Why did feminists feel a need to distinguish sexed embodiment (“sex”) from the constellation of personality traits, interests, aptitudes and social roles associated with sex (“gender”)? Because they needed to challenge the widely-held idea that “gender” is caused by biology, and therefore, “natural,” right, and good.
For feminists, “gender” isn’t simply an empirical observation that different sets of traits are associated with the sexes (feminists acknowledge this). More importantly, gender is a causal narrative explaining these differences (feminists vary in their views on this, but generally do not accept biology as a wholesale explanation). Most importantly, gender is a cultural prescription for what is, and is not, acceptable (feminists reject this).
The problem was that “gender” for women revolved so much around reproductive function and child rearing that it limited their participation in the world, which kept them economically and politically dependent on men. The idea that women aren’t constitutionally suited for many pursuits outside the domestic sphere needed to be challenged if women were ever to be liberated.
The feminist concept of “gender,” as a causal narrative and cultural prescription rightly deserving of skepticism, is not just different from but antithetical to “gender” as understood by gender identity ideology, which informs trans activism.
As illustration, take the example of what we today call a “gender non-conforming” woman. The feminist would see her as an example that disconfirms the causal narrative of “gender.” In addition, the feminist would accept her as no less a member of her sex on account of her nonconformity. In fact, this acceptance is required for expanding the notion of what a woman can be beyond the restrictive cultural confines of “gender.”
In contrast, under gender identity ideology, this woman is encouraged to view herself either as a man, or as not a woman, whatever that means. And this view requires her to disclaim her sex, which often entails drugs and surgery to modify her female body to look less female.
Gender identity ideology views gender as a quality that inheres in a person, which couldn’t be more different from the feminist view of gender as a cultural narrative of causality and prescription that has kept women from fully participating in public life.
In treating gender as an inherent (and cherished) aspect of the psyche, this ideology has effectively reified and essentialized the cultural narrative of gender that feminists criticize.
MDG’s constant nervous chuckling as he summarizes feminist thought sounds more like open mockery than objective scholarship. (Thank you, Lisa, for trying to get him to acknowledge the societal context in which feminist ideas developed.) I came away with the impression that therapists, theorists, and academics of the 2010s are to blame for the trans crises, not so much the feminists of the 1970s, whose ideas seem laughably absurd to him.
While I understand how you might feel that way from how Marco Del Giudice is in the habit of almost constantly smiling, I did not at all get the feeling that he was mocking objective scholarship or feminists. Quite the opposite. His knowledge of intellectual history relevant to this topic is wonderful. I wish that we had a transcript of what he said as he methodically went decade by decade to review the relevant intellectual history.
Having listened yesterday, and an hour in today, I'm on Team Holly, absolutely. My question for these two - and I'll keep listening in hopes of the answer - is what do they really mean by "feminism" and "radical feminism" when they chuckle, and blame feminists/feminism? I'm not understanding the link between the centuries' long fight for women's rights ((allowing for its permutations) and, for example, males self-IDing as women, or pre-pubertal medicalization to avoid passing?
In the new NYT podcast, Johanna Olson-Kennedy claims that she started transitioning young Black males so that they could pass as women, and thereby, in her words, avoid sexual violence from men. That seems deeply un-feminist to me. (And, for me, also makes Olson-Kennedy a prime candidate for "Whose Fault it is?")
Bailey briefly mentioned how billionaire autogynephiles like Pritzker in Illinois have had a huge impact had on promoting transgender ideology by donating many millions of dollars to gender clinics. Attributing the spread of transgender ideology to anything that the feminist movement has done ignores the huge roll these wealthy AGP males have had.
Lisa, why are you discussing the history of feminism with two men who have little understanding of feminism or history? Sure, blame women for medical greed. Blame women for it all, why not? who's going to defend women but some stupid feminists who have no money or power & are "niche" and "unknown" ...
If you want to blame "feminists" take a look at Judith Butler.
How can the rise of transgenderism be discussed without discussing John Money? Martine Rothblatt?
