One of the problems I face as a liberal anti-trans activist is that I don't want to be associated with all the conservative ideas that conservatives hold, ideas that I consider to be very bad. For that reason I was hesitant to watch the Megyn Kelly segment, but I did out of curiosity. She didn't utter a single word that I disagreed with, and I felt the anger she was expressing.
The question for me, however, is -- How conservative is she?
If she is tolerant of trans individuals, is she also tolerant of gay people? Most conservatives, especially Christians, are not.
Is she a racist? Republicans across the country continue to try to disenfranchise black voters.
Does she support abortion? Abortion is arguably more important to women than rejecting trans ideology is.
Does she support the social safety net? The social safety net probably benefits more women than men, given that women live longer and need Social Security for more years.
Does she think the 2020 election was stolen from Trump?
The list goes on.
I keep wondering why conservatives are so clear and articulate in their opposition to transgender ideology, and yet they are so wrong on so many other issues.
Where do you stand on these other issues, Ms. M? Are you a knee-jerk conservative?
I think it's great that you watched Kelly's statement despite the reservations you had (I, for instance, didn't know much about her beforehand as I'm not American). I believe that's exactly what we all need to do more: Hear the other side and stop thinking in terms of these two camps left/right or Dem/GOP or progressive/conservative. If we presume that someone who is against gender ideology automatically has to go full-on conservative on all these other issues you listed, then we end up where we are now: On two sides of very very distant extremes on the left-right spectrum. I don't believe the majority of people think like that, the extremes are rather pushed by powerful minorities.
This ideological extremism only nurtures trans ideology because liberals and moderates are afraid of being associated with the "wrong" side and just don't say anything, thereby giving trans ideology more room to fester.
I'm (obviously, see above) in favor of gay rights and certainly not a racist (I'm from a mixed background myself). But I'm, for instance, very much divided on the Trump 2020 issue because I cannot come to a satisfying conclusion and remain skeptical about how everything went down. But that doesn't mean I'm a Republican or Trump supporter or knee-jerk conservative, far from it. Just trying to make sense of things and skeptical about the political "elites" in general.
So if Kelly is in favor of Trump, well that's her opinion and I don't share it but I accept it. But that is a question of personal opinion, not of truth. If you believe that a boy can become a girl, however, that's a question of truth. And this is where I draw the line.
If you're willing to listen to this one point on which you agree with Kelly, are you willing to *listen?* Because many of the points you made above are simply not true; they're exaggerations at best, outright lies at worst, told by one side to smear their political opponents.
Have you heard conservatives present their views in their own words, or just the claims that their enemies make about them? Have you listened? Are you willing to?
That's probably the simplest one of all. I don't need to show that it's wrong on ideological grounds or debate nuances and technicalities of the definition of words like "racism" or "disenfranchise" which Leftists are always trying to redefine out from under anyone who calls them on their propaganda. No, this one can be refuted by the simple expedient of showing that it is factually incorrect: *there is no disenfranchisement of black voters gong on.*
Feel free to correct me if this isn't what you were referring to, but typically when Leftists talk about "disenfranchisement" and "voter suppression," what they're actually objecting to is election integrity, and most particularly the requirement to show ID in order to vote. They imagine up fanciful scenarios in which the necessity to obtain government-issued photo ID once every few years constitutes an expensive, painful burden on black people and minorities in general that acts as a barrier to their ability to vote.
And not only is it not happening in practice, it's not even happening in theory! The 24th Amendment prohibits the imposition of any poll tax (fee that must be paid to access the polls,) which has been (correctly) interpreted exactly this way by the courts. If the state requires ID to vote, they must then provide a form of valid ID at no cost. And as far as I'm aware, every state with photo ID requirements does in fact comply with this requirement. (If you're aware of any state that 1) requires photo ID to vote and 2) does not offer a free state ID card, please let me know.)
There is simply no evidence to support the "voter suppression" narrative, and plenty to refute it. It's factually incorrect, and not even particularly well-received by Democrats; 62% of whom (as of two years ago) favored voter ID laws. ( https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_us_062121/ ) It's a bit mystifying as to why this obvious lie continues to be spread around when a supermajority of even the people it's most targeted at motivating find it unpersuasive.
You're a racist, Bob. Your arguments are the ones that are specious, not mine. Diluting the black vote via gerrymandering is a very real thing, so real that our conservative Supreme Court just ruled against it in Alabama. Requiring voter IDs (and making it hard for voters to get the IDs, which a lot of states have done) also dilutes the black vote. There are black people in several states who can't vote at all because they have no personal ID to show the state in order to get the voter ID. Older people, especially, may not have things like birth certificates, or may have lost their ID in a fire or during a move. One would think that having a flesh-and-blood human being standing right in front of you would be proof enough that that person exists, but no, ID is required to show that you exist.
