Split Thread Philosophical musings about trans rights

[theprestige]

Your arguments tend to be too abstract for my tastes, so pardon me if I'm not interested in trying to translate my thoughts into another conceptual language that apparently you don't believe in.

This is pretty much my feeling too. This far along in the discussion, I'm way past any interest in abstract arguments. Tell me about practical applications. Tell me about concrete policy proposals that embody whatever abstract values you hold.

ETA: And also I agree with JoeMorgue here.

 

[Matthew Best]

It's pointless trying to debate this sort of thing because debate is an imperialist capitalist white supremacist cis heteropatriarchal technique that transforms a potential exchange of knowledge into a tool of exclusion and oppression.

 

[Paul2]

It's pointless trying to debate this sort of thing because debate is an imperialist capitalist white supremacist cis heteropatriarchal technique that transforms a potential exchange of knowledge into a tool of exclusion and oppression.

You need to trademark that.

 

[shuttlt]

Then why talk at all of natural rights? If the language, rhetoric and concept of natural rights isn't how you conceive of rights, then why use it?

Because I'm trying to understand the philosophical basis of your position, and other liberals (I get the impression you are one) positions on the forum. I'm explaining where they break down for me. This isn't a debate that anybody is going to be convinced by who doesn't already share your assumptions, and all those people seem already to agree. The trans activists don't share your assumptions, so what is there beyond trying to understand the grounding of other people's positions? I'm not going to convince you of my position, because you don't have the same assumptions about the world as I do. I've articulated my position a bunch of times already, I can do it again if you want. I'm not going to try to convince you of it though, because that would be pointless over ambitions. It took me years to be convinced of it.

One of the reasons I think that trans-activism is bad, very briefly, is that I think that the concept of man and woman goes through us like the writing on a stick of rock. I do not think it is socially constructed, or at least a significant amount of it isn't. I think the civilisation is built on top of such things. I think we treat such things as if they were unimportant matters that we can change to appeal to the latest new idea that has struck us as plausible is incredibly dangerous. I see it as one step in a game of pulling blocks out from the load bearing walls of the cathedral that is western civilisation. You are free to do that kind of thing for a while, but I think I see cracks.

Again, from what I can see, many people argue a philosophically liberal position founded in natural rights for causes they support, and then turn into philosophical conservatives for causes they don't support. This is what that quote about everybody being a conservative about what they love best was about.

It isn't necessarily how I conceive of rights - I was trying to get my head around your arguments, which invoked natural rights.

I was making the standard liberal case which I assume we all know. Under it's assumptions, it seems pretty hard to consistently argue against trans-inclusion. If you aren't philosophically liberal, then perhaps you could explain the basis for your thinking. Are you a utilitarian?

Your arguments tend to be too abstract for my tastes, so pardon me if I'm not interested in trying to translate my thoughts into another conceptual language that apparently you don't believe in.

The different sides of this debate have different assumptions about the world. If you aren't interested in that, and aren't interested in clarifying your assumptions then the whole issue becomes like an argument between a Frenchmen and a German neither of which speaks the others language and insist on barking at one another in their own language.

It seems like you're more interested in trying to trip up 'liberals' or 'progressives' for reasons that aren't clear to me, because you're not actually stating your true beliefs, they're just 'not a liberal', 'not a progressive'. Since I've happily debated self-styled National Socialists and racists in the past, whatever you actually do believe in isn't going to shock me. So make your own political-philosophical position clear, or get plonked.

Not. I am not trying to trip up liberals or progressives. I am somewhat frustrated that so many people are pretty much only interested in their conclusions rather than how they get to their conclusions. It's like the old joke about the man building a wall and trying to start at the top. With that attitude you end up arguing A to get to conclusion 1 and NOT A to get to conclusion 2 and are well satisfied.

When different people have different philosophies, as the different sides of this question do, you can't just bypass discussing the philosophies and just jump straight to arguing about the conclusions. Paul2 has mentioned post modernism a couple of times. Would it make any sense to argue with somebody presenting a post modern position as if their philosophy and it's difference to yours was unimportant? That would be madness. You'd never get anywhere. The trans-activist position, or a lot of it, derives from Foucault doesn't it? It's about as post modern as it gets.

From what I can see, if you aren't interested in the philosophy, you aren't interested in the core disagreement.

