What did JK Rowling do wrong?

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DW_a_mom
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10 Sep 2022, 1:22 am

Mona Pereth wrote:

The_Walrus wrote:

I hate to say “watch this very long video” but ContraPoint’s video is very good if you want a deeper engagement with what she says: https://youtube.com/watch?v=7gDKbT_l2us

I'm transcribing some of ContraPoint's more salient specific objections to statements by JK Rowling.

Regarding Rowling's tweet of Dec 19, 2019:

Quote:

Dress however you please.
Call yourself whatever you like.
Sleep with any consenting adult who'll have you.
Live your best life in peace and security.
But force women out of their jobs for stating that sex is real?
#IStandWithMaya #ThisIsNotADrill
7:57 AM Dec 19, 2019

Looks entirely reasonable at first glance, to people unfamiliar with the issues. ContraPoint replies as follows:

Quote:

"Sex is real " is a pretty dishonest summary of what Maya said in her discrimination complaint, namely:

"I believe that it is impossible to change sex or to lose your sex. Girls grow up to be women. Boys grow up to be men. No change of clothes or hairstyle, no plastic surgery, no accident or illness, no course of hormones, no force of will or social conditioning, no declaration can turn a female person into a male, or a male person into a female." Para 23

- If Joanne had said Maya had been fired for claiming that a person born male can never be a woman, and a person born female can never be a man, that would've been more accurate. But it would also sound contentious, and obviously anti-trans.

"Sex is real" is a euphemism designed to present Maya Forstater's transphobia as a simple statement of fact, basic common sense, which only crazy activists and ideologues would oppose.

Transphobes love to play this game where they pretend that trans people just don't understand basic biology, that's our problem!

As if I didn't start taking female hormones because I'm acutely aware that my body is not the same as a cis woman's body, that sex is real. [...] No trans person thinks it's possible to change chromosomal sex, and to pretend otherwise is to argue in bad faith. When we say that someone is a trans man or a trans woman we are talking about psychological and social identity.

So when transphobes say "Sex is real," they are not actually contradicting anything most trans people believe, except by implication.

When transphobes say "Sex is real," what they mean is that only chromosomal sex matters. They mean they don't believe in transgender identity, which they trivialize by calling it "dressing up," "fashion choices," "whatever you wanna call yourself."

When Joanne says, "Dress however you please," "call yourself whatever you like," she's belittling what it actually means to be trans, reducing it to a change of name and costume.

It's similar to the language of casual homophobes. For example, the homophobic equivalent of Joanne's tweet might read:

Quote:

Choose whatever lifestyle you want.
Indulge your sexual preferences with any consenting adult in the privacy of your own bedroom.
But force Christians out of their jobs for stating that marriage is between a man and a woman?
#IStandWithKimDavis

A penis and a sausage cannot make a baby. Checkmate the gays, it's just science.

Homophobes trivialize what it is to be gay. They refer to it as "sexual preferences" or "a lifestyle" or "what you do in the bedroom." We don't tell straight people to keep their lifestyle in the bedroom. (laughs)

[...]

Being gay is more than what you do in the bedroom. It's also who you love, it's part of who you are, part of your humanity, and that's something that stays with you outside of the bedroom. So to dismiss it as "sexual preferences" is homophobic.

Likewise, being trans is not a costume I take off at the end of the night. It's not a fashion choice. It's not a pet name some people call me. It's part of who I am as a person, you know? It's part of my humanity. And it's also the kind of body I have, a transsexual body.

That is a whole lot of analysis that, I have to admit, I'd be completely naive of.

Activists have to give people space to learn and understand. Assumptions don't change overnight; I have lived more years without the world understanding LGBTQ issues (and not caring that it didn't) than I have with the world trying in any way, shape or form to grant equality. Am I supposed to intuitively know that if I say X someone else will take it to mean Y? I can't. But if someone tells me why X is hurtful, I'll take the lesson in and try to get more educated on the concept.

From what I've seen society is forgiving errors if the person who made them seems sincere about learning to do better, but jumps out strongly opposed if the person who made the errors doesn't seem sincere about learning to do better.

It can be really hard to react appropriately when, at the start, you are completely clueless about the error you are making. First instinct is to be defensive.

To take a tweet and assertively write "X is really saying this" strikes me as overly presumptuous. It would be better to say "X may or may not realize it, but saying Y is heard and felt as saying Z." The later leaves room for education.

Sorry, I have no idea how JK Rowling handled all of it, or how far into the controversy that analysis was written, but it makes me uncomfortable seeing an analysis that left no space or grace for her learning to do better.

I know everything has to be a two-way street, and I know that those of us who are still evolving should be careful with our words when jumping into a situation we may not be fully informed about. I don't want to defend anyone who is hurtful and unconcerned about how they were hurtful. But this example looks to be full of landmines to me, and that makes it hard for consensus to advance.

I do understand at my core that LGBTQ issues are about who a person IS, not something they choose. But would I always have the conversational language for that? I don't know that I would.

