It's on my agenda to write about what's happened to the "gender critical" movement, as it took me a minute to figure it out.
What has happened is that the original (radical feminist) movement opposed GENDER--i.e. sex stereotypes. That's what the "gender" in "gender critical" means. Any opposition to "transgender" was a side effect--an opposition to considering sex stereotypes to be defining features of sex.
The newer movement has misunderstood the GC goal as opposing TRANSgender. Ironically, for many this manifests as a desire to critique the clothing of the "enemy" and to call for his return to sex-stereotypical dress.
I think there’s something to this. Also, the way liberal feminism as such got eaten by postmodernism (Helen - your book “Cynical Theories” gives such a good explanation of this, which I watched play out in real time online!), so that liberal feminists were shunted into the categories radical feminist (despite not necessarily being radical feminists at heart) or “on the right side of history” intersectional feminist based on the question “Do you really, really believe trans women ARE women? That they were in the beginning, are now, and ever shall be?”
And then, some women who maybe previously hadn’t even considered themselves feminists at all were coming into the conversation because this issue started touching their real lives, and going, “So, I guess I’m a TERF? Huh. All right then. Men in dresses are perverts who need to be stopped!”
But that’s not really fair to the newer women, and men; many of whom I’m sure are quite thoughtful. The worst filters through on the internet, and it’s difficult for any one person to make an impact against a reactionary zeitgeist.
I've read your writings for many years - the very beginning of discovering the GC movement. From your GC perspective do you distinguish between "forced" gender norms vs group conformity behaviours which settled from naturalistic patterns? In other words do you allow room for the existence of social patterns which are not mandated but nevertheless coalesce into cultural norms (which necessarily apply conformity pressures)?
Thank you for taking the time to consider my question.
What I meant by "allow room for" was does the GC position consider all gender norms to be necessarily bad/wrong/damaging and therefore needing to be eradicated somehow, or does it acknowledge there are gender-normative behaviours that aren't necessarily harmful. IE wearing different clothes where there are no "rules" as such but collective behaviour simply "gravitates to" most women vs men dressing distinctively.
I think that's complicated. I think the vast majority of female-coded behaviors are damaging, while most male-coded behaviors are uplifting. I do not think people gravitate to certain clothing naturally based on sex. What would be the driver for that? Feminist linguist Deb Cameron has made a convincing case that nearly all socialized "feminine" behaviors are meant to prepare women for being heterosexual wives and support systems for men.
If we're talking about something like women's propensity to be more nurturing and men's to be more aggressive (on average) that is probably natural based on evolutionary advantage, and not necessarily bad, though women do often allow their natural tendencies + socialization to turn into damaging habits.
Though I'm kind of surprised that you think -- maybe with some justification -- that the "trans community" is saying that phrase of yours.
But maybe somewhat apropos of which, a case of a transwoman, a transexual that I ran across recently that you might know of, or be in your bailiwick:
Lynn Conway who was a very smart cookie indeed:
Computer Scientist; Electrical Engineer; Innovator; Systems Architect; Research Leader; Engineering Educator; Adventurer & Visioneer; Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Emerita; University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan; Member, National Academy of Engineering
Seems to have been sailing on a more or less even keel despite a predilection for "gender non-conformance". A real puzzle as to how and why that "incongruence" manifests itself.
I'm a very left leaning political independent and haven't voted for a Democrat or Republican for president in over 30 years - but that said I am deeply appreciative of President Trump quickly standing up for the rights of women and girls. With that in mind - and my tongue planted firmly in cheek - I've coined the I think meme worthy phrase - "Grab em by the pronouns!" : ) : )
I have a son who wears dresses, not because he is trans-odentified -- but because he thinks dresses are more attractive on his, and he should have the right to dress as he sees fit. Of course he has that right, and in a truly open society (or even locally Liberal, I live in "Progressive-land) I would frel fine with that. And he certainly has the right to buck a genderism that was still mostly untouched.
However, I am concerned, not because I think it us wrong, but because people think he is Trans. And how we are identified strongly affects our self-perceotion.