 

[theprestige]

I agree that this is how it is in practice. They are claiming a different set of natural rights. Arguing about whether or not sex pests and so forth are going to abuse that right is irrelevant. That is why that argument never, ever goes anywhere.

Yes, thank you, but I already know how to suck eggs. Is there anything I can possibly say to convince you to stop trying to teach me?

In many ways you are saying about natural rights being axioms is the same as an idea in counter enlightenment and dissident right wing circles, that you need to hold your core beliefs outside of rational questioning. Religion, Natural Rights... whatever it may be. The foundation can't be questioned otherwise the whole thing falls down.

I have no opinion about that.

Look, I told you explicitly what kind of discussion I'm interested in. You ignored all of that, to try to continue exactly the discussion I've made clear I don't want. Are you being rude on purpose, or are you in the grips of some ideé fixe that has resisted your every attempt to dislodge it?

 

[shuttlt]

Please then explain the dick pic phenomenon - is this rooted in an innate biological urge of men now expressed through smartphones because of advances in technology, or something that is unrestrained because of a lack of socialisation or lack of consequences?

I'm pretty sure there is a biological basis to urges to sexual display, competition and aggression.

Before smartphones and the internet, teenage boys and adult men weren't as far as I'm aware using Polaroid cameras to photograph their penises to send the photos to girls and women, or apparently engaging in flashing and exhibitionism on the scale reported by girls and women who have been exposed to dick pics.

Sure, but dirty old men showing their penises to women in the park was a thing. I don't recall too many stories of middle aged women feeling a similar compulsion. That's not to say that no woman ever flashed her chest, but that is a rather different phenomenon to the compulsive dirty old man in the park, in the way that e-thots are a different phenomenon to dick pics.

 

[shuttlt]

Look, I told you explicitly what kind of discussion I'm interested in. You ignored all of that, to try to continue exactly the discussion I've made clear I don't want. Are you being rude on purpose, or are you in the grips of some ideé fixe that has resisted your every attempt to dislodge it?

My sincere apologies. So many people talk, that I lost track. It pains me somewhat that people want to deal with a post modern disagreement as if it was a linear programming problem. The question you seem to be interested in seems to me rather like a year in to WW2 focusing on how precisely to divide Berlin between the winning powers and what percentage of German steel should be exported after reconstruction, but if it interests you... I guess I have nothing to say. I will try not to pester you any further.

 

[Robin]

I'm pretty sure there is a biological basis to urges to sexual display, competition and aggression.

So you are saying the brain is gendered, right?

 

[Matthew Best]

You need to trademark that.

I can't - it's an actual quote from Professor Sunny Singh.

She seems to have deleted or hidden her original tweet in which she wrote this, but here's a screenshot:
https://twitter.com/broseph_stalin/status/1309104461470740481

 

[shuttlt]

So you are saying the brain is gendered, right?

I guess I'm not sure what you mean by the question. There are clearly differences in average behaviour that are rooted in being born in a male body vs a female body. It would be incredible if that wasn't the case. Is that what you were asking?

 

[shuttlt]

Look, I'll add something here while I've got the analogy in my head. Sex and gender are sometimes discussed as if they were separate free floating things. That the cultural role of man or woman was somehow completely arbitrary. The way I imagine it is this....

Gender is the cultural manifestation of the physical reality of sex differences and everything that goes with that. Imagine a group of people building a town. A town is in some sense a cultural manifestation. There are many different styles and types of town. The physical environment in which the town is to be build is not a cultural manifestation.

As culturally created as towns are, they have to contend with the physical reality of their location. A town that is perfectly appropriate on a Caribbean island is going to be horribly inappropriate if you tried to replicate it in the arctic circle. Venice is terrific, but you would have a terrible time trying to build a city based on canals in the middle of the Sahara.

Gender is like that. It is the cultural manifestation of an underlying physical reality. The idea that it would be anything like the norm to radically question your gender, or have society have no stereotypical expectations around gender is incredibly decadent and is akin to thinking that the casinos of Las Vegas where pyramids sit next to reconstructions of Venice is a sensible model for town planning that other places should follow. Such things are only possible when floating on such a sea of wealth that we can, for a time, hold back physical reality.

 

[theprestige]

Half of this thread belongs in The Other Thread. Half of what remains should have stayed in AAH. Where's the philosophy of natural rights as such?

 

[Paul2]

I can't - it's an actual quote from Professor Sunny Singh.