If you take a broader view than late 20th C. American culture, the "gender" code of cultures varies greatly. That has zero to do with medical attacks on the bodies of confused children and youth. These men just do not take the current situation very seriously in terms of what constitutes it. It is not that "gender" is malleable or sex is partially subject to hormones, the dynamics are much broader and uglier.
I did not hear either of these men "blaming feminism". What I did hear was mention of how certain concepts that various feminists introduced into social discussion have been used by transgender ideologues to advance transgender ideology and by conservative men (and women) to advance conservative viewpoints on the "proper" roles of women and men.
This is very common in human behavior. The same concept can be a double-bladed sword, used by advocates for very different, opposed viewpoints.
Children need to be cared for. That is a concept we can all agree on.
Social conservatives can say: a woman needs to stay home with her children.
Social liberals can say: the government needs to provide free childcare so that women can work outside of the home.
Nothing either of these men said sounded to me like they think that the current transgender movement is fine and dandy. Bailey carefully noted the difference between the Autogynephilic men who are self-aware that they have a sexual fetish and do not demand that they be accommodated in women's spaces because they know that they are not women versus Autogynephiles who are not self-aware and really believe that they are women and so are extremist trans activists who demand that they have access to anything and everything that actual women are entitled to.
Holly, it's really great to see your engagement in this arena and I appreciate your "voice of reason". The topic of blame is in the podcast title isn't it? ... Blaming feminists is a habit of many men. At any rate, the currents that have created the trans-apocalypse are broad and diverse, ranging from medical innovations (in surgery and endocrinology), through university-based queer theory (apposite to feminism by most learned accounts), to NGO activism funded by deep-pockets, the invention of the smart phone in every teens' hands, and social media, including YouTube, multi-player games where groomers stalk children, and so on. To reduce this complicated terrain to "well, feminists used gender to gain political rights in the 1970s and therefore cleared the terrain for the trans bulldozer" (to paraphrase Marco Giudice) is just not helpful in advancing understanding. I think male academics as we saw in this podcast like to blame feminists because they make an easy scapegoat.
I wish there were a transcript of this podcast. I think you and I came away from listening to Marco Del Giudice with different impressions of his feelings about what he was saying. Also, although his English is excellent, it is Italian-accented and that can make it harder to discern the feelings of a speaker. It seemed to me that he was very familiar with the history of feminism, and the different streams of feminist thought at different times, and how at certain times there were feminists very vocally in opposition to each other on certain issues. Anytime feminists disagree on something, anti-feminist men are quick to seize on that disagreement to say "See...there are women who agree with me". Pornography is an example. So is women referring to themselves as "sex workers". So much of liberal feminism lends itself to supporting what radical feminists oppose.
Also, remember that Lisa made "Are feminists to blame..." the central question. That is unfortunate because that was then the question that framed the entire discussion.
The self-aware Autogynephiles may wear women's clothing in public, but they do not demand that anyone "affirm" their "identity" because they know they are not really women and that they just enjoy the sexual and other feelings they get from wearing women's clothing. These, by the way, are typically the men that many women know personally as friends or intimate partners, so that those women will say they are not bothered by such men, not understanding that there are other "cross dressing" men who are actually predatory and enjoy intruding on women's spaces, violating the privacy of girls and women, and frightening girls and women.
So Bailey made an important distinction that we need to keep in mind in our activism on behalf of women's sex-based rights and against transgender activism and the attempts to enshrine "gender identity" into law as a protected class.
We cannot as rational feminists say both that women should be agree to wear whatever we want, but that men cannot be free to wear whatever they want. Cross dressing and appearing to be conventionally feminine are not the problem. Actually, we are already seeing that extremist transgender ideologue men are now insisting that they have a right to be accepted as women even if they do not in any way try to alter their appearance to look like women. Men with full beards wearing conventionally male clothing are now insisting that, just as females are women no matter how we appear, males can "identify" as and should be accepted legally to be women no matter how they appear.
I do wonder: why do these men with beards & so forth claim to be women? are they a version of Neo-Dadaist performance art? or are they just bullies who want to invade women's locker rooms & spas?
