Peter Tatchel talking utter nonsense.

[Alucard55]

I have just watched the trailer.....

Wow. I'm looking forward to it already.

There is very little I think is good about Peter Tatchell, but I'll give him this: he's brave. I can respect the fact that he holds a belief that we all have a gender identity. I can take it at face value that he really does have a genuine belief.

However, I don't share his belief.

I'm also very sceptical that some people feign a belief for their own gains. Much like the Catholic priest scandal of recent years.

To clarify, the analogy above is simply about a) someone demonstrating/announcing to the world that they have a belief i.e. they hold something to be true (e.g. that god is the father, that we all have a gender identity). They say all the things you would expect to hear from a believer and b) in truth their belief is either very shallow or not really there at all. It's just a convenient front behind which a nefarious actor can hide.

Obviously not all Catholic priests etc etc. But also obviously, nobody can tell the difference between a believer and a feigner until they see clues/patterns or after someone has already committed an offence.

The thing that annoys me about Tatchel is that during media debates he is often given more up to date or correct information about legislation (or about things like the Cass Review or sports science) and, even if he deigns to acknowledge that there might be some truth to this new information in that debate, in the next debate he completely resets back to factory settings and just continues on repeating the same factually incorrect things he was saying previously with no acknowledgement that he ever in his life heard anything to the contrary.

It’s like information that he doesn’t like just bounces off his skull and never gets assimilated 🤷‍♀️

He also tries to present his faith-based views as objective facts, and again ignores factual counter arguments (eg his daft arguments about tiny or skinny men being fine to compete in women’s sport).

He’s the queer theory equivalent of a creationist or flat earther and I’m not sure he brings anything to the public debate for either position because he’s very much ploughing his own weird wee furrow with a cobbled together mish mash of talking points 🤔

It's a day ending in Y, after all.

I'm also very sceptical that some people feign a belief for their own gains.
Yes, I often wonder this, (especially with Tatchell).

I wonder how long the Youtube economy for blokes exploiting GI can hold up.
Theres so many of them now.

I wonder if there is a strange middle ground, where bad actors cling on to something as a belief at the most basic level - even when they don't really believe it - because it's the only way they can justify who they are to themselves.

I'll try and explain myself better.

The thought first occurred to me when I watched the BBC Jimmy Savile drama (it's excellent) with Steve Coogan. The jarring disconnect between Savile's very unchristian actions and his desperate need for validation from the priest during confession was fascinating. He was sharing some of his dark thoughts with the priest but also desperate to hear that god was there for him. Obviously it's very possibly just artistic licence but it gave some food for thought.

When someone has dark thoughts (such as a paraphilia, or multiple paraphilias - Savile's multiple ones and how this changed over time are explored in the drama, albeit briefly) they are unlikely to want to think of themselves as unpalatable to the world. Obviously they don't care about what others think on some level and most of what they probably care about is feeding their narcissism and/or nefarious desires. But deep down, I should imagine everyone has the need to be at peace with themselves, otherwise you're completely rudderless and wouldn't be able to pass off as "normal" at a societal level. We all anchor onto our own core values and hold ourselves to those standards. Sometimes this incorporates outside beliefs or crosses over with them (I'm an atheist but I used to believe in god and some of my core values trace back to those days).

I'm no psychologist but I'm guessing there's some form of self-gaslighting that kicks in. To the point where everything is "ok" if you can centre it on your feigned belief. Maybe then your feigned belief starts to feel more "real". You know you're faking what you're saying and doing - going through the motions - but you're so well practised at it that you internalise enough of it as true.

I wonder if it might help someone to reconcile how someone can know their behaviour is not remotely Christian but they can still trot out all of the Christian things that people are meant to say. And be completely at peace with this disconnect. Or in the case of gender identity belief, they know that when undeniable facts are thrown at it (e.g it is undeniable that sex and gender identity are not the same thing - and that this means one is a physical reality and the other is something you carry in your head as a concept) they can concede it but then the flip switch kicks in and they are back to trotting out all of the things that those who truly believe in gender identity would say.

