Caitlin Moran discusses her absence from the trans debates

[MotherEarthisaTerf]

20 mins and 30 seconds in

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001zlw2?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

The difficulty is in using broad band derogatory labels to cut people out of your life is that those labels now lack clear definition or shared understanding.

E.g.;

A) A racist might now be someone who is hateful and discriminatory towards other races or it might be someone who is concerned about immigration, thinks white fragility is a bullshit dangerous concept or who let's their non Pacific native child wear a Moana costume.

Or

B) Homophobia might now be someone who hates and attacks gays or it might be someone who dislikes pride parades, thinks it shouldn't be taught to very young kids in schools or who holds the view a marriage is between a man and a woman.

Just like

C) Transphobia might be hatred of trans people or now also people who think the lgb is seperate to the T, or that biological sex is immutable or that the GRA should be repealed.

If you find yourself cut out of people's lives because you've taught them that's it's acceptable to do that for anything now considered under the broad band terms in A) and B) then you really shouldn't be surprised when you get caught in the very trap to taught them when you fall under the broad band terms in C).

It's reductive dangerous thinking.

@MalagaNights Did you miss me talking about nuance? Maybe you did. Hey ho.

Incidentally, I find the your post worryingly close to the "You can't say anything any more" school of thought. A short step from "it's only banter"

Very much this. I'm broadly supportive of people identifying how they feel most comfortable and in the spectrum of human experience it makes sense to me that there are people who think and experience life more like another gender than their birth one. I'm also concerned that current gender ideology is regressive in some ways, because what does it mean to be a woman or a man? I'm more gender nonconforming in an old school sense, but think if I was young now I'd be experiencing a lot of social influence to identify as trans or nb. I think trans people have always existed and exist across cultures, but I'm also not convinced as many people are "truly" trans as identify as such in the Western world today, so I could believe there is some social contagion at play.

I'd get eviscerated for these thoughts at work and with a lot of my friends but they're also hardly aligned with gender critical feminism, and I feel the main concerns from that camp are overblown and quite often driven by bigotry or ignorance.

I feel a lot of people are in the middle ground, in reality, but don't feel comfortable discussing the full range of their feelings on the subject.

I don't believe in a "birth gender". A baby is neither masculine nor feminine. She is female or he is male, and neither is so as a result of anyone's perception, including their own (hardly surprising at that age). I suppose that some babies are "given a gender" in some sense, if stereotypes are imposed on them. Eventually their own personality will emerge.

No, but its quite a small community. People tend to go to the same events. I can only speak of my otherwise quite bold home educating friends who are genuinely conflicted and worried about being kicked out of a social network, and access to resources, that is very important to them and their kids. I don't have those fears with my kids in school and my kids aren't getting TWAW messages from their peers or teachers, nor are they witnessing their peers organise rallying mobs to intimidate GC adults.

'gender critical feminism, and I feel the main concerns from that camp are overblown and quite often driven by bigotry or ignorance.'

What do you think gender critical feminism means?

You can also give your students a real education rather than what passes for it these days in school. Which helps a lot with making it possible to engage with differernt ideas

And sorry, but this is not what I have witnessed in the home ed community. Parents, quite understandably, pass on their own views and perspectives to their kids, with their kids not having exposure to the wider range of views they may have access to at school. Some parents choose home ed for this exact reason. I know someone who took her son aged five out of school when the school refused to socially transition him. Her son now has no influences or avenues through which to question whether or not he is the girl his parents are telling him he is. And he is being educated in a home ed environment which is infused with this GI shit.

If parents think taking their kids out of school will mean they can escape GI they may find exactly the opposite.

but they're also hardly aligned with gender critical feminism, and I feel the main concerns from that camp are overblown and quite often driven by bigotry or ignorance. I feel a lot of people are in the middle ground, in reality, but don't feel comfortable discussing the full range of their feelings on the subject

I'm with @ArabellaScott What do you think GC feminists think? The last time I heard someone saying that their research shows most of the public take the middle ground, not GC position, he also said that the public were happy for men to present as women but that they shouldn't be in women's sports and prisons etc. ( I think this was the Common ground organisation set up in memory of Jo Cox). And I thought, what on earth do you think GC feminists think? That IS our position!

So I'm curious as to what your middle ground position is and what you think the GC position is?

I am gender critical in the sense that I believe that gender is a a social construct that either intentionally or accidentally works to place women in a subservient position to men.

There may be other interpretations. Please correct me if I am wrong but I will need to see your working.

Well, yes, of course you can give a child a shitter education.

Or a significantly better one.