Plus, he is on the autism spectrum, raised without gender stereotype, naive, and as lovely a rather "feminine" and shy young man as could be. He isn't dating, but I've always assumed that he is gay. As one would say, he is a "sitting duck". I am afraid that he will be coaxed into the belief that he actually IS Trans.
This is one of those cases where liberal idealism threatens to lead to a more narrow understanding of what a man is, not because "dresses are for women", but because "cross-dressing means you're Trans".) Or, basically, that though one may have the right to do something, that doesn't necessarily make it a good idea in a particular set of circumstances. But I don't honestly know what to say to him about this. He's soaking in Post-Modern Kool-aid just as much as his siblings and their friends and online pals.
I think there's a problem right here: "It is, therefore, important that those of us who have discussions across political divides are able to make arguments about what is true and what is compatible with individual liberty rather than what is progressive and regressive.". I believe this fundamentally assumes what you're trying to advocate. That is, they don't consider it "individual liberty" in the first place. You're back to the difficulty of arguing to conservatives that liberal's concept of liberty is correct. But they already told you they didn't agree with that concept of liberty - the word they often use in this case is "license". Thus "We may not ever change the minds of those who truly reject truth, individual liberty or both, but we can, at least, show them to be doing that." reduces down to something like "We may not convince those who disagree with us, but can show they disagree with us". But again, that was where you started.
Well, yes. I said we'll never change some minds because we won't. All we can ever do is make more people who do not truly reject truth or individual liberty recognise when the people and ideas they are leaning towards do. Most conservatives already accept the concept of individual liberty, particularly American ones because it is baked into the constitution and sense of nation. This is why you see people scrambling to find ways to argue that what they're doing is compatible with individual liberty and we have to show that it is not.
I don't know what you mean by me being back where I started? What do you expect to happen in the course of an article? It wasn't going to bring about world peace during the process of writing it, was it? It's an argument for having better conversations and trying to influence culture in more liberal directions. I do assume my readers care about what is true and are broadly liberal because those are the people I am writing to and the purpose of this substack is bringing them together.
I keep hearing things from you that amount to accusations that my pieces aren't achieving anything but I've asked you before, what do you expect them to achieve except making people about how to clarify issues and defend liberal values and what do you think I should be doing instead of writing? Should I be blowing things up and shooting people?
What are you doing apart from writing comments that my writing is worthless? I have suggested that you write the piece you think I should have written setting out the solution you think I should be offering, but it seems you'd rather complain that other people's writing does not fix the world than suggest ways to fix it. Write something. Make an argument. Convince me and other people that you have better answers.
The last time we spoke, you appeared to believe that becoming more sympathetic and supportive of the woke was a better corrective than becoming more liberal and opposing authoritarianism consistently. Make your case. Show how more wokeness on the left is going to make people see the left as more credible and vote for it despite so many surveys saying that this is what drove many people away from it in the first place. Show that the output of the woke actually helps reduce racism, sexism, homophobia etc. instead of increasing it as so much research indicates. Set out clearly what you think people should do and why you think that will help and why I am wrong to think that liberalism and caring about what is true, is what people on the left and right should be putting their strength behind to get their own houses in order and address the illiberal fantasists on the other side.
I apologize if I've offended you. Look at it this way: I suspect the "political distance" between you and me is much less than between either of us vs the "woke" left or "MAGA" right. Yet if these relatively small disputes are so difficult, how much more so the much wider gulfs?
How much more important, then, that you articulate your positions and solutions clearly, as Helen suggested, so that you can determine upon what you agree. You have avoided addressing her response here.
Fair. It definitely seems heated, but well within the bounds of civil discourse. I’d be willing to bet that there’s still opportunity for understanding
It's on my agenda to write about what's happened to the "gender critical" movement, as it took me a minute to figure it out.
What has happened is that the original (radical feminist) movement opposed GENDER--i.e. sex stereotypes. That's what the "gender" in "gender critical" means. Any opposition to "transgender" was a side effect--an opposition to considering sex stereotypes to be defining features of sex.
