JK addresses “language policing”

[Mayyouleave]

Haven't seen a thread on this, if there is one I'll ask for this to be removed.
JK posted about language policing today.

It has started a lot of intense discussion (as do most JK posts) however this time it is mainly from women and men who are gender critical, sex realists, trans windows etc who are upset and annoyed about her post.
I agree with her about language policing, I wonder what the thoughts are on this board?

x.com/jk]]

I'll copy the text in for those not on twitter/X

*I say the following again because, while I understand people's strong views on the matter, some of the language policing is getting a bit wearing.

As I've said multiple times, I do not believe that a person can be born in the wrong body and I don't believe in gendered brains or souls. I believe the ideology that preaches such ideas is dangerous.

However, there are people in this world who want to present as the opposite sex for many diverse reasons - some of which I'm truly sympathetic to, others far less so - all of whom call themselves 'trans.' I use the word 'trans' in the full awareness that this umbrella term covers multiple groups who have nothing else in common with each other, such as straight men who enjoy cross-dressing for erotic purposes and young lesbians who, tragically, feel they'll be happier without their breasts.

When I talk about sex-based rights, I use the word 'trans' to denote 'people who wish to be seen or treated as the opposite sex', no more or less. Telling me ad nauseam that 'there is no such thing as a trans person' isn't overly helpful, because you're trying to pull me into a different argument, on which I've already made my position clear.*

Have no time to get beyond page 1 but in response to this:

JKRowling understand how there's multiple groups here with varying needs. See them, understand their needs and how we can start to reach them, rather than entrenching and making them draw closer to those using this as a tool of power for nefarious reasons.

That's ivory tower thinking. Many of those under the trans umbrella have no "needs" at all.

The have a political agenda, and have no place being treated as thought the same as people with gender dysphoria.

And claiming this is being said by someone who has a clear understanding of how to use language, is in fact irrelevant.

This is about real life happening now. What some dilitante lecture of use of language.

Has she had a memory blank.

Troubled teenagers who have difficulties maturing should in no way be put in the same group as overtly perverted adults looking for young people to exploit.

For heavens sake.

How is it okay to block out this ugly reality by being "kind" about observing the false reality of such distinct groups of people.

Finally RTFT. My takeaway is this:

Keir Starmer is completely out of his depth in how to handle everything, even with Wes Streeting having had an epiphany.

I propose he stays quiet for a bit (one of his better qualities when flip-flopping), accepts that his pre-election strategy of saying just enough to placate everyone worked to get in to government and that the grown ups should now take over.

This is a great thread with lots of fantastic contributions. Between them, Redtoothbrush and JKR have a far better grasp of what's going on and what to do about it. He can then swan back in again once they've sorted it and pretend it was all his doing.

🙄 you're kind of illustrating my point that the pedantry gets more attention than the important stuff (protecting women and children)🤷‍♂️

I still go back to labels are just labels. It doesn't affect being.

Some people are Taylor Swift fans and call themselves swifties (or something similar). Their self-made label means they recognise each other as having the same preference, but changes nothing else including their rights. They may dress differently, have tattoos or surgery to look like their idol, but they do not become what they are not. No label should change legislation.

That's what pornography means if you are an ancient Greek. It's not what pornography means in 21st century English.

In any case, prostitutes don't all consent to sex, even if you mean in the most legal sense where an adult person has agreed to sell sex. There are slaves who are prostituted.

I am doing no such thing. This is a thread discussing JK Rowling’s complaints about language policing. There’s no “greater issue” being missed by engaging with it.

On the one side, people argue against pedantry and policing of language, because ‘we all really know what is meant’, and on the other side, people argue that, no, accurate language is absolutely essential in a climate where many concessions in language has led to real world harms.

The arguments against accurate language have been that it’s mean/rude to speak accurately and truthfully, that it won’t win any arguments, friends, hearts or minds, to speak accurately and truthfully, that it’s not that important to speak accurately and truthfully, now it seems it is a petty distraction from important matters, to speak accurately and truthfully.

However, inaccurate language, such as calling men women or kids ‘trans’, sets an illogical and confusing framework to discussion. Accurate language brings that mountain-spring of goodness that wipes away all confusion - intellectual clarity. It’s too important to dismiss as pedantry.

