Trans: the new ideology of the ruling class (article)

[PorcelinaV]

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/09/25/trans-the-new-ideology-of-the-ruling-class/

[Datun]

All too true.

When women are oppressing men because they don't want them violating their boundaries.

The very people who denied them single sex toilet provision, dubbed the urinary leash, are doing it again.

Progression much.

[Toseland]

I keep seeing social class being bought into this fight now - a new development - why?

[highame]

I'm really glad there is a focus on elitism because if you look at many of the pillars of 'progressive ideology' they are very exclusive. Pronouns, complex language regarding women etc etc. They are also very divisive. It's almost like academia has lost the plot, has run out debate. They are looking for more and more obscure philosophies. So many absolutely rubbish theories are put forward and grabbed hold of without any rigor and peddled around as though there is some superior and mystical thinking that, if we can't understand, then we are not one of the community.

Fascinating stuff, however, academics hang fiercely on to their theories, after all, their reputations are at stake

[guinnessguzzler]

Interesting piece, but what about the unions in all this talk of the workers? Most of them are pushing this ideology quite significantly too.

[MargotBamborough]

@Toseland

I keep seeing social class being bought into this fight now - a new development - why?

I think there is a class aspect to it.

Although I personally am both a "TERF" (or, more accurately, a "MERF") and a remainer, I can see a lot of parallels between gender identity theory and the EU, in terms of who believes in what.

There was a lot of sneering from the remain camp about working class Brexit voters and a lot of anger from leave voters about metropolitan elites.

Working class leave voters were generally characterised as not having enough intelligence or education to understand the benefits of remaining in the EU, and whilst it is true that the benefits of remaining were often difficult to comprehend for people who aren't educated to a very high level, I am not convinced that most remain voters really understood how it all worked either, it was just that their political tribe had decided it was good so they went along with that. But in addition to that, I think what wasn't really acknowledged by remain voters is that whilst the EU with its freedom of movement represented opportunities for affluent young people and professionals, there were negative impacts for low paid workers who found their wages eroded due to mass immigration. So the EU was, and is, both a fairly academic idea which wasn't all that accessible to a lot of people, and also something with the potential to harm certain less privileged groups.

I think there is a similar class divide when it comes to gender identity theory. First of all, it's an academic theory which is pretty incomprehensible to most people and if you say you don't get it you're either called a stupid bigot or patronisingly told that you are making the basic mistake of believing that women's things are for people born with vaginas because you haven't read enough academic feminism. And at the same time, although obviously women from all social classes are vulnerable and rape and sexual assault can happen anywhere, working class women are more vulnerable than middle and upper class women and less likely to be OK with their spaces being shared with the opposite sex.

[GarlicGrace]

There's a lot to dislike about Brendan O'Neill but he really is good with words!

This is a department charged with cutting deals with powers across the globe and yet they’re scared to say ‘mum’ lest an anonymous furry on the internet call them a bigot.

🤣🙌🙌🙌

[MargotBamborough]

I liked the point he made about "Karen" as well.

[Froodwithatowel]

@Toseland

I keep seeing social class being bought into this fight now - a new development - why?

The open letter from the Deptford Women's Project made clear that on the ground, they had people actually struggling without education or literacy, homeless, abused, living with substance abuse - who were being gatecrashed at events for them by a bunch of public school educated local university students who quite liked the image of playing being working class and wanted to lecture these service users at length about how they, these extremely affluent, highly educated, highly protected and nurtured youngsters were much more vulnerable than anyone else in the project, and should be centred because of their gender identity oppression with everyone learning about their pronouns. No capacity to consider that these people perhaps had other issues or weren't immediately ready to do what these young people expected and drop everything to provide care and support for them.

In that sense, yes, there's the traditional class issue going on, where those with the naivety, and power, and disrespect for others, (including the time, resources, freedom and, belief in their own entitlement to be in authority) are taking straight forward traditional advantage on a class basis, while talking a lot about the words they quite like the feelz of and adopting the bits of the image and experience of oppression. Women see it all the time .

