Don’t bother applying for a job if you think people can’t change sex, NHS trust tells health official

[MidCenturyClegs]

uk.news.yahoo.com/don-t-bother-applying-job-162233187.html

The wonderful Kate Grimes expressed interest in a non-exec position at the Tavi this year and was told to not waste her time as she holds gender critical beliefs. Peter Daly has been employed. Wow!

And I'm sure the child attacked by Katie Dolatowski (for example) feels incredibly empowered by you laughing at their assault.
It didn't happen to you, and I'm sure if it had you'd have been so strong and cool with it, that it's no problem, yeah?

PS - you can't "notice" someone's gender. Bit offensive of you to say you have the power to notice whether someone is trans or not.

"Small and physically feeble" - have you seen Lia Thomas? And Caitlyn Jenner? And Gabrielle Basketball-player?

Karen White's no shrinking violet!

Nothing new in that post from ides. It was like deja vu. Except the introduction of the ever so privileged ‘hasn’t happened to me so therefore is not an issue’.

I am sure readers will be enlightened seeing that little gem.

Anyway, anything to say that addresses the OP Ides. Or is this another merail?

The point @ides has sailed merrily over your head. For your benefit let me say it again. The problem under self Id is MEN. Men who would abuse the system. Since 99% of sex crimes are committed by men this is the reason for keeping them out of single sex spaces. Unless of course you have evidence that male pattern behaviour changes after saying the magic words 'I am a woman'? (Hint: you do not)

For entertainment, try rereading Ides' screed replacing all references to "transwomen" with "men called Keith".

It makes just as much sense - special pleading for a self-salami-sliced subset of men who deserve to be treated specially because they then become a minority via the artificial salami slicing.

(And we don't care whether they're called Keith or not, this is not Keithphobia...)

Women are so fragile and so delicate, it only takes one person, equipped with a dick and testicles, no matter how small and physically feeble that person may be, to be a menace to all the women around?

Jeez, really, sincerely - can you not see how pathetic that looks?

Women being aware of the threat of rape is 'pathetic'?

Nice. What do you think we should do about the threat of rape? Just 'man up' and get over it?

Women are so fragile and so delicate, it only takes one person, equipped with a dick and testicles, no matter how small and physically feeble that person may be, to be a menace to all the women around?

To be clear, 'fragile and delicate' has nothing to do with the risk of rape.

If a woman is raped it is not her fault, whatever her build or height. Statistically, males are larger and stronger than females. This is due to testosterone, for the most part. It is not casting aspersions on the moral strength or virtue of women to note that males have greater muscle strength.

This is a very simplistic argument sometimes misattributed to feminism. It's not about women somehow overcoming evolutionary biology to bionically overpower males. Feminism is about liberating women from the disadvantages faced by our sex; many of which are due to or exacerbated by or maintained by yes, biological factors. This can be achieved mostly by aiming for equity.

Women are so fragile and so delicate, it only takes one person, equipped with a dick and testicles, no matter how small and physically feeble that person may be, to be a menace to all the women around?

As Ides has repeated this on this thread and over other threads.

I think though, that most readers will see that there are many layers of issues reflected in that one sentence. It is so enlightening really.

Women are so fragile and so delicate, it only takes one person, equipped with a dick and testicles, no matter how small and physically feeble that person may be, to be a menace to all the women around?

Yes, it's an interesting statement. Is Ides implying that if women only tried harder, they could repel assailants? Or trying to suggest that males are smaller and physically feeble, which is clearly nonsensical? As for 'all the women around' - is this implying a large group of women would be able to defeat a small, feeble male? Is this some kind of theoretical gender top trumps scenario?

I read the statement as being rather full of hatred. The source of that hatred could be coming from different angles, but it is aimed at women who have been attacked in any way, and at those fighting to retain single sex provisions and maintain adequate safeguarding levels.

It is also important to remember too that one person could have conflicting issues that would produce a sentence such as this. One that has been repeated as often as it has been here on MN FWR.

@9toenails

DadJoke, a person posting here on MN has said, amongst other things, this: 'the science of gender identity is well-established'

Alex Byrne , Professor of Philosophy at MIT has said, amongst other things, this: 'If there is some kind of “gender identity” that is universal in humans, and which causes dysphoria when mismatched with sex, it remains elusive. No one has yet found a way of detecting its presence ...'

These two claims are contradictory.