Ok, listened all the way through. It seems like what the two videos have in common is a discussion of the ways in which feminists have shot themselves in the foot. The 1970s notion that "we can be anyone" gave way to "anyone can be us", doing the "90% of the work" that MDG talks about. With ridiculous and sad outcomes, like the recent CA track meet with three teens crowded onto the first place podium, two girls in the back, one boy in the front.
A little separately: Lisa, I'm curious what, for you, is your takeaway from engaging with, as you put it, "happily transitioned people"? Have those conversations shifted your view on policies like self-ID, or "gender affirming care" for minors, or it is (as I think it is for me) kind of beside the point?
I do apologize that this will be a much longer comment than anyone might care to read but it’s my way of working out the thoughts swirling in my
head after listening to both segments:
Why not “blame” human nature and the human condition? Because as social creatures, in order to survive in the natural social order we tend to oversimplify and generalize/exagerrate differences between groups that justify exclusion in the competition for resources. This involves stigmatizing based on stereotyping as a social survival strategy that is adaptive for each group.
Therefore it’s natural that groups that have been suffering by being stereotyped negatively and held down or oppressed in the pecking order want to break free of those stereotypes as social barriers that keep people in boxes that are unnecessarily limiting, even if there are real differences on some level that can’t be denied but are disadvantageous to admit in that fight to be included or to flip the script.
So in order to avoid being kept in a one-down position, groups in the lower pecking order seeking to achieve parity and to compete more fairly in what MDG called the “matrix of oppression” , it pays strategically to minimize those differences as artificial barriers created by a society in which different groups are all jockeying for their relative position of dominance
Trans activists are trying quite successfully to achieve empowerment/legitimacy for their social group and freedom from stigma and oppression by following a standard playbook that has been used successfully before by other groups such as “female feminists” (as Lawford Smith helpfully distinguishes them from “trans feminists”) by asserting they are both a distinct but also similar category of people (separate from but similar to gay sexual orientation or even racial groups) and that’s why it’s important not to be regarded as just a sexual interest minority group like AGP
Trans activists have gained power by assumung society will more readily accept trans ID as biologically based and immutable therefore deserving of recognition and acceptance alongside equal rights movements for racial and sexual orientation minority groups, and also by minimizing psychological differences and also biological differences just as early feminists and early civil rights and gay rights groups that came before them did
But the way forward in a more mature stage of social progress (echoing MDG) it becomes necessary eventually to stop denying the fact that despite overlap of psychological characteristics between groups, some of which are relevant in the interest of minimizing social inequality or disadvantage, (such as gender non conforming males who might ID as transfeminine and might want recognition that they share some female typical prefrences or traits which might not be so important to deny vs. when they want to assert that trans women *are* women), there are also between-group differences that ultimately can’t or shouldn’t be denied and are real in the sense of being “material” between-group differences that pertain to respecting scientifically proven realities that have relevance to law, medicine, and social boundaries etc.
So even though we might sometimes prefer to exaggerate sameness of characteristics between groups when it’s convenient to promote equal rights of one group vis a vis another, we should balance that idea that there is overlap between all humans (which helps support ideal of universal dignity and worth of all humans) with the recognition that despite there being undeniable individual variation within groups that accounts for some of that overlap and appearance of sameness and defiance of stereotypes for individuals who belong to different groups (who may be more alike in some ways compared to members of their own group), some differences between groups do exist and will remain in place which will be more biologically determined or less culturally modifiable to varying degrees, as MDG points out, depending on the trait in question—and this will be the case despite our wishful thinking about what we like or don’t like about those traits being characteristic or typical for any one group
Is it necessary or even possible to strive to be “color blind” essentially with respect to acquiescing to fiction that trans women are exactly the same as? When we pretend to not notice race or sexual orientation is that helpful really to the cause of fairness and equality? We do classify others based on observable differences, it’s only human, but can we still treat each other with respect for our common humanity and our individuality without denying differences in group identity that may have bearing on how we all get along with appropriate humility? I can’t ever become male, or change my race, or sexual identity—but can I still get along peaceably with males and other races and people with other sexualities without enmity or envy for whatever perceived “built in” advantages we have/don’t have?
