Is JK Rowling transphobic?

[RickJay]

@Banquet_Bear

Transwomen are women.

Saying things over and over doesn’t make them true. Transwomen are transwomen. They are not the same as women - That is why you felt the need to append the modifier “trans” - and trans men aren’t the same as men. In some - most - respects they can be treated as if they are the sex they identify as, and that is just the decent thing to do and is honestly best for everyone, but they aren’t the same. I’m sorry, but that’s just what the real world is like, unless it is your position that the words “women” and “men” have no meaning at all.

Rowling was right. Sex is a real thing, and it is core concept behind the primary, non-figurative meaning of the words “man” and “woman.”

@SciFiSam

Transwomen have to take hormonal medications every day.

Well, no, we’ve established that the assumption is a transwoman is a transwoman by identifying as such.

Yes, you were talking about IOC rules - but even in the context of sport, that’s not always the case. The Canada Winter Games has done away with any medical requirement at all, and many amateur or school athletic federations do not require it. (Of course, at that level, it would likely be prohibitively expensive to test anyone.) At the high school, college and free amateur levels, there is no one policy. Some prominent transgender athletes are strong proponents of there being no hormonal limits or requirement for medication, so it’s an idea that is likely going to gain traction.

[Richard_Parker]

If you exclude trans women from sex segregated sports on the grounds that they do not menstruate or risk pregnancy, do you exclude cis women who also lack those traits? Why not?

None of the phenotypes that fall into categories of gender and sexual dimorphism are binary (and even the key genotypes like X and Y chromosomes or SRY genes, or the genes that code for cellular response to sex hormones, do not divide into two clean categories). There are spectrums and exceptions, which means that what makes a woman a woman isn’t any biological fact. It is a social category. Deciding that trans women are not women is not the conclusion to any biological syllogism. It is a choice you are making about how you want social categories to operate.

[DSeid]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

I confess that BB’s style of posting is unreadable for me. I scroll past any post that’s snip-and-respond. In that respect I may have lost the thread of conversation. …

I think you have. Which is understandable as BB’s has been pretty much just spraying spittle, but let me try to bring you up to speed as I’ve seen this thread.

Complete agreement by posters in this thread that gender dysphoria exists.

Complete agreement by posters in this thread (unless I’ve missed something) that those with transgender dysphoria deserve to be able to live with respect and dignity as the genders of their identity, with their preferred pronouns respected, bathroom access, appropriate medical care, and so on. I believe that all here would agree that there has not yet been enough done to protect their rights and their safety, and the roll back of fairly recent gains by the Trump administration need to be fought against.

Further no one here has a problem respecting whatever pronoun someone wants whatever their presentation or lived life. You’ve been raised comfortably female, like to dress in a stereotypically female manner, but state that you have a male identity and want he/him? Fine.

So far we good?

Here’s where it diverges though:

There are people who agree with all of that as the right way to behave out of decency and compassion for those who have gender dysphoria and out of respect for others’ stated wishes (simple manners), but who nevertheless are not convinced that gender is more than a social construct, a social construct that has historically limited what behaviors and roles are acceptable for women.

There are those who note that the lived lives of those who identify as women and are trans, are not the same as those who have grown up as female biologically.

Again they endorse all of what we hopefully are good on above.

BB in particular argues that those people are hateful transphobic bigots who may say that they are good with all that but he knows better: they actually have an endgame in mind to oppress the transgender, to roll back all protections. To BB questions regarding if gender identity is a biologically inherent thing, discussions about issues that cis-women have that transgender women don’t have merely by virtue of having a stated female gender identity, put transgender lives at risk. Discuss that? “Fuck the debate.”

BB believes whatever anyone states as their gender IS their gender and should be treated as such in all ways, and is hostile to anyone who disagrees with thinking about it that way. To BB that biologically male bearded stereotypically male attired individual IS a woman, as much as any cis-woman is, the second the individual states so. Biology, chosen presentation, presence or absence of any dysphoria between anatomical sex and stated gender identity, duration of such identity, all immaterial. Any pushback on considering that person as a woman in the same sense any other woman is saying you want to the transgender to die.

