TERFs? Posting interesting and positive content? I don't think so, Elon - they're usually regurgitating same bullshit over and over, and being as miserable as possible. Just like the Twitter's usual far right user base, but somehow even more so.
LOL he just told her she'd be pretty if she smiled more. What an asshole. Being an asshole, to an asshole. There's no winner in that exchange.
I have a theory that JKR got sexually abused by a trans woman who had won and then abused her trust, and hasn't processed the trauma from it. And doesn't want to, nor feels she has to. So she just decided to hate that whole class of people instead.
David Attenborough voice: Here is a rare treat! We are now witnessing an encounter between narcissistic billionaires. Make no mistake, this is no courtship however; notice the pointedly cordial tone. This is a veiled insult. They see themselves, and even they feel compelled to strike.
We can distinguish an animal's self awareness by how they respond to a mirror. Do they recognise themselves, or do they perceive a threat? Billionaire specimens are usually out of budget for science departments, so we must trust in careful observation to deduct their nature.
I think that's far too generous. It tries to justify her hate. I think it's far more likely she's just a conservative asshole. Most anti-trans people have never even had a conversation with a trans person. Ignorance is the true source of hate, not betrayal.
Lots of people interact with trans folks on a daily basis and have no idea. I'd bet she encountered someone trans at some point in her life and had no idea.
Of all hills to die on that ruin your reputation and legacy, why this one? I just don't get it.
I am a gen x cis heterosexual white male.
Transexuality is strange and foreign to me. I don't understand it. This gives me exactly zero right to take any stand against it. I'd say it gives me less right to express an opinion as how could I be knowledgeable on something I've just admitted I don't understand?
Mostly attention issues. She had her big hit, was very famous then that started to fade so tried a dozen different things to stay in the lienlight from bad sequels to bad prequels to publishing bad stories under a fake name, but none if it got her enough attention. So she did what basically every other washed up celebrity does and just be controversial to get attention.
And also I think part of it is that rich, steisght white women, are very privileged but being a woman gives them 1 point in the oppression Olympics so they think their opinions on these issues matters more. Which is why almost all the most outspoken term are middle class strisght white women.
Sup, fellow XCHWM here. My first thought was to agree and say something about how people’s right to exist and live the life that is normal to them doesn’t depend on anybody understanding or approving it. And assuming it’s peaceful and all that. You know, decent human stuff.
But then I reread your last line and got saddened by imagining the mental state of JKR. Imagine you are not just rich, but an adored famous artist, an American Dream success story, and doubly mega fucking rich to the point that you could just walk around giving random people life-changing amounts of money all day while funding other big amazing shit… and your mind is distracted by anger and fear towards the existence of other people you don’t even know. And now your famous name is attached to that awful attribute.
Also XCHWM. Like most other things, it gets less strange and foreign the more exposure you have to it. My biggest old man Gen X hurdle so far regarding gender was remembering to use "they" when referring to a non-binary person. It felt weird for a while, but they more I did it, the easier it got.
In a different comment, I talked about the difficulty I have with pronouns. It's not because it offends me, it's because the traditional usage is so hard wired in whatever part of my brain oversees language.
She's so transparently working backwards from her original knee jerk judgement on her views on gender. I've never understood why people feel the need to die on this hill, change is scary sure, but it's not THAT big a deal is it?
It’s hard and it hurts. Self improvement, especially when you’ve been publicly vocal, requires humbling yourself. It involves accepting shame. And it sounds like in her case it involves reprocessing some trauma. I know who I choose to be, but on a much lesser scale I’ve met plenty like her. Folks who make the choice not to reevaluate their beliefs
Some people need a very structured, simple, well-defined worldview in order to function. Sort of like a computer has to follow a set program or it bluescreens.
‘This person coming towards me is a man. I can tell by his bowler hat and dapper suit. Therefore the correct action is to say ‘good morning sir, nice weather today’.’ And ‘This person coming towards me is a woman. I can tell by her dress and long hair and makeup. She is married based on the ring I see. Therefore the correct action is to say ‘good morning, ma’am, nice weather today’.’
And so on.
A person not presenting clearly as either gender, or isn’t the gender they’re expecting, means the ‘script’ no longer works. They no longer feel sure of what to do, and that lack of control of the situation makes them panicked.