The difference is that with children, they de facto cannot consent to sexual activity, whether they are paid, filmed or not, a crime has been committed, and they are a victim of sexual abuse.

Adults can consent to sexual activity, even though it can also be non-consenting, especially in prostitution or pornography, since money can be coercive and the links between slavery and prostitution go back, probably to its beginnings.

The fact that adults can consent is the reason that prostitution and pornography involving adults isn’t de facto criminal, or can be argued that it’s not always abusive, even if it often/mostly is.

Realised I need to frame this comment better. Here's my second attempt:

JKR has raised such an important issue because it cuts right to the heart of how to move things forward at a societal level.

At that level, we've got far more Be Kinders than any other group in the UK i.e. the majority of the population:

a) isn't really thinking about this issue much - they see it as a fringe issue
b) believes it doesn't affect them, despite the impact it's all had on free speech and women's rights
c) isn't influenced at scale by religious thinking. Obviously at an individual level plenty of religious people don't (conflate and) judge sexual orientation and gender identity as morally wrong but there are also plenty of religious people who do. This is where the difference in the UK and US populations is likely significant: according to Google, 68% of people in the US are Christians (1% are Muslim) whereas only 46.2 of people in the UK are Christians (6.5% are Muslims)
d) don't question why LGB and T have been packaged together, so don't think about why it's important to remove the conflation
e) are aware that gay people have been unfairly treated in the past and want to be a part of putting that right
f) want to live and let live

If we're going to achieve better protection for vulnerable children and young people (the people on the left-hand side in the screenshot below) and stop the erosion of women's rights (due to the actions driven by the people on the right-hand side) it's important to recognise when to stand firm on language and when to accept that doing so causes more issues than it solves.

A good example of a sensible place to stand firm is "there's no such thing as a trans child" because a) it forcloses on the outcome of therapeutic exploration (David Bell articulates this brilliantly) b) children get specific protection from harm because they are too young to make informed decisions that impact their lives c) it recognises that children have been taught by adults that everyone has a gender identity.

Obviously all the above could be said of vulnerable adults too. Especially so because the Cass Report, the announcement of the review in to adult services and the WPATH files all demonstrate that consent isn't really informed at all because of the lack of evidence base. However, the fact remains that adults will always have autonomy to make decisions about their own bodies, even when those decisions are linked to a belief; whether that's someone who believes that we all have a gender identity (and is distressed because theirs doesn't match their sex) or any other belief.

The gender dysphoria book that Sue and Marcus Evans wrote explores this distress in young people and how to support them. They unpick the "old school transsexuals" too. They do all of it without judgement and without needing to affirm or deny anyone's belief that everyone has a gender identity.

"Old school transsexuals" include people who genuinely believe everyone has a gender identity (even if some do recognise that they haven't actually changed sex), people with internalised homophobia and those who see a convenient front to indulge their fetish. And yes, it's the pushing from the activists in this group that led to the GRA mess.

However, at a societal level it's important to recognise that we can't stop people believing that everyone has a gender identity (and that it's possible for your own to differ from your sex) any more than we can stop people believing that it's possible for a human to be the son of god, born to a mother who was still a virgin at the time. It's a waste of effort to try.

Yes, language has been mangled. But JKR is more than capable of knowing when it's important to stand firm on that and when it's sometimes more helpful to use the language of the belief to make a point. The same rings true whether you're chatting to your friend or writing tweets that millions will see e.g. to make the point that males with DSDs shouldn't be in women's sports, it might be better to use "she" when talking about Caster Semenya to your friend. Or perhaps your friend says "she" and you say "he". I've been in exactly this scenario with a relative and because I was aware that my points would likely be discarded as a kind of bigotry if I used "he" and/or insisted that my relative did too. We'd never have got past that point in the conversation. As it happens, by the end my relative had recognised that she hadn't been aware Semenya had testicles, had always just assumed people were being mean and when the penny dropped said: "Oh, so she's a man!".

There have been lots of great posts in this thread but to me, the ones that stand out hugely are from Redtoothbrush because, just like JKR, Red's posts recognise the value in pushing back on the impact of the belief being enforced on society as a truth, rather than getting lost in fighting people on the tenets of their belief. Sometimes there are greater gains to be had by using a word like "trans", even when you know it's a broad umbrella, and then articulating your points. It's the substance of the argument that matters more than the words. Sadly, we've now got a government, under weak leadership from Keir Starmer, which wants to push the belief in gender identity on to our society as a truth. Articulating why this shouldn't be allowed is far more important than policing the language of the people who are doing this well. JKR is right: when someone is as informed as she is on how to articulate this, it is indeed wearing.