But also, if you think of this in terms of a new ruling class, a powerful elite who wine and dine and dance with those in the highest positions of authority, who the police always believe, for whom all funding and services revolve around in a highly unequal way, who have powers under law to control and oppress, who openly demand respect, subservience, service, others knowing their place and accepting their lesser lot? That they aren't entitled to things like privacy or dignity or equality of consideration and access compared to their betters? We have a political movement where some would really like to replay Victorian times, and get to be the colonialists who destroy resources and culture to replace it forcibly with their own and punish dissenters. And re educate the children in the way that they should think and get them away from their parents and culture. And get to have privilege and power that others don't have, and to enjoy the benefits of being able to oppress and control other lesser people and require labour.

The amusing thing is that this leftist politics is the one that slams labels in your face at every museum howling about 'this has colonialist roots' and 'ohhh slavery was evil' and 'oh the appalling treatment of the working class by evil bastard white rich people' and cannot see the irony or hypocrisy in any way at all. They want to undo equality and reverse it, while telling you how much they love equality, but only if they get to be the ones who get all the benefit.

I suspect if you got the right group of people at the right moment in private, you'd have very enthusiastic agreement that women who say no to men and talk here should be in gulags, that magdalen laundries had the right idea, and yes stuff 'em all on reservations where no one has to listen to their awful views - this political movement makes a lot of fig leaf noises, but it's ethics and integrity? Is FUBAR.

[DogandMog]

YY to the above. The lower down you are in socio-economic class + culture/education, the more that macro-level sociological guardrails and insulation protect you against harsh social forces and malevolent actors. If you are wealthy or have educational cultural capital that naturally insulates you to a large degree, eg you can join “naice” private gyms, afford fee-paying schools, private health care, unlikely to go to prison etc. Guardrails, clear & truthful definitions in language, legislation etc protect the genuinely most weak and disadvantaged in society. Protecting “sacred castes” according to Queer Theory narratives is the epitomy of “luxury beliefs”.

[MargotBamborough]

@DogandMog

YY to the above. The lower down you are in socio-economic class + culture/education, the more that macro-level sociological guardrails and insulation protect you against harsh social forces and malevolent actors. If you are wealthy or have educational cultural capital that naturally insulates you to a large degree, eg you can join “naice” private gyms, afford fee-paying schools, private health care, unlikely to go to prison etc. Guardrails, clear & truthful definitions in language, legislation etc protect the genuinely most weak and disadvantaged in society. Protecting “sacred castes” according to Queer Theory narratives is the epitomy of “luxury beliefs”.

Yes. A perfect example of this is Emma Watson's gushing and wide eyed acceptance of trans women as women who belong in all women's spaces.

That's all very well for you to say, Emma. When was the last time you needed to access a rape crisis centre, domestic violence shelter, communal shower or even a public toilet?

[Froodwithatowel]

And it's exceptionally obvious that child has absolutely no experience whatsoever of the existence of women who lack her privilege and whose life is very different to hers.

Because I doubt it's that she knows and doesn't care.

[MargotBamborough]

@Froodwithatowel

The open letter from the Deptford Women's Project made clear that on the ground, they had people actually struggling without education or literacy, homeless, abused, living with substance abuse - who were being gatecrashed at events for them by a bunch of public school educated local university students who quite liked the image of playing being working class and wanted to lecture these service users at length about how they, these extremely affluent, highly educated, highly protected and nurtured youngsters were much more vulnerable than anyone else in the project, and should be centred because of their gender identity oppression with everyone learning about their pronouns. No capacity to consider that these people perhaps had other issues or weren't immediately ready to do what these young people expected and drop everything to provide care and support for them.

In that sense, yes, there's the traditional class issue going on, where those with the naivety, and power, and disrespect for others, (including the time, resources, freedom and, belief in their own entitlement to be in authority) are taking straight forward traditional advantage on a class basis, while talking a lot about the words they quite like the feelz of and adopting the bits of the image and experience of oppression. Women see it all the time .

But also, if you think of this in terms of a new ruling class, a powerful elite who wine and dine and dance with those in the highest positions of authority, who the police always believe, for whom all funding and services revolve around in a highly unequal way, who have powers under law to control and oppress, who openly demand respect, subservience, service, others knowing their place and accepting their lesser lot? That they aren't entitled to things like privacy or dignity or equality of consideration and access compared to their betters? We have a political movement where some would really like to replay Victorian times, and get to be the colonialists who destroy resources and culture to replace it forcibly with their own and punish dissenters. And re educate the children in the way that they should think and get them away from their parents and culture. And get to have privilege and power that others don't have, and to enjoy the benefits of being able to oppress and control other lesser people and require labour.