Really, a lot of this, and conservatism in general, comes down to simple structure and control, so these people feel they always know what to do and where they stand.
Because our society is a social contract, and to act wrongly means you get ostracized from society. In ancient times that was practically a death sentence, and I don’t think these folks have ever gotten over that. They fear becoming the ‘outsiders’, left to the wolves and lions.
I am not sure that just because someone produces sperm vs eggs delineates them as male vs female. You could produce sperm but have endocrinological phenotypes (driven by genes) affect your physiology, so it wouldn’t make sense to keep insisting that one is male then.
Also, how does this definition take into account intersex people who produce both types of eggs? They’re a man? Or woman? What subcriteria would you use to define them, and then why wouldn’t you use that same subcriteria on single-cell producers?
At a socio-political and cultural level, it seems useless to worry about how someone’s sex is defined. There’s no purpose served other than to create a class of people who can conveniently be othered and used as a means to distract from people who are truly damaging to society—the greedy and resource hoarders.
and she's using only one characteristic that can be used to determine sex when it doesnt even work alone (other characteristics have to be met, and even if most of them are met, theres probably still exceptions cause biology is fun like that)
Lol. Normally Elon just posts cringe that isnt funny in any way. But this is hilarious. "I love your transphobia, but have you tried thinking about literally anything else?" Like he wants her to start posting great replacement shit
Awards are just bespoke emoji. You can still react to a comment with a picture or emoji if you want.
IMO your comment, actually expressing explicit and specific approval, is worth more than, like... a picture of a little whale with money coming out of its blowhole, or whatever.
Awards or any other monetarily focused system inherently balance discussions towards the inclinations of wealthy people. We already have too much of that in the world, that they can buy law, buy awareness, buy support, it is a bad idea to let them buy opinions and discussion. Everyone gets one vote, nobody is special enough to be worth more than any other.
There isn't any truly stopping them however, they can buy users, buy botnets, buy influence anywhere. Fuck it I guess, nothing is sacred, everything is tainted.
I mean, sure. My comment was entirely tongue in cheek. I didn't like awards, especially those that are more than just a glorified emoji (such as those I mentioned)
But, truth be told, the wealthy can just straight up buy discussions and opinions. User farms/bots aren't free, and neither was Twitter currently X. Nothing can hide from the cruel hand of capital. The fediverse isn't immune to this either: it's too small for anyone rich to buy out, but there's very little preventing them from just buying one of the larger instances. And even without that, it still privileges those with money - hosting isn't free.
The most we can do is to stay vigilant, I suppose. Be aware of the inherent biases in the world and refuse to engage with systems that are too strongly captured - Twitter currently X, the zuck platform, Reddit soon (probably).
The thing that always bugged me about awards, especially Reddit gold back in the day, is occasionally I would comment about something wrong with the world, and someone else would see that and give three bucks to Reddit when they could have donated it to an organization trying to solve the issue I was commenting about. Like, I get that you're showing appreciation for my comment but I'd rather that money go to something other than Reddit premium.
Jesus, it's way more dehumanizing to be thought of only in relation to checks notes Large Gametes than it is to simply accept that people of the same gender can be born with different bits.
It's even worse than that. Individuals are a vessel for those gametes, not the gametes themselves. I'm sorry, but sperm aren't fucking people Robert Rowling. You aren't your cum or your period. Inhaling pollen during spring isn't killing trees.
Joanne Galbraith's conservative gender ideology values genes and bloodlines more than people. Living a good life doesn't matter, only reproducing like e coli.
Phobes want the world to make sense because they think it'll fill the emptiness in their soul. It'll never work. The void can't be filled that way.
Joanne Rowling has released books under the name Robert Galbraith, and the poster above has mixed up the names for humourous effect.
Also Robert Galbraith Heath was a psychiatrist who was a big proponent of conversion therapy for queer people. Probably nothing to do with why Rowling chose that name...
Eh. Despite its problems, Harry Potter was fairly decent, especially in terms of having characters people care about. The world building was mid and there was bigotry against people outside of England, but there is a lot to like about it. It had a huge Fandom, many of whom were queer. That series earned her most of her wealth and popularity originally.