She seems to have deleted or hidden her original tweet in which she wrote this, but here's a screenshot:
https://twitter.com/broseph_stalin/status/1309104461470740481

The reverse of Poe's law. I had a brief thought that it could have been meant seriously, but reduced the odds of that to, maybe, 30% or so.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Alright so this sort of counts a thought experiment, I guess it belongs here, although as noted the line as to what thread is for what is a little blurry. If anyone thinks it works better in the other thread, let me know. I am at least ATTEMPTING to follow the spirit of why this thread was spun off.

And yes this is tying back to a concept/argument I've used many times before, so sue me.

Scenario: I'm in a private but publicly accessible space for men; bathroom, locker room, something like that. A "male space" as the concept has been used this discussion.

A biological female who identifies (how I know they do is a question I'll leave for the sages) as a "Man" comes into the room. I "accept" them into that space.

This, by definition is trans-accepting.

But then a biological female who identifies as a "woman" comes into the room. She was just sick of waiting in line for the ladies room let's say.

I also accept this person into the space.

Have my actions now become trans... not accepting?

I've given the trans person everything they claim to want, just not in the context of them being an exception to assumed social rules.

 

[Robin]

I guess I'm not sure what you mean by the question. There are clearly differences in average behaviour that are rooted in being born in a male body vs a female body. It would be incredible if that wasn't the case. Is that what you were asking?

Indeed, and I agree that it would be incredible if this was not the case. It would also be incredible if these differences were uniquely tied to sex differences.

It's just that this seems to be an unpopular view among those here who are skeptical of trans rights. I have certainly received quite a lot of pushback from this contingent when I suggest that the brain might be gendered in this sense.

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Alright so this sort of counts a thought experiment, I guess it belongs here, although as noted the line as to what thread is for what is a little blurry. If anyone thinks it works better in the other thread, let me know. I am at least ATTEMPTING to follow the spirit of why this thread was spun off.

And yes this is tying back to a concept/argument I've used many times before, so sue me.

Scenario: I'm in a private but publicly accessible space for men; bathroom, locker room, something like that. A "male space" as the concept has been used this discussion.

A biological female who identifies (how I know they do is a question I'll leave for the sages) as a "Man" comes into the room. I "accept" them into that space.

This, by definition is trans-accepting.

But then a biological female who identifies as a "woman" comes into the room. She was just sick of waiting in line for the ladies room let's say.

I also accept this person into the space.

Have my actions now become trans... not accepting?

I've given the trans person everything they claim to want, just not in the context of them being an exception to assumed social rules.

Maybe, depends how you treat them, which would depend on the particular space.

 

[Paul2]

Indeed, and I agree that it would be incredible if this was not the case. It would also be incredible if these differences were uniquely tied to sex differences.

It's just that this seems to be an unpopular view among those here who are skeptical of trans rights. I have certainly received quite a lot of pushback from this contingent when I suggest that the brain might be gendered in this sense.

Do you have an example, even a hypothetical, of what you're talking about? that is, a sex difference which is not uniquely tied to the brain but is also associated with - what, either some non-brain biological difference? Is that what you mean?

 

[Leumas]

For those who are so hot under the collar about public bathrooms... what is so special about them?

What do you think a transgender female is going to do in a public women's bathroom??

Should we start segregating Lesbian women from going to women's bathrooms? Or Gay men from going into male bathrooms??

Why this obsession by the theists with public bathrooms and paranoia about a particular gender entering them???

And what is ironic is the myriad of cases where we see these hypocritical theists doing precisely what they self-project others wanting to do.

It is more often the very theists who are the most vehemently vociferous against something who are doing that very thing.

The self-hate of these wretched victims whose skulls are riddled with the droppings of the religion syphilitic parasite rattling around their craniums in lieu of grey cells must be so overflowing that they obliviously project it unto others and they cannot help it.... they are compelled and propelled by their syphilitic parasite to spread the infection.

Much like this poor creature....

 

[theprestige]

For those who are so hot under the collar about public bathrooms... what is so special about them?

What do you think a transgender female is going to do in a public women's bathroom??

There's a whole thread that discusses this and related questions in great depth. This isn't it.

 

[shuttlt]

For those who are so hot under the collar about public bathrooms... what is so special about them?

What do you think a transgender female is going to do in a public women's bathroom??

Without rehashing the other thread..... you need to describe what is going on as if you were a gender critical feminist, not as if you were what ever you are.