Byrne backs up his claim, see Byrne on gender identity, for example. (More relevant material can be found on his MIT pages.)

I wonder if DadJoke would like to back up his contrary claim?

If not, we would be foolish to conclude otherwise than that DadJoke is either ignorant, possibly mistaken, or out-and-out simply lying in his/her teeth.

We might simplify matters, perhaps, with reference to the implied challenge, 'No one has yet found a way of detecting its [sc. gender identity's] presence.' If DadJoke is right and Byrne wrong, someone has found a way: Who, DadJoke ? And how? -- What way has been found of detecting the presence of gender identity?

Without such a way of detecting its presence, far from the science of gender identity being well established, such science has yet to begin. No?

Byrne is a professor of philosophy, not a medical or psychological academic or professional. The idea of people having privileged access to their experience appears to be novel to him, which suprising as he is apparently a philosopher of the mind. The idea of a personal having an internal sense of something is not obscure. When we want to find out what someone's internal sense of something is, there is this incredibly novel way of doing it - we ask them, just as we do with pain.It's almost like he's arguing in favour of philospical zombieism.

Even if there were a way of "detecting" gender identity, you still wouldn't acknowledge its reality. Showing me articles written by such people does not change the fact that the science of gender identity is well established.

In this one section, Byrne is correct - this is the standard theory:

"We have just assembled three claims about gender identity which frequently appear in explanatory material about transgender issues intended for the general public. Together they form what we can call the standard picture, which we can set out as follows:

A: Everyone has a gender identity, which is usually stable. Non-transgender people have gender identities that match their sex.
B: Transgender people — in particular, MtF and FtM transsexuals, or transgender/trans women and transgender/trans men — have gender identities that do not match their sex.
C: A mismatch between sex and gender identity causes gender dysphoria.

Some prominent clinicians and researchers (although by no means all) endorse the standard picture. "

The only place he is wrong here is that he says "Some" prominent clinicians and researchers, it's nearly all - in other words, a scientific consensus, which is the claim that I am making.

A mismatch between sex and gender identity causes gender dysphoria.

Which sexes match which genders? Does "female" match "woman"?

@bishophaha

A mismatch between sex and gender identity causes gender dysphoria.

Which sexes match which genders? Does "female" match "woman"?

And what is gender?

The only place he is wrong here is that he says "Some" prominent clinicians and researchers, it's nearly all - in other words, a scientific consensus, which is the claim that I am making.

Even if that were true, if the majority of scientists are Christian, or meat-eaters, or Labour boters, that is not a scientific consensus.

A "scientific consensus" is a consensus about science, not the results of a poll of the non-scientific opinions of scientists.

Gender identity is just a politically-motivated distorted framing of gender dysphoria (which is clearly real, just like any other body dysphoria, but many/most current "trans" people don't have anyway).

But it's totally obvious to any outside observer that this purported "female gender identity" experienced by a male in no way resembles anything a woman has. Have you seen how transwomen act? They're nothing like women. Whatever this thing they experience is, it's obviously not what women experience. Women do not have a desire to be women, they just are. So how can you equate the male desire with the female being?

For gender identity to do what you want it to do, you need to prove that the "transwoman" identity is the same as the "woman" identity. (As well as falsely assert that sex doesn't matter).

This doesn't even pass a basic common-sense test, let along have any scientific backing.

DadJoke:
'Byrne is a professor of philosophy ...'

Hello DadJoke . Well done and thank you for looking at (at least part of) the Byrne piece. Of course, as I said, Byrne is a philosopher. But philosophers do have things to say about science.

I wonder if ‘the standard view’ he adumbrates is to be thought of as scientific, strictly so-called? (He delineates it in order to refute, notice: you think he fails to do so, although without overtly engaging with what he says; me, I think he does a pretty good job. But there you go.) -- I suspect that not, but no matter, anyway.

That could get a bit sticky, as could talk of privileged access to mental states. I am sure Byrne is familiar with related issues; you, maybe not so much, going on what you say. I might not wholly agree with Byrne about this, anyway. But let that stand, too. No need to get into it. Thoughts on privileged access in the philosophy of mind may differ, but no-one to my knowledge claims that all (even all sincere ) self-descriptions are necessarily true. ( ‘There’s a guy works down the chip-shop swears he’s Elvis.’ ? Hmm?)

