Interesting Guardian Article

[StrawberrySquirrelThief]

An interesting interview with Finn McKay - www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/oct/05/finn-mackay-the-writer-hoping-to-help-end-the-gender-wars

I thought it was a v interesting and thoughtful article - clearly there are more areas where I’d have liked to hear Finn’s views. But mainly it is a piece that reflects a high degree of engagement in issues that matter, not just parroting slogans or relying on bekind, and it’s the kind of article I’d like my younger “ftm” teen relations to read. Recognising that biology is implicit in many issues women face - frankly, that’s a radical statement compared to many. It’s an article that can be read by people who are unsure where they sit, and keep the door open for thought and discussion.

The bigger question, Mackay argues, is why sex has come to matter so much; why it is loaded with expectations about how people will live or behave, when in an ideal world it could be irrelevant.

well it isn't an ideal world..

sex matters as crime patterns differ markedly between the sexes

and there is no evidence to suggest that the crime patterns of transwomen differ from other males

@thinkingaboutLangCleg

I have to admit that I read the Guardian interview thinking Mackay was very reasonable and understanding — unusual in anything I’d read by a transwoman before. Then I realised Mackay is a woman. Suddenly the goodwill and courtesy all made sense. Oh dear.

Yes, strange isn't it.....

Yes, I still disagree with lots of what's in that article but there were also signs in there of a willingness to listen to other viewpoints, and to the feelings of women, which is an absolute first time I have seen that in this sort of article.

Interestingly, Owen Jones has also shared this article! And is already getting shit from at least two prominent TRAs for endorsing it. Oh dear Owen, don't you realise you cannot stray from the ideology in any way? Not even to acknowledge the feelings of women? Naughty naughty.....

An interesting example of how to say a lot without saying very much and an absolutely dazzling display of avoiding all the hard questions.

Finn is an idiot. Finn should have been allowed to realise that you can be female and like anything. You can like 'female coded' things like make up, 'male coded' things like cars and you can like things that haven't been given a social gender code like hamburgers, mountains or the sea.

I just feel deeply sorry for people who get so wrapped up in this ridiculous notion of gender roles and requirements. Fuck that. I like the sea.

@Talipesmum

I thought it was a v interesting and thoughtful article - clearly there are more areas where I’d have liked to hear Finn’s views. But mainly it is a piece that reflects a high degree of engagement in issues that matter, not just parroting slogans or relying on bekind, and it’s the kind of article I’d like my younger “ftm” teen relations to read. Recognising that biology is implicit in many issues women face - frankly, that’s a radical statement compared to many. It’s an article that can be read by people who are unsure where they sit, and keep the door open for thought and discussion.

Yes - I agree with this. I can see why it's frustrating for many here, but I think it moves the conversation helpfully eg OJ endorsing it. I can see Finn Mackay's perspective and tone helping people to climb down from some entrenched positions, in ways which will be helpful to women, without losing face. That's valuable.

@334bu

An interesting example of how to say a lot without saying very much and an absolutely dazzling display of avoiding all the hard questions.

I agree, but thought it was an interesting read in one sense, all the same.

This had me rolling my eyes hard:
"It is this willingness to slip between categories that makes Mackay a fascinating observer of the so-called gender wars, or the long-running argument over what makes a woman or a man"

Tons of us on here have said we fit into multiple categories, have our "masculinities", yet for our "fascinating observations" we get threats and abuse.

this is just the lesser spotted #bekind version of transactivism.

It still denies that sex matters but comes with less abuse.

What I am getting from the childhood memories and some other situations described is that Finn just enjoyed not being recognised as a female as it gave him much more freedom. So there was simply some advantage of passing as male, which is also what I think Abigail Shrier pointed out in her book, when she described girls transitioning or being non binary to escape the sexualisation and beauty tyranny of social medial.