Republicans have so many tricks up their sleeves to make it harder for people to vote that I can't remember them all. In some states, it's now illegal for voters to get assistance from various organizations to register to vote.
There have been instances in which a conservative state has made it so much harder to vote that black people rallied and helped each other to the polls, but after one or two election cycles, the voter ID law starts to have the effect it was intended to have, and then voter participation starts to drop.
The bottom line is that voter fraud is so rare that there is no need for voter ID cards at all. When I was young in N.Y. State, all I had to do was to duplicate my signature at the polling place, and I was allowed to vote. Today I have to have an ID, and getting that ID isn't easy because all I have is a bicycle to get to the necessary government office.
So, let's say that in a particular election, you have 55 fraudulent votes cast. Changing the laws to require voter IDs may stop those fraudulent votes, but at the expense of perhaps 1,000 people being unable to vote because they couldn't satisfy the requirements of the law. So which vote is the more accurate vote? Allowing a tiny amount of fraud is better than disenfranchising thousands of voters.
Your whole Substack is filled with specious arguments that support bad conservative policies. You're a devious person.
Thank you for providing such a clear answer to my original question, "are you willing to listen?" And the answer is no. You're just here to troll, make defamatory accusations of racism, and repeat spurious talking points that can be debunked with 5 minutes of research, all the while not even realizing how racist your own terms like "the black vote" are. (The implicit assumption contained in those words, that "all those black people are the same, they vote alike because they're black" is the very definition of racism!)
Go away. There's no point in talking to people who aren't willing to listen.
I don't think you can tell me to "go away" from a Substack that isn't yours. I've been reading about Republican voter suppression for decades -- dozens and dozens of articles and news stories over the years. I'm 72 and I've had a life-long interest in politics.
For you to paint me as the racist one here is pretty ridiculous since I support policies that would result in a larger black vote than the policies you support. Furthermore, I never said that black voters are a monolithic voting block -- you are the one who said that. I am well aware that about 10% of black voters are conservative (maybe 15%). You're the one who is making assumptions, not me.
For you to say that I'm a troll is just ridiculous. I'm passionate about what I believe, and I'm well informed. I don't think you know what a troll is.
As I said before, you are a devious one.
And by the way, I am a night owl. I spent my life working 2nd and 3rd shift. I go to bed around dawn.
Thanks for the links and thumbnail sketches. Too much to read through at the moment but I had seen Megyn Kelly's post earlier -- quite a "cri de coeur", a rather stunning volte face and profound sea change. Hopefully one which will "peak" a great many people.
However, I can't help but get the impression that there are still a bunch of misperceptions on both sides which tends to preclude an early resolution to the problems entailed by transgenderism. And first and foremost is that pretty much every last man, woman, and otherkin has profoundly different and quite antithetical definitions for both "sex" and "gender", the latter in particular. Nice summary of the problem from evolutionary biologist Colin Wright:
Wright: "Most confusion about 'gender' results from people not defining it. Many definitions are in circulation:
Apropos of which, I did, as you suggested, finally read Helene's post over at PITT. Quite a damning indictment of transgenderism, but seems clear that her "there are only 2 genders, male and female" puts her into those thinking "sex" and "gender" are synonymous.
In addition, I also managed to at least skim through your article there -- also quite a damning indictment -- and was intending to post a comment there on it. But one thing that kind of struck me as "problematic" is that you seem to give short shrift to the argument that there is some merit in the concept of gender, that you more or less agree with Helene that "sex" and "gender" are synonymous:
No doubt that there are many "toxic" aspects to "gender ideology", but rejecting Wright's items 3 through 5 seems to preclude being able to grapple with some aspects of the issue that are important to resolving the problem. You may wish to take a gander at my elaborations on that theme in a post on Lisa Davis' Substack:
And, on the other side of the coin, you might also have some interest in a Note by a US professor and politician Robert Reich, and my response to him:
Reich: "Why has the GOP targeted transgender people? There’s not a shred of evidence that trans people are threats to anyone. All they want is to live peacefully as their true selves."
"true selves" -- 🙄. Seems like a rather serious misunderstanding of the situation, one which is apparently predicated on a serious lack of any sort of agreement on what we actually mean by "sex" and "gender". As philosopher Will Durant put it in commenting on Voltaire's quip:
Durant: “ 'If you wish to converse with me,' said Voltaire, 'define your terms.' How many a debate would have been deflated into a paragraph if the disputants had dared to define their terms! This is the alpha and omega of logic, the heart and soul of it, that every important term in serious discourse shall be subjected to strictest scrutiny and definition. It is difficult, and ruthlessly tests the mind; but once done it is half of any task. — Will Durant"
For whatever it's worth, "sex" to me is 1. "Gender" to me is 1, 3, 4, 5. "Gender" just has broader uses. 2 sounds to me like "gender identity", and I'm not decided whether or not I believe in it. If I do, then certainly only SOME people feel it.
