Kathleen Stock - "These people are just a bit thick"

[Another2Cats]

So, Kathleen Stock has just made her views on people like Joylon Maugham et al known.

She started off with a tweet that said:

"Never mind the serious reputations, the accents, the swagger, the BBC connections, the Guardian column, the KC status, the rave book reviews, or whatever it is - like no other issue, trans ideology shows up people who are really quite stupid."

Which, not unsurprisingly, got a lot of replies. Some in support and some defending these people.

In reply to those defending these people she then had this to say. It's a different take on how to approach the argument. Don't know if I entirely agree:
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I never do a long post but first time for everything. Lots of lively comment on my "they are just quite thick" explanation of Establishment transactivism capture (proposed hashtags #itsthestupidstupid #makeidiocymortifyingagain).

Also, some alternative explanations being proposed. I suppose my conclusion is: it doesn't matter if they really ARE thick, or just pretending/left-brained/lost in a cult/cosseted from the consequences/ smart in a way that makes them susceptible to motivated reasoning.

Having spent best part of six years (FML) arguing patiently with these people, a) I am not convinced of the more charitable explanations for notable characters, and b) either way, I don't care any more. If it walks like a moron, talks like a moron, it is – for all relevant purposes– a moron, and we should say so.

So for instance (just a small selection from timeline today):

• if you think transwomen (men) are to women what step-parents are to their children YOU ARE A MORON (think it through to the end: when was the metaphorical marriage? wtf is "womaning" as a verb? Wearing kneesocks?)

• If you think you can't know your own sex because you haven't seen your chromosomes YOU ARE A MORON (if that is the burden of proof, how do you personally know you have a brain?)

• If you think that the Supreme Court should have "consulted trans people" about their "lived experience" while interpreting existing law YOU ARE A MORON, this is not what courts do; and for good reason - how would it be workably scaled up?

• If you base your glowing view of trans ideology on what your daughter at private school and all her mates tell you (it doesn't affect us, Dad, why can't they just be kind?), then YOU ARE A MORON. What kind of general epistemology is that, exactly? You seem to be confusing having 360 degree insight into the intersection of law and social reality with them being able to use the remote better than you can.

I see so many people on here trying to shame the likes of Maugham, Campbell, Stewart, Harman (insert your most annoying establishment shill for transactivism here) on the grounds of their ethical failures and inability to empathise with vulnerable or respect basic fairness norms. It is hopeless. These people are utterly convinced of their moral rectitude, they automatically take disagreement as a sign of the limited mindset of their opposition.

We should forget all that, and hit them where it hurts: in the ego. THESE PEOPLE ARE JUST A BIT THICK. They are promoted way above their station, have blustered through on their accents, educations, and connections, and now the tide is going out, we can truly see who is naked. Let's learn from this, and never trust their so-called expertise on any other matter again.

https://x.com/Docstockk/status/1917165815339589823

Yes, it has been wall to wall wilfully shallow arguments in the media since the SC. So many disingenuous people out there desperate to miss the point.

We have decades and centuries of research available so there are no excuses.

How brilliant. She's not wrong, is she?

She is bang on. Dangerous, arrogant fuckwits.

Thank you for that! Invaluable service xx

And before the SC ruling too.

I guess the difference is that before the ruling, the police, employers, etc thought Stonewall law was law, so none of us could express what we really thought without potentially dire consequences.

So we had to tie ourselves in knots to argue against patently obvious stupid and bad faith arguments without being able to call them out as such, which is why it took professional philosophers such as KS to speak out on our behalf. She had to choose her words incredibly carefully despite our all being able to see the truth - that gender woo is nonsensical.

Whereas now, people are free to say the quiet part out loud, as the police can’t exactly arrest us for saying what the SC has ruled as bloody obvious.

Oh I fucking love Kathleen Stock sometimes! Thanks for sharing. What a cathartic read.

Given what she's gone through, I think she's earned the right to stop being polite to people when they're being twattish.

"The thing is, you don’t have to agree."

Oh, don't get me wrong, I would love the opportunity to tell, say, Owen Jones to his face "You're really quite thick, aren't you?"

But whether that would actually achieve anything I really don't know (except for giving me a bit of satisfaction).

But maybe that really is the only thing that will goad some of these people into having a reasoned argument?