One interesting thing Lawford Smith said that stayed with me as an interesting irony for women in particular, is the concept of men gaming the system of intersectionality—that in this upside-down world of third wave feminism and social justice fundamentalism we’ve actually incentivized being seen as a member of an oppressed group, so we shouldn’t be surprised that some people want to “opt in” to a lower status group in order to obtain social advantage—an odd twist on the idea of defeating “the man” by attempting to climb down instead of up the social ladder, the goal being to shed one’s privilege by swapping membership in a high status group that has been deemed oppressive with being one of the currently-designated “worst off” group. It would seem then that it wouldn’t be desirable for that “worst off” group to ever become fully integrated with the rest of society, as just one more category that is no more deserving of rights and recognition than anybody else, would it? And maybe that’s part of the problem of why some people aren’t playing along, especially those who’ve “been there, done that already”—It’s time for this particular movement to grow up.
Lisa, the question you pose (Is It Feminism's Fault?) is not the only way or the best way to approach the serious issues we are facing. I understand that you are reacting to right wing men saying feminism is to blame for the extremes of transgender activism because feminism, particularly radical feminism, has put into question whether there are or are not differences between males and females that should be taken into account in how women should be treated in our culture.
Instead of us adopting the blame game attitude of conservatives and even some supposedly left wing men and women, we can instead approach this as the need to consider causality and intellectual/cultural history, which I think is the approach of Marco Del Giudice.
The various forms of feminist thought have undeniably affected how people view sex roles, and led people to question the respective effects of nature versus nurture of males and females. Conservatives couch this as feminists are to blame to anything negative that results from people in our society doing such questioning. But, as you alluded to, it is not acceptable to blame anyone for what others do with their ideas. That misogynist, predatory autogynephilic males are exploiting the intersectionality promoted by some liberal feminists is not the fault of liberal feminists.
As for the recovered memory and Satanic rituals fiasco, unfortunately we all know that it is all too common for girls (and boys) to be sexually molested by their fathers and other male relatives. Freud himself came to doubt that the reports of his women patients were accurate when they described being molested by their fathers. He could not believe that something that is actually all too common had happened to so many of his patients, so he doubted that it had happened to any of them.
The wrong people -- female teachers of young children -- ended up being accused of something that is actually done almost entirely by adult males. Meanwhile, the men who actually do sexually abused children for the most part are never held responsible.
Did anyone catch the name of the sexologist that Michael Bailey mentioned and said had done the best research on how most males who had gender dysphoria from early childhood and wanted to be girls desisted by their early 20s? I would like to Google for that study. I heard "Kin..." but could not make out the rest of the name.
To dismiss the possibility of recovered memories, is not based in reality. Children can dissociate from traumatic events and the memory of those events can be deeply buried, only to resurface when it's safe. I'm sure there are therapists who planted these ideas, but to discount them all whole cloth is just not reality based.
No one is denying that children and adults suppress memories of things that have traumatized them. The problem is that too many therapists did suggest to too many clients that "maybe something happened to you..." and so now people are being cautious before believing that someone really is remembering something, the memory of which they had totally suppressed.
There are so many books about the recovered memories scandal. One I can recommend is Making Monsters by Ofshe and Watters . . . or if you're not a reader, here's an episode of the Blocked and Reported podcast touching on it: Episode 48: Ethan Watters On The Latest Skirmish In The Never-Ending Memory Wars https://www.blockedandreported.org/p/episode-48-ethan-watters-on-the-latest-c1b
I understand that some might not want to listen to anything longer than one hour, but you could of course simply stop listening after one hour. Some of us really appreciate how much more that is worthwhile is discussed after the one hour mark.
Listening to these men, I can now understand how academia distorts and rewrites history.
Why did feminists feel a need to distinguish sexed embodiment (“sex”) from the constellation of personality traits, interests, aptitudes and social roles associated with sex (“gender”)? Because they needed to challenge the widely-held idea that “gender” is caused by biology, and therefore, “natural,” right, and good.