Just to be very clear: monstro is not the one being irrational or hostile here. At all. I don’t agree with her positions completely but she is expressing them in good faith, honestly, clearly, and they are not hateful ones and not transphobic in ANY way.

[RickJay]

@Richard_Parker

If you exclude trans women from sex segregated sports on the grounds that they do not menstruate or risk pregnancy, do you exclude cis women who also lack those traits? Why not?

No, because they are women. Women who aren’t pregnant right now are still women.

The reason there are men’s and women’s sports is because if there were not, women would not be able to compete at any equivalent level. I am amazed I have to remind everyone of this, but men are astoundingly more capable, athletically, than women. The fastest women’s sprinter in the entire world could not win an NCAA regional meet. The USA women’s hockey team would be humiliated by a decent boy’s high school squad.

You are absolutely right that for almost any phenotypical characteristic there is overlap between men and women. Some women are 5’10" and some men are 5’9", how about that. You are, of course, absurdly wrong in saying it’s just a sociological distinction. It is a logical fallacy to believe that because two groups are not invariably distinguished by one clear factor that they cannot be distinguished. 99.9% of all humans are, based on objective physical fact, men or women, and that division is BY FAR the best way to ensure fairness in the great majority of sports.

If there is no sex segregation in sports, what would happen?

[Richard_Parker]

What specific biological characteristic(s) do you believe 99.9% of women have in common?

(And that men lack.)

[Richard_Parker]

@Richard_Parker

What specific biological characteristic(s) do you believe 99.9% of women have in common?

(And that men lack.)

I will save you the time. There isn’t one. The best case you have is sex chromosomes, but the variation there is higher than 1/1000. And keep in mind this whole discussion is about relatively rare exceptions.

As importantly, all of the stuff that chromosome controls is also subject to dramatic genetic variation—including especially the stuff relevant to athletic competition.

Moreover, you do not exclude the cis women who fall outside of whatever definition you’ve picked, so you are back at it being a sociological question.

[DSeid]

@monstro

I really appreciate the debate. I have to say that I’ve heard some good arguments on both sides of the discussion.

However, I’m still not sure I’m any closer to understanding what gender is.

These are the possibilities I’ve explored over the past few days.

**#1. Gender is a social construct–a loose culturally-specific description of a set of behaviors and physical traits that are typically (although not always) attached to the two biological sexes. **

What I infer from this definition:

• Gate-keeping is allowed under this definition, since “social construct” implies its founded on social rules. Self-identification takes a backset to external perception under this definition.

• As a social construct, it is subject to change from place to place and time to time. So an individual who claims to feel like they are a specific gender isn’t speaking of some metaphysical condition. They are simply saying that the social rules for that gender are more in line with their identity than the social rules for another gender. Thus, when this person transitions to their preferred gender, it is reasonable to expect them to reflect at least some of the social rules for that gender.

**#2. Gender is a biological description–a way of describing an individual based on congenital or acquired sex characteristics. **

What I infer from this definition:

• Gate-keeping makes some sense if we accept this definition, since the presence of a biological indicator(s) is required for gender classification. If an individual does not possess the minimum number of biological indicators associated with a specific biological sex, that individual is ineligible for the concomitant gender.

• An individual need not be born with the sex characteristics of their preferred gender to be designated as that gender. But they would need to acquire these characteristics through surgery/hormone treatment to be considered that preferred gender.

• This definition is problematic because it renders folks who have ambiguous or mixed biological indicators (intersex folks or folks with vaginas who have XY chromosomes) as “genderless”. It also limits our understanding of gender to the biomarkers we know about it. Our knowledge of our own biology is always shifting.