I think it is useful in that it will move the conversation helpfully in the right direction but really annoying because she is say the same thing as us and we are getting vilified for it. This is how the debate will move on. The TRAs will accept all of our points but say we were only making them because of transphobia.

It does feel that she thinks they are legitimate points but we shouldn’t make the. I feel sad that she worked with that woman who sat in the dark because she was too traumatised to allow a male electrician into her house but she bashes other women who make that point. In the current climate that woman would not be able to access a single sex abuse service because she is frightened of being a bigot.

See, I genuinely think we will see some rolling back on the extreme position that 'women can never have single sex services which exclude trans women (even though the law specifically provides for that)', and I think it will come packaged just like this, ie. people saying "I definitely wouldn't fight a women's refuge for having a trans-exclusive policy" as Finn does in that article.

Which is kind of in line with your first paragraph I guess.

I found the claim that "only women have a cervix" is a dog-whistle sat uncomfortably alongside the recognition that that Lancet cover was badly positioned. "Only women have a cervix" was in response to the Lancet! It wasn't just a random statement of science Rosie Duffield decided to make one day.

Now this is an interesting Guardian article, two opinions on sport, one from the wonderful Dr Nic, the other from Natalie Washington a transwoman who campaigns from trans inclusion in womens sports.

www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/oct/05/who-is-included-views-report-on-transgender-participation-in-sport

This is exactly the sort of thing they should be doing, putting both sides of the argument

Even as a student looking for temp work, Mackay ended up in telesales because everything else involved wearing a skirt. “It was all goths, gays, queers – everyone else who thought: ‘I’m not wearing a freaking pinafore, so I’m going to have to do this job where nobody sees me.’”)

Really? Sorry but I don't buy that at all.

There's an organised TRA protest outside the Guardian offices at 5pm today due to what they see as transphobia from The Guardian and The Observer.

Even the tiniest bit of common sense or fence sitting apparently is not to be tolerated.

@KimikosNightmare

Even as a student looking for temp work, Mackay ended up in telesales because everything else involved wearing a skirt. “It was all goths, gays, queers – everyone else who thought: ‘I’m not wearing a freaking pinafore, so I’m going to have to do this job where nobody sees me.’”)

Really? Sorry but I don't buy that at all.

Finn must be about my age or slightly younger. I've had zero issues wearing trousers in any job from being a student upwards.

I'm younger than Finn and also have never found wearing trousers to work an issue. Maybe she did, maybe it reflects the kind of jobs on offer at time, but very few places have that as a dress code.
Overall though I thought it was a thoughtful interview and she's coming from a sympathetic viewpoint.

Older not younger!

I thought the Finn article was useless and Finn came across as a bit simple and not capable of engaging with the real meat of the issues. That may, however, be the result of the Guardian writing.

@Thatsjustwhatithink

Finn is an idiot. Finn should have been allowed to realise that you can be female and like anything. You can like 'female coded' things like make up, 'male coded' things like cars and you can like things that haven't been given a social gender code like hamburgers, mountains or the sea.

I just feel deeply sorry for people who get so wrapped up in this ridiculous notion of gender roles and requirements. Fuck that. I like the sea.

I guess though, when Finn was growing up and shaping their sense of self, they were taught that you CAN'T be female and like anything.

Maybe something in Finn was wired to make the pleasant feeling of being able to do what they liked when "passing" as a boy actually feel like they WERE a boy/should have been a boy.

Many of us had the same experience but just felt the unfairness.

It's a constant trope in both male and female transitioners when they talk about childhood, and it seems to be a blind spot that they can't see there experiences as actually pretty common childhood experiences.

I want to like Finn, lots of people I respect and agree with have a lot of time for them, but ultimately I'm not really seeing anything new or revealing here. A woman can be as masculine as she likes without being a man, and it chucks all women in our infinite variety under the bus of gender shackles when we pretend otherwise (the personal being political and all that).

So no, 20 or 30 years is not enough for a man to become a woman. 100 years is not enough. Eternity is not enough and it shouldn't be controversial to say it.