I should go over to Reich's site and give him a scolding. That's the nice thing about being liberal on most issues: I can scold other liberals.
Agree that 2 is more or less equivalent to "gender identity". However, some reason to argue that there is still some merit in the concept, although as a "gendered soul", it is clearly a bridge too far, so to speak.
But you might take a gander at an article from the Stanford Encyclopedia Philosophy [SEP] on "personal identity" which bears some resemblance to what people might mean by "gender identity":
SEP: "Outside of philosophy, ‘personal identity’ usually refers to properties to which we feel a special sense of attachment or ownership. Someone’s personal identity in this sense consists of those properties she takes to 'define her as a person' or 'make her the person she is', and which distinguish her from others."
Certainly somewhat subjective, but not entirely so.
But agree also that "... 'gender' has broader uses", though I think it is untenable to argue that it encompasses sex -- which seems to be what you're saying. Some reason to argue that -- as suggested by Wright's 3, 4, & 5 -- "gender" consists of a rather murky bunch of "sexually dimorphic" traits.
However, to say that "sex" is to be included in "gender" is to argue, in effect, that sex is sexually dimorphic. Does not compute; virtually equivalent to saying "2+2=5". Sex is the trait by which we are able to ascertain degrees of dimorphism in the first place; it can't possibly be sexually dimorphic in itself. Sex and gender, from that point of view, are entirely different kettles of fish, if not of organisms from different genera or domains: fish and fowl or mammals.
However, part of the problem there is a great deal of confusion -- if not willfully pigheaded blindness ... -- as to exactly what it is we mean by "male" and "female" as sexes (NOT genders). You might have some interest in the standard biological definitions stipulated in the Glossary of this article in the Journal of Molecular Human Reproduction [MHR]:
MHR: "Female: Biologically, the female sex is defined as the adult phenotype that produces [present tense indefinite] the larger gametes in anisogamous systems.
Male: Biologically, the male sex is defined as the adult phenotype that produces [present tense indefinite] the smaller gametes in anisogamous systems."
"Gamete competition, gamete limitation, and the evolution of the two sexes"
By those definitions, ALL it means to have a sex is to have functional gonads of either of two types, those with neither being, ipso facto, sexless. As ALL it means to be a teenager is to be between 13 & 19, even though there are a great many other "properties" associated with being in that category.
Trying to mash a bunch of other traits and properties into the definitions for the sexes -- as far too many insist on doing -- is basically to try turning the sexes into genders.
In any case, I wish you well if you go "fourth" on Reich -- so to speak 🙂 -- to show him the errors of his ways. He seems rather remarkably clueless about the rather odious consequences of transgenderism.
Helene does use sex and gender synonymously, yes. While I don't agree with that (biological sex is one thing, societal roles influenced by that sex is another, and I find the term "gender" rather overall problematic), I still find her testinony quite powerful. Detrans stories are incredibly important because they show the immense damage this ideology can cause and can hopefully be a cautionary tale for others. They also help understand why children would fall prey to such an ideology (something that I couldn't quite understand at the beginning). And I try to understand that so I can do my part as a teacher to help them.
Re: "true selves": This narrative was invented to shut down any criticism of trans ideology as being against someone coming into their own. Emotional manipulation, grounded in no argument whatsoever. There is no "true self" and no "untrue self".
> There’s not a shred of evidence that trans people are threats to anyone.
Reich is, as usual, full of nonsense. Even if you discount the direct harm that trans ideology does to those who follow its teachings, it is quite impossible, without engaging in rank dishonesty, to separate the ideology from the activists who wage social (and occasionally physical) warfare against dissenters. To see threats to "anyone" and indeed to everyone, you need look no further than the *actual threats* of doxxing, job termination, lawfare, and occasionally even criminal charges for doing nothing more than disagreeing with the activists' lies.
Megyn Kelly’s repeated invocation of "I didn't see the harm," culminating in finally seeing the harm once it's right out there, obvious and in everyone's face and too big and harmful to ignore, is a tragic illustration of the value of conservative notions of morality. This is precisely why conservatives tend to discount the "harm" standard in favor of the neglected but more important "conservative virtues" outlined by Moral Foundation Theory. By the time the harm becomes big and clear enough to see, the damage has already been done.
One of the problems I face as a liberal anti-trans activist is that I don't want to be associated with all the conservative ideas that conservatives hold, ideas that I consider to be very bad. For that reason I was hesitant to watch the Megyn Kelly segment, but I did out of curiosity. She didn't utter a single word that I disagreed with, and I felt the anger she was expressing.