Accurate language brings that mountain-spring of goodness that wipes away all confusion - intellectual clarity. It’s too important to dismiss as pedantry.

I'm following this discussion with much interest and being pulled in both directions.
But, I just needed to jump in and comment on this.

To me, this statement is beautifully put, and you make a compelling argument here CherryBlossom.

I do appreciate these discussions on FWR for helping me to process amd clarify my own lines.

I noticed the reference upthread to Asperger's as a term that used to be used for a lot of people who would now simply be referred to as Autistic. I know the change happened partly because of Prof Asperger's Nazi activites later in his career (something he shared with Erwin Gohrbandt, pioneering 'sex change' surgeon and a war criminal who experimented on people at Dachau).

It was a useful term, not least because it didn't conflate people who could function in everyday life from very dependent non-verbal Autistic people. I accepted the change as being good faith and in ASD people's best interest, but now I'm questioning all these linguistic changes and wondering just what they were meant to achieve.

At the least, they seem to have contributed to a narrative that there is a right way to interact with the world (and to be a man, or a woman) that can be measured and encoded, and that everyone who does things differently is wrong and should be fixed. As opposed to just a bit odd and should be helped if possible, tolerated if not. Lots of people on both sides of my family have histories of behavior that would now raise questions of ADS and of ADHD - I used to think it was a shame they lived before that was understood. I'm beginning to wonder whether they (we, tbh) had a lucky escape.

This is unbelievably and unhelpfully pedantic, fine if you’re debating the wording of a pro-GC leaflet your particular GC group is drafting, but not if you’re trying to engage people - it’s the type of statement that has the ordinary, uninformed majority thinking that the collective GC head has disappeared up its own arse!

Also, statements such as “you give legitimacy to trans as though it names an objectively true thing, which it does not” allows TRAs to say that GCs believe “trans people should not exist”; I know it’s TRA propaganda, but society generally doesn’t, and this is where the GC cause is harmed.

I agree with you up to a point, but I think you’re misrepresenting my views (building strawmen and false equivalents is another tactic that both sides can be susceptible to - sorry, for intellectual clarity “to which both sides can be susceptible”, but you know what I meant). I have not argued against speaking “accurately and truthfully” and I’m not concerned in any way about being accused of being “mean/rude” by those offended by my GC views.

There are times when clarity of meaning is essential, we need to fight hard for the definition of “woman”, for example - but saying that “transpeople” don’t exist because, actually, technically, intellectually, pedantically, the correct term is “people-who-are-trans-identified”, doesn’t advance the GC argument in any meaningful way whatsoever. It seems that you would rather remain lost in the foothills of tedious and pedantic “intellectual clarity”, than actually guide people to the top of the hill to take in the surrounding view and the actual clarity.

This!

Particularly these comments:

JKR has raised such an important issue because it cuts right to the heart of how to move things forward at a societal level. At that level, we've got far more Be Kinders than any other group in the UK i.e. the majority of the population…
a) isn't really thinking about this issue much - they see it as a fringe issue
b) believes it doesn't affect them, despite the impact it's all had on free speech and women's rights…

And…

If we're going to achieve better protection for vulnerable children and young people… it's important to recognise when to stand firm on language and when to accept that doing so causes more issues than it solves. it's important to recognise when to stand firm on language and when to accept that doing so causes more issues than it solves…

And…

However, at a societal level it's important to recognise that we can't stop people believing that everyone has a gender identity… It's [potentially] a waste of effort to try.

And…

Yes, language has been mangled. But JKR is more than capable of knowing when it's important to stand firm on that and when it's sometimes more helpful to use the language of the belief to make a point. The same rings true whether you're chatting to your friend or writing tweets that millions will see…

And…

There have been lots of great posts in this thread but to me, the ones that stand out… recognise the value in pushing back on the impact of the belief being enforced on society as a truth, rather than getting lost in fighting people on the tenets of their belief. Sometimes there are greater gains to be had by using a word like "trans", even when you know it's a broad umbrella, and then articulating your points. It's the substance of the argument that matters more than the words…

And... for "clarity", the infographic included should be pasted to every women's toilet and changing room door.