The bigger question, Mackay argues, is why sex has come to matter so much; why it is loaded with expectations about how people will live or behave, when in an ideal world it could be irrelevant.

How can it ever be irrelevant? Just to use an example in the Guardian today, the Texas abortion laws very obviously affect women differently to men. The idea that you can easily ignore which people might grow a baby in their body only seems possible in a society with legislation and access to medical care that we can’t take for granted.

The thing that can be changed (see history of 20th century) is expectations of how men and women should behave - but by talking about ‘living as a man or a woman’ Finn seems to endorse that.

We've discussed golden bridges (Tsun Szu) before (never box an adversary in completely, always offer a golden bridge to an escape because they will otherwise fight to the death).

There's been some interesting discussion about cooling hyperpolarised disagreements. This is the example of an anti-vaxxer perspective and using what is known about perpetrating cons/fraud. Does Finn Mackay have a role as a potential cooler?

Goffman observed that all “marks” eventually come to understand that they have been defrauded. But strangely, they almost never complain or report the crime to the authorities. Why? Because, Goffman argues, admitting that you have been conned is so deeply shameful that “marks” experience it as a kind of social death – the painful end of one of the many social roles we all play.
…
Within those groups, we can pinpoint influential members who may be turning their backs on Covid denialism, and encourage them in their journey. We can message them offering support, particularly if our reference groups overlap – whether that means sharing the same home town, or practising the same faith. The more shared social space, the better. We might offer to back them up if they get trolled for expressing misgivings about Covid denialism. Or we could let them know that we would admire them for telling the truth.

Those people may not have a television audience of millions, but they nonetheless have the potential to act as “coolers” for those in their reference groups – both online and off. The higher their status within the groups, the more influence they will have in reconciling their fellow travellers to the reality of the pandemic, perhaps enabling them to rejoin society, or at least preventing them from endangering the rest of us.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/09/convince-anti-vaxxers

I've no idea how the above is possible if SM platforms keep banning some people because this reduces interaction. And, much as I think the ability to block and mute is much needed (especially by women) it does facilitate being in a bubble - which is why those crossover coolers are so necessary.

That sports article was interesting. I thought it was telling that the second person thought the sport authortities hadn't looked properly at qualification/entry/categorisation/eligibility, but wrote off having a trans category as "unworkable" without giving any reasons why.

“If somebody looks twice at somebody they think is a man in a small, enclosed space that’s supposed to be just for women, it might not be because they’re a homophobic or transphobic bigot; it might be because that’s the reality of the world we live in, with endemic rates of sexualised violence against women. We need to be focusing on that which makes egalitarian models so difficult in the first place.”

Is this the middle ground then? That women might have a reason for objecting to males in female-only provisions?

I found this article wholly unconvincing. Someone who is fully immersed in gender identity ideology presented as an mere observer of the "gender-wars". No, Finn is someone who has taken a firm position on the pro-self-id side. The fact that Finn has some understanding of trauma in female survivors is not accompanied by similar understanding for the needs of other groups of women to single-sex provisions and no understanding demonstrated at all that wanting to preserve our privacy and dignity in female-only provisions are also entirely reasonable reasons for excluding all males from our spaces.

And there is nothing at all here about the fact that we cannot address inequalities on the basis of sex if we pretend sex only matters because we're arguing about now.

Half the problem, Mackay argues, is that arguments that could have been thrashed out within the LGBT community are being stirred from outside it. They were particularly shocked by a recent suggestion from Philip Wilkinson, the Conservative police and crime commissioner for Wiltshire, that trans women should no longer be able to use women’s toilets as they have freely done for years.

That's not middle ground either. The claim that self-id is a matter of interest only for the LGBT community and everyone else should butt out, is an extremist position that denies that a) that women should have a say in deciding who qualifies as a woman and b) that women's rights are affected when males are considered to be women on their say so.