The amusing thing is that this leftist politics is the one that slams labels in your face at every museum howling about 'this has colonialist roots' and 'ohhh slavery was evil' and 'oh the appalling treatment of the working class by evil bastard white rich people' and cannot see the irony or hypocrisy in any way at all. They want to undo equality and reverse it, while telling you how much they love equality, but only if they get to be the ones who get all the benefit.

I suspect if you got the right group of people at the right moment in private, you'd have very enthusiastic agreement that women who say no to men and talk here should be in gulags, that magdalen laundries had the right idea, and yes stuff 'em all on reservations where no one has to listen to their awful views - this political movement makes a lot of fig leaf noises, but it's ethics and integrity? Is FUBAR.

Edited

Yes, all of this, particularly the colonisation part.

Colonising India = bad.
Colonising womanhood = fine.

Even the language aspect, depriving the colonised people of their own language to describe their own lives is pretty much on page 1 of the colonialist playbook.

[MrsOvertonsWindow]

A powerful article:
"Depicting working-class women as a threat to professional men, as that training video essentially does, is one of the cleverest and most sinister tricks the capitalist elite has ever played"

Depressing to see male supremacism being lauded in society in this way.

[MargotBamborough]

@MrsOvertonsWindow

A powerful article:
"Depicting working-class women as a threat to professional men, as that training video essentially does, is one of the cleverest and most sinister tricks the capitalist elite has ever played"

Depressing to see male supremacism being lauded in society in this way.

Yes, that was a really good line.

I thought the overall article wasn't as strong as it could have been and there were places where it just read like a bit of a right wing rant against woke, which is a shame because there were some really powerful lines in it.

I'd quite like to pick out the best bits and then have the article rewritten by Hadley Freeman so I could send it to my TWAW best friend.

[MargotBamborough]

@Froodwithatowel

And it's exceptionally obvious that child has absolutely no experience whatsoever of the existence of women who lack her privilege and whose life is very different to hers.

Because I doubt it's that she knows and doesn't care.

She's in her mid 30s now but she certainly behaves like a child.

I was up last night with a non-sleeping baby and I started reading the latest Cormoran Strike book which is released today.

There's a line in it about famous people being forever stuck at the age they were when they got famous and I think that is true of the rotten Harry Potter trio.

[RoyalCorgi]

This is very much a middle-class movement that has seized the opportunity to sneer at working-class people as bigoted, stupid and reactionary. I think Margot is right to draw the parallels with Brexit, though I think it's even more apparent in the trans issue. At least there were sane arguments in favour of Remain, whereas there are no sane arguments in favour of trans ideology, which is completely irrational and dangerous.

This is a good article with a similar theme. It talks, inter alia, about how the professional class bamboozles working-class people with linguistic codes that they aren't familiar with. It's behind a paywall, unfortunately, but if you can get access it's definitely worth reading:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/02/opinion/trump-meritocracy-educated.html

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Deptford Women's Project article mentioned above: https://www.feministcurrent.com/2018/03/23/leftist-women-uk-refuse-accept-labours-attempts-silence-critiques-gender-identity/ Long article, the bit about the project is in the second half.

The students concerned probably came from Goldsmiths. Let's not forget this extraordinary moment five years ago: https://www.feministcurrent.com/2018/09/12/whats-current-goldsmiths-university-lgbtq-society-defends-gulags-suspended-student-union/ 

• The Twitter account of the LGBTQ+ society at Goldsmiths University in London suggested sending an intersex rights advocate to a gulag, then praised gulags as “compassionate” places of rehabilitation and education. They were criticized by historian Anne Applebaum, and the group was suspended by the Goldsmiths Student Union.

Jaw-dropping stupidity, arrogance and naivete.

[AutumnSalad]

I saw a phrase that seemed quite apt

A playground for the privileged…

I think there are a few issues that are about privileged people, wanting to be special, wanting to control the narrative, and wanting special dispensations and its not just the transgender issue. All seem to use younger people and say ‘that if you don’t do what we say there will be terrible mental health consequences’, and they shout louder than anyone else. Louder than those suffering domestic violence, homeless, addicts, those with severe disabilities, ethnic groups and seem to think their ‘needs’ should take centre stage.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

I was listening to PM last night and they had an item about Trump's strong poll showing in the US. They were asking if the Democrats might be thinking about ditching Biden as their candidate for the 2024 election but the conclusion, I think, was it's a bit late for that now. The Primaries will start in a few months and the election is 14 months away. I can hardly believe the US would go back to Trump and yet Biden and the Democrats are quite frightening in their own way, not least because of their wholesale uncritical support for gender ideology and all it entails, even though it's resulting in troubled children and teenagers having unevidenced irreversible hormone treatment and surgery in place of counselling, therapy and other mental health interventions.