The one isn't related to the other, it isn't ike state education where they have any kind of standard policies or curricula or anything like that. Two different families can be completely radically differernt in how they approach education.

Most schools aren't exposing kids to differernt ways of thinking, that's the problem we're seeing. It's all very of the moment.

Did anyone see this from The Sunday Times?

Students can’t converse with people who disagree with them, says Ivy League chief
The president of Dartmouth College in America says social media is harming students’ ability to interact in real life

Link via Apple News, hope there's no paywall:-

apple.news/Az2l8dGNLR5C-FysdE0-s-w

Thought it covers a few bits upthread and I've been thinking this myself quite a lot recently.

Also, a conviction among people proliferates that "the other side" are brainwashed by what they read on SM etc but not entertaining the fact that they themselves are susceptible.

Students can’t converse with people who disagree with them, says Ivy League chief

Same could be said for many posters on this sex and gender branch.

"Students can’t converse with people who disagree with them, says Ivy League chief"

There's a lot of it about.

That’s not true though, is it?

Posters here can converse with those they disagree with- no one refuses to engage or says “no debate” - it’s just nothing anyone who believes in gender identity says is convincing enough to change minds.

@ApocalipstickNow
"Posters here can converse with those they disagree with"

Well, apart from the ones who tell me that it's my own fault I have TWAW children because I am intolerant of racists and homophobes and choose not to have them in my life!in my life!

I'm not surewhy my post 'worries' you that I'm 'close' to saying anything goes as 'banter'??

None of my examples were about 'banter' they were about people's opinions.

Are you insuating I'm fine with racism?

I'll add to earlier post to say that the notion of 'cuttiing out' close relatives because of opinions they hold that you don't like is a very recent form of moral standgranding. I think it's having toixc and negative impact on families and individuals abilty to navigate conflict and difference.

Anyone who subsribes to the 'cutting out for wrong opinions' mantra and teaches their children this is the moral way to live your life should not be suprised if/when they themselves fall foul of the wrong opinions category and receive the sanction they have taught is appropriate for this.

(What else did they think would happen? They'd always have the right opinions? Because they're such good people? Only ego maniacs would believe that to be true. I actually can't think of a more dangerous belief you could have than: I am good person and always right.)

This is not a comment on your parenting @CurlewKate because I don't know the 'nuance' of your life.

It is a comment on the general point made earlier in the thread about CM and her kids, others who feel they are supressing ther views in fear of their kids 'cutting them out' and the obvious phenonmenon that is occuring here.

It's a sign that something is very wrong with our cultiue and child rearing.

Oh, and I don't engage in or condone racist banter so no need for you to 'worry' about that anymore.

Yeah, not sure where talking about your views on a subject is "banter" even if it's about race.

But - there is no question that I come from a background that would feel really uncomfortable bantering about many social issues.

My partner, who is working class and black - he is very inclined to banter about such things, as are a lot of the guys he has typically worked with. It seems to be pretty much totally socially acceptable across race.

I definitely think there is a significant class element to the sense that banter is wrong somehow.

Well yes Home Ed does mean that parents can choose to educate their children with the perspective they wish. For some that might mean basedarounbd a particular ideology, for others it might mean a broader more classic liberal eductaion that the state system is lacking in.

Some can bring their children up with GI if they wish, and I think anyone wantng to do so homeecuation is the appropriate aveneue for this because it should not be in schools.

I think home ecuation communities are developing around several different positions in oppostion to what schools are currently teaching. I think that's a good thing. Parents can have more control and form communities, and even then probaly their own schools which provide what they want for their children when the state offreing doesn't.

I don't blame her. These people have shown themselves to be totally unhinged. They have attacked, have killed and have used vandalism to get people to shut up and with succes.

I have a great deal of admiration for JK Rowling for her contributions to this issue, however I can't fault any woman for sitting this one out. Why should they carry a torch and paint a target on their back for us bunch of anonymous, internet randos, who feel safe to speak with our keyboards, but who would not stand up publicly and declare our views at work, let's say.

Many of us can't afford to. But even if we could, is it really worth it? This issue still needs to acquire a critical mass of dissent. It will and then a lot of people will speak up publicly and that will do far more than individual women who literally put their own lives on the line right now.

@MalagaNights "
"Are you insuating I'm fine with racism"

Obviously I assume not. But you do seem to be saying (I may be misunderstanding) that we should be accepting of any views, however abhorrent, and that it never right to decide that you want nothing more to do with a person because of their views.

You seem to be saying....

Nope. Not what I'm saying.

But none of that is blocking or deleting your posts, it’s still talking even if that is a disagreement.

The point is anyone can discuss with anyone. People engage even if the views are polar opposites.