Transgender is it just me that is totally perplexed?

[pengaleng]

People's lives are structured in important ways depending on the location/era they live in. Hence roles today are generally different from 50 years ago due to economic changes etc. I don't think there are infinite ways to live a life that aren't constrained by the social structures of the time.

but thats looking at life in a very simplistic way and not really considering things like childhood experiences and stuff < development etc

think we coming from different angles, I just think the whole thing is a lot more complex than hormonal exposure in the womb and brain structure which is the usual go-to

 

[Sunset Tree]

but thats looking at life in a very simplistic way and not really considering things like childhood experiences and stuff < development etc

I was thinking that childhood experiences can be specific and individual, but gender is more of a social formation so would have less variance or be more linked to the broader social trends of the time period.

I could very well be being over simplistic (wouldn't be the first time) and I do appreciate the discussion. I'll come back to it tomorrow as I am up way too late.

 

[Sue]

I’m not interested in debating the merits of transphobia with committed transphobes. As you insist you aren’t a transphobe, you have no reason to believe that statement applies to you.

As you appear to believe I am, why would I think that doesn't apply to me? Or are you now saying you don't think I'm a transphobe? Am I still a liar? Since you haven't apologised for calling me either of those things, I'm guessing your views haven't changed.

It seems though that you are trying to avoid tying yourself to any particular opinion here - you want to pander to transphobes, want them to be listened to, say that some of their arguments are valid and go out of your way to avoid saying that obviously bigoted statements are bigoted, but you balk at telling us which of their views you agree with or what it is of value that you think that they add to a discussion about trans rights.

Read the thread Nigel. I really don't have the time or inclination to go back through all the stuff that's already beem discussed at length just because you now want a debate. (And even if I could be bothered, we seem to have very different ideas what 'debate' actually looks like.)

And if saying it's important to listen to both sides is 'pandering', then I guess I'm pandering to both sides. You ought to try it, you might find it interesting.

 

[kabbes]

I think we might be at cross purposes about its misuse, but I think you're wrong about most people straying from the original meaning. For example, several people seemed to read that Munroe Bergdorf tweet as saying you can't talk about female biology on a women's demo, but it wasn't saying that at all. It said if you're going to come you need to be prepared to include all women, not just women who were born with female biology. Problematic for TERFs yes, but absolutely intersectional in its original sense. We need to build find common cause between cis women and trans women (and black women and lesbians and disabled women) instead of rejecting some women as 'other'.

Woah there, that is not intersectional in its original sense. Have you read Crenshaw’s original paper? I have — it’s very good. Intersectional in its original sense was making a point about how legal frameworks are constructed to only recognise structural inequality along one axis, rather than in combination. So companies could get away with discrimination against black women by showing that they were not discriminatory against black men, nor against white women.

In other words, Intersectionality as it was originally conceived was very much about class and the way capital specifically is able to legally continue oppressing certain groups even in the face of anti-discriminatory legislation. It was about reframing equality legislation to prevent capital’s piecemeal defence. It was nothing to do with how individuals should be prepared to go to a demo accepting that trans women are women. If anything, intersectionality in its original sense would be a framework for arguing that the protections offered to women as a consequence of their material reality should not be able to be satisfied by instead giving those places to those materially born male.

 

[TopCat]

Gender identity is a first world luxury. 95% of girls in Somalia have their clitorises cut off and their vaginas stitched shut. No one cares what they identify as. They are mutilated because they are born women.

Done to women by women. Fucking awful.

 

[Sunset Tree]

Woah there, that is not intersectional in its original sense. Have you read Crenshaw’s original paper? I have — it’s very good. Intersectional in its original sense was making a point about how legal frameworks are constructed to only recognise structural inequality along one axis, rather than in combination. So companies could get away with discrimination against black women by showing that they were not discriminatory against black men, nor against white women.

In other words, Intersectionality as it was originally conceived was very much about class and the way capital specifically is able to legally continue oppressing certain groups even in the face of anti-discriminatory legislation. It was about reframing equality legislation to prevent capital’s piecemeal defence. It was nothing to do with how individuals should be prepared to go to a demo accepting that trans women are women. If anything, intersectionality in its original sense would be a framework for arguing that the protections offered to women as a consequence of their material reality should not be able to be satisfied by instead giving those places to those materially born male.

