Hadley Freeman Margaret Attwood article guardian today

[SadWordlePlayer]

Apologies if there is already a thread. Very interesting.

Pity their email exchanges after the interview are off the record!

www.theguardian.com/books/ng-interactive/2022/feb/19/margaret-atwood-on-feminism-culture-wars

I noticed Jess Cartner-Morley on the Guardian fashion desk - Hadley's former boss - retweeting Hadley's article and supporting her on Twitter. Good to see.

Sorry wrong thread - Jess retweeted the Unherd article.

It strikes me that Canada really are clueless and so she's had no real discourse. That she's mentioned dsds before demonstrates naivety to me.

I would say this is true. Particularly among educated liberals, most believe being trans is a dsd and that's the line that organizations like the CBC follow. "Trans people" is understood to mean people with a particular issue with their brain.

Particularly among educated liberals, most believe being trans is a dsd and that's the line that organizations like the CBC follow.

That doesn't seem like a very educated position. Surely educated people would take the time to find out what it really means. Ask questions and do some research.

"Trans people" is understood to mean people with a particular issue with their brain.

'An issue with their brain' isn't the same as a DSD. How can they believe trans is both a DSD and a disorder of the brain?

@OldCrone

Particularly among educated liberals, most believe being trans is a dsd and that's the line that organizations like the CBC follow.

That doesn't seem like a very educated position. Surely educated people would take the time to find out what it really means. Ask questions and do some research.

"Trans people" is understood to mean people with a particular issue with their brain.

'An issue with their brain' isn't the same as a DSD. How can they believe trans is both a DSD and a disorder of the brain?

The brain is also part of the body. Most people who think this way are basing it on the idea that the brain structures of people who are trans are in some important way more like the brains of opposite sex people - they have in some way been feminized or masculinized. Many believe in the hormone wash theory. They also tend to believe all of this is well supported scientifically.

It may not seem like an educated position but the people who think this way, like MA, tend to be well educated middle and upper middle class people with good incomes. You are more likely to find doubters among people who are not university grads or who live in rural areas.

I have v educated friends with phds, but not in the area of biological sciences who believe it's all to do with some sort of vague hormonal "issue." That needs correcting. They've then not worked out how sexist it is. But if I'm honest it was through really thinking hard and reading here that I untangled it for myself.

Thanks for the link, SadWordlePlayer. I am full of admiration for Hadley Freeman for being brave enough to raise the topic. Margaret Attwood's position is more nuanced than her famous comment about not 'being the sort of feminist who was against lipstick and bothered about letting transgender people into bathrooms' but few journalists have sought to explore this more fully.

I've read a lot of her novels. She has always prided herself on her scientific knowledge, which she compares favourably with other novelists. That comes out clearly in Oryx and Crake. However, in the interview she only offered the long established fact that chromosomal variations exist as her riposte to the argument that sex is dimorphic. It feels like she is stuck in a 1970s view of science. There's an interesting contrast here with Ian McEwan who has engaged much more deeply with how contemporary novelists can engage with rapid advances in science.

I think Atwood has always been one of those women who privileges her own experiences above other people's. I like her writing but think she has no sense of the collective. She's perfectly entitled to be this way of course but I think she much prefers to be seen as a lone voice, distinct from the crowd. Let's not forget that for many years prior to the TV adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale she was feted as Canada's most famous novelist, a level of public recognition she would never have had had she been American or British. When she won the Booker with Bernadine Evaristo she was so condescending to Evaristo. It actually came across as quite colonialist to me, as if Evaristo had never won a literary award before and needed to be encouraged to write more.

Longwinded way of saying I'm not expecting her to change her public stance on sex and gender!

The brain is also part of the body. Most people who think this way are basing it on the idea that the brain structures of people who are trans are in some important way more like the brains of opposite sex people - they have in some way been feminized or masculinized. Many believe in the hormone wash theory. They also tend to believe all of this is well supported scientifically.

So it's the 'born in the wrong body' idea that they believe in? Meanwhile over here organisations like Stonewall and Mermaids, who have pushed that narrative for years, are furiously back-pedalling and insisting that they never said that.

The hormone wash theory is an odd one. I know we're not talking about scientists here, but has it not occurred to them that if there could be such a strong effect on the brain, to create a female brain in a male body (and I'd like to know what they think is the difference between a male and female brain), that it is odd that it has absolutely no other effects on the body?

And as Warrior says, the idea of 'lady brains' is sexist as hell.

It's odd, the gendered brain in wrong body theory, because despite all this flim-flam about hormone washes and masculinity and femininity, when it comes down to it they also deny that being trans has anything to do with masculinity and femininity. Surely all these affluent Canadian liberals have encountered trans people who seemed completely unremarkable, typical members of their sex prior to transition? They can't really think it only (or even mostly) involves effeminate gay men and very butch lesbians? No. I think, when pressed, they would say it's simply something in the brain that tells you whether you're a man or a woman (presumably with an in-between setting for non-binary). Which is patent nonsense, but I expect they don't want to look at it too closely. Safer not to question.

Actually, perhaps you have

1. The TRAs pushing the "innate satnav" line, bearded lesbians and all that, and then
2. A wider population of useful idiots who really do assume it's about masculinity and femininity, and don't want to cause any upset by questioning the sexist assumptions, the bearded lesbians etc.