#3. Gender is more like a personality description than anything else.

What I infer from this definition:

• Personality is a subjective experience, so it is difficult to gate-keep. But it is not impossible to do so. Extroverts can be distinguished from introverts, even if there is some subjectivity with both terms. Like, one can reasonably argue that a person who becomes lonely or bored if they go an hour without communicating with another person is questionable as an introvert. If gender can be described as a personality description, theoretically a psychological test should be able to reliably predict a person’s self-identified gender.

• This definition suffers from circularity unless we actually describe what a “man” and “woman” personality is. We can describe an introvert without referencing “introvert”. The same with other personality descriptions. But “A man is a person who feels/thinks/acts like a man” doesn’t tell us what “man” is.

• I don’t know what traits would go into a “man” or “woman” personality that can’t be debated to death.

**#4. Gender is a category that is defined primarily by the individual who professes to belong to it. **

What I infer from this definition:

• Gate-keeping would be pointless under this definition, since individuals are free to designate themselves by whatever criteria they deem meaningful.

• Gender has no objective meaning because it solely exists as an individualized experience. Because gender has no objective meaning, there is no real point of segregating or specifying individuals by gender, since there is nothing cohesive linking same-gender identified individuals together besides the ability to communicate “I am Gender X”.

• It is because of the above reason that I believe a lot of posters here are arguing two contradictory things. Gender has great social important! But don’t you dare gate-keep! It seems to me that if something is socially important, then some gate-keeping should not only be expected, but it should be also valued. Socially important things must be protected somehow. Prohibiting gate-keeping only makes sense if gender has little social importance (being perceived as “woman” is no different than being perceived as “extroverted” or “agreeable” or “person who drinks overly sweet tea”).

So…it seems to me if we don’t want people to gate-keep gender, we have to take it off the high pedestal that it currently sits on. We need to do away with gendered pronouns. We need to do away with all gender-exclusive spaces. We need to discourage people from using gender as a criterion for relationships. Either that or we need to teach folks that gender is totally different from biological sex, which can be substantiated objectively. You want a female gynecologist because you want to optimize your chances of getting treated by someone who has empathy for your stigmatized, historically downplayed “female issues”? Well, if you select by gender you may get women with penises and women who have only spent a small amount of time living with female parts. You better ask your practitioners to disclose their biological sex with you if that is important to you–even thought it is hella awkward to ask a stranger you aren’t planning to have sex with what kind of genitals they have.

I have discriminated based on gender when it comes to my own health care. When I started getting pap smears a few years ago, I decided I wanted a woman to perform them. When I was making that selection, I wasn’t thinking, “I want a person who feels like a woman”. I was thinking “I want a person who has lived in a body with certain organs, awash in certain hormones, just like I have.” So in that case, I was using definition #2. When I sought psychotherapy, I screened psychologists based on gender (among other criteria). When I made my selection, I wasn’t thinking, “I want this person to have the same personality traits that I do.” I was thinking, “I want this person to have been socialized as a woman and thus be someone who may be able to relate to some/many of the experiences I have had.” So in this case, I was using definition #1.

Definitions #3 and #4 are questionable to me. But I think I can go with #3 as long as it could be fleshed out some more. Definition #4 doesn’t make any sense to me, and it probably never will. Despite the excellent dialogue, I’m still not convinced that means I’m transphobic. A person who desires a meaningful classification scheme, yes. But not a hateful person.

Comments -

Gender roles are social constructs. Gender identity appears to not be.

Gender identity does seem to have a strong biological determination and one that does not completely co-vary with anatomical sex. The link I gave before on the science such as it is was a good review of the support for that while it isn’t at climate change level it has convinced me.

Right now the only strong predictive characteristic associated with that innate aspect of an individual is their persistent statement that such is the case and a dysphoria at having to pretend as if they experience their identity as something else. THAT is the secondary characteristic.