So eventually what they actually believe and what they pretend to believe get a bit muddled up. Nothing is ever real for them but they can anchor on to it just enough to function and seem "normal" when actually, their paraphilia(s) never really switches off and they are always planning how to indulge it or already secretly doing so (possibly while hiding in plain sight).

If someone gets a high enough profile, they don't even have to care if most of what they say doesn't make any cohesive sense, to anyone else or to themselves. Or if it's never the same as what they said previously. It's all totally fluid, allowing them to sound "reasonable" and "engaged" in the moment.

It all reminds me of buying 'indulgencies'.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/indulgence

I watched it. Tatchell seems to have a real blind spot. His blind spot is that he doesn't actually accept that women are real human beings. For him, women seem to simply be props to validate the identity of deluded males.

He's not even consistent in his description of what he thinks a gender identity is. Straight after saying that it was nothing to do with stereotypes, he told Andrew Gold that he had a male gender identity because he was dressed in a stereotypically male way.

But he doesn't seem to believe what he's saying either. He becomes hesitant and shaky talking about gender stuff compared to his tone at the beginning when he's talking about his early campaigning work for gay rights and minority groups.

I enjoyed this interview, I like Andrew Gold, has lots of interesting people on his podcast. Fair play to Peter Tatchell for going on, he knew he'd get challenged but it was all very calm and respectful. I'm sure Tatchell knows he's wrong about this but self interest means he's pretending to believe. Looked like hard work at times, the way he kept denying things are happening straight after being given clear evidence they are.

I absolutely love this explanation.

I thought he was quite contradictory at times and found a lot of what he said frustrating. I agree with a PP that he doesn't care for women. Arguing that men who identify as not men are at risk of violence from men if they were to use the male toilets, but not seeing the hypocrisy that women would then be at risk if these men were to access the female toilets. On the one hand he's making a point that men are the violent sex but on the other hand they "just want to pee".

I thought Gold was spot on in asking if men can't access female only spaces why should acceptions be made for some men. These men may view themselves as not men but (most?) women do not. However, Tachell seems to believe there is a distinction between men and men who identify as not men. I'd like to know his advice on how we can tell the difference.

I genuinely think there are some people who just don't get it and/or don't care for girls and women.

...and birds go tweet! At least he's consistent, I suppose.

So over this guy getting a platform, and youtubers using him for clickbait.
Make him irrelevant and investigate him.

I could only stomach half of it. Him saying it wasn't about stereotypes, then saying Andrew Gold had a male gender id because of his clothes!

Credit to him for showing up I suppose.

…Him saying it wasn't about stereotypes, then saying Andrew Gold had a male gender id because of his clothes!

Honestly, this statement is Tatchel showing the reasoning level of a young child: studies have shown that before the age of 7 or so children think that wearing certain clothes is what makes someone a man or woman.

One doesn’t expect this type of limited reasoning from adults….but, still, we keep encountering it 🤷‍♀️🙈

One of the most unexpected discoveries for me during the last few years of following this is quite how many really stupid people there are, and a surprising number of them have a platform, or are in positions of power and responsibility. I watch or listen to them and think, you can't actually be that stupid? But they are! Boggling.

Love all the thoughtful analysis, but the guy is just a self-seeking, thick twat who likes the sound of his own voice even when he knows he is talking complete bollocks. It’s as simple as that.

As if a man would go through the whole ordinance of priesthood to gain access to children 🙄

That bit was really bizarre. He's determing how a person identifies based on their appearance but if we call a quite obvious man a man then we are misgendering.

Thank you @QuickMember and... phew! I've had that thought trying to form itself in my head ever since I watched the TV programme. I'm glad I was able to articulate it in a way that made sense when I finally got it out.

Agreed @RainWithSunnySpells The human condition is a funny thing. Sadly a shared belief leaves space for bad actors to bend society to their will, hide in plain sight and have their behaviour accepted as righteous. This very much links to Andrew Gold's point (also said by many others) that we shouldn't change laws that uphold the values of a belief system. It ends up giving people rights that allow them to justify what they are doing under their belief - and not everyone shares their belief.

