Transgender - Part 2

[Gethelred]

Please be aware that the tolerance of anti-trans language on BF is at an all-time low. Jokes and insults that are trans-related, as well as anti-trans and bigoted rhetoric will be met with infractions, threadbans etc as required. It's a sensitive (and important) topic, so behave like well-mannered adults when discussing it, PARTICULARLY when disagreeing. This equally applies across the whole site.

 

[Gralin]

This is Part 2 of the thread Transgender.

Part 1 can be found here

Transgender

Please be aware that the tolerance of anti-trans language on BF is at an all-time low. Jokes and insults that are trans-related, as well as anti-trans and bigoted rhetoric will be met with infractions, threadbans etc as required. It's a sensitive (and important) topic, so behave like...

www.bigfooty.com

 

[Gethelred]

Yes, would love to see it. Thanks!

I've been given the go ahead. Courtesy of 4cunningTonneTruck:

Backup Trans Rights Fact Sheet

docs.google.com

Hey all, remember that the following applies:

Please be aware that the tolerance of anti-trans language on BF is at an all-time low. Jokes and insults that are trans-related, as well as anti-trans and bigoted rhetoric will be met with infractions, threadbans etc as required. It's a sensitive (and important) topic, so behave like well-mannered adults when discussing it, PARTICULARLY when disagreeing. This equally applies across the whole site.

 

[Chief]

Yes, if you narrow the entire question down to who's appearing on the bill at one single event, you'd be dead right.

No, it's not one single event.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

Exactly. These people are inherently evil. To be left wing, as they all are, you have to be evil. You have to want to steal the fruits of another mans labour. You have to support the expansion of the state over the individual to warrant the economic and social restrictions that their ideology demands. You cannot trust a modern left-wing individual. They will sooner scrape the flesh off your bones than provide anything of value to the world.

Ridiculous rubbish.

 

[Chief]

Trans people are saying they are being discriminated against because of what they feel they are.

And this is the ENTIRE problem with anti-trans people such as yourself. Inability to accept reality.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

No, it's not one single event.

Correct, it's not; I would say it's part of a disturbing trend.

But even if you added up every single event of that sort that has ever happened, anywhere in the world, you wouldn't even start to get close to representing the totality of the question that was posed.

 

[Chief]

But even if you added up every single event of that sort that has ever happened

I'm talking about the 'activists' that are networking online and in real life at events.

 

[Kwality]

Inability to accept reality.

Who's version of reality is that ?

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

And this is the ENTIRE problem with anti-trans people such as yourself. Inability to accept reality.

No, you mean inability to accept I should alter my behaviour based on what someone else tells me is inside their head.

Of course I will give them the time of day. I try always to be a decent human being. But I won't automatically change my behaviour on the strength of the encounter, and I certainly won't vehemently agitate for all of society to do the same.

This is the identity politics tail wagging the democracy dog.

(And I am not anti-trans. Of course, round here, anyone who's not a card-carrying, placard waving, satyagrahari pro-trans activist is branded anti-trans, but that's exactly my point.)

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

I'm talking about the 'activists' that are networking online and in real life at events.

Still not even close to the totality of the question.

 

[Engimal v3]

So it’s ALL about good manners and not being an a-hole?

You really think that’s the first principles at play here?

This extraordinary, worldwide phenomenon we’ve witnessed in the last few years is just about manners and not being an a-hole? LOL.

Yeah

 

[The Cryptkeeper]

Exactly. These people are inherently evil. To be left wing, as they all are, you have to be evil. You have to want to steal the fruits of another mans labour. You have to support the expansion of the state over the individual to warrant the economic and social restrictions that their ideology demands. You cannot trust a modern left-wing individual. They will sooner scrape the flesh off your bones than provide anything of value to the world.

 

[Chief]

Still not even close to the totality of the question.

I dunno. I'm doing other things at the same time and I've lost the thread of what you mean by "the question".

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

Apologies for not replying to everyone yet; I'm at work.

 

[Gethelred]

No. People of African descent have a genuine grievance that they're discriminated against purely because of what they are.

Most minorities could make this case, and it is absolutely valid.

Trans people are saying they are being discriminated against because of what they feel they are.

This seems to me to be a distinction without a distinction; either both minority groups are valid, or neither are.

Both groups look different, experience life differently, and are suffer the effects of prejudice for who and what they are. Both groups suffer through how society perceives them.