Shared gender identity means shared gender identity and does not necessarily imply any other shared features including personality characteristics. A cis-woman has not experienced the same discrimination that a trans-woman has nor has a trans-woman experienced hers. Their bodies are not the same. Those differences can have relevance is some venues and in the few venues gatekeeping makes some sense. Those circumstances are few. Noting that is not transphobic and is not causing the transgender to die. It is not part of an anti-trans endgame agenda hand in glove with Trumpists.

[MrDibble]

@you_with_the_face

If you aren’t speaking as transgendered person, you are not helping them either.

I’ll happily shut up as soon as a transgendered poster asks me to. Not on your say-so.

[Unreconstructed_Man]

@DSeid

believes whatever anyone states as their gender IS their gender and should be treated as such in all ways, and is hostile to anyone who disagrees with thinking about it that way. To BB that biologically male bearded stereotypically male attired individual IS a woman, as much as any cis-woman is, the second the individual states so. Biology, chosen presentation, presence or absence of any dysphoria between anatomical sex and stated gender identity, duration of such identity, all immaterial. Any pushback on considering that person as a woman in the same sense any other woman is saying you want to the transgender to die.

Sorry if I’m belabouring things but I just want to make sure I understand this correctly: are you saying that BB’s position is that if a male weightlifter said they were a woman, they could (or should be allowed to) compete against female weightlifters without changing anything about themselves or having hormone treatments and stuff? And if they set a new Deadlift record or whatever, that record should stand as the female Deadlift record, even if the weightlifter goes back to identifying as a man later on?

Again, apologies if this has already been covered but, like Left Hand of Dorkness I find it really difficult to read BB’s posts.

[DSeid]

As to sports.

An individual who was male through puberty is, on average 5 cm taller than they would have been if they were female. Their bone structure was impacted by male puberty. Stating they have a female identity (all that is requisite per some) does not change that and assuming for the sake of discussion that hormone therapy completely alters muscle mass and fat percent to female levels those differences are not reversed.

Depending on the sport those features have some competitive salience.

It is simply afactual to state that someone whose path to adult woman went through male puberty is the same as someone who was always biologically female. I am not sure how to handle it but some level of sports-specific gatekeeping seems potentially appropriate there.

[Richard_Parker]

All of those same social questions are raised by, e.g., cis boys with abnormal puberty for one reason or another. Should they get to compete as girls?

ISTM, the answer goes to what we are trying to achieve with sex segregation and who we are willing to harm and benefit when we make decisions about people who are atypical in some way.

If the women’s deadlift record was achieved by a cis woman with more testosterone and cellular testosterone-sensitivity (among many other genetic gifts like favorable body geometry), why is that meaningfully different from it being achieved by a trans woman with lower testosterone?

[DSeid]

@Unreconstructed_Man

Sorry if I’m belabouring things but I just want to make sure I understand this correctly: are you saying that BB’s position is that if a male weightlifter said they were a woman, they could (or should be allowed to) compete against female weightlifters without changing anything about themselves or having hormone treatments and stuff? And if they set a new Deadlift record or whatever, that record should stand as the female Deadlift record, even if the weightlifter goes back to identifying as a man later on?

While BB has, to my read, been self-contradictory in several aspects in this thread (motivations don’t matter v. what they say doesn’t matter because I know what their endgame is, so on) he’s been pretty consistent on this (as has Kobal2):

Yes. They say they are a woman then they are a woman. No place for gatekeeping about that. Any gatekeeping in any way is misgendering them and promoting suicide among the transgendered.

[you_with_the_face]

@Richard_Parker

If you exclude trans women from sex segregated sports on the grounds that they do not menstruate or risk pregnancy, do you exclude cis women who also lack those traits? Why not?

That obviously wouldn’t be the grounds for excluding them. It would be testosterone levels and the length of time such levels are below a certain limit.

