's not even paying your dues and waiting your turn. Your turn never comes.

Absolutely Charley, there is a huge inconsistency between wanting capitalism abolished and being trans. Transitioning relies heavily on pharmaceutical input and a variety of external indications that one is living in one's chosen gender such as makeup, jewelry, clothing. This kind of individualism (or societal expense) would not be tolerated in a society which thinks in collective terms. It seems to me that gender ideology is incompatible with communism.

Similarly (and as is often pointed out on here) abolishing the police seems to be an odd position to take for a cohort so utterly reliant on them to police those with dissenting views.

There are so many inconsistencies between what Faye seems to want from society and how we see 'gender rules' play out in society. I would read their book but in line with their thoughts on capitalism I won't insult them by paying for it.

I would read their book but in line with their thoughts on capitalism I won't insult them by paying for it.

Yes indeed - surely if Faye was a genuine anticapitalist radical thinker, Faye would release Faye’s book on the internet as an open source document free for all to read…?

Terryleather, you are on fire! 🔥

Love the Oompah-loompa reference.

Just like trans ideologues attempt to co-opt other cultural practices that aren’t really like transgender thinking at all (two-spirit, Hijra, etc.).

I’ve found myself musing (and even googling) over the past few days about these groups. I couldn’t find much, but there didn’t seem to be any indication that any of them were considered to be women within their societies. I don’t know how much access to single sex spaces exists in those countries where these “third gender” groups exist but I wondered how the claim that such groups have always existed interacts with the current western demand that these men are women and must be treated as such. I definitely get the feeling this is another of those arguments that has to be welded in place in the heat created by the intense friction from cognitive dissonance.

Pretty much universally, all these "third genders" were single-sex.