Do you see how the bolded could be seen as dismissive, as though blaming trans people for their experiences?

That's not to say it's ever OK to discriminate against trans people; all people should be treated with dignity and respect. But if people can't see the relative intellectual weakness of their case, compared to discrimination against, say, black people, or women, I don't know what to say.

If your case is that you think there's a distinction between trans people and other minority groups, you've yet to make it.

Well if you proceed from the position that anyone who accedes to all wishes of a tiny minority is automatically a decent person, but anyone who has any misgivings about what they're being asked to accept is not a decent person, you wouldn't, would you?

I genuinely do not know what you want from me here. Sorry, but could you render your thoughts in a fashion so I might be able to understand?

From the sounds of it, you're objecting to the shifting of the Overton window to prevent people deadnaming or misgendering trans people akin to further spreading the vilification act. Is this what you're saying?

Yep, and as I've said elsewhere, the world will be burned to a crisp, and people on here will still be whipping themselves into butter over something that is of next to zero concern to the vast majority of the planet.

You will probably counter that you like to think you can walk and chew gum at the same time. Well I say look around. While you think you're approaching things holistically, I think you're being played like a cheap violin by the right wing. Rising to the bait every. single. time. While meanwhile, they get away with murder.

Sheesh, I'm hardly alone in saying the left's obsession with reducing everything to identity is hindering their effectiveness on a wide range of issues. People on here are acting like this is all news.

I would hazard a guess that every time a fresh identity politics grievance rears its head, a lot of those hard heads in the Greens (and what's left of the progressive element in the ALP) - the ones who make the tough daily decisions about strategy - roll their eyes and go "FMD not this again."

Politics is the art of the possible. Choosing your battles.

It's interesting reflecting on the relative paths we take ideologically. My initial position started out not dissimilarly to what you've put forth here extremely closely; that culture war stuff was and remains a smokescreen to hide the genuine class warfare that's going on writ large in late stage capitalism.

Part of changing views is reading and listening to other people, listening to the experiences and struggles of others within the movement. The real problem the modern left has is that it is split certainly, but it is interesting the reversal of onus here: you (and I used to) want the minority groups who would never find support on the right to join the movement, cognisant that change is only possible through unity.

The problem is that without their help, we don't win either. These minority movements are central to the goals of the union movement; the struggles of black people and gay people throughout history has been the struggle of the left. An awful lot of our rhetoric, our philosophy and our vision of the future was borne from minority groups, and you want to tell them their wants don't matter in the context of wider issues?

Small wonder the left is disunited. We push those we need away, through telling them their problems don't matter.

Democracy is the "tyranny" of the majority. By definition.

... which is why behaving like a tyrant results poorly, especially when lefties do it.

As I've said, by winning over the majority. And I'm not in any way convinced a fixation on the grievances of a tiny sliver of society is any way to go about that.

I restate what I've said before: no non-violent protest movement alone resulted in genuine change.

You don't win over the majority without negating or equalling the monopoly of violence the state holds over its populace.

In a democracy, how else do you think minority rights are won? They are won only on the sufferance of the majority. One of life's tough lessons.

Now, you sound like Kwality.

Minority rights are won when the state starts to lose control and is compelled to change, not when a ballot is counted. Concessions are never given without reason to give them.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

I find a lot to agree with SBD on, on the Swans board, including our own SRP thread, though trans rights, specifically pronouns, hasn't come up in any detail.

Does seem odd to come to a Transgender thread, argue at length, and say we should be focusing on climate change though.

Thanks mate.

I don't think it's odd at all. One of my main points all along is that this fixation on minority rights is cruelling action on more important things*. Where else would I make that point? Is the Transgender thread for discussion of the transgender issue, or is it just for people to come on and say they support transgender rights?

As to the pronoun issue, it takes two to tango.

*Yes, I am actually saying that! I am saying that to most people, and even to many progressives, there far are more important issues than trans rights (and identity politics in general.)

 

[Kwality]

Minority rights are won when the state starts to lose control and is compelled to change, not when a ballot is counted.

As the same sex marriage referendum reflected what the people wanted.

 

[Gethelred]

The other side of it is - and this is probably a conversation for another thread, one I might make at some point - that democracy (like capitalism) is the organisational structure we use to get what we want. We made it up, and we can unmake it at, literally, any point.