None of the phenotypes that fall into categories of gender and sexual dimorphism are binary (and even the key genotypes like X and Y chromosomes or SRY genes, or the genes that code for cellular response to sex hormones, do not divide into two clean categories). There are spectrums and exceptions, which means that what makes a woman a woman isn’t any biological fact. It is a social category.

A few points:

• For millions of years, our species has considered anyone female as people born with vulvas and vaginas. Males, in contrast, were born with penises and testicles.

• Post-pubescent secondary sex characteristics (breasts and widening hips in females, deep voice and facial hair in males) further signaled to our senses whether the person in front of us was a woman or man. The realization that these traits pretty much always lined up with the genitalia of birth predictively made it empirically clear to our ancestors these two groups of people were biologically different from one another. For reasons unknown. (It wasn’t until advances in science allowed us to appreciate that differing sex chromosomes was the cause).

• But with a little trial and error, humans discovered that women (ie. people with a certain package of traits linked with having vaginas) was the group to carry and nurse babies. We also learned that men (ie people with another package of traits closely linked with penises and testicles) was the only group to sire babies. And although reproduction wasn’t guaranteed to happen when a woman and man copulated, it never happened when a man copulated with a man and a woman copulated with a woman. This was a clue that the existence of two biological groupings was critical to reproduction.

• I’m not a evolutionary psych theorist, but if I were pretend to be one, I’d say selective pressure is why the vast majority of people can readily determine biological sex even when genitalia is hidden and regardless of accoutrements like clothes, makeup, and jewelry. A man who couldn’t distinguish women from men was going to spend a lot of time pursuing sex with people who not only wasn’t going to arouse him once the clothes came off, but also wasn’t going to give him any offspring.

• Sure, you can call this social categorization if you want. But even if this is what we posit, it still doesn’t change the fact that objective biological markers (penises, vagina) inform how we peg people as male and female. And when our senses see other traits we’ve learned to associate with males and females, its unrealistic to expect millions of years of evolution to be overridden in an effort to perceive male-presenting, self-identified women as much “woman” as biological females. “Woman” has always been grounded in some objective reality. Not something ephemeral as “I feel like a woman”.

[DSeid]

@Richard_Parker

All of those same social questions are raised by, e.g., cis boys with abnormal puberty for one reason or another. Should they get to compete as girls?

ISTM, the answer goes to what we are trying to achieve with sex segregation and who we are willing to harm and benefit when we make decisions about people who are atypical in some way.

If the women’s deadlift record was achieved by a cis woman with more testosterone and cellular testosterone-sensitivity (among many other genetic gifts like favorable body geometry), why is that meaningfully different from it being achieved by a trans woman with lower testosterone?

What sort of abnormal boy puberty are you thinking about? Pubertal delay? Don’t get your point. No he is not female, and should not compete as one, not in a sport in which males are perceived as having advantage. Pubertal delay or not he has a different bone structure and fat to muscle ratio than girls of the same age or weight group.

The naturally high testosterone level and/or sensitivity issue has come up in sports - see Caster Semanya.

Female track athletes with naturally elevated levels of testosterone must decrease the hormone to participate in certain races at major competitions like the Olympics, the highest court in international sports said Wednesday in a landmark ruling amid the pitched debate over who can compete in women’s events.

The decision was a defeat for Caster Semenya, a two-time Olympic champion at 800 meters from South Africa, who had challenged proposed limits placed on female athletes with naturally elevated levels of the muscle-building hormone testosterone.

At a time when the broader culture is moving toward an acceptance of gender fluidity, the ruling affirmed the sports world’s need for distinct gender lines, saying they were essential for the outcome of women’s events to be fair. …

In any case natural variation is I think something different than having consciously altered from a different anatomic sex that you went through puberty as.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@DSeid

I think you have. Which is understandable as BB’s has been pretty much just spraying spittle, but let me try to bring you up to speed as I’ve seen this thread.

