J K Rowling and the trans furore

[Miller]

@YWTF

If there is no way to distinguish fakers from non-fakers, then this underscores how nebulous all this gender identity stuff is. In the sciences, if you can’t objectively measure something, that makes it untestable. If it’s untestable, there’s no way to distinguish a true claim from a false one. So any male that self-identifies as a woman is as valid as any other male saying the same thing. This is the stuff faith made out of, and I don’t do faith.

Incidentally, I’ve been seeing a doctor off and on since my late 20s to treat my depression - largely successfully. There is no test to measure how depressed I am. There’s no test to measure that the meds I’m taking are effective. My doctor has no idea what physiological reason, if any, underlies my depression. The only evidence that my depression is real is my own report of how I feel.

Glad to know my depression wasn’t real all along.

Oh, and the drug I take to manage my depression is addictive, so there’s a strong incentive for people to lie about having depression, so they can get some pills. I’m not sure how that can possible work, what with it being impossible to separate out the fakers without an objectively measurable test.

[monstro]

@Riemann

Indeed. Behavioral patterns. Well, that seems to rule out the pancreas hypothesis, doesn’t it. So - the brain, maybe?

Is gender a set of behaviors now?

You seem to be trying to play a “gotcha” game with YWTF that isn’t making any sense to me.

[Riemann]

@monstro

Why should we believe that no one switches genders “for fun”?

I didn’t claim no one.

Do you really refuse to acknowledge that there is a significant minority of a people who appear to be born with a (mental) gender identity that is not in accord with their somatic sexual characteristics? People who are generally miserable if they attempt to conform to the immense social pressure to adopt a cis identity, even though this would appear to be by far the easiest path to social acceptance and happiness? And that this strongly implies that they are not choosing this identity, or adopting this identity whimsically?

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@monstro

But let’s say someone I know to be a biological male as of two weeks ago shows up to the meeting and they tell me that they are a woman. And they’ve always been a woman, they tell me. But they aren’t “doing woman” in any discernable way, and I happen to know this person is a sexist edgelord. I want to be able to tell that edgelord to go fuck himself without a chorus of onlookers saying stuff like, “Well, how do you REALLY know they are lying!?” I wouldn’t know what I could say to prove he was lying. But I would still know it, and I wouldn’t want him in my safe space.

How does this really change if you know it’s a cis woman who’s a sexist edgelord who’s showing up? I mean, if you’re running that group for women who work in male-dominated fields, and Tomi Lahren shows up and you know she’s there to edgelord it up, I hope you’d feel comfortable kicking her out.

It’s the edgelord tendencies that will disrupt.

There’s an interesting nuance here: a cis male will only show up to this group if he’s an edgelord, because who shows up at a group he’s not wanted in (excepting historical oppression reasons that don’t apply here)? A trans woman who shows up may or may not be there to edgelord. So if someone shows up presenting to you as male, of course you’re gonna be on your guard.

But it’s the behavior, not the chromosomal makeup, that’ll probably determine whether this person needs to go.

[monstro]

@Miller

Incidentally, I’ve been seeing a doctor off and on since my late 20s to treat my depression - largely successfully. There is no test to measure how depressed I am. There’s no test to measure that the meds I’m taking are effective. My doctor has no idea what physiological reason, if any, underlies my depression. The only evidence that my depression is real is my own report of how I feel.

Glad to know my depression wasn’t real all along.

Oh, and the drug I take to manage my depression is addictive, so there’s a strong incentive for people to lie about having depression, so they can get some pills. I’m not sure how that can possible work, what with it being impossible to separate out the fakers without an objectively measurable test.

Your classification as a depressed person does not require strangers to accommodate you in any way. There are no privileges or benefits to being a depressed person. I’ve never heard of spaces that are segregated by mental illness type. We don’t have to shift our language when speaking about depressed people. We don’t describe people by mental illness type. We don’t have different customs and expectations and norms and roles for people with different mental illness types. So you’re comparing apples and oranges.

Upthread you said you get the value in gender gatekeeping in some respects (like in prisons), but now you’re acting super dense when it comes to the point that YWTF is making. Why is prison segregation important if biology doesn’t matter a whole bunch? Can you reconcile these conflicting ideas for me? Because maybe I’m the one who is super dense.

[YWTF]

Suppose a (cis) woman has indeed had her sex organs fully removed. Your claim is that nothing of gender resides in the mental state, so what now is the relevance of the chromosome configuration? What are the genes now doing to make this person (by your definition) a woman?

My genes are being translated to produce proteins that are synthesized into enzymes, neurotransmitters, and building blocks for tissues and organs and other shit. What else do chromosomes do?

