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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Guardian readers' response to Rustin piece on Phoenix v OU

61 replies

theilltemperedclavecinist · 02/02/2024 23:58

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/02/gender-critical-beliefs-under-the-microscope

Highlights:

It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected.

and

(The) prescriptive belief that genetic sex should have primacy over gender identity.... denies the validity and very existence of those with transgender identity.

Confused

Gender-critical beliefs under the microscope | Letters

Letters: Readers respond to a piece by Susanna Rustin in which she questions why women are being punished for having gender-critical views

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/02/gender-critical-beliefs-under-the-microscope

OP posts:
CuriousAlien · 03/02/2024 09:26

Ahh thanks @ArabellaScott .

So what is really being said is:
Sex is immutable and dictates gender = invalidates trans lives

And this explains a recent conversation with an intelligent friend who believed that this was the definition of "gender critical". Which as most people here would say is in fact

Sex is immutable and sometimes matters = important to protect women as members of a sex class

soupfiend · 03/02/2024 09:31

NotBadConsidering · 03/02/2024 00:08

It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected.

It’s hard to fathom whether people like this are really that stupid.

I don’t deny that trans people believe that their reality is they are of a different sex, but I don’t believe it myself and I don’t believe I should be forced to comply with their belief.

It’s really not difficult.

Well and what 'reality' is ok and what isnt. Why is the reality of anxorexics who believe they need to restrict their food/are fat/need to lose weight - not protected, why do we treat that as a mental health issue or certainly disordered thinking but not 'gender' reality

Why do we treat the reality of the serial killer or criminal who believes they're someone else or believes they can do what they want, we treat this as a MH issue or criminal issue or psychological issue that needs support/treatment/change - we dont say, yes Mr Fraudster you can take this money/open all these accounts in different names, we recognise thats your reality

Its madness

m00ngirl · 03/02/2024 09:45

"It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected."

This is the most stupid statement I have read in a long time. Where do we even start.

SinnerBoy · 03/02/2024 09:54

Holeinamole · Today 08:19

This, from the letter by F. Green, is so telling:

I noted this in her letter:

Susanna Rustin states that the women involved in recent employment tribunals were “targeted” simply for their belief, but these have serious real-world effects on real lives.

Is she so stupid, or purblind that she thinks that all those women were not subjected to sustained campaigns of illegal harassment? And bullying? Has she actually read any account of Jo Phoenix's horrible ordeal at the hands of the Open University, FFS?

TheAntiGardener · 03/02/2024 10:01

m00ngirl · 03/02/2024 09:45

"It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected."

This is the most stupid statement I have read in a long time. Where do we even start.

Well, apart from the alarming ease with which the writer is happy to discard freedom of speech, I would start with how the statement relies on imprecise concepts to make its point. Obviously, I understand in broad terms the message, but actually I don’t precisely know what is meant by “denying other people’s reality”.

What is other people’s reality exactly? Is it different from reality?
If I don’t agree with a belief (assuming this is what is meant by the above) does this amount to denying it?

The sentence makes sense apart from this nebulous phrase which is doing all the heavy lifting.

If we don’t even understand or agree on what this is, how can we assess whether it is serious enough to warrant policing speech?

But this sort of thing is par for the course in this ideology. It’s how I often find myself spotting examples of people who seem to be ardently for the cause saying things that fly in the face of its ideological underpinnings. Most people simply don’t understand the arguments when you dig into it, while a small number are consciously using obfuscating language.

ArabellaScott · 03/02/2024 10:35

TheAntiGardener · 03/02/2024 09:23

I was really hoping this might be a thread about how people’s eyes are opening. Reading the nonsense about how expressing GC views endangers people was instead like going back in time five years or so.

It’s unsubstantiated. How is it that people are still getting away with repeating this nonsense as though it were fact?

GC women can write as many finely crafted essays as they like pointing out logical inconsistencies, concerns and examples, all the while - as in JKR’s famous essay - taking pains to be clear that they wish no harm to trans people and distancing themselves from right wing bigots.