[MargotBamborough]

@RoyalCorgi

This is very much a middle-class movement that has seized the opportunity to sneer at working-class people as bigoted, stupid and reactionary. I think Margot is right to draw the parallels with Brexit, though I think it's even more apparent in the trans issue. At least there were sane arguments in favour of Remain, whereas there are no sane arguments in favour of trans ideology, which is completely irrational and dangerous.

This is a good article with a similar theme. It talks, inter alia, about how the professional class bamboozles working-class people with linguistic codes that they aren't familiar with. It's behind a paywall, unfortunately, but if you can get access it's definitely worth reading:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/02/opinion/trump-meritocracy-educated.html

Well, as I said, I was on one side of the Brexit debate and I'm on the other side of the trans debate, precisely because there were sane arguments for remaining in the EU whereas I don't think there are sane arguments in favour of gender identity theory.

When you look at how complex the EU is and all the different things it does which most people have no idea about and all the insane levels of bureaucracy involved, it seems almost unfair to expect a regular person to be able to make an informed opinion about it. We are talking about economic and social policy at a level which is beyond the comprehension of most people and it was almost impossible to, for example, warn about the potential impact of leaving the EU on the Good Friday Agreement in a way that didn't come across as batshit scaremongering to the average person, even though that ended up being precisely what fucked everything up in the end.

But the question of what a woman is shouldn't be complicated. Our shared understanding of what a woman is and what a man is goes right back to the very beginning of human civilisation. There is a lot of talk of being inclusive, but if you are going to redefine words as basic as "woman" and "man", without either the consent or the understanding of 99% of the population, you are being the opposite of inclusive.

Put simply, if the vast majority of people don't understand what it is you believe a woman is, it's because they are right and you are wrong. Not because you are clever and they are a stupid, uneducated, working class bigot.

[TarantinoIsAMisogynist]

But also, if you think of this in terms of a new ruling class, a powerful elite who wine and dine and dance with those in the highest positions of authority, who the police always believe, for whom all funding and services revolve around in a highly unequal way, who have powers under law to control and oppress, who openly demand respect, subservience, service, others knowing their place and accepting their lesser lot?

This is a massive stretch - trans is not a new ruling class. This is just about men exercising their power to oppress women, as they have done for years. Same old, same old.

Men have been the sex class with the most power for hundreds and thousands of years, and that hasn't changed.

[Desecratedcoconut]

I think in practice, trans activism is a men's rights movement but I think the free pass was built by the so called 'new elite' who use their positions within established institutions to tinker with the language in official documents, to build policies within the dynamics of their progressive values, and captured within the media to build a self congratulatory feedback loop.

Together, in a multitude of small ways, they stitch together a top-down approval for the dismantling of a sex class.

[Rightsraptor]

Billy Bragg, witch finder general of the trans ideology Twitter division. 😁

Really good article from Brendan.

[RedToothBrush]

@Toseland

I keep seeing social class being bought into this fight now - a new development - why?

Because I think it's part of it.

One of the phrases commonly used to defend the ideology is indeed "educate yourself".

It's not a coincidence.

It's deliberately designed to exclude a certain part of the population from the conversation.

Then you have the word salad. Again elitism.

And the fact it's very much being driven from Universities. And celebrity/media culture.

It's hard to argue it's NOT elitist when you start to break it down.

Women who are most affected negatively come from outside this circle and are socially and economically lower down the peaking order.

[MargotBamborough]

@RedToothBrush

Because I think it's part of it.

One of the phrases commonly used to defend the ideology is indeed "educate yourself".

It's not a coincidence.

It's deliberately designed to exclude a certain part of the population from the conversation.

Then you have the word salad. Again elitism.

And the fact it's very much being driven from Universities. And celebrity/media culture.

It's hard to argue it's NOT elitist when you start to break it down.

Women who are most affected negatively come from outside this circle and are socially and economically lower down the peaking order.

I have educated myself.

The more I educate myself the more I think it is all a load of nonsense.