I think it was possible for her to have grown out of her conservative worldview if she was willing to. Unfortunately, it's hard to critically examine your beliefs. Her financial success probably affected the chances of her knowing queer people personally, which decreased her motivation to understand us. If she wasn't successful, she might have been a better person than she is now. Then again, maybe not. At least she wouldn't have caused as much harm.
Biologist here. The main problem with this argument is that Rowling is trying to win her argument through scientizing, and is not only doing it in an inept way, but in a way that’s completely ironic.
She’s invoking biology, but infortunately she’s adopting an approach that incorporates a high school level of biology. When we start teaching science, we start with highly simplified presentations of the major topics, then build both in breadth and depth from there. If you really want to get down the rabbit hole of sex determination (and multiple definitions of genetic and phenotypical “sex”), you really need to get into molecular biology, genetics, and developmental biology. She’s been advised of this multiple times by multiple experts, so at this point it’s willful ignorance.
The painfully ironic part is that she’s relying on an area where she has no expertise in order to make her point, while ignoring the fact that, as a world-known literary figure, she should know that the applicable part of the definition of “woman” is linguistic and semiotic - which is to say it’s cultural. The definition of “woman” was different in the 1940s South, among the 17th century pilgrims, the Algonquin tribes, cultures throughout sub-equatorial Africa, and so on.
The definition of “woman” was different in the 1940s South, among the 17th century pilgrims, the Algonquin tribes, cultures throughout sub-equatorial Africa, and so on.
Can you give an example? Not trying to be a bigot, just curious.
In examining sex and gender in Igbo society today, it is evident that colonisation was not just an event. Colonisation is a structure, an unhealed wound that remains open to this day, in the form of Western gender norms among multiple other manifestations.
However, this was weakened by the flexible gender system of traditional Igbo culture and language. As Ifi explained, a major component of this gender framework was that “male roles were open to certain categories of women through such practices as “nhanye”- “male daughters” and “igba ohu” – “female husbands”
What, you're telling me that boywives were real all along!?
There’s entire branches of research on this, but I think one of the easiest ways to approach it for starting out is to think of the word “womanly.”
having or denoting qualities and characteristics traditionally associated with or expected of women.
I would strike the word “traditionally” from that definition since we’re talking about a comparative and differential analysis and concentrate on the “qualities and characteristics” part. Although most people in the US today wouldn’t think of it this way, imagine the perception of a woman army officer commanding male troops in 1845. You can take the same approach when looking through history or across cultures. What roles, qualities, and characteristics are associated with “women” and how do they differ and evolve?
There’s some complexity when you get into the details - indigenous cultures change when they come into contact with, say, colonialism, and the people who studied them might themselves be observing through their own prejudices. History is replete with examples of British colonialists being unable to properly deal with things like the egalitarian democracies of the northern indigenous peoples or the matriarchal social structures. Picture the used car dealership where the salesman still insists on engaging with the man even though it’s the woman buying the car.
Semantics is the study of the meaning of words, and semiotics is the study of symbology. When we’re talking about these things, we’re talking about how the ideas and symbols associated with the idea-token “woman” differ.
The reason why this is important is that this is the crux of the transphobic argument. Their argument is cultural, not biological (although like I said, even their biology is sketchy).
I think a great study that includes cross cultural anthropological analysis of the role of women, as well as politics and economics, is David Graeber’s The Dawn of Everything.
Sorry if this question seems stupid, but you seem to really know what you're talking about.
My understanding is that the main issues TERFs have is protecting women's spaces, and that by having a vague or arbitrary definition of womanhood it erodes those spaces.
I personally would like to see a society that's far less focused on gender and minimises that kind of segregation outside of medical necessity. But I know that's quite extreme and I don't have a "perfect" solution, assuming we're going to keep things like women's only gyms, domestic violence shelters, and professional sports.
Judging based on "passing" is clearly transphobic and ignores any kind of intersex/non-binary presentation. As well as some masculine featured afab women somehow failing. And basing on biology is clearly flawed. So if it's not too much trouble what would your suggestion be?
The person you asked your question of claims to be a biologist, but you dismiss the relevance of biology.
...basing on biology is clearly flawed...
It sounds like you might be more interested in an answer from a sociologist. Or are you asking the biologist to argue that basing it on biology is not flawed?