Thank you for summarising Crenshaw so clearly. I don't think many intersectionalists have read Crenshaw or are applying her framework as it was formulated. I never see it used in this sense, yet regularly see people saying if you disagree with idpol you just don't understand the theory.

I just searched through the identity politics thread to find this article that I found really useful. History of intersectionality from a way of enriching socialism to a tool of individualistic liberalism.

Identity Crisis - Viewpoint Magazine

 

[Mation]

Woah there, that is not intersectional in its original sense. Have you read Crenshaw’s original paper? I have — it’s very good. Intersectional in its original sense was making a point about how legal frameworks are constructed to only recognise structural inequality along one axis, rather than in combination. So companies could get away with discrimination against black women by showing that they were not discriminatory against black men, nor against white women.

In other words, Intersectionality as it was originally conceived was very much about class and the way capital specifically is able to legally continue oppressing certain groups even in the face of anti-discriminatory legislation. It was about reframing equality legislation to prevent capital’s piecemeal defence. It was nothing to do with how individuals should be prepared to go to a demo accepting that trans women are women. If anything, intersectionality in its original sense would be a framework for arguing that the protections offered to women as a consequence of their material reality should not be able to be satisfied by instead giving those places to those materially born male.

Yes, I've read the original paper. How intersectionality came about and what effect an intersectional framework can have on the legal ability to discriminate based on who you are is related to but not synonymous with or in opposition to what that means about how you think about people negatively affected along structural inequality axes other than those that affect you. You could construct a framework purely as an intellectual or practical and even helpful exercise without feeling, but she didn't.

I didn't say it wasn't about class; I clearly mentioned class. And I was referring to the tweet when I said that 'it' was about how you need to be prepared to come to a demo. The protections currently afforded to women are a result of structural inequality that is based on biology but they are currently afforded to all cis women, whether or not they have primary and secondary sex characteristics and reproductive organs or not. This isn't about to change.

 

[Sunset Tree]

Crenshaw herself has criticised identity politics in the form it has manifested.

I also don't know why we'd listen to Munroe Bergdorf about anything. Her twitter feed alone is ridiculous. All she does apparently is identifies women's issues and explain how trans women have it worse. Not surprised at all that her background is middle class, private school, posh uni, working in PR... then oppressed twitter activist. Her political platform is based on media controversy from saying all white people are guilty of racial violence.

None of this seems progressive to me.

 

[Mation]

Crenshaw herself has criticised identity politics in the form it has manifested.

Indeed she has. For example in this interview with her from 2016:

Crenshaw is a veteran activist and theorist, but it is young feminists who have enthusiastically turned intersectionality into a feminist cornerstone. When I ask her why, she laughs. “As a term, ‘intersectionality’ has been around since the late 80s,” she says, “so there is something to be said about it being taken up in a robust way 30 years on. It’s like a lazy Susan – you can subject race, sexuality, transgender identity or class to a feminist critique through intersectionality.” But Crenshaw is aware of pitfalls. “Some people can use [intersectionality] as a way to deflect a critique of patriarchy – by saying: ‘How can there be any full structural critique when we are so many different things at the same time?’”

Is that what you meant?

I also don't know why we'd listen to Munroe Bergdorf about anything. Her twitter feed alone is ridiculous. All she does apparently is identifies women's issues and explain how trans women have it worse.

What, like here?










I could go on. For quite some time. (And I probably will!)

 

[Mation]

Content warning: extreme homophobia racism and violence.

Spoiler

Had to make a new post for these last two that I tried to include up there, as a post can only take 5 pieces of media.

 

[co-op]

Read the thread Nigel. I really don't have the time or inclination to go back through all the stuff that's already beem discussed at length just because you now want a debate. (And even if I could be bothered, we seem to have very different ideas what 'debate' actually looks like.)

Nigel spent the first 200 pages and most of his 140+ posts strutting around like some junior officer straight out of public school telling everyone there was literally nothing to debate, move along now, a posture that got more and more ludicrous the longer the thread went on.