I've watched it now. He contradicts himself continuously and he repeatedly says "we mustn't generalise"... then he generalises.

Him saying it wasn't about stereotypes, then saying Andrew Gold had a male gender id because of his clothes!

Yup. Yet he says that nobody should tell anyone else what their gender identity is or isn't.

Also he said that it was absolutely right that any young person who attends a gender clinic needs to have a proper assessment first to understand if anything else was going on, because it's a major medical intervention.... then he says it's appalling that anyone would interrogate a young person and not believe them about their gender identity (i.e. nobody should tell anyone else what their gender identity is or isn't).

He's conflated everything in to such a muddle that he doesn't seem to understand what is coming out of his own mouth. I think his core belief is that gay people should be allowed rights and freedoms to be themselves. Everything else that he says on this topic is a conflation that projects from it. Maybe he believes we all have a gender identity, maybe he doesn't. His constant self-contradiction makes it impossible to tell, so I'll take it at face value that he believes it (just as many religious people hold contradictions continuously e.g. immaculate conception vs the biology of reproduction).

Andrew Gold did a great job with the questions in this interview. I'm relieved that there weren't any questions about the age of consent. I applaud what Peter Tatchell has achieved in the past for gay rights but sadly he just doesn't seem to know when to stop being progressive and put hard boundaries in to law. Society can't function in the way that he advocates under his top down generalisation that everyone should have the freedom to do everything and it should be looked at case by case. If we don't have hard boundaries in law (by sex, age etc) we will gravitate towards governance under a belief system, where the bad actors have risen to the top and get to make all the rules that define how we behave - which loops back to the "indulgences" link from RainWithSunnySpells.

Is it worth watching to the end? About 5 minutes in and it’s already irritating in listening to his inconsistencies and misrepresentation. If only he’d stuck to being an advocate for gay people, he’d have been on strong ground.

I couldn't watch beyond the first half, my TV might have borne the brunt if I'd continued.

He positions himself halfway; he agrees sex, as in biology, exists but also gender ID. Did Gold ask him which trumps the other? He seems vehemently protective of trans 'rights' yet, as a gay man, that orthodoxy means he should consider a transman as a sexual partner. Is he ever questioned on that and not permitted to wriggle off the hook?

I managed about 3 minutes, by which time my eyeballs had rolled so far that they fell out of my head and I had to stop the video so I could crawl around on the floor feeling for them.

😂😂😂😂😂 I just snorted out loud.

He seems vehemently protective of trans 'rights' yet, as a gay man, that orthodoxy means he should consider a transman as a sexual partner. Is he ever questioned on that and not permitted to wriggle off the hook?

This is implicitly covered @Rightsraptor and the answer is that he wriggled out of it. Nobody should ever tell anyone who they should or shouldn't be attracted to etc. It was right back to his ironic "let's not generalise by putting in arbitrary boundaries" generalisation of how everyone should live their lives.

If only he’d stuck to being an advocate for gay people, he’d have been on strong ground.

Yep. The continuation of the progression of rights with no boundaries was initially limited to his advocacy for lowering the age of consent (his infamous letter to the Guardian, that chapter in that book, that video interview etc) and has extended to advocating for gender identity belief to be the basis upon which policies are made. I'm proud to think of myself as a liberal and I'm certain that some of the things I support will be considered "woke" by others - I never use that word myself as one person's woke is another person's reasonable. But I'm also glad I uphold boundaries when they are there for a reason. Two key reasons for me:

1. The reality of sex (male/female) is as important as the line between child and adult when making laws to keep everyone in a society safe from would-be bad actors, focused on achieving this before they do the bad act as much as possible.

2. nobody's belief should ever give them rights that take rights away from someone else who doesn't hold that belief. Andrew Gold refers to this several times in the interview, as do many other people who explain rights as a pie etc.

I'm going to have to turn it off. He's too annoying. Dunno if Andrew Gold knows about tatchell's paedophilia apologies.