Thing is, Byrne makes an implicit challenge I tried (and failed, so far, despite your apparent willingness to connect) to get you to attempt to engage with. Such engagement would simplify matters considerably, and give us a shot at clarity on the issue.

The challenge is, we might say, part of the philosophy of science. It rests on an assumption: that science deals exclusively with empirical matters. If this is right, things to which we have no empirically-based epistemic access just do not count – cannot count -- as objects of scientific study.

We can have no science of, say, guardian angels if we have no empirical way even of telling whether there are such things. Morals , another example: many would say we cannot have a science of morality since we have no empirical test for the existence of moral truth. (Others deny this … debate ensues.)

So: metaphysics, theology (pace Mary Baker Eddy!) and (interestingly to some) pure mathematics. Not science. OK? (Morality? – Moot, let us say.) Important to us, perhaps; just not science.

So, here is the challenge once again. How do we tell if there is such a thing as gender identity? Byrne says no one has managed to find a way of detecting its presence. If he is right, we can have no empirical way of studying it – we cannot do science with it, that is. You say we can do science with it; that is, we have an empirical way of studying it … so you are committed to the view that we have empirical epistemic access to it: a way of detecting its presence. Do you see?

The challenge, implicit in Byrne, explicitly from me: Byrne says, ‘No one has yet found a way of detecting its [ sc. gender identity's] presence.’ If you, DadJoke , are right and Byrne wrong, someone has found a way: Who, DadJoke ? And how? -- What way has been found of detecting the presence of gender identity?

-- We might note that ‘ask someone if he/she has a guardian angel’ will not do as a way of detecting the presence of guardian angels, whatever your position on privileged access; same for immortal souls, bio-energetic paranormal auras, reincarnations of Elvis and the like. [Why? I leave that as an exercise.]

So, DadJoke : Who has found a way of detecting the presence of gender identity? What is this way of detecting it?

Without an answer to this latter question, there cannot be any science of gender identity, no matter what ‘prominent clinicians and researchers’ may think, nor how many of them think it.

Simple enough? Simple enough. How do we detect the presence of gender identity ?

[Btw, your ‘Even if there were a way of "detecting" gender identity, you still wouldn't acknowledge its reality.’ is just abuse. I give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you wish to convince rather than insult.]

Even if that were true, if the majority of scientists are Christian, or meat-eaters, or Labour boters, that is not a scientific consensus.

A "scientific consensus" is a consensus about science, not the results of a poll of the non-scientific opinions of scientists.

Gender identity is just a politically-motivated distorted framing of gender dysphoria (which is clearly real, just like any other body dysphoria, but many/most current "trans" people don't have anyway).

But it's totally obvious to any outside observer that this purported "female gender identity" experienced by a male in no way resembles anything a woman has. Have you seen how transwomen act? They're nothing like women. Whatever this thing they experience is, it's obviously not what women experience. Women do not have a desire to be women, they just are. So how can you equate the male desire with the female being?

For gender identity to do what you want it to do, you need to prove that the "transwoman" identity is the same as the "woman" identity. (As well as falsely assert that sex doesn't matter).

This doesn't even pass a basic common-sense test, let along have any scientific backing.

Perfectly put.

For entertainment, try rereading Ides' screed replacing all references to "transwomen" with "men called Keith".

It makes just as much sense - special pleading for a self-salami-sliced subset of men who deserve to be treated specially because they then become a minority via the artificial salami slicing.

(And we don't care whether they're called Keith or not, this is not Keithphobia...)

Recommend this!

I think the Cass interim report has plenty to go on as to why hiring only someone who believe that ‘affirming only’ is the only treatment plan or the final outcome of any treatment plan that should be considered is harmful and has been harmful.

What is needed is a senior team that is actually patient focused and in this case ‘child patient’ focused and can assess the needs of the organisation with balance.

As I have said before, there is already people who believe that sex cannot be changed, that these patients are very vulnerable and need the very best care plans working there.

I have not seen anything plonked down so far that is compelling enough to discriminate against Kate or the Baroness being part of a balanced senior team at a NHS gender clinic.

It is clear, and sorry if I am repeating myself, that some posters have their own deeply held prejudices and political agendas that are reflected in their posts though. I believe if the senior team was only sourced from people all believing the same politically aligned beliefs, it is the patients who will miss out.