You seem to think this question is getting at something really profound, but it doesn’t. Females are genetically different than males. They just are. The two sex classes have to differ because otherwise we wouldn’t be able to produce fertile male and fertile female children with one another. Even if these sex chromosomes are essentially dormant in the absence of sex organs, it still doesn’t change the fact that they differ between sex classes.

We didn’t even know that genes and DNA existed until recently, so chromosome configuration certainly isn’t in itself something that has defined people as female “since the inception of human speech”.

We have always known which group of humans can become pregnant and which cannot. You don’t need to know about genes to figure out two people with penises never make children together, and neither do two people with vaginas. You also don’t need a PhD in biology to figure out that only the vagina-havers get pregnant, nurse babies, and periodically bleed. This is pattern recognition at its most primitive.

I really feel like I’m losing my mind in this conversation. If even my 3 year old has figured out that it’s always the mommies that carry babies in their “stomach”, why am I having to explain to an adult what differentiates females and males?

I don’t see how you can logically claim that it’s solely your female reproductive system that makes you a woman; yet simultaneously maintain that the loss of that reproductive system would not entail loss of womanhood.

Because it doesn’t work that way. Like, I don’t know why it’s that hard to understand.

But let’s suppose a woman removes her uterus, ovaries, and vagina. And let’s suppose that does cause her to lose her claim to female status.

That doesn’t suddenly make her male, and that doesn’t mean her ”gender identity” becomes male. So what is your point?

[monstro]

@Riemann

Do you really refuse to acknowledge that there is a significant minority of a people who appear to be born with a (mental) gender identity that is not in accord with their somatic sexual characteristics?

No, I don’t refuse to acknowlege that. Never once have I said anything in this thread for anyone to infer that I don’t believe there are people who believe they inhabit the wrong body. I not only believe this, but I also think the vast majority of these are sincere and deserving of services and protections.

I just don’t think all transpeople suffer from gender dysmorphia. And it seems to me that focusing so much on dysmorphia is only planting fertile ground for a gatekeeping criterion, which totally undercuts the argument about gender identity that is currently in fashion. Some transgender folks were born knowing they were born in the wrong bodies. Some transgender folks don’t have this narrative. They woke up one day and realized, “Maybe I’d be happier as an X.” Is that narrative somehow less authentic than the other? Why or why not?

If gender dysmorphia wasn’t a thing at all and all transgender folks were people who just really love identifying as the opposite gender for whatever reason, does that suddenly destroy the “gender identity” argument? Would you suddenly sympathize with the JK Rowlings’s position?

Because I think JK Rowlings and others are responding to this emergence of “gender euphorics” and folks who experiment with gender and nonbinaryness for sociopolitical reasons. It is easy to feel sympathy for folks who wish to kill themselves because they hate their penises or vaginas. It is harder to feel sympathy for folks who think being a woman is wearing a costume–one they can take off whenever when the mood hits them. These are the extremists I mentioned way back in the early days of this thread. They are small in number, but I don’t blame people (especially women) for being leary of them and their goals.

[YWTF]

Incidentally, I’ve been seeing a doctor off and on since my late 20s to treat my depression - largely successfully.

Success has a measurable metric, correct? If you’re sick and you feel better after treatment, then whether the treatment works is a testable hypothesis. “Does Miller’ report feeling better after taking this drug?” is that hypothesis. A doctor could also administer to you a questionnaire asking you questions about your thought patterns, sleep habits, and instances of self harm to determine whether you are reporting changes that suggest improvement.

What isn’t testable is whether a male who sees himself as female has a true female identity as opposed to a false one. What is the metric you’d measure to figure this out? If you asked about thought patterns, what would you look for that proves someone has a female “mental state?

. The only evidence that my depression is real is my own report of how I feel.

When it comes to determining the effectiveness of a treatment, self-reported feelings are sufficient.

When it comes to establishing whether someone’s gender identity is actually true, a person’s claim isn’t sufficient. It’s not testable unless there are measurable criteria.

[DemonTree]

@Miller

Fuck biology.

I’ve been trying to work out why this bothers me. I think it’s because it sounds like you want to ignore biological differences, and pretend they don’t exist, in a world that was designed for male biology. Everything from tools that are sized for male hands, to drugs that are only tested on men, car safety tests that use male dummies, ‘unisex’ clothes and protective equipment that is actually designed to fit male bodies, career paths that make it difficult to succeed if you take time out for childbearing, and of course the toilets that provide the same amount of space for men and women, resulting in huge queues for the ladies.

So can we maybe sort some of these things out before we start pretending everyone is equal and we can ignore biology?

[Riemann]

@YWTF

My genes are being translated to produce proteins that are synthesized into enzymes, neurotransmitters, and building blocks for tissues and organs and other shit. What else do chromosomes do?

Of course they are. I was never disputing this - what I was pointing out was your failure to recognize that one of those organs is the brain, your denial of the plausibility of sexual dimporphism between male and female brains.