For feminists, “gender” isn’t simply an empirical observation that different sets of traits are associated with the sexes (feminists acknowledge this). More importantly, gender is a causal narrative explaining these differences (feminists vary in their views on this, but generally do not accept biology as a wholesale explanation). Most importantly, gender is a cultural prescription for what is, and is not, acceptable (feminists reject this).
The problem was that “gender” for women revolved so much around reproductive function and child rearing that it limited their participation in the world, which kept them economically and politically dependent on men. The idea that women aren’t constitutionally suited for many pursuits outside the domestic sphere needed to be challenged if women were ever to be liberated.
The feminist concept of “gender,” as a causal narrative and cultural prescription rightly deserving of skepticism, is not just different from but antithetical to “gender” as understood by gender identity ideology, which informs trans activism.
As illustration, take the example of what we today call a “gender non-conforming” woman. The feminist would see her as an example that disconfirms the causal narrative of “gender.” In addition, the feminist would accept her as no less a member of her sex on account of her nonconformity. In fact, this acceptance is required for expanding the notion of what a woman can be beyond the restrictive cultural confines of “gender.”
In contrast, under gender identity ideology, this woman is encouraged to view herself either as a man, or as not a woman, whatever that means. And this view requires her to disclaim her sex, which often entails drugs and surgery to modify her female body to look less female.
Gender identity ideology views gender as a quality that inheres in a person, which couldn’t be more different from the feminist view of gender as a cultural narrative of causality and prescription that has kept women from fully participating in public life.
In treating gender as an inherent (and cherished) aspect of the psyche, this ideology has effectively reified and essentialized the cultural narrative of gender that feminists criticize.
MDG’s constant nervous chuckling as he summarizes feminist thought sounds more like open mockery than objective scholarship. (Thank you, Lisa, for trying to get him to acknowledge the societal context in which feminist ideas developed.) I came away with the impression that therapists, theorists, and academics of the 2010s are to blame for the trans crises, not so much the feminists of the 1970s, whose ideas seem laughably absurd to him.
While I understand how you might feel that way from how Marco Del Giudice is in the habit of almost constantly smiling, I did not at all get the feeling that he was mocking objective scholarship or feminists. Quite the opposite. His knowledge of intellectual history relevant to this topic is wonderful. I wish that we had a transcript of what he said as he methodically went decade by decade to review the relevant intellectual history.
Man, if I had my old court reporter equipment, I'd volunteer for the job of transcribing some of that.
Having listened yesterday, and an hour in today, I'm on Team Holly, absolutely. My question for these two - and I'll keep listening in hopes of the answer - is what do they really mean by "feminism" and "radical feminism" when they chuckle, and blame feminists/feminism? I'm not understanding the link between the centuries' long fight for women's rights ((allowing for its permutations) and, for example, males self-IDing as women, or pre-pubertal medicalization to avoid passing?
In the new NYT podcast, Johanna Olson-Kennedy claims that she started transitioning young Black males so that they could pass as women, and thereby, in her words, avoid sexual violence from men. That seems deeply un-feminist to me. (And, for me, also makes Olson-Kennedy a prime candidate for "Whose Fault it is?")
Bailey briefly mentioned how billionaire autogynephiles like Pritzker in Illinois have had a huge impact had on promoting transgender ideology by donating many millions of dollars to gender clinics. Attributing the spread of transgender ideology to anything that the feminist movement has done ignores the huge roll these wealthy AGP males have had.
Among other things, some of these wealthy men retained the Denton law firm (the largest law firm in the world) to map out what has turned out to be a very successful strategy for capturing governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations, so that they incorporate transgender ideology into everything that they do: https://open.substack.com/pub/grahamlinehan/p/the-dentons-document?r=7atbc&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
very excellent point.
Lisa, why are you discussing the history of feminism with two men who have little understanding of feminism or history? Sure, blame women for medical greed. Blame women for it all, why not? who's going to defend women but some stupid feminists who have no money or power & are "niche" and "unknown" ...
If you want to blame "feminists" take a look at Judith Butler.
How can the rise of transgenderism be discussed without discussing John Money? Martine Rothblatt?