The newer movement has misunderstood the GC goal as opposing TRANSgender. Ironically, for many this manifests as a desire to critique the clothing of the "enemy" and to call for his return to sex-stereotypical dress.
I think there’s something to this. Also, the way liberal feminism as such got eaten by postmodernism (Helen - your book “Cynical Theories” gives such a good explanation of this, which I watched play out in real time online!), so that liberal feminists were shunted into the categories radical feminist (despite not necessarily being radical feminists at heart) or “on the right side of history” intersectional feminist based on the question “Do you really, really believe trans women ARE women? That they were in the beginning, are now, and ever shall be?”
And then, some women who maybe previously hadn’t even considered themselves feminists at all were coming into the conversation because this issue started touching their real lives, and going, “So, I guess I’m a TERF? Huh. All right then. Men in dresses are perverts who need to be stopped!”
But that’s not really fair to the newer women, and men; many of whom I’m sure are quite thoughtful. The worst filters through on the internet, and it’s difficult for any one person to make an impact against a reactionary zeitgeist.
I've read your writings for many years - the very beginning of discovering the GC movement. From your GC perspective do you distinguish between "forced" gender norms vs group conformity behaviours which settled from naturalistic patterns? In other words do you allow room for the existence of social patterns which are not mandated but nevertheless coalesce into cultural norms (which necessarily apply conformity pressures)?
I just deleted my prior comment because I believe I misunderstood what you mean by "allow room for."
I have no guess as to how much behavior is influenced by nurture versus nature, if that's what you're asking.
Thank you for taking the time to consider my question.
What I meant by "allow room for" was does the GC position consider all gender norms to be necessarily bad/wrong/damaging and therefore needing to be eradicated somehow, or does it acknowledge there are gender-normative behaviours that aren't necessarily harmful. IE wearing different clothes where there are no "rules" as such but collective behaviour simply "gravitates to" most women vs men dressing distinctively.
I think that's complicated. I think the vast majority of female-coded behaviors are damaging, while most male-coded behaviors are uplifting. I do not think people gravitate to certain clothing naturally based on sex. What would be the driver for that? Feminist linguist Deb Cameron has made a convincing case that nearly all socialized "feminine" behaviors are meant to prepare women for being heterosexual wives and support systems for men.
If we're talking about something like women's propensity to be more nurturing and men's to be more aggressive (on average) that is probably natural based on evolutionary advantage, and not necessarily bad, though women do often allow their natural tendencies + socialization to turn into damaging habits.
Relevant:
https://x.com/ShannonThrace/status/1890385775860322760
plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/plus_%C3%A7a_change,_plus_c%27est_la_m%C3%AAme_chose
Though I'm kind of surprised that you think -- maybe with some justification -- that the "trans community" is saying that phrase of yours.
But maybe somewhat apropos of which, a case of a transwoman, a transexual that I ran across recently that you might know of, or be in your bailiwick:
Lynn Conway who was a very smart cookie indeed:
Computer Scientist; Electrical Engineer; Innovator; Systems Architect; Research Leader; Engineering Educator; Adventurer & Visioneer; Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Emerita; University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan; Member, National Academy of Engineering
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_Conway
https://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/conway.html
Seems to have been sailing on a more or less even keel despite a predilection for "gender non-conformance". A real puzzle as to how and why that "incongruence" manifests itself.
As always, clear and well argued.
I'm a very left leaning political independent and haven't voted for a Democrat or Republican for president in over 30 years - but that said I am deeply appreciative of President Trump quickly standing up for the rights of women and girls. With that in mind - and my tongue planted firmly in cheek - I've coined the I think meme worthy phrase - "Grab em by the pronouns!" : ) : )
I have a son who wears dresses, not because he is trans-odentified -- but because he thinks dresses are more attractive on his, and he should have the right to dress as he sees fit. Of course he has that right, and in a truly open society (or even locally Liberal, I live in "Progressive-land) I would frel fine with that. And he certainly has the right to buck a genderism that was still mostly untouched.