I don't think he has any understanding of the questions raised but that's not his interest, just to shout "transphobe" at anyone who doesn't sign up unquestioningly to his party line, denounce any woman who questions it as just old and unsexy, and try not to trip over his swagger stick. He's a hack.

 

[Sunset Tree]

Identity is the primary source of privilege and oppression. Class is just another identity. Someone posted a video of her earlier in the thread where she had that same liberal condescension about how if people don't agree they just need to be educated. It's one thing to pay lip service to your own privilege but another to avoid having that privilege inform the way you view the world.

 

[ElizabethofYork]

Nigel spent the first 200 pages and most of his 140+ posts strutting around like some junior officer straight out of public school telling everyone there was literally nothing to debate, move along now, a posture that got more and more ludicrous the longer the thread went on.

I don't think he has any understanding of the questions raised but that's not his interest, just to shout "transphobe" at anyone who doesn't sign up unquestioningly to his party line, denounce any woman who questions it as just old and unsexy, and try not to trip over his swagger stick. He's a hack.

Don't you just love men who tell women how they should be doing feminism?

 

[Sunset Tree]

[/spoiler]

Was this homophobic violence? The most recent articles still say it's unsolved. She'd had a hard life, had recently been released from jail, and this was apparently connected to a few other murders that happened? Seems a bit disingenuous to call it extreme homophobia when there's no mention of that. It is no less of a tragedy for it.

Plus it was covered on fox new and washington post so it's hardly keeping the populace in the dark.

 

[elbows]

Allegations about a 'hate list' appear to have reached the legal threats stage.

 

[Treacle Toes]

Allegations about a 'hate list' appear to have reached the legal threats stage.

Karen is very cross about this!


She clearly thinks what she said is okay...

 

[Pickman's model]

Karen is very cross about this!
View attachment 125876

She clearly thinks what she said is okay...

View attachment 125877

Ageism not a good look

 

[Mation]

Was this homophobic violence? The most recent articles still say it's unsolved. She'd had a hard life, had recently been released from jail, and this was apparently connected to a few other murders that happened? Seems a bit disingenuous to call it extreme homophobia when there's no mention of that. It is no less of a tragedy for it.

Plus it was covered on fox new and washington post so it's hardly keeping the populace in the dark.

I'm going to stay here, waving you goodbye as you set off down that diversionary route, and hope you enjoy the reactionary view at its dead end.

 

[weepiper]

Allegations about a 'hate list' appear to have reached the legal threats stage.

Mm.

 

[bimble]

This is (allegedly) the invitation criteria to join the secret group - which compiled the list of people to report which they are talking about above. And which Lily now claims never to have set eyes on.
To join contact .. Lily Madigan.

 

[TopCat]

Lily Madigan is a poisonous cunt.

 

[Treacle Toes]

Why are people pretending not to know that Lily/others are challenging the reason/description of a/the list?.... It's bloody obvious and addressed on a thread below Karen's tweet to Stella Creasy.

 

[19force8]

Lily Madigan is a poisonous cunt.

You said "cunt"

 

[elbows]

Madigan has become a very convenient focal point for hatred and abuse. Only a portion of that can be attributed to her own words and acts, a lot of it is simply down to what she represents and the position she has managed to get into. Even when she fucks up, those that attack her in brutal ways are usually just exposing their own disgusting prejudices and related hate-speech.

 

[pengaleng]

dont know who these people are

 

[elbows]

dont know who these people are

A partial introduction:

Lily Madigan and the Hunt for Past Transgressions

 

[pengaleng]

i honestly dont think i care enough to find out tbh, cheers tho

 

[Treacle Toes]

Ufff....it's out of control on all fronts... I wonder how this is actually playing out for people day to day outside of twitter..at their LP meetings? Amongst their peer/friends circles? As work?



It's seriously sad to read stuff like this too...causalities on all sides it seems.

 

[elbows]

I havent got a shit misgendering list, but Pilgrim Tucker would probably qualify for it if I did.

 

[pengaleng]

yeah I well dont fuck with social media, it's weird and no one in real life even knows these convos happen it's a thorough waste of time, I am finding it hard to give a fuck about some pictures of tweets by some nobody.