If you take a broader view than late 20th C. American culture, the "gender" code of cultures varies greatly. That has zero to do with medical attacks on the bodies of confused children and youth. These men just do not take the current situation very seriously in terms of what constitutes it. It is not that "gender" is malleable or sex is partially subject to hormones, the dynamics are much broader and uglier.
I did not hear either of these men "blaming feminism". What I did hear was mention of how certain concepts that various feminists introduced into social discussion have been used by transgender ideologues to advance transgender ideology and by conservative men (and women) to advance conservative viewpoints on the "proper" roles of women and men.
This is very common in human behavior. The same concept can be a double-bladed sword, used by advocates for very different, opposed viewpoints.
Children need to be cared for. That is a concept we can all agree on.
Social conservatives can say: a woman needs to stay home with her children.
Social liberals can say: the government needs to provide free childcare so that women can work outside of the home.
Nothing either of these men said sounded to me like they think that the current transgender movement is fine and dandy. Bailey carefully noted the difference between the Autogynephilic men who are self-aware that they have a sexual fetish and do not demand that they be accommodated in women's spaces because they know that they are not women versus Autogynephiles who are not self-aware and really believe that they are women and so are extremist trans activists who demand that they have access to anything and everything that actual women are entitled to.
Continued below....
Holly, it's really great to see your engagement in this arena and I appreciate your "voice of reason". The topic of blame is in the podcast title isn't it? ... Blaming feminists is a habit of many men. At any rate, the currents that have created the trans-apocalypse are broad and diverse, ranging from medical innovations (in surgery and endocrinology), through university-based queer theory (apposite to feminism by most learned accounts), to NGO activism funded by deep-pockets, the invention of the smart phone in every teens' hands, and social media, including YouTube, multi-player games where groomers stalk children, and so on. To reduce this complicated terrain to "well, feminists used gender to gain political rights in the 1970s and therefore cleared the terrain for the trans bulldozer" (to paraphrase Marco Giudice) is just not helpful in advancing understanding. I think male academics as we saw in this podcast like to blame feminists because they make an easy scapegoat.
I wish there were a transcript of this podcast. I think you and I came away from listening to Marco Del Giudice with different impressions of his feelings about what he was saying. Also, although his English is excellent, it is Italian-accented and that can make it harder to discern the feelings of a speaker. It seemed to me that he was very familiar with the history of feminism, and the different streams of feminist thought at different times, and how at certain times there were feminists very vocally in opposition to each other on certain issues. Anytime feminists disagree on something, anti-feminist men are quick to seize on that disagreement to say "See...there are women who agree with me". Pornography is an example. So is women referring to themselves as "sex workers". So much of liberal feminism lends itself to supporting what radical feminists oppose.
Also, remember that Lisa made "Are feminists to blame..." the central question. That is unfortunate because that was then the question that framed the entire discussion.
The self-aware Autogynephiles may wear women's clothing in public, but they do not demand that anyone "affirm" their "identity" because they know they are not really women and that they just enjoy the sexual and other feelings they get from wearing women's clothing. These, by the way, are typically the men that many women know personally as friends or intimate partners, so that those women will say they are not bothered by such men, not understanding that there are other "cross dressing" men who are actually predatory and enjoy intruding on women's spaces, violating the privacy of girls and women, and frightening girls and women.
So Bailey made an important distinction that we need to keep in mind in our activism on behalf of women's sex-based rights and against transgender activism and the attempts to enshrine "gender identity" into law as a protected class.
We cannot as rational feminists say both that women should be agree to wear whatever we want, but that men cannot be free to wear whatever they want. Cross dressing and appearing to be conventionally feminine are not the problem. Actually, we are already seeing that extremist transgender ideologue men are now insisting that they have a right to be accepted as women even if they do not in any way try to alter their appearance to look like women. Men with full beards wearing conventionally male clothing are now insisting that, just as females are women no matter how we appear, males can "identify" as and should be accepted legally to be women no matter how they appear.
I do wonder: why do these men with beards & so forth claim to be women? are they a version of Neo-Dadaist performance art? or are they just bullies who want to invade women's locker rooms & spas?
