What I Said at MIT
Despite concerted efforts to stop me and the others from speaking
On Sunday, Simon Amaya Price, whom I recently interviewed here, moderated a panel discussion about gender in education, medicine, psychology and law, hosted by MIT. Protestors got wind of it and—certain they objected before hearing a word—organized opposition.
Only a few protestors made it into the MIT building. One came into the lecture hall and sat down, refusing to leave even though he didn’t have a ticket. I asked him why he thought he deserved special privileges—why he alone should be allowed inside when everyone else had to pay. He said he deserved exceptionalism because he was protesting. I did not find his argument persuasive. Nor, I’m sorry to say, did I find it funny. I am not good at remaining calm in the face of lunacy—my own, or anybody else’s.
Outside the lecture hall, four or five people, whom I believe identified as trans and who had a lot of cameras, screamed at me that I was bullying trans women through various quotes they’d catalogued in a nifty handout.
I asked how it was bullying if I wasn’t saying it directly to the person. Mistake! Ante upped! I wasn’t bullying trans women, I was killing trans children—apparently by sharing what I’d learned about autogynephilia from the experts who’d studied it, and by making some jokes that were also truths, like that the man in the pink mini-skirt was a…man.
Truth hurts. And when you’ve spent your life trying to avoid pain, and thinking anyone causing you pain deserves to feel pain themselves, well, you’ll do anything to silence the truth in order to avoid that pain. I get it.
But I would have liked to know how, if bullying another person means identifying them in a way that does not match their own identity, it is not bullying to call me a TERF when I do not identify as one. I’m neither trans-exclusionary nor a radical feminist. This is violence and I have been harmed! And how was it not bullying to chant “Shame!” at me? I would have had a conversation with those folks, but for their malignant rhetorical style.
Although I said many other things, and not everything below, during the actual event, I’m sharing what I typed in preparation. If there’s a video of the event, I’ll share it later. But first, enjoy these snippets of the protest that happened not because we shared information, but because we dared to have dinner afterwards!
Here’s the sign I wrote on a napkin. I’d like to make it into a t-shirt:
By the way, the Glass House restaurant deserves a round of applause for not canceling the event, despite the pressure to do so, and the malicious, fake one-star Yelp reviews.
And now: the MIT talk.
Q: The first few months of the Trump presidency has brought us over 145 executive orders, many of which pertain directly to gender-related issues. Do you think Trump’s presidency spells the end for gender ideology?
A: I absolutely do not.