Pulman again

[Pudmyboy]

In the Telegraph today, sorry I can't do links, but at least he has definitely stated his side, though his reasoning is puzzling to me:

Pullman is hard to pigeonhole, and not everybody who agrees with his stand on freedom of expression will go along with his views in the great Terf vs Trans war (“I’m in sympathy with the trans side in this quarrel because I think that’s the side of the imagination, and I’m in favour of that.”)

Imagine suggesting that kids should be able to cut off their daemon & replace it without damaging them.

@Morwenscapacioussleeves I’m a big fan of HDM, this made me so sad because it’s a very good analogy.

The “imagination” thing just pisses me off. As does any throwaway comment where someone supports TWAW because it’s boring not to… There’s this assumption that if you’re GC then you must be conservative, traditional, all twin sets and pearls. But it’s such bullshit! I’ve loved my gender non conforming circles forever (goth, alternative, etc here). I don’t want to put anyone in a box that they weren’t born in to!

I find it mind blowing that Philip Pullman would write about the Gobblers and their experiments on children, yet if he sympathises with the trans side he is on the Gobblers' side.

I guess it does take imagination to experiment on children

Well, that’s very disappointing. Especially since he’s missed the parallels between the Gobblers/Magisterium and gender ideology. Or maybe he doesn’t but he doesn’t dare upset the Far Too Invested In Fantasy brigade.

I'm almost grateful Sir Terry isn’t around to disappoint me, although I doubt Granny Weatherwax would have had any truck with gender ideology, much as Magrat would have absolutely been a Be Kind-er.

“I’m in sympathy with the trans side in this quarrel because I think that’s the side of the imagination, and I’m in favour of that.”

Torture and compulsive lying also require imagination. Is Phil on the side of those, too?

Pretty ironic that he once wrote about a group of zealots performing a painful metaphysical "surgery" on pubescent children - a surgery that traumatised them, interfered with their natural path to maturity and cut away an important part of who they were.

The zealots were the bad guys in that. But that was before it became trendy. 🙄

I get your point, however I think that is something some quite a few folk on all sides struggle with. The whole gender is a construct thing might be old news to some of us, but I hear things from people all the time that find it hard to get their heads around it completely. By "getting their head around it" I don't mean learning they shouldn't be nasty or hateful, whilst not really agreeing with it. I mean fully embracing it.

On Pullman, I'm going with the idea that he's being deliberately ambiguous. Someone who writes for a living is crystal clear ... when they want to be

The first two books of HDM were amazing. The third one went wobbly iirc.

Anyway. He's a twonk.

His 'reason' is puzzling to you because it's silly.
It probably sounded better in his head than it does in cold print.

Imagination is a wonderful thing. Trying to make everyone else accept your imaginings as reality is delusion.

I read the 'His Dark Materials' trilogy when I was on honeymoon.

He must be on the side of the 'magisterium', he's definitely a 'gobbler' otherwise he wouldn't have a vested interest in preventing puberty.

What a sell out.

What's this? Someone who works in children's publishing has considered all the arguments and gone with the one that most aligns with the children's publishing industry? What a free-thinking maverick.

Agreed 100%

He's always been marketed as the edgier alternative to JKR. So whatever she's vocal about, his PR team will advise him to say the opposite. It might even work, some of those heartbroken Potter fans may convince themselves to become Pulman fans instead. Add a few pounds to his modest takings.

That's an interesting point. And makes sense. If true means he's a truly pedestrian idiot.

😂

It's funny he claims elsewhere in the article not to like identity politics.

It seems he disapproves of identity politics when it's women, ethnic minorities or gay people asserting their identity, but he does approve of identity politics when it's men claiming to be women.

Hmm. I wonder what the difference is?

Yes, very good points!

Imagination and fantasy is fine, but you kind of need reality to pin it to. Otherwise you are just away with the fairies and it is meaningless.

I think I’m going with either

a) he hasn’t actually engaged his critical thinking skills enough to realise (as pp pint out) that he’s already written about this; or

b) he’s scared of getting the sort of response as JKR. He’s just not as brave as she is

This is what I was going to say. He's pretty much said that trans people aren't who they say they are, it's just all in their imagination!

Absolutely - it just seems like yet more evidence that he hasn’t a clue about the actual claims and demands made by gender ideology. If trans activists were happy to agree that being trans is just about “imagination” then we wouldn’t have the issues we do with surgery on minors, detransition and transition regret, loss of female-sexed safe spaces and sports etc etc.

You could argue that religion requires more imagination than atheism - atheism is very literal and tethered in reality, whereas religion requires an imaginative leap to believe things that are arguably fantastical. So on that basis, Pullman shouldn’t consider himself an atheist.