"Who was a gay man"

[noblegiraffe]

I've been reading quite a lot of responses to Rowling's post about her trans friend and this one has made me think a lot because it wasn't even something that registered when I read her post. It's 'transing away the gay' in action, and I'd not even noticed. I strongly doubt Rowling meant it that way either, so I think it is a perspective that deserves a wider audience.

"I’ve been thinking about this and I hope this reply makes sense.

Firstly - I get it. I understand that a gay man might be a friend and his desire to be called she (hence his performance which does help with that) is something a friend might do. I also understand that this doesn’t mean you think he’s “lesser” - because obviously, women aren’t lesser so that’s not in your thinking. I also get the kinship feeling that happens with men like him - and the massive “othering” that happens from our (other gay men) side.

That said, you are referring to a gay man as “she”. You also said he “was” a gay man.

He still is. You can’t make someone not gay in the same way you can’t make someone not a man - who is a man.

And the effect of “who was a gay man” immediately provokes a very strong emotional reaction in me. “Was” a gay man. Ergo isn’t any more. It’s hard to explain but seeing any gay man described as effectively “ex gay” is unavoidably alarming to me.

Also, while again, the intent is not to denigrate - I know that, because there’s nothing inherently lesser or undesirable about “female coded energy” - that energy is found much more in gay men than straight men. It is really important to me to make sure people understand gay men are as much men as any other men. Every single one.

And the effect of even one exception - within “gay man world” - is to continue the problem we have with our perceived “femininity”. Plenty of gay men already reject men they consider “feminine” (and I don’t mean camp here i mean the soft gentle men) and those men are the most vulnerable to incorrectly concluding they are “better off” as mimics of women.

This is never the case. While I would never force people to undo surgeries and hormone treatments they are now healthy on, going forward we should I think be advocating for “no one is better off as a mimic of the opposite sex”, and “disguising attributes as opposite sex” should be off the table.

And so I will never call another gay man “she” again. I won’t call a straight one she either but people who make an exception nearly always do that for soft, gentle gay men - and I know it’s not malicious, not homophobic and not because they see these men as “lesser”. It’s because they recognise kinship. I understand that.

But my reply is because this is what keeps a certain pressure on gay men, especially the soft gently younger ones to start questioning “am I also “better off” as a “she””. It’s effectively wider “social transitioning” which isn’t neutral. It’s not a zero impact choice. There is some impact.

Because you’re also not using “she her” for him - for his benefit - he’s not here? I means granted he might read it but - the effect is to tell me you don’t consider this gay man to be a gay man anymore. On account of traits and mannerisms he has - that a lot, or even most gay men have in some degree. (I have no words for this “gayness” - it’s not female like but it is… definitely a thing).

This isn’t about the you-him relationship because the language is third person. This is about the you-reader or if I’m speaking to you the you-me relationship.

It’s not the worst thing ever™️ but it matters to me to say why I don’t think it’s a good idea to make any exception - especially because it influences the gay man world to continue to “other” those who are deemed “soft and gentle” - or even “ethereal” sometimes - and for those gay men to continue to believe they are “better off” changing themselves to look like women."

https://x.com/duncanhenry78/status/2047291489294639527?s=61&t=U9XrcF693-JpMxeIueYG7g

I hadn't picked up on that, but it's a very perspicacious point.

He "was" a gay man, implying that he no longer is. So what is he now?

I suppose that is for him to decide and not really the business of strangers.

I refuse to get too worked up about this tbh. I think it is a mistake to try to police the nuance of specific compromises people choose to make in their personal relationships. Much more important are the broader principles that JKR has consistently demonstrated she understands and has been brilliant and steadfast on. If there is one thing we can usefully learn from today's cesspit of progressivism, it is that purity spirals never strengthen a movement. I don't think we can afford to indulge ourselves in one over this.

Provoking thought isn't the same as correcting it.

Yes, fair point. I am just wary (and already weary) of the pile-on to JKR over her comments, I suppose

There's a bit in Harry Potter about the bravery it takes to stand up to your friends, more so than your enemies, so I would hope that she wouldn't mind a challenging thoughtful reply. You'll notice that at no point did he say that he was disappointed in her, as other people have done.

I think it is really interesting that she was very clear that she didn't consider her friend to be a woman, but gave no thought to saying that he was no longer a gay man, and that it didn't register with me either.

I suppose that is for him to decide and not really the business of strangers.

My question was more rhetorical than anything else.

He's still a man because humans can't change sex - he doesn't get any choice in that.

I don't think it is part of a pile-on, so long as we look at the general principles rather than the individuals involved.

I did actually post that piece on the other thread yesterday, because the gay man's perspective was something I had never considered before.The repeated use of 'she' may contribute towards a gay man feeling that he is not accepted and would be better off as a 'woman', with all the horrors of 'gender-affirming care' that involves. The 'she' contributes to the 'trans-identification', it is a cause not an effect. Just as Cass identified that it is not a neutral act for children, it is not for adults either.

Interestingly, I have a lot of gay friends who refer to each other as she, with no expectation of it being considered a trans statement; it is just a mannerism of some gay communities. Kind of a deliberate underlining of their otherness from straight men. It is mildly fascinating to see it continue unaffected by the trans insanity.

On this we agree 🙂

Reclaiming the slur?