And this is the shit that comes back. It’s positively Trumpian.

There are two 'TWAW' letters and two counter views.

Given the absolute state of the Guardian's output in the past few years that's progress.

It's finally starting to permit debate.

And we all know what happens once that starts...

Brainworm · 03/02/2024 10:56

I think we are on a journey from 'no debate', to 'poor quality debate' to 'reasoned debate'......and will end up with 'no debate worth having' as everything will be put to bed - extremists with indefensible ideas who will be shouting in to the void.

Chersfrozenface · 03/02/2024 11:06

Sex in humans is binary and immutable, that is a provable, observable fact.

That is THE reality.

In the first comment quoted "other people's reality" isn't reality at all. It is perception, imagination, even delusion.

ArabellaScott · 03/02/2024 11:14

People have a right to believe delusions and state them. I'd also fight for the right of trans activists to claim there are 100 sexes and we can change sex.

The problem is suggesting nobody can express disagreement for fear of 'denying someone else's reality'.

Brainworm · 03/02/2024 11:19

There is an area of philosophy called ontology, that examines the nature of reality. It has been written about for years.

Lots of writers recognise the difference between the material/physical world and the very experiences that can come from inhabiting it.

Even the most ardent 'relativists' (those who focus on reality being subjective) tend to acknowledge the objective nature of the material world. Rather than contest this, they place emphasis on the meaning we give to material aspects. Those who don't accept this tend to end up in a nihilistic cul-de-sac.

Froodwithatowel · 03/02/2024 11:20

ArabellaScott · 03/02/2024 08:28

hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected.

It's weird how the letter writer is able to make such a spectacularly batshittily stupid statement while writing fairly lucidly and eloquently.

I always want to take twits like this one and ask whether they believe they should have legal protection from someone's reality that they're entitled to steal their car/that the car is theirs.

I feel certain we'd suddenly find that he expects reality and law to apply to him when his skin is in the game.

RoyalCorgi · 03/02/2024 11:50

m00ngirl · 03/02/2024 09:45

"It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected."

This is the most stupid statement I have read in a long time. Where do we even start.

Well, indeed. But the most obvious place to start is that we do legally protect views that deny other people's reality. For example, my view that there is no such thing as God, that Jesus didn't rise from the dead and that nobody has a soul is legally protected. That obviously very clearly denies the reality as practised by Christians. In fact, if we didn't protect views that deny other people's reality we'd be in a right old pickle.

TheAntiGardener · 03/02/2024 11:54

Yes, you’re right, Arabella. Things are a lot better than they were.

I just find the style of rhetoric where someone repeats a statement that sounds authoritative but is unclear, unproved or meaningless to be utterly frustrating.

WeeBisom · 03/02/2024 12:17

And the belief that gender trumps sex discriminates against the female sex, but no one gives a shit about that because women are expected to shut up.

Brainworm · 03/02/2024 12:17

The point about 'expressing views about other people's reality' seems to be a new iteration of denying people's reality. I guess they processed the point that no one was denying that people had those thoughts, just that they agreed with it.
Once people 'level up' from the 'denying existence' stage, the hack they need to level up again is recognising people's 'reality' is a belief system and that there are alternative/opposing belief systems that warrant respect too. The final level is achieved when they realise that it is unreasonable to expect others to partake in one's own belief based rituals!

ProtectAndTerf · 04/02/2024 08:08

ArabellaScott · 03/02/2024 10:35

There are two 'TWAW' letters and two counter views.

Given the absolute state of the Guardian's output in the past few years that's progress.

It's finally starting to permit debate.

And we all know what happens once that starts...

Quite.
Also, the sentence "the self-evident belief that biological sex and gender identity are different" did make me pause for a moment and realise they have been forced to acknowledge that sex actually exists and is relevant and must be talked about.

On a different note, I increasingly find that the striking thing about gender ideology is the way it will not accept any dissent. No agreeing to disagree or understanding why someone else might come to a different conclusion.