@OldCrone

The brain is also part of the body. Most people who think this way are basing it on the idea that the brain structures of people who are trans are in some important way more like the brains of opposite sex people - they have in some way been feminized or masculinized. Many believe in the hormone wash theory. They also tend to believe all of this is well supported scientifically.

So it's the 'born in the wrong body' idea that they believe in? Meanwhile over here organisations like Stonewall and Mermaids, who have pushed that narrative for years, are furiously back-pedalling and insisting that they never said that.

The hormone wash theory is an odd one. I know we're not talking about scientists here, but has it not occurred to them that if there could be such a strong effect on the brain, to create a female brain in a male body (and I'd like to know what they think is the difference between a male and female brain), that it is odd that it has absolutely no other effects on the body?

And as Warrior says, the idea of 'lady brains' is sexist as hell.

It's pretty close to the born in the wrong body idea, probably a little more sophisticated but not much. Al ot of people don't really see the significance in the nuances of groups like Mermaids changing their language but I'd be shocked if MA had any knowledge of them beyond maybe who they are. It's not something that will be in the media she sees.

I don't particularly think it's especially laudable to reject the idea that male and female brains or thinking might be different for ideological reasons, but certainly in this instance there is no real evidence of the supposed hormone wash theory. A lot of people like MA are relying on some of the old studies of dissections etc of brains of transsexual women. That's not as totally crazy as it seems, I remember reading about them in university psychology texts in the late 80s/early 90s, so it was being proposed then as a serious possibility.

I don't particularly think it's especially laudable to reject the idea that male and female brains or thinking might be different for ideological reasons, but certainly in this instance there is no real evidence of the supposed hormone wash theory.

There may well be differences, as there are in other organs (heart attack symptoms are different for example), but the idea of a sexed brain always seems to revolve around stereotypes. And the idea of a 'lady brain' which was too frivolous to cope with serious matters is what kept women out of public life and positions of power for centuries. People like MA really should think about what it means to embrace sexist ideas like this.

I've never heard of a man claim he 'knows' he's a woman because he's had breast cancer, or because he believes one of his organs (his heart or liver for example) behaves more like that of a woman. It's always his brain having female attributes. Meanwhile, in most cases, his male reproductive system works just as well as that of any other man.

But the idea of an opposite sexed brain to the body is nonsense in any case. If a man's brain has attributes which it was thought only occurred in women, it doesn't mean that he has a woman's brain, but that the hypothesis that these attributes only occurred in women was wrong.

MA is to feminism what Margaret Thatcher was to Girl Power

I think Atwood has always been one of those women who privileges her own experiences above other people's. I like her writing but think she has no sense of the collective. She's perfectly entitled to be this way of course but I think she much prefers to be seen as a lone voice, distinct from the crowd.

Yes, I agree. And I think feminists may have misinterpreted HT as a novel about oppression of women when it was actually a novel about something else (totalitarianism?) and she was using a very old trope - VAWG - to tell the story. I agree with a pp that 'she seems to enjoy piling misery on her female characters' and I think that maybe all this time that has been misinterpreted, partly because she is female.

@OldCrone

I don't particularly think it's especially laudable to reject the idea that male and female brains or thinking might be different for ideological reasons, but certainly in this instance there is no real evidence of the supposed hormone wash theory.

There may well be differences, as there are in other organs (heart attack symptoms are different for example), but the idea of a sexed brain always seems to revolve around stereotypes. And the idea of a 'lady brain' which was too frivolous to cope with serious matters is what kept women out of public life and positions of power for centuries. People like MA really should think about what it means to embrace sexist ideas like this.

I've never heard of a man claim he 'knows' he's a woman because he's had breast cancer, or because he believes one of his organs (his heart or liver for example) behaves more like that of a woman. It's always his brain having female attributes. Meanwhile, in most cases, his male reproductive system works just as well as that of any other man.

But the idea of an opposite sexed brain to the body is nonsense in any case. If a man's brain has attributes which it was thought only occurred in women, it doesn't mean that he has a woman's brain, but that the hypothesis that these attributes only occurred in women was wrong.

I think all of this is more in depth than someone like Atwood has likely been exposed to.

It's hard to give a sense of the limits of the Canadian media compared to that in the UK, but in depth pieces critical of gender ideology don't exist. We are in a place where the only kind of warning voice allowed would still never question the basic ideas around gender identity. Maybe where the Uk was 5 years ago.

I think all of this is more in depth than someone like Atwood has likely been exposed to.

It's hard to give a sense of the limits of the Canadian media compared to that in the UK, but in depth pieces critical of gender ideology don't exist. We are in a place where the only kind of warning voice allowed would still never question the basic ideas around gender identity. Maybe where the Uk was 5 years ago.

Yes, I understand that, and about 5 years ago was when I first arrived here, having been signposted by someone on another forum. I was completely mystified why my newspaper of choice (the Guardian) thought everything to do with transgenderism was wonderful, when all I could see in it was the reinforcement of gender stereotypes and offensive sexist ideas like 'lady brains'.

So what I really don't understand is why all these educated people don't stop and think for themselves about this. They shouldn't need the media to do their thinking for them if they're educated and consider themselves intellectuals. They should be thinking.