She has a point.

I heard her on PM talking to Evan Davies saying something like "I can remember thinking, if I can just explain to people, then they will realise what's going on." That was years ago and like the rest of us she ran out of fucks to give a long, long time ago.

Thanks so much for posting this. I’ve been worrying about all this stupidity and how women’s rights will be ignored… for sure debate needs to happen but now if someone talks utter tripe theres no need to get embroiled - just roll out the hashtags:
#makeidiocymortifyingagain
#itsthestupidstupid

brilliant!

but I would tend to take the Michelle Obama tack: 'We go high'.

And how's Obama's team doing at the moment? No, fuck 'em. They don't play fair, or honest. Doc Stock is bang on, as usual.

I disagree.

'We go high' didn't work out well for the Democrats in the US - it allowed Trump to get away with all sorts of outrageous behaviour with his lies and attempts at insurrection.

You have to fight dirt with dirt in my opinion!

I get the anger, of course. I just don't want to be seen hurling insults.

I'm happy to hurl insults at people who hurl insists at me and even worse think I should be raped/hung/murdered because I don't agree with their nonsense.

I think KS is correct, some people are just wilfully stupid and should be called out on their idiocy, especially when it affects others so much.

I know it's a minority opinion on here but I don't agree with using the words 'thick' and 'stupid' about people you don't agree with. I certainly don't agree with using the word 'moron' which is just plain offensive.

We have ample evidence in the trans debate about people who are clearly intelligent, educated, knowledgeable, highly respected in their field expressing opinions that we think are nonsense. There's even a thread about how can intelligent people believe this genderwoo mullarkey.

Because I have spent a lot of time researching and reflecting, I think I'm right in all my firmly-held believes. But I know everybody doesn't agree with me, and it irks me when people argue with me from a position of relative ignorance.
But that doesn't make them thick, or stupid, or a moron, and I don't agree with using those words about them. About anybody, for that matter.

It does however make them wrong wrong wrong, and I'll take that😄

Yes, but there’s a difference between differing political opinions and outright stupidity, these people are literally claiming humans can change sex, it’s on par with flat earthers and people who don’t believe in evolution, they’re entitled to their opinions and the rest of us are entitled to think they’re thick.

Obama is also part of the reason we’re here, he blithely signed a lot of this nonsense into law during his two terms. I think you’ll also find that Michelle Obama is pretty much on the TWAW bus.

I have to admit that when I meet anyone that is even a little bit captured by this nonsense I do tend to think they can’t be very bright. Especially those from a medical/scientific background.

I also question anyone’s motives who expect me to collude with them about something that is fundamentally false, I wouldn’t agree with a flat earther about their ideology, so I’m certainly not going to agree with GI.

As Sal Grover says, ‘if you believe women have penises I won’t believe a single thing you say, because if you will lie about something so obvious, I will assume you will lie about everything’. (Or you’re a bit thick!).

Brilliant!
You seem to be confusing having 360 degree insight into the intersection of law and social reality with them being able to use the remote better than you can

She’s absolute class.

Too right we're all abused women. Gender ideology is a form of coercive control - applied at a societal level by those with most prestige and wealth on those with less social power than them, but particularly the most vulnerable women (such as women in prison) but also working class women and children.

She’s not using those words about people she doesn’t agree with per se, she’s using them about people whose beliefs are so far removed from science and reality that it beggars belief.

THESE PEOPLE ARE JUST A BIT THICK. They are promoted way above their station, have blustered through on their accents, educations, and connections, and now the tide is going out, we can truly see who is naked. Let's learn from this, and never trust their so-called expertise on any other matter again.

She has a point.

I think her patience is just gone though and after many years of arguging with this never ending nonsenes I can see why she just wants to say - this is utter nonsense and only an idiot would say it rather than being kind and finding excuses.

Agreed, actually. Although he's still regarded as a latter-day saint by much of the liberal Left in Europe as well as the US, plenty of this nonsense started on his watch, with his full approval.

I think the people that sign up to gender ideology are either thick, scared or bullies (i.e. abusers) who enjoy the coercive control.

On the NHS Audit thread there's a trust who have a policy that states if a patient questions why a transwoman (aka biological male) is on their ward they will be met with 'zero tolerance'. So a threat, basically for having eyes that see and daring to speak up.

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