The Democrats Need an Honest Conversation on Gender Identity

[Ingenieur]

An interesting article in The Atlantic today, and a sign the tide might be turning in the USA.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/11/democrats-dishonest-gender-conversation-2024-election/680604/

Most voters think that biological sex is real, and that it matters in law and policy. Instructing them to believe otherwise, and not to ask any questions, is a doomed strategy. By shedding their most extreme positions, the Democrats will be better placed to defend transgender Americans who want to live their lives in peace.

Baby steps

Thank you.

Having been on these boards for many years now as it was one of the very few places even permitting discussion on what I (leftist reality based feminist, btw) could see from the outset was glaringly batshit, misogynist and deeply conservative ideology based entirely on regressively sexist sex stereotypes that I thought had been consigned to the dustbin of history decades ago. To believe in any of it would have meant leaving behind all my previous feminist principles and views about equality, fairness, democracy and reality.

The answer's still no.

Some on here may be busy disingenuously claiming they've "never seen this" or that it's a "miniscule" problem or a "culture war" recently invented by Republican or Putinist bots that us supposedly silly thick wimms have 'fallen for', but they're either outright lying or have been so dumb they've failed to pay any attention whatsoever for about a DECADE now. Given the zealotry with which the minimising attempts and demonising when that fails is happening, I'm going for the former.

Gender ideology is a non-factual belief system which is operating like a cultish, fundamentalist religion, complete with true believers, enforcers, inquisitions and punishments for heretics. Sex-realists and feminists have made some progress in helping to roll it back a little or at least questioning, over the last few years, but it's come at a cost and it's still absolutely insane how slow it is and that we are still where we are. Genderists are happily sterilising and medicalising young people for life for not adequately fitting the old-fashioned sex stereotypes they seem utterly beholden to, refuting scientific evidence, and trying to gain power in every institution in the country. Child safeguarding principles have been largely abandoned.

Women's legal rights, particularly those relating to the right to have any boundaries whatsoever against men or any spaces or services to ourselves, are being dismantled without consent or discussion with those most impacted. Rank misogyny and old fashioned patriarchy is seen as the height of "progressiveness". People who have spent lives campaigning for equality are being smeared and lied about and demonised by those who identify as"righteous" and have morally superior values. Women have bullied out of jobs, lost livelihoods and been hounded, just for stating facts or asking questions. That doesn't sound like "progressive principles" at work to me. It's something else entirely. Shame on those still pandering to it. Or pretending it's not been happening, or handwaving it away.

Don't you know that us women are incapable of thinking for ourselves?

It's even more silly to suggest that as it's a small number it doesn't matter.

If you've got a bloody, bollocking policy that allows rubbish male athletes to win money, awards, education, kudos and status in women's sport, it's not going to be a small number!

@lifeturnsonadime That is a fantastic post. Thank you.

What a great clip.

Anyone watching that will have seen how calmly and clearly the man was trying to make his point (and most will no doubt agree with it... sport safety and fairness is the easiest issue to grasp regarding gender identity belief)..... and will likely have been appalled at the way he was being shut down. Even when he offered to adapt his language to make his point he was still being shouted down as "transphobic". It really does highlight how ridiculous the situation is if the obvious problem can't be spoken about.

The shouty man just ended up sounding dictatorial. Saying that the adverts were wrong, because they called trans girls boys will sound utterly mad to everyday people, when what is clearly wrong is males playing in female sports, no matter whether they have a gender identity, a DSD or not. It's cheating, it's unsafe in contact sports and it's unfair.

Have a look at this.

https://x.com/Riley_Gaines_/status/1855115295230152824

There's a man on here who seems to genuinely think that some boys are girls. Do you think he's the only one? Or do you think he doesn't really believe this and he's lying?

I note Campbell is still trying to suggest that it only became an issue in the U.S election because it was targeted by the Republican campaign - not because voters inherently disapprove.

Yes it's disgraceful, i really think it is.

The liberal elite really do ignore women's voices. They are just not (male) important enough.

@lifeturnsonadime following on from the Alastair/Rory chat, do you listen to Ed Balls/George Osborne on their podcast? I’ve just listened to todays and they’re a bit more upfront in confronting the issue.

George Osborne stated that you can date all the problems for the SNP from their overreach on the Gender Recognition Act.

How did Ed Balls receive that? He's been a big let down on this issue, for me, being a fully signed up TWAW warrior.

No I haven't. I'm reasonably new to podcasts, which one is it? And thanks.

You're missing the point. The sleight of hand comes in the language and how you define the word woman.

The reason why women are asking politicians to define the word woman, is because they can't, all of a sudden.

These activists obviously know that humans come in two varieties. It's just that they think the biological aspect shouldn't be the categorising factor.

People should be categorised according to 'internal gender'. And that's a sense of whether or not you think you're man or a woman. And It's never explained more fully than that. Plus, if you think you can ask questions in order to flush out the lack of argument, you can't you bigot.

All driven by misogynists, cross dressing men, and various other people who benefit from eradicating sex categories.

What's Orwellian about it is if you change the language, you stop people being able to talk about it. But that change has to be forced.

And, up until now, it bloody well has been.

When the Prime Minister of our country can't tell you what a woman is, because the words don't work anymore, that's Orwellian.