…

Just to be very clear: monstro is not the one being irrational or hostile here. At all. I don’t agree with her positions completely but she is expressing them in good faith, honestly, clearly, and they are not hateful ones and not transphobic in ANY way.

I appreciate the summary. FWIW, I’m not at all convinced BB’s arguments hold much water; but at the point where monstro accused me of gaslighting for god-knows-why reason, I kinda lost interest in her argument, either.

Again, I think that the discussion of hypothetical trans people who AFAICT don’t actually exist doesn’t do much to advance conversation, any more than discussion of “I identify as an attack helicopter” does. We’re much better off grounding the discussion in terms of what actually comprises the experience of trans folk than in hypotheticals. I don’t know if those hypotheticals are all offensive, but they’re certainly distracting from reality.

[filmore]

@Richard_Parker

If the women’s deadlift record was achieved by a cis woman with more testosterone and cellular testosterone-sensitivity (among many other genetic gifts like favorable body geometry), why is that meaningfully different from it being achieved by a trans woman with lower testosterone?

Testosterone is not the only thing that matters to athletic success. Mental differences are significantly important. A champion will need to be highly dedicated to the end result and will need to make significant sacrifices along the way. They will need push through pain and lack of motivation. Certainly both men and women do this, but mental differences may mean that cis-men and cis-women are not equivalent competitors. A trans-woman may have a cis-man focus on training and sacrifices, which means she could be at a much higher level than cis-women.

[you_with_the_face]

@Richard_Parker

If the women’s deadlift record was achieved by a cis woman with more testosterone and cellular testosterone-sensitivity (among many other genetic gifts like favorable body geometry), why is that meaningfully different from it being achieved by a trans woman with lower testosterone?

Please read this blog that monstro linked to. I has a great takedown on this viewpoint.

In short, even when you compare women on the far right side of the testosterone bell curve to biological men on the far left side, there is a chasm of difference between them. We’re not talking about “gifts”. We’re talking about inherent disadvantages due to the absence of certain gonads.

[Miller]

@RickJay

They are not the same as women - That is why you felt the need to append the modifier “trans” - and trans men aren’t the same as men.

Seriously?

Black women are women.

Jewish women are women.

Left-handed women are women.

Having a label to identify a subgroup does not imply that they are not part of the originating larger group.

[RickJay]

@Miller

Seriously?

Black women are women.

Jewish women are women.

Left-handed women are women.

Having a label to identify a subgroup does not imply that they are not part of the originating larger group.

All very true. None, however, have those modifiers as meaning that they are “transitioning” from being male.

[monstro]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

I appreciate the summary. FWIW, I’m not at all convinced BB’s arguments hold much water; but at the point where monstro accused me of gaslighting for god-knows-why reason, I kinda lost interest in her argument, either.

It was obvious (to me) that for most of this discussion, I’ve been talking about the possibility of guys rigging the system and claiming “woman” for attention-seeking, edgelordy reasons. Guys like this one. And in response to my posts, I got a bunch of hysterical kneejerking from you and others about how offensive and hateful my insinuation was. Remember you calling out my scenario for being bizarre and “profoundly unlikely”?

And then after all of that, you come back with something like, “My goodness, why do you think someone would give you a hard time for raising your eyebrows at an edgelord claiming to be a woman!? Of course that would be acceptable!” Can you not see how gaslighty that is? If gate-keeping is inherently hateful and TERFy, why wouldn’t raising my eyebrows at someone claiming to be a woman not also be hateful and TERFy? I noticed that you didn’t castigate BigT for scolding me for having negative feelings. If negative feelings are so acceptable now, why didn’t you say so way back at the beginning of the thread?

I’m sorry that my harshness took you out of the debate. I really am. I like you as a poster and enjoy engaging you in discussion. But I’m going to stand by my harshness because I believe it is deserved. How is a woman supposed to react to a situation similar to the one in the link above that doesn’t earn her a big TERF label from the Judgy McJudgerson Jury?