Thanks to @BonfireLady for explaining my own position with perhaps more clarity than I was able to manage.

From what you are saying, you don’t seem to value clarity, you value progress/forward motion, even if it comes at the expense of clarity. Your idea that this leads to clarity or an overview is not supported by your argument at all.

It’s like someone saying “can you stop fiddling with that compass and get going please”, which leads people, after all their motion and efforts, round and round in circles, in the foothills of confusion. It may feel like progress, because of the efforts and the aches, but it is just a lot of wasted time going sideways.

Vagueness, inaccuracy, saying “fuck it that will do”, does not lead to ‘actual clarity’.

❤️

Yours have been some of the fantastic posts on this thread too.

I realised I had done a terrible job of giving clarity on my position the first time I tried. The dangers of an abridge too far 😁 I'm relieved that my second attempt actually made sense!

When I wrote my initial response after RTFT it was as a result of taking thoughts that I already had and blending them with some of the excellent comments on here. Clearly I forgot the bit where you show the class your working out... and ended up with a post that looked like it should be on a different thread entirely. D'oh 🤦‍♀️ This is such a great thread. It's fantastic to have so many people sharing their views and experiences on subjects like this.

And... for "clarity", the infographic included should be pasted to every women's toilet and changing room door.

What I really like about this cut down version is that it allows people in the Be Kind majority to work out how they might have been accidentally acting as an umbrella holder (the larger version of the graphic has the umbrella holders underneath) without them having to immediately feel blame/guilt and the temptation to square off their own conscience to themselves. It's a part of the human condition that if we realise we've done something that might have harmed someone, we can sometimes cling on to the idea that we might not have done it or there's some other explanation (even if we know we did - that pit in stomach moment).

I've expanded on that graphic versus the full one on a different thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/5181391-12-ways-to-gently-respectfully-challenge-pro-trans-arguments?reply=138970468&utmcampaign=reply&utmmedium=share

Again, with the false analogies. You can't see the woods because the trees are obscuring your view. Ordinary (currently non-GC) people get bored with your repetitive, tedious refusal to acknowledge that we are where we are, and they switch off from engaging with the very thing you are trying to clarify. In your tortured analogy, they say "Fuck it, I don't want to hear about who invented the compass, or why it's called a compass, or precisely how a compass works, can you please just shut the fuck up and tell me where we're going, otherwise I'm heading back to the peace and quiet of the car!" 😂

I was developing your analogy of a view from a peak.

Yes, you can’t be bothered with accuracy, yes, you don’t want to think too hard about what you are saying or where it will lead, yes, you are not alone in this, and this, is why we are where we are.

I remember aeons ago, I used ‘assigned at birth’ as a way to speak about the sex of people who identify as trans - I wasn’t really thinking about what the word ‘assigned’ was literally claiming, it was just the parlance at the time. I later realised how stupid it was. Making linguistic concessions like that ‘because everyone knows what I mean’, can lead to the shadow secretary of state for women and equalities claiming that human beings are born without a sex. https://uk.news.yahoo.com/labour-mp-dawn-butler-child-born-without-sex-150324736.html

Accuracy is everything.

Again, you conflate things, and it's disingenuous to say I can't be bothered with accuracy.

I've thought long and hard about these issues, which is why I'm now GC from a position of "meh, what's the harm". This is thanks, mainly, to JKR, Maya Forstater, Helen Joyce, Kathleen Stock, and others being brave enough to challenge the TRA ideology (often in ways, and with language that is respectful of those most vulnerable under the trans umbrella). Alienating people who aren't really pro-trans, but who just don't care that much won't help the GC cause.

Others (society in general) "don't want to think too hard", which is why your approach turns people off. It's worth quoting my own earlier comment... "saying that “transpeople” don’t exist because, actually, technically, intellectually, pedantically, the correct term is “people-who-are-trans-identified”, doesn’t advance the GC argument in any meaningful way whatsoever".

I don't object to the notion that we should provide clarification when necessary, but we must engage people first, we can't provide clarity if people aren't listening, and your insistence that, essentially, "trans people don't exist" sounds intransigent and unflinchingly ideological - you can try to explain why you feel that "trans people don't exist", but most will interpret your explanation as splitting hairs.