@YWTF

You seem to think this question is getting at something really profound, but it doesn’t. Females are genetically different than males.

I agree that it’s hardly a profound point that genes are involved in building brains. Again, the point is your denial of the possibility that male and female brains, just like male and female bodies, could have different characteristics.

As for the rest of your screed about 3-year-olds? Well, I could equally well say that any 3-year-old would understand that this discussion is not about how we make babies.

[Miller]

@YWTF

Success has a measurable metric, correct? If you’re sick and you feel better after treatment, then whether the treatment works is a testable hypothesis. “Does Miller’ report feeling better after taking this drug?” is that hypothesis. A doctor could also administer to you a questionnaire asking you questions about your thought patterns, sleep habits, and instances of self harm to determine whether you are reporting changes that suggest improvement.

“Does Miller feel better” isn’t testable. There’s no objective measure for how I “feel.” Whether I feel bad to start with, or if I later feel better, can only be determined by relying on my reporting of my inner emotional state. Which is, apparently, sufficient to establish the reality of depression, but insufficient to establish the reality of gender identity. Because reasons.

[YWTF]

Males and females differ in some aspects of their brains, notably the overall difference in size, with men having larger brains on average (between 8% and 13% larger when not corrected for body size),[[2]]

I hope you understand what that part in bold means.

Men on average are significantly bigger than women, so yeah their brains are bigger. This is not evidence that their brains are “sexed” any more than men’s larger lungs is evidence that lungs are sexed.

If trans women brains turned out to be the same size as cis women’s, that would be some damn compelling science for your side, though. We both know there is no science like this because otherwise you would’ve posted it.

Early postmortem studies of transsexual neurological differentiation was focused on the hypothalamic and amygdala regions of the brain…

Noticed a lot of “somes” in there. Unless there is a statistically significant number that establishes a real association, this looks like weak sauce.

Studies aimed at comparing trans individuals to their same-sex and opposite-sex counterparts is interesting, but its putting the cart before the horse. We can’t even reliably detect neurological differences between cis males and cis females. If we can’t do that, we don’t have the information needed to say trans brains are more or less like the brains of their desired sex.

[Kron]

@YWTF

Before I provide a list of examples of it happening (which means I will have to take the time to repost some things already posted in this thread which, to be honest, I really don’t feel like doing), can you tell me whether it is likely to make a difference on your opinion?

If I show multiple examples where males have beaten and displaced females in sports, will you call those isolated incidents that aren’t worth me worrying my petty little head over? Or will you agree this is a problem?

I definitely don’t doubt that transwomen could and would displace women in sports, for the same reason that women using PEDs will generally outperform women who don’t. While I’m sure that there have been transwomen who outperformed (and shattered the records of) women, my contention is that there is no major support for allowing transwomen into women’s sports. I will fully admit that I have ZERO interest in sports, so if I’m wrong, I plead ignorance on that point. In my experience, though, I haven’t seen that support at all.

I would totally be interested in the government portion, and also wonder why any position would be “reserved to women”, as in my perfect world everything would be run as a complete meritocracy.

One of the things in this thread that I’m seeing is that there are some of you that seem to think transwomen are a bunch of Snidely Whiplash motherfuckers that are going to shave their mustaches off just to be able to grope women in the bathroom. Or prison. And I am really just not okay with that characterization.

[Miller]

@YWTF

I hope you understand what that part in bold means.

Yes, I understand it. Size is not the only difference noted in that article.

A 2014 meta-analysis found differences in grey matter levels between the sexes. The findings (where differences were measured) included males having more grey matter volume in both amygdalae, hippocampi, and anterior parahippocampal gyri, among others, while females had more grey matter volume in the right frontal pole, inferior and middle frontal gyrus, anterior cingulate gyrus, and lateral occipital cortex, among others. In terms of density, there were also differences between the sexes. Males tended to have denser left amygdalae, hippocampi, and areas of the right VI lobule of the cerebellum, among other areas, while females tended to have denser left frontal pole.[2] The significance of these differences lies both in the lateralization (males having more volume in the left hemisphere and females having more volume in the right hemisphere) and the possible uses of these findings to explore differences in neurological and psychiatric conditions.

[Riemann]

@Kron

While I’m sure that there have been transwomen who outperformed (and shattered the records of) women, my contention is that there is no major support for allowing transwomen into women’s sports.

Veronica Ivy is an example - a word champion in track cycling. And she is known for radical views on transgender participation in sport.

But I think most people disagree with her, including me. I see no conflict in being a strong supporter of transgender rights in general, while opposing unrestricted participation for trans women in sport without fairly strict criteria. The entire point of supporting transgender rights is recognizing that gender identity is a mental state that may not be in accord with the physical body you were born with; and most sports are principally about physical prowess.