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goldfish21
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10 Sep 2022, 1:44 am

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for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.

firemonkey
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10 Sep 2022, 8:52 am

If it stopped at understandable anxieties and fears, then fine. However there's a hardcore of these women that have a pathological hatred of those who are trans. The only outcome they want is for trans to cease to exist.It's impossible to have a sensible discussion with such women.

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10 Sep 2022, 9:18 am

My only question about this is, a TERF is a radical feminist, by definition. So this controversy means that some sincere forms of feminism are to be rejected?

I guess another example might be pro-Palestine activists whose anti-Zionism borders on antisemitism. There is a leftist bookstore in Baltimore where customers have been harassed for wearing Jewish religious garb. How to sort this out?

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itscomplicated
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10 Sep 2022, 9:25 am

it seems misogynist to me . i hope people can see why women feel so attacked . feminism is suppose to be for womens rights . it is not a bad thing just as black rights isnt bad

firemonkey
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10 Sep 2022, 10:32 am

It's not 'misogynist' to be against women who would be quite happy for the total eradication of trans people to occur. On the other hand dismissing and mocking women for bona-fide anxieties and fears would be.

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10 Sep 2022, 10:36 am

firemonkey wrote:

It's not 'misogynist' to be against women who would be quite happy for the total eradication of trans people to occur.

those are certanly in the minority and people like rowling are not like that

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10 Sep 2022, 10:49 am

It 's hard to tell given that she has no qualms about interacting with anti-trans lobbyists.

The_Walrus
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10 Sep 2022, 10:57 am

MaxE wrote:

Most feminists will reject some forms of feminism.

I'm comfortable rejecting radical feminism. I support liberal, individualist, and intersectional feminism. I think radical feminism (the idea that gender shouldn't exist) falls apart due to the existence of people whose gender identity doesn't line up with their sex; it also tends to bring along some pretty patronising ideas about sex work. I think Marxist feminism is dumb for the same reasons Marxism is dumb. I think eugenic feminism is dumb for the same reasons eugenics is dumb. I think trans-exclusionary radical feminism is dumb for similar reasons as to why other forms of transphobia are dumb (although "garden" transphobia tends to be less "evil men are trying to infiltrate womanhood" and more "what if the woman I just kissed has a penis?").

If you harass someone for wearing religious garb then you're just a bigot, never mind if you're "left wing". Bigotry doesn't become OK when you dress it up as a class struggle.

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10 Sep 2022, 11:33 am

firemonkey wrote:

Cite?

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Dox47
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10 Sep 2022, 11:36 am

The_Walrus wrote:

If you harass someone for wearing religious garb then you're just a bigot, never mind if you're "left wing". Bigotry doesn't become OK when you dress it up as a class struggle.

What about harassing someone because they don't share your exact beliefs about sex and gender? I think that often looks a lot like bullying dressed up as activism myself.

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Last edited by Dox47 on 10 Sep 2022, 3:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Dox47
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10 Sep 2022, 11:42 am

DW_a_mom wrote:

. But if someone tells me why X is hurtful, I'll take the lesson in and try to get more educated on the concept.

Here's the thing that I think a lot of people miss; it's perfectly okay to investigate, come to understand the other person's perspective, and decide that they're completely wrong, no one has a monopoly on truth or morality here. I think a lot of people are so terrified of being labeled as a bigot that they just immediately surrender when someone makes one of these accusations, that's part of what I've found interesting with the Rowling situation is that she's actually pushed back and has the resources to do so, and I suspect that is her real sin in the eyes of the "activists" and clout chasers slandering her online.

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10 Sep 2022, 11:46 am

MaxE wrote:

My only question about this is, a TERF is a radical feminist, by definition. So this controversy means that some sincere forms of feminism are to be rejected?

In theory, TERF stands for trans-exclusionary radical feminist, but in practice it's just become a snarl word for a segment of the activist left for anyone they accuse of breaking the new rules of gender ideology, kinda like how "fascist" has drifted from a specific type of government to a generic political insult. Some people tried to make SWERF a thing, this time as a slur for anti sexwork feminists, but I hardly ever see it outside of the occasional dating profile with the boilerplate disclaimer "no TERFs/SWERfs", which are fairly common in my area.

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goldfish21
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10 Sep 2022, 12:15 pm

Dox47 wrote:

DW_a_mom wrote:

. But if someone tells me why X is hurtful, I'll take the lesson in and try to get more educated on the concept.

Or maybe your autism traits impair your ability to see what other people find offensive about what jkr said and did so you personally see nothing wrong with it.

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for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.

DeathFlowerKing
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10 Sep 2022, 12:37 pm

Can we all at least agree though that the people sending her death threats on Twitter are being way out of line?

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10 Sep 2022, 12:49 pm

DeathFlowerKing wrote:

Can we all at least agree though that the people sending her death threats on Twitter are being way out of line?

Well, I don't thing any sane person would approve of sending her death threats.

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