The reason the US has a Bill of Rights in the first place is because they feared the tyranny of government over minority groups, they just didn't mention which minority groups they meant (ie, wealthy landowners and slaveowners, the writers of it).

Democracy is there to serve us, not for us to serve it; prioritizing the process over the outcome is not something that will lead to justice over spans of time.

 

[Gethelred]

As the same sex marriage referendum reflected what the people wanted.

... seriously?

Um, I don't know how to tell you this, Kwality, but look up the origins of Pride marches (Stonewall) and get back to me.

 

[Bloods86]

Thanks mate.

I don't think it's odd at all. One of my main points all along is that this fixation on minority rights is cruelling action on more important things*. Where else would I make that point? Is the Transgender thread for discussion of the transgender issue, or is it just for people to come on and say they support transgender rights?

As to the pronoun issue, it takes two to tango.

*Yes, I am actually saying that! I am saying that to most people, and even to many progressives, there far are more important issues than trans rights (and identity politics in general.)

I think a society can be judged on how it treats minorities. Otherwise we're leaving them to the wolves that would exploit prejudices against them, to enhance their base and power, which they then wield against things like environmental action.

Yes, it takes two to tango. Your assumption appears to be though, that people requesting preferred pronouns are making some onerous demand, and by default, are doing it rudely. Maybe there's some obnoxious trans people out there that will scream if you slip up, maybe they just cop it every day, but you'd have to show they are the majority, and without cause, for this to be a relevant point.

As for not changing behaviour based on what other people feel? That sounds like a pretty ice cold way of relating to people. We're not even talking about temporary/situational emotions here, but fundamental identity. Given we've not found a gene that determines sexual orientation, do you go around refusing to acknowledge that gay people are gay? Would you think it's fine to keep asking a gay man about potential girlfriends? Or vice versa. There's no reason for you to do so unless you're refusing to accept the validity of their professed orientation, or that you don't think the orientation is valid at all.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

they've also managed to reduce the entire argument about trans rights down to just pronouns so they can argue it's not important enough to worry about

No. That's just the direction things happen to have gone in here. No need to read any grand-narrative into it.

But yes I do believe that, without ignoring trans people's situation, there are far more important issues facing us than trans rights.

You seem to believe nothing is more important than saying nothing is more important than trans rights.

 

[Gralin]

No. That's just the direction things happen to have gone in here. No need to read any grand-narrative into it.

But yes I do believe that, without ignoring trans people's situation, there are far more important issues facing us than trans rights.

You seem to believe nothing is more important than saying nothing is more important than trans rights.

You were the one that decided to focus the entire discussion on pronouns my guy.

Well that and how you don't really believe them so you're not interested in helping them

 

[ShanDog]

Do you believe that everyone should have the right to call a 'black' person, the 'n-word'? (In places that 'black people' are a minority).
Because 'free-speech' is a human right, and insults are just a matter of manners.



Or do you accept that there are limitations on free-speech, in order to create a more inclusive society?
For example, intentionally and repeatedly calling someone by their incorrect pronouns.

By limitations, do you mean socially, or legally?

 

[Kwality]

... seriously?

Um, I don't know how to tell you this, Kwality, but look up the origins of Pride marches (Stonewall) and get back to me.

Thanks for the Stonewall reference & I'm happy to acknowledge I had no understanding of the history of the Pride outside of it evolving in Australia, before my eyes over the past however long. Probably that goes back to Police Commissioner Nixon in the early 2000s, & non violent.

 

[Geelong_Sicko]

No. That's just the direction things happen to have gone in here. No need to read any grand-narrative into it.

But yes I do believe that, without ignoring trans people's situation, there are far more important issues facing us than trans rights.

You seem to believe nothing is more important than saying nothing is more important than trans rights.

It's always good to question things. To wonder aloud at the direction we've been going and where our destination actually is. As a society and as a species.

While you're right that there ARE more important issues facing us, only ONE group is holding us back from moving on to those issues. ONE group that doesn't accept the concept of a common humanity where we can each pursue happiness in our own lives without negatively affecting others regardless of shade of skin. Regardless of social status, or perceptions of such. Regardless of gender no matter how that gender is expressed.

This one group holding us all back from moving on - it aint the progressive left. Your sights are trained on the wrong group. Those who believe in a common humanity are not the enemy, those who work against such ideals are and always have been.

Never lose sight of that.