However, I am concerned, not because I think it us wrong, but because people think he is Trans. And how we are identified strongly affects our self-perceotion.
Plus, he is on the autism spectrum, raised without gender stereotype, naive, and as lovely a rather "feminine" and shy young man as could be. He isn't dating, but I've always assumed that he is gay. As one would say, he is a "sitting duck". I am afraid that he will be coaxed into the belief that he actually IS Trans.
This is one of those cases where liberal idealism threatens to lead to a more narrow understanding of what a man is, not because "dresses are for women", but because "cross-dressing means you're Trans".) Or, basically, that though one may have the right to do something, that doesn't necessarily make it a good idea in a particular set of circumstances. But I don't honestly know what to say to him about this. He's soaking in Post-Modern Kool-aid just as much as his siblings and their friends and online pals.
I think there's a problem right here: "It is, therefore, important that those of us who have discussions across political divides are able to make arguments about what is true and what is compatible with individual liberty rather than what is progressive and regressive.". I believe this fundamentally assumes what you're trying to advocate. That is, they don't consider it "individual liberty" in the first place. You're back to the difficulty of arguing to conservatives that liberal's concept of liberty is correct. But they already told you they didn't agree with that concept of liberty - the word they often use in this case is "license". Thus "We may not ever change the minds of those who truly reject truth, individual liberty or both, but we can, at least, show them to be doing that." reduces down to something like "We may not convince those who disagree with us, but can show they disagree with us". But again, that was where you started.
Well, yes. I said we'll never change some minds because we won't. All we can ever do is make more people who do not truly reject truth or individual liberty recognise when the people and ideas they are leaning towards do. Most conservatives already accept the concept of individual liberty, particularly American ones because it is baked into the constitution and sense of nation. This is why you see people scrambling to find ways to argue that what they're doing is compatible with individual liberty and we have to show that it is not.
I don't know what you mean by me being back where I started? What do you expect to happen in the course of an article? It wasn't going to bring about world peace during the process of writing it, was it? It's an argument for having better conversations and trying to influence culture in more liberal directions. I do assume my readers care about what is true and are broadly liberal because those are the people I am writing to and the purpose of this substack is bringing them together.
I keep hearing things from you that amount to accusations that my pieces aren't achieving anything but I've asked you before, what do you expect them to achieve except making people about how to clarify issues and defend liberal values and what do you think I should be doing instead of writing? Should I be blowing things up and shooting people?
What are you doing apart from writing comments that my writing is worthless? I have suggested that you write the piece you think I should have written setting out the solution you think I should be offering, but it seems you'd rather complain that other people's writing does not fix the world than suggest ways to fix it. Write something. Make an argument. Convince me and other people that you have better answers.
The last time we spoke, you appeared to believe that becoming more sympathetic and supportive of the woke was a better corrective than becoming more liberal and opposing authoritarianism consistently. Make your case. Show how more wokeness on the left is going to make people see the left as more credible and vote for it despite so many surveys saying that this is what drove many people away from it in the first place. Show that the output of the woke actually helps reduce racism, sexism, homophobia etc. instead of increasing it as so much research indicates. Set out clearly what you think people should do and why you think that will help and why I am wrong to think that liberalism and caring about what is true, is what people on the left and right should be putting their strength behind to get their own houses in order and address the illiberal fantasists on the other side.
I apologize if I've offended you. Look at it this way: I suspect the "political distance" between you and me is much less than between either of us vs the "woke" left or "MAGA" right. Yet if these relatively small disputes are so difficult, how much more so the much wider gulfs?
How much more important, then, that you articulate your positions and solutions clearly, as Helen suggested, so that you can determine upon what you agree. You have avoided addressing her response here.
I think the exchange had gotten contentious enough, that continuing in depth was inadvisable, the typical "more heat than light".
Fair. It definitely seems heated, but well within the bounds of civil discourse. I’d be willing to bet that there’s still opportunity for understanding