It's hard to read subtlety on an X post, but I think he is suggesting that 'she' is often applied by gay men to a particular type of gay man. Then when the straight community also use 'she' for that man it is no longer an in-group mannerism, rather a suggestion that that type of man is not a 'real' gay man in some sense. The woman-identity then leads from that.

I kind of feel that this is a gay man trying to describe something that is going on within and adjacent to the community and I felt it was important to listen to him, being neither gay nor male myself.

I have tended to read it as containing an element of self-hatred.

I don't disagree with @noblegiraffe 's points. It's a bit "thin edge of the wedge"? isn't it, to accommodate a trans person's personal choices. Which might or might not indicate a wholesale acceptance of trans ideology.

But people are nuanced and hopefully allowed to be nuanced.

As a parent of a trans identifying child (in their 20s actually) I absolutely do not believe or encourage the belief that my child has changed sex (they also don't believe this). But in the name of love and to preserve a positive relationship, I acquiesce to the opposite sex pronouns.

Maybe if it were a friend rather than a family member, I might hold more strongly to my personal GC beliefs. But IMHO some relationships are worth "sacrificing" an element of personal principle.

But I'm not a public figure whose every word will be analysed by the masses, so my personal balance of biological truth vs trans ideology is only going to questioned and fretted over by me.

This thread is about the response that a gay man has made to JKR's post. Do you have any comment on his views, as outlined in the OP?

I think there's a lot of things going on.

Masculine gay men may see feminine gay men as 'lesser' (probably a bit of misogyny involved). They may refer to them as she.

Feminine gay men may not feel like they belong in the group 'gay men' and are in the wrong body so transition.

Women who agree that it is not possible to change sex and who do not refer to other trans women as 'she' nonetheless see the 'femininity' and don't feel any cognitive dissonance in referring to a feminine gay man as 'she'.

Which reinforces the idea that a feminine gay man not really a gay man but is at least a trans woman.

Which puts pressure on other feminine gay men.

Yes, I think that is a good summation.

Probably the 'was a gay man' is more harmful than the 'she'.

I'd like to know what lesbians think about this discussion.

I think its more about the power of language.

No matter how much both JKR and her friend know he hasn't 'literally' changed sex, calling him 'she' has made the idea that he is a gay man odd.

By knowing him by a women's name and always referring to him as 'she', they have subconsciously decided that some sort of transition has happened. He's not totally woman, but not man enough to be a gay man?

When shes writing or thinking about him as a younger man, she imagines him as a gay man, but she cant see the man she knows now as an older gay man.

I agree that this is an important angle. There's often a lot of overlap between homophobia and misogyny. Trans ideology threatens both women and gay people.

I think this bit bears repeating:

"Gay men are as much men as any other men"

Sex is binary: we are all either male or female. Sex is not a spectrum and to suggest that it is is to claim that some men are 'more male' (masculine) than others, and some women are 'more female' (feminine) than others.

No. Every man, no matter his sexuality, personality, fertility, appearance, physique, mannerisms, is just as male as any other male.

And all women are just as female as each other: whether they are lesbian/bi/straight, whether they are fertile, infertile or post-menopausal, whatever their body shape or weight, however they dress, to whatever degree they correspond to how the society they live in claims women should look or act. All equally female

This 'sex is a spectrum' bullshit has crystallised for me some of the misogyny and homophobia underlying society in general and gender ideology in particular

(I would just like to add that I don't blame J.K. Rowling for this, I think she's a hero and she gets things right most of the time. I'm sure she'd be much more open to discussion of the finer points of this argument than TRAs are)

Thanks for posting this.

It's an important point of view, not least because there are plenty of places in the world where gay men are forced to transition (including castration) which are very definitely homophobic places. Mr Menno had a lovely conversation with a man he met on the street who was gay in a repressive country and was transitioned. And now - for better or for worse - is stuck with the body he has, surgically modified.

It's often been said on here that trans activism is no friend to homosexuals and I think this is definitely the case. 'Transing away the gay' seems to definitely be a thing, in this country as in many others.

I'd be fascinated to hear Mr Menno's thoughts actually - he has said a number of times that he thinks he would have been susceptible to pressure to transition at a certain point in his life had it been a thing then.

I can understand the OP's reasoning and feelings on this, having been in the gay community as a teenager. There were places/events I and other young trans women were barred from entering, as were all women. Gay male culture is highly sexualised.

I think he is ignoring the various subcultures within gay male communities that are actually stratified according to butch and femme roles. Leather and kink for one, and bear/twink for another. Gay culture also puts a lot of value on youthfulness.

Gay men love men however. FWR has labeled me a gay man, but there was no future in my childhood where I was going to grow up to be a man, socially or physically. Anyone who knew me would find the label gay extremely difficult to reconcile. Just because I was born one way and am attracted to and have loved men my entire life doesn't overwrite my decades of social experience and presence within straight cultures.

Adding on to the above thought, what FWR is attempting to do to me, by labeling me 'gay' is an attempt to recategorise 'what is gay' and define 'who is gay' when my cultural location and social experience is so far outside of gay culture and the lives and loves of gay men. Personally, I don't belong in gay male spaces any more than I belong in men's spaces.

This seems very close to a reverse of when I hear lesbian women complain about trans women who plop themselves into lesbian spaces without awareness or observance of lesbian culture.

You're a gay man. Get over it.