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A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

economist.com

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Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#131

Post by a_conservative »

dang wrote: post #90
zozbot234 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Truscum" being the word for someone who thinks that changing one's gender and sexual characteristics might not be the greatest idea ever unless you actually have , like, gender dysphoria. Never mind the many, many people who are now pursuing "detransition" after going one step too far. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

Please don't take HN threads further into flamewar. We're trying for a different sort of internet here, to the extent possible. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Its interesting that you didn't actually tell the poster what they did wrong.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#132

Post by TaylorAlexander »

Moodles wrote: post #120
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don’t like their identity being debated. Bringing up trans women in sports as a talking point would be pretty upsetting to most trans women as it is likely to feel like you’re invalidating their personal experience of being trans. There’s this thing with marginalized communities where people outside of the communities “just want to have a discussion” but the stakes of that conversation are way too high for mar…

I'm sorry, but this is a classic example of what I'm talking about. > People don’t like their identity being debated. But this is reframing. I'm not debating that someone is trans or should be treated with respect or anything like that. > Bringing up trans women in sports as a talking point would be pretty upsetting to most trans women as it is likely to feel like you’re invalidating their personal experience of bein…

You can say you’re not debating their existence till they’re blue in the face, but I’m telling you that’s how it will feel to 9/10 trans people when you try to discuss this topic with them.

You can ignore their feelings but that’s the problem. You don’t care that it’s upsetting. To you it’s just some abstract intellectual thing to discuss but to them it could be a source of trauma and pain. I don’t think you’re appreciating what you’re asking a trans person to do when you bring up topics that relate to trauma they’ve experienced.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#133

Post by handmodel »

mike00632 wrote: post #124
fungiblecog wrote: post #92

I think the irony of the current battle around identity is that we have been making steady progress based on the idea that personal characteristics shouldn't matter. However this whole debate is reversing that by not only saying it matters a great deal but that other people should be forced to defer to others personal choices even when it directly affects them

Do you feel the same way about nicknames? If you call someone by a nickname that they don't like and they let you know they prefer their own name then do you consider it too onerous to defer to them about it?

I don't think that is what commenter is saying. I, personally, of course defer to nicknames and pronouns.

I think it is more similar to race-blind versus race-conscious policies - along with gender-blind versus gernder-concious.

Is it better to assume that men and women are pretty much the same in academia and each are capable of the same thing? Or is it better to assume that men and women are intrinsically better at different things with certain characteristics.

I think the answer is in the middle but clearly there has been a move in the last five years to say that gender inherently effects your worldview/characteristics while simultaneously saying that men/women should have equal outcomes in all fields. Its not internally consistent.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#134

Post by MyHypatia »

Latty wrote: post #119
MyHypatia wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you don't have to place them in solitary confinement. You can place them with other trans-women. Men are housed with men in jails. Yes, sometimes they commit violence against each other, including rape. But we don't put all men in solitary confinement.

This begs the question of why it is acceptable for men and trans women to be raped, but unacceptable for cis women to be raped? There is no justification for accepting any prison rape—or, for that matter, sexual assault, which cis women are entirely capable of. (And, to be clear, sexual assault is not inherently a lesser crime than rape, rape is just a specific form of sexual assault, and depending on jurisdiction, m…

It is not acceptable for men nor trans-women nor cis-women nor anyone to be raped in prison. My comment does not condone rape. If you think that all men and all trans-women should have separate cells to prevent this possibility, I think that could be a positive step forward. I do not think that subjecting cis-women to the fear of rape is a positive step forward.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#135

Post by bachmeier »

dang wrote: post #99
oofabz wrote: post #98

I don't think gender ideology is an appropriate topic for HN. There is little to be gained and much to be lost from discussing it here. Little to be gained because it has nothing to do with software development, and because gender issues are thoroughly covered elsewhere. Much to be lost because gender issues are so divisive that we risk alienating members of our community.