They are bullies who enjoy making women feel uncomfortable. No, they are not doing performance art. They are being the pricks that they are.
Ok, listened all the way through. It seems like what the two videos have in common is a discussion of the ways in which feminists have shot themselves in the foot. The 1970s notion that "we can be anyone" gave way to "anyone can be us", doing the "90% of the work" that MDG talks about. With ridiculous and sad outcomes, like the recent CA track meet with three teens crowded onto the first place podium, two girls in the back, one boy in the front.
A little separately: Lisa, I'm curious what, for you, is your takeaway from engaging with, as you put it, "happily transitioned people"? Have those conversations shifted your view on policies like self-ID, or "gender affirming care" for minors, or it is (as I think it is for me) kind of beside the point?
I do apologize that this will be a much longer comment than anyone might care to read but it’s my way of working out the thoughts swirling in my
head after listening to both segments:
Why not “blame” human nature and the human condition? Because as social creatures, in order to survive in the natural social order we tend to oversimplify and generalize/exagerrate differences between groups that justify exclusion in the competition for resources. This involves stigmatizing based on stereotyping as a social survival strategy that is adaptive for each group.
Therefore it’s natural that groups that have been suffering by being stereotyped negatively and held down or oppressed in the pecking order want to break free of those stereotypes as social barriers that keep people in boxes that are unnecessarily limiting, even if there are real differences on some level that can’t be denied but are disadvantageous to admit in that fight to be included or to flip the script.
So in order to avoid being kept in a one-down position, groups in the lower pecking order seeking to achieve parity and to compete more fairly in what MDG called the “matrix of oppression” , it pays strategically to minimize those differences as artificial barriers created by a society in which different groups are all jockeying for their relative position of dominance
Trans activists are trying quite successfully to achieve empowerment/legitimacy for their social group and freedom from stigma and oppression by following a standard playbook that has been used successfully before by other groups such as “female feminists” (as Lawford Smith helpfully distinguishes them from “trans feminists”) by asserting they are both a distinct but also similar category of people (separate from but similar to gay sexual orientation or even racial groups) and that’s why it’s important not to be regarded as just a sexual interest minority group like AGP
Trans activists have gained power by assumung society will more readily accept trans ID as biologically based and immutable therefore deserving of recognition and acceptance alongside equal rights movements for racial and sexual orientation minority groups, and also by minimizing psychological differences and also biological differences just as early feminists and early civil rights and gay rights groups that came before them did
But the way forward in a more mature stage of social progress (echoing MDG) it becomes necessary eventually to stop denying the fact that despite overlap of psychological characteristics between groups, some of which are relevant in the interest of minimizing social inequality or disadvantage, (such as gender non conforming males who might ID as transfeminine and might want recognition that they share some female typical prefrences or traits which might not be so important to deny vs. when they want to assert that trans women *are* women), there are also between-group differences that ultimately can’t or shouldn’t be denied and are real in the sense of being “material” between-group differences that pertain to respecting scientifically proven realities that have relevance to law, medicine, and social boundaries etc.
So even though we might sometimes prefer to exaggerate sameness of characteristics between groups when it’s convenient to promote equal rights of one group vis a vis another, we should balance that idea that there is overlap between all humans (which helps support ideal of universal dignity and worth of all humans) with the recognition that despite there being undeniable individual variation within groups that accounts for some of that overlap and appearance of sameness and defiance of stereotypes for individuals who belong to different groups (who may be more alike in some ways compared to members of their own group), some differences between groups do exist and will remain in place which will be more biologically determined or less culturally modifiable to varying degrees, as MDG points out, depending on the trait in question—and this will be the case despite our wishful thinking about what we like or don’t like about those traits being characteristic or typical for any one group
Is it necessary or even possible to strive to be “color blind” essentially with respect to acquiescing to fiction that trans women are exactly the same as? When we pretend to not notice race or sexual orientation is that helpful really to the cause of fairness and equality? We do classify others based on observable differences, it’s only human, but can we still treat each other with respect for our common humanity and our individuality without denying differences in group identity that may have bearing on how we all get along with appropriate humility? I can’t ever become male, or change my race, or sexual identity—but can I still get along peaceably with males and other races and people with other sexualities without enmity or envy for whatever perceived “built in” advantages we have/don’t have?