This was beamed onto the ministry of Justice in London, six years ago.

'Men are women' so now the word woman is emptied of all meaning

Orwell:

War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength.

"But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought."

George Orwell, 1984

Political Currency

Thank you.

This ⬆️🎯

I'd like to see more silly people getting angry like the bloke in the Riley Gaines tweet. The more they speak, the more people will finally realise that it's OK to point out the obvious: boys who identify as girls and men who identify as women don't belong in female sports and spaces (and vulnerable, distressed children and young adults shouldn't be experimented upon with irreversible medical interventions).

#OperationLetThemSpeak

This really could be the silver lining of the Trump election victory. It's happened now, whether we like it or not. If this medical and women's rights scandal can be brought to a halt as a result of his win, that would be fantastic

Interestingly he didn’t push back much. They were talking about it in context of what can Labour and the Tories learn from the election - ie focus on the economy but don’t ignore the cultural stuff.

That's a great post Datun

This thread encapsulates why #nodebate was such a gift to extreme transactivists. When your arguments for removing women's rights and setting children and young people on a one way path to sterilisation consist of:

It's a niche issue
It's a culture war
You're victim blaming
It's just a bot
It's only a soundbite
Nobody really believes men can become women ....

The lack of any ethical, moral and intellectual justification for the bullying and intimidation involved in pushing this ideology onto an unwilling population is immediately evident.

Thank you to everyone for all the insightful, educated and informative posts that women on this board repeatedly post in response to all this

That poor, poor child. What a mess.

Edited to add- quote fail on my part. Responding to article where a child was removed from her parents, put in a hospital in a different state, then put in a group home. Gender identity aside, surely all that moving cannot possibly be in the child's best interests. Just appalling.

I think it's fascinating when politicians are asked "what is a woman?" and they try to fudge and bluster and go "um oooh ahh well it's complicated". If they are captured by the trans ideology they are busy trying to pass into law, their answer should be simple - a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman. So why don't they say that? It's almost as if they know that's utter nonsense and they'd be laughed at - but that IS what self-ID in law, and self-ID in institutions like the NHS and prisons actually means.

So many people in public life and positions of power, whether political power or smaller power, like a company's HR department, are being controlled by something they don't understand. They know (because they've been told by "training" from stonewall or self-appointed DEI "experts") that saying a woman is an adult human female is terrible bigotry and verboten and must be punished, but they don't really know why. Yet so many of them - as Robert Jenrick illustrated the other day, calling TW "trans men" - think of a trans woman as a man. Like wise Lammy with his convoluted thinking that it's not only women that have a cervix, because as far as he's able to surmise with the tiny amount of info he's attempted to cobble together, TW can have a cervix. Ergo he thinks TW are men.

This thinking is all over the place. It's not that the Democrats really think men are women (though I acknowledge some activists do convince themself of this in a metaphysical way, everyone still knows which is which and which opposite sex hormones they need). It's that everyone's running away from each other in a big circle so terrified of saying saying an un-woke thing that they can't stop to think about why they're going along with an ideology in which all discussion and questioning is banned.

I do think this conversation will start but it feels like it needs everyone involved to do a course in basic logical consistency, scientific method and stats before they even have the tools to pick apart the mess they've made.

If they are captured by the trans ideology they are busy trying to pass into law, their answer should be simple - a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman. So why don't they say that? It's almost as if they know that's utter nonsense and they'd be laughed at

Nailed it.

Exactly. If laws are passed requiring us to say we see men as women, if laws are passed that mean we cannot exclude men from anything reserved for women as long as they say they are women, if the law defines a Legal Sex that can be different to your body sex, if culture and language are forced into using the word women in a way that includes men so we cannot even talk, write or legislate about women without including men, why does it matter if actually no one really believes it? The damage to women is exactly the same.

The only place the difference between really believing men can be women and pretending to believe men can be women is significant is in the experience of the man under question. The experience of the women si the same either way.

Those who make that type of argument, based on whether the man's experience of, or belief in, his own womanhood is genuine, betray that they consider whether we are being fair to the man more important than whether we are being fair to the women.

JKR handing Alastair Campbell his arse on Twitter. She's got class.

Ooh can you provide a screenshot?

It is a growing dialogue so a screenshot wouldn't grab it.
Basically Campbell and Stewart referred to the woke issues influencing the US election outcome. And Campbell said that maybe we should give it more credence now it had been explained to him (referencing Farage).
JKR waded in to say she's pleased that now a man has explained the issue to him, he can see things from a woman's point of view.
He replies to say she's misrepresented him and he is schooled in women's issues by his wife and daughter.
(His daughter Grace is a raving troon and probably one of the reasons he gives this subject a swerve).
JKR responds 'yes I believe you' and she exhibits an unhinged anti JKR tweet from Grace.
Alastair tries to shut down the gotcha by saying he doesn't pretend to understand this issue as much as her and he would welcome her to his podcast.
Loads of comments underneath including queen Navratilova.
More importantly, Campbell et al would have happily continued to ignore this topic but that didn't work out very well for the Democrats and they now need to engage.

I would LOVE JKR to go on Leading. She would rip AC into teeny tiny pieces!