Something we can agree on perhaps? That mealy-mouthed politicians of all persuasions pandering to what they think is popular opinion has allowed TRAs to blur the meaning of language to promote their harmful ideology, while the majority of us didn't notice and/or weren't particularly invested? (I suspect that we perhaps do agree on more than our engagements on this thread would suggest 😉).

JKR, MF, HJ and KS haven’t been speaking about these issues for very long. It has been those people before them, who refused to compromise on language who really turned things around. Although JKR has been amazing, using her status as ‘too big to be cancelled’ to elevate MF and the arguments more generally - an enormous contribution, pushing through the censorship barriers. Also Elon Musk has been incredible, taking back twitter. These brave people have been wonderful, using their power and status to normalise the arguments.

The arguments were thrashed out diligently before they were elevated by the big names though. Just because you weren’t there to witness it, doesn’t mean it wasn’t essential.

Up to a point. But Dawn Butler saying something so, so silly like this has woken me up to the importance of not assuming a logical, sensible mind in another person, just because they have the grit to become a long-standing politician, or have found themselves in another position of power and authority.

There truly is a danger in assuming ‘sensible-minded’ people will know what I mean’ when using language to placate your opponents.

Although KJK is a controversial figure, it was her uncompromising use of language, making that ‘her thing’, which got through to Kiera Bell. Kiera Bell then woke the world up to the lack of proper care and the brutal, harmful treatment of ‘gender-confused’ youth that was happening behind all the obfuscating language elsewhere.

The arguments were thrashed out diligently before they were elevated by the big names though. Just because you weren’t there to witness it, doesn’t mean it wasn’t essential.

Yes.

I suspect that we perhaps do agree on more than our engagements on this thread would suggest 😉

Me too.

Going back to the compass analogy, there are some fundamental principles to iron out first:

1. where are we going? - Do we need to convince everyone that sex is immutable? How much does that matter as a goal? Could the goal instead be to stop the enforcement of the belief that "we all have a gender identity" in law, education, hospitals, workplaces etc?
2. recognition that most people who need to come on the journey to achieve the goal have no idea that the proposed destination exists or why it would be a good idea to go on the journey
3. there are people actively trying to stop people getting to the destination by saying it's a pointless place to go or will be somewhere that causes vulnerable people harm etc.
4. it's impossible for everyone to get to the destination together - we wouldn't all fit on the path at the same time and there would be too many navigation arguments

So we'll need a mix of people. We'll need some who are going to just set off with a map without checking the compass bearings. They'll articulate why the destination is a good idea with very little detail but they'll definitely get some people moving. Some of those will have good directional intuition and/or know that it'd be a good idea to stay in regular contact with those who are doing a bit more prep.
Others will stay back a bit and check that the compasses are working properly and that there are enough to go round.
Some will be want to ensure everyone stands the best chance of keeping a working compass with them all the way to the destination so that enough people make it there properly and don't end up somewhere else but believe that they've made it. They'll explain the mechanics of the compass in detail so that enough people know how to recognise when one is broken and how to fix it.

In other words there's no "right" or "wrong" way as long as we've got enough of a consensus on where we're aiming, people are aware that they're going on a journey (even if they have no idea why other than it seems like a reasonable idea) and we get enough people arriving there.

Some will wander off the track and never make it, some will get distracted by people who want to sabotage everything and not realise they've wandered off elsewhere - because they never fully understood why they were on the journey in the first place. To minimise this, we can't just assume that everyone who sets off first is going to go wrong or that we all need to know exactly how the compass it built in case one needs fixing. We need all different types of people approaching this in all different ways. If we spend too much time agreeing the rules of how we're going to get there, we'll have too many people who never saw the point of the journey in the first place and saying .."tell me where we're going, otherwise I'm heading back to the peace and quiet of the car!"

I would suggest that perhaps the people that are so anxious about clarity (me included) are those that have seen the linguistic sleights-of-hand and how they have led to people unquestioningly accepting nonsense phrases, then changing their actions based on those.

Some of these people might well change their minds and language once this has been, well, clarified.
Others, as they say, didn't reason themselves into the position so won't reason themselves out of it. They've genuinely 'felt the feeling' - perhaps the feeling of guilt and sadness at how gay people have been treated in the past, perhaps the nice feeling of "feeling kindly" ( a great K Stock piece I think). Those feelings won't change unless other feelings come along.