[Taber]

@DemonTree

Transwomen have set world records in womens events. I’m not aware of any transmen who have set world records.

Which ones? How long was the trans woman athlete on hormones? By what margin? My position is only that the Olympic standards are acceptable, so if a trans woman wasn’t on hormones for two years, then I agree that it shouldn’t count. Also cis women break cis women’s records all the time, so trans women breaking a record occasionally doesn’t prove anything. I tried googling to see if any transmen broke any records, and google came back with some trans women breaking records, so let’s see what we get:

-Mary Gregory - one year on hormones, couldn’t compete by Olympic standards, but clearly had an unfair advantage

-Rachel Mckinnon - she’s been on hormones long enough, but her success is similar to a very good cis woman, but isn’t unbeatable. She broke the 35-39 record, but was slower than the 40-44 record and 45-50 record, and is considerable slower than the overall record.

The first page of results names a few other trans athletes, but no details on whether they’ve set any records, much less whether they’ve been on hormones long enough to meet the Olympic’s standard.

[YWTF]

I definitely don’t doubt that transwomen could and would displace women in sports, for the same reason that women using PEDs will generally outperform women who don’t. While I’m sure that there have been transwomen who outperformed (and shattered the records of) women, my contention is that there is no major support for allowing transwomen into women’s sports. I will fully admit that I have ZERO interest in sports, so if I’m wrong, I plead ignorance on that point. In my experience, though, I haven’t seen that support at all.

It’s interesting you are making this assertion in bold, but then claiming ignorance about it.

Read about this lawsuit in Connecticut. Two transgender athletes have competed in track and field against female students, winning multiple races and breaking female records. The female students have sued on the basis of Title IX because not only are they forced to compete against males but there is no requirement that trans girls be on hormone blockers or estrogen therapy.

You assert there is no major support for this. So why is ACLU fighting against the lawsuit, calling it an “assault on the basic dignity and humanity of transgender people”? So you have a bunch of young women trying to argue for their right to play against biological peers in keeping with the law, and they are called transphobic for doing so.

Stories like this one are very worrisome to me because we’re not talking about edge cases here. I don’t see any fairness in refusing to restrict girls sports to female players.

I would totally be interested in the government portion, and also wonder why any position would be “reserved to women”, as in my perfect world everything would be run as a complete meritocracy.

This just happened in New York. . Why a position would be reserved for women is also explained. Obviously, it’s to help address the underrepresentation of women in political office.

[Banquet_Bear]

@YWTF

Read about this lawsuit in Connecticut. Two transgender athletes have competed in track and field against female students, winning multiple races and breaking female records. The female students have sued on the basis of Title IX because not only are they forced to compete against males but there is no requirement that trans girls be on hormone blockers or estrogen therapy.

…can you quote the parts in that cite that show the two transgender athletes “won multiple races” and “broke female records?”

[SlackerInc]

I know one girl (my older kids’ stepsister) who did just what Rowling is talking about, declaring herself (temporarily, himself) a transboy before changing her mind and going back to being a girl. Just an anecdote, obviously; but it’s not hard for me to imagine this became more common when trans stuff became so au courant in the culture. That’s what teens do, jump on trends.

[Kron]

I appreciate you taking the time to provide links.

@YWTF

I don’t see any fairness in refusing to restrict girls sports to female players.

As I’ve stated, we are in agreement on this point. We appear to be in disagreement over whether or not there is widespread support to the contrary. I still don’t see that support… even your link isn’t very convincing (to me). Sure, a lawsuit was filed. It’s America, lawsuits are filed about EVERYTHING. I just haven’t noticed a groundswell of support among liberals insisting transwomen be allowed to participate as equals in women’s sports.

@YWTF

This just happened in New York.

That article itself is absolutely problematic at best. The author is very explicitly transphobic.

Emilia Decaudin, a man, has won the Female District Leader position for New York City’s 37A district, which resides in Queens.

So this is another point of our disconnect- we disagree on whether Emilia Decaudin has the right to consider herself a woman. Obviously you and the article’s author believe no, I believe… That it isn’t my place to say.

The author of that article, though, ventures off into the weeds a bit, and really drives home her agenda a little deeper in…

Decaudin also has a history of making misogynistic and homophobic comments. The new “Female” District Leader has also publicly referred to women as “trash”, argued that men can be lesbians, and has claimed to be a “trans lesbian” or “gay woman” himself.

Ooooookay. For those who don’t want to follow the links there, she didn’t refer to women as trash… She referred specifically to Rosario Dawson as “garbage” because of a specific workplace discrimination issue. Much like I personally refer to certain politicians as garbage people for their positions. She posted a freaking meme image that said TRANS LESBIANS ARE LESBIANS, which was “an argument that men can be lesbians”… The entire article requires you to already believe that transwomen are just… Snidely Whiplash, again.