HN is for topics that gratify intellectual curiosity, not "software development". Please see the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . You're certainly right that this is an inflammatory topic with strong political and ideological overlap, and as the guidelines explain, we don't want flamewar here, and we don't want ideological or political battle. The site exists for intellectual curios…

> HN is for topics that gratify intellectual curiosity

I think that's the problem with a topic like this on HN. There will be little learning going on, with many statements made with certainty by individuals that have never studied any of these concepts in any detail. The level of dismissal in the comments is itself a reason to pull the plug.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#136

Post by notahacker »

MyHypatia wrote: post #89
throwaway284534 wrote: post #36

There’s a lot that’s already been said in this topic but I feel compelled to bring up the damage imposed by TERF talking points. The conversation goes something like this: “Transgender women possess an innate maleness that carries a non-zero threat to female spaces.” They believe that dictionary definitions of woman are prescriptive, declared at the chromosomes during birth, rather than descriptive, as in how one pre…

I don't see how it is unreasonable for a female inmate to be uncomfortable sharing sleeping quarters with a person who has a penis (regardless of how that person identifies). The fear that cis-women have of rape is real. The fear that transgender women have of rape in a men's jail is real. I think the fairest thing to do is take both of these fears seriously and house intact trans-women in a space where they neither…

Fear of rape or pressurised sex amongst prisoners is perfectly real, but if a tiny minority of transpeople are a distant third in terms of sexual threat to female prisoners behind male warders and natal females and a campaign organization proposes rehousing transpeople (all 125 of them) in different prisons as their solution to prison rape over better safeguarding practises or single occupant cells which might offer many more women more protection from more pervasive threats it sounds suspiciously more like a "talking point" against the target group than a practical solution to sexual violence in prisons. Especially if the campaign groups responsible have long lists of other issues with transpeople, and somehow the sexual activity involving people with penises and keys doesn't get the same attention...

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#137

Post by xupybd »

mike00632 wrote: post #124
fungiblecog wrote: post #92

I think the irony of the current battle around identity is that we have been making steady progress based on the idea that personal characteristics shouldn't matter. However this whole debate is reversing that by not only saying it matters a great deal but that other people should be forced to defer to others personal choices even when it directly affects them

Do you feel the same way about nicknames? If you call someone by a nickname that they don't like and they let you know they prefer their own name then do you consider it too onerous to defer to them about it?

This is common in many of the team sports I've played in. The more someone hates their nickname the more likely it will stick. Generally it's only done with close friends.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#138

Post by danielodievich »

One of my favorite sci-fi authors is Ian M. Banks (discussed here on HN with regularity). His Culture series describe a post-scarcity interstellar society of human(oid)s who among many, many things can change their own gender just by thinking about it. After suitable body alteration time, you can be a male, female, or even something in between (that happens to be important part of one of the characters in one of the books), with most citizens transferring back and forth at least once to act as both a father and a mother at least once in their long lifetime.

In this society, there is no gender inequality. Ian's own "A Few Notes on the Culture" essay http://www.vavatch.co.uk/books/banks/cultnote.htm states it best:

A society in which it is so easy to change sex will rapidly find out if it is treating one gender better than the other; within the population, over time, there will gradually be greater and greater numbers of the sex it is more rewarding to be, and so pressure for change - within society rather than the individuals - will presumably therefore build up until some form of sexual equality and hence numerical parity is established.

Until our science invents this, this is a great thought experiment to conduct.

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#139

Post by metalliqaz »

foolinaround wrote: post #38

while this article focusses on the gender ideology issues, IMHO the censorship in universites is on a wider range of issues, with the common denominator being the viewpoints espoused in far-left circles (not passing judgement here on whether they are right or wrong) Enforced group-think is going to be the death of these universities.

"Enforced group-think is going to be the death of these universities."

How?

Re: A backlash against gender ideology is starting in universities

#140

Post by just_to_reply »

mike00632 wrote: post #124
fungiblecog wrote: post #92

I think the irony of the current battle around identity is that we have been making steady progress based on the idea that personal characteristics shouldn't matter. However this whole debate is reversing that by not only saying it matters a great deal but that other people should be forced to defer to others personal choices even when it directly affects them

Do you feel the same way about nicknames? If you call someone by a nickname that they don't like and they let you know they prefer their own name then do you consider it too onerous to defer to them about it?

It's not just like a nickname, though. It's about who you're willing to date, who is put in which prison or who is allowed to compete in which sports competitions.
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