ArabellaScott · 04/02/2024 08:15

Brainworm · 03/02/2024 12:17

The point about 'expressing views about other people's reality' seems to be a new iteration of denying people's reality. I guess they processed the point that no one was denying that people had those thoughts, just that they agreed with it.
Once people 'level up' from the 'denying existence' stage, the hack they need to level up again is recognising people's 'reality' is a belief system and that there are alternative/opposing belief systems that warrant respect too. The final level is achieved when they realise that it is unreasonable to expect others to partake in one's own belief based rituals!

How long do you think it'll take the Guardian to catch up with processing the facts of life?

Brainworm · 04/02/2024 09:59

I think news outlets and organisations that are run by TRA's will hang on to their alternative reality for as long as they can survive and do so.

I think those who are motivated by being kind and/or worried about being seen as bigoted will flip as soon as they feel it's safe to do so.

RoyalCorgi · 04/02/2024 10:07

On a different note, I increasingly find that the striking thing about gender ideology is the way it will not accept any dissent. No agreeing to disagree or understanding why someone else might come to a different conclusion.

This has long been its core feature - hence "no debate" and so on. And the endless attempts, often successful, to hound dissenters by removing them from their jobs, reporting them to the police, removing them from speaking engagements, sending them death threats etc.

When you think about it, it's easy to see why. The whole ideology rests upon other people's willingness to accede to it. If you're gay, or black or whatever, it doesn't really matter whether other people accept gayness or blackness (in fact the very idea is absurd). But if you're a man who thinks he's a woman, your identity depends entirely on other people's willingness to go along with it. As soon as someone says, well, actually, you're a man, the whole thing goes up in a puff of smoke. A bit like the way, in Peter Pan, a fairy dies every time a child says "I don't believe in fairies."

Froodwithatowel · 04/02/2024 10:11

The whole ideology rests upon other people's willingness to accede to it.

It does.

We seem to be seeing a finally dawning realisation that the days of insisting it's against the law and people can be forced to accede are over: it doesn't stand up in court or end well for the insisters, and gets fact shamed.

This seems a last ditch appeal that nice people would selflessly enable.

Which is in fact the third spaces argument. There can be the nice gender neutral spaces where those who are willing can go and accede, and those who do not and indeed cannot consent, have their own space. There is no coercive control, there is no denial of reality, consent and access needs are respected, and ....

well. Anyone feeling deprived by that is missing a different experience. Which would be one of the ones that doesn't stand up in court.

theilltemperedclavecinist · 04/02/2024 10:26

Thank you for all your comments.

I think the 'denying people's reality' phrase might be intended to mean something more like denying their existence.

The logical conclusion, though, is that the belief that gender identity should have primacy over genetic sex denies the very existence of people with different sexes.

The Guardian has carefully selected two ideologically driven letters and two which are more practical (about medical and employment aspects). Heaven forfend that a philosophical debate should break out on the letters page, let alone below the line!

Disappointing.

OP posts:
fightingthedogforadonut · 04/02/2024 10:29

I don’t deny that trans people believe that their reality is they are of a different sex, but I don’t believe it myself and I don’t believe I should be forced to comply with their belief.

This

Chersfrozenface · 04/02/2024 10:36

I don’t deny that trans people believe that they are of a different sex, but I know it's not true and I shouldn't be forced to comply with their belief.

Their belief vs the factual, provable reality I recognise and my right not to be coerced.

WickedSerious · 04/02/2024 10:49

m00ngirl · 03/02/2024 09:45

"It is hard to fathom why expressing views denying other people’s reality should be legally protected."

This is the most stupid statement I have read in a long time. Where do we even start.

That person probably likes Crunchies,except for the yellow stuff in the centre.

ArabellaScott · 04/02/2024 10:54

I think the 'denying people's reality' phrase might be intended to mean something more like denying their existence.

In exactly the same way that expressing my atheist belief that there is no god is 'denying the existence' of Christians/Hindus/Muslims.