One interesting thing Lawford Smith said that stayed with me as an interesting irony for women in particular, is the concept of men gaming the system of intersectionality—that in this upside-down world of third wave feminism and social justice fundamentalism we’ve actually incentivized being seen as a member of an oppressed group, so we shouldn’t be surprised that some people want to “opt in” to a lower status group in order to obtain social advantage—an odd twist on the idea of defeating “the man” by attempting to climb down instead of up the social ladder, the goal being to shed one’s privilege by swapping membership in a high status group that has been deemed oppressive with being one of the currently-designated “worst off” group. It would seem then that it wouldn’t be desirable for that “worst off” group to ever become fully integrated with the rest of society, as just one more category that is no more deserving of rights and recognition than anybody else, would it? And maybe that’s part of the problem of why some people aren’t playing along, especially those who’ve “been there, done that already”—It’s time for this particular movement to grow up.
Really interesting discussion: thank-you
Lisa, the question you pose (Is It Feminism's Fault?) is not the only way or the best way to approach the serious issues we are facing. I understand that you are reacting to right wing men saying feminism is to blame for the extremes of transgender activism because feminism, particularly radical feminism, has put into question whether there are or are not differences between males and females that should be taken into account in how women should be treated in our culture.
Instead of us adopting the blame game attitude of conservatives and even some supposedly left wing men and women, we can instead approach this as the need to consider causality and intellectual/cultural history, which I think is the approach of Marco Del Giudice.
The various forms of feminist thought have undeniably affected how people view sex roles, and led people to question the respective effects of nature versus nurture of males and females. Conservatives couch this as feminists are to blame to anything negative that results from people in our society doing such questioning. But, as you alluded to, it is not acceptable to blame anyone for what others do with their ideas. That misogynist, predatory autogynephilic males are exploiting the intersectionality promoted by some liberal feminists is not the fault of liberal feminists.
As for the recovered memory and Satanic rituals fiasco, unfortunately we all know that it is all too common for girls (and boys) to be sexually molested by their fathers and other male relatives. Freud himself came to doubt that the reports of his women patients were accurate when they described being molested by their fathers. He could not believe that something that is actually all too common had happened to so many of his patients, so he doubted that it had happened to any of them.
The wrong people -- female teachers of young children -- ended up being accused of something that is actually done almost entirely by adult males. Meanwhile, the men who actually do sexually abused children for the most part are never held responsible.
Did anyone catch the name of the sexologist that Michael Bailey mentioned and said had done the best research on how most males who had gender dysphoria from early childhood and wanted to be girls desisted by their early 20s? I would like to Google for that study. I heard "Kin..." but could not make out the rest of the name.
Ken Zucker
To dismiss the possibility of recovered memories, is not based in reality. Children can dissociate from traumatic events and the memory of those events can be deeply buried, only to resurface when it's safe. I'm sure there are therapists who planted these ideas, but to discount them all whole cloth is just not reality based.
No one is denying that children and adults suppress memories of things that have traumatized them. The problem is that too many therapists did suggest to too many clients that "maybe something happened to you..." and so now people are being cautious before believing that someone really is remembering something, the memory of which they had totally suppressed.
There are so many books about the recovered memories scandal. One I can recommend is Making Monsters by Ofshe and Watters . . . or if you're not a reader, here's an episode of the Blocked and Reported podcast touching on it: Episode 48: Ethan Watters On The Latest Skirmish In The Never-Ending Memory Wars https://www.blockedandreported.org/p/episode-48-ethan-watters-on-the-latest-c1b
Lisa, Is it possible for podcasts to be around 1 hr...........??? Thank you.
I understand that some might not want to listen to anything longer than one hour, but you could of course simply stop listening after one hour. Some of us really appreciate how much more that is worthwhile is discussed after the one hour mark.
I'm always left wanting to hear more . . .