The majority of patients' families likely think gender is another word for sex and don't understand the ideological information being said by their young family member. Having someone who can see the family perspective and confusion on hearing about the 100s of floating genders would help them. Someone who can explain that some young people have different feelings, but also this can change (transition and detransition), so the need to take a cautious approach is vital.

@9toenails

First the analogy with guardian angels is just silly. Guardian angels are not well established objects of research and scientific consensus.

A better analogy is sexuality. You can observe behaviour and assume sexuality, or, the most common way of finding out - you just ask.

Before that nomenclature existed, gay people were treated as abnormal and suffering from a mental condition. Straight people were just "normal," and many of them objected to the nomenclature because it assumed that homosexuality was not pathological.

I think we all accept that when a person with gender dysphoria says that there is a mismatch between their body and their sense of being a man or woman, that that internal sense is something real, not like a "guardian angel". So, gender dysphoria brings that sense to the foreground, because of the conflict between their gender identity and their sexed characteristics just as issues with proprioception do.

So, we probably agree that in the case of gender dysphoria there is something real going on, and we label that inner sense as "gender identity." You just disagree that people without gender dysphoria have that inner sense.

How do I detect gender identity? The same way you "detect" sexaulity. You just ask.

Are you a woman?

If you answer the question "yes," a researcher would mark you as having a gender identity of being a woman, definitionally. It makes no difference what you attribute that to, or whether you "feel" like a woman, any more than you have self-knowledge of your proprioception. There is no inner conflict between your gender identity and your body.

My statement about gender identity being detectable was not facetious. If I could invite a device and point it at someone and it returned their gender identity (which they confirmed verbally), would you accept that gender identity was real?

If it makes any difference to you, gender identity, like sexuality, has a hereditable component, and cultural factors are negligible.

www.gwern.net/docs/genetics/heritable/2018-polderman.pdf

their sense of being a man or woman

How do you form that sense if you take the words 'man' and 'woman' as purely descriptors of a physical body? (Is it similar to 'phantom limb' where people feel nerve activity relating to a body part they no longer have?)

You can't unless you absorb sex role stereotypes to some extent.

You are disingenuous stating that replying 'yes' to 'are you a woman' means you have a gender identity. If you, as most people have, have spent your life believing that 'woman' means 'female-bodied' you will believe that you are affirming that you have a female body.

If you are arguing that, because some people interpret the definition of a word differently from its dictionary definition (but won't say what their definition is) that anyone using that word also subscribes to it, or is somehow identifying themselves as being that alternative meaning, you are not making a logical argument.

I could ask 'is your starsign Capricorn' and then say 'ah some people believe Capricorns are terrible cooks, so you must be a terrible cook'. It's the same as the ridiculous sleight of hand used around the word 'woman'.

I notice you didn't reply to my question further up.

I think we all accept that when a person with gender dysphoria says that there is a mismatch between their body and their sense of being a man or woman, that that internal sense is something real, not like a "guardian angel".

It may be real to them, but it's not something that you can describe to someone who doesn't feel this, nor is it something which can be observed by someone else. So in that respect it is similar to a belief in guardian angels, or any other religious belief.

What do you mean by a 'mismatch between their body and their sense of being a man or woman'? Is this a similar feeling to that experienced by people who think that some of their body parts don't belong to them?

What sense does someone have of being a man or a woman other than recognising whether they have a male or female body?

How do I detect gender identity? The same way you "detect" sexaulity. You just ask.

Are you a woman?

If you answer the question "yes," a researcher would mark you as having a gender identity of being a woman, definitionally. It makes no difference what you attribute that to, or whether you "feel" like a woman, any more than you have self-knowledge of your proprioception. There is no inner conflict between your gender identity and your body.

If you asked me that question I would say 'yes' because I am an adult female human. This is nothing to do with having a 'gender identity', it's a statement of biological fact.

You haven't explained what you mean by 'gender identity'. What is it?

You could measure sexuality by evaluating physical responses to images. The results of this would usually, but not always, agree with a persons own description of themselves. I think in those cases were there was conflict, you could argue that the physical response gave the more truthful answer to the question of sexuality. What test would you perform to evaluate the truth of someone’s self description of gender identity?

You could measure sexuality by evaluating physical responses to images. The results of this would usually, but not always, agree with a persons own description of themselves. I think in those cases were there was conflict, you could argue that the physical response gave the more truthful answer to the question of sexuality. What test would you perform to evaluate the truth of someone’s self description of gender identity?

This👆