The question for me, however, is -- How conservative is she?
If she is tolerant of trans individuals, is she also tolerant of gay people? Most conservatives, especially Christians, are not.
Is she a racist? Republicans across the country continue to try to disenfranchise black voters.
Does she support abortion? Abortion is arguably more important to women than rejecting trans ideology is.
Does she support the social safety net? The social safety net probably benefits more women than men, given that women live longer and need Social Security for more years.
Does she think the 2020 election was stolen from Trump?
The list goes on.
I keep wondering why conservatives are so clear and articulate in their opposition to transgender ideology, and yet they are so wrong on so many other issues.
Where do you stand on these other issues, Ms. M? Are you a knee-jerk conservative?
Good to read from you again, Perry!
I think it's great that you watched Kelly's statement despite the reservations you had (I, for instance, didn't know much about her beforehand as I'm not American). I believe that's exactly what we all need to do more: Hear the other side and stop thinking in terms of these two camps left/right or Dem/GOP or progressive/conservative. If we presume that someone who is against gender ideology automatically has to go full-on conservative on all these other issues you listed, then we end up where we are now: On two sides of very very distant extremes on the left-right spectrum. I don't believe the majority of people think like that, the extremes are rather pushed by powerful minorities.
This ideological extremism only nurtures trans ideology because liberals and moderates are afraid of being associated with the "wrong" side and just don't say anything, thereby giving trans ideology more room to fester.
I'm (obviously, see above) in favor of gay rights and certainly not a racist (I'm from a mixed background myself). But I'm, for instance, very much divided on the Trump 2020 issue because I cannot come to a satisfying conclusion and remain skeptical about how everything went down. But that doesn't mean I'm a Republican or Trump supporter or knee-jerk conservative, far from it. Just trying to make sense of things and skeptical about the political "elites" in general.
So if Kelly is in favor of Trump, well that's her opinion and I don't share it but I accept it. But that is a question of personal opinion, not of truth. If you believe that a boy can become a girl, however, that's a question of truth. And this is where I draw the line.
If you're willing to listen to this one point on which you agree with Kelly, are you willing to *listen?* Because many of the points you made above are simply not true; they're exaggerations at best, outright lies at worst, told by one side to smear their political opponents.
Have you heard conservatives present their views in their own words, or just the claims that their enemies make about them? Have you listened? Are you willing to?
Bob, if you want to tell me how the things I said were wrong, we can have a debate about it.
Let's start with this: "Is she a racist? Republicans across the country continue to try to disenfranchise black voters." How is that wrong?
That's probably the simplest one of all. I don't need to show that it's wrong on ideological grounds or debate nuances and technicalities of the definition of words like "racism" or "disenfranchise" which Leftists are always trying to redefine out from under anyone who calls them on their propaganda. No, this one can be refuted by the simple expedient of showing that it is factually incorrect: *there is no disenfranchisement of black voters gong on.*
Feel free to correct me if this isn't what you were referring to, but typically when Leftists talk about "disenfranchisement" and "voter suppression," what they're actually objecting to is election integrity, and most particularly the requirement to show ID in order to vote. They imagine up fanciful scenarios in which the necessity to obtain government-issued photo ID once every few years constitutes an expensive, painful burden on black people and minorities in general that acts as a barrier to their ability to vote.
But the simple, unavoidable fact of the matter is, that's not happening. At all. Studies have shown over and over again that voter integrity laws have no negative effect on enfranchisement, and in fact typically *increases* voter turnout slightly, presumably by bolstering voters' confidence that their votes will actually matter. (See https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legal-work/42eca6f8a576d4eb30_q3m6bxck3.pdf , https://www.povertyactionlab.org/evaluation/effects-voter-id-notification-voter-turnout-united-states , https://www.nber.org/papers/w25522 ) Sometimes the increase in voter turnout isn't even a small one; see the massive 44% black voter participation increase in Georgia from 2006 to 2010! ( https://www.ajc.com/news/despite-voter-law-minority-turnout-georgia/3wOfD2SkXmTgRwbySd2ZiK/ ) The notion of voter suppression is so transparently false that even hard-left outlets such as the Washington Post have debunked it! ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/30/biden-falsely-claims-new-georgia-law-ends-voting-hours-early/ )
And not only is it not happening in practice, it's not even happening in theory! The 24th Amendment prohibits the imposition of any poll tax (fee that must be paid to access the polls,) which has been (correctly) interpreted exactly this way by the courts. If the state requires ID to vote, they must then provide a form of valid ID at no cost. And as far as I'm aware, every state with photo ID requirements does in fact comply with this requirement. (If you're aware of any state that 1) requires photo ID to vote and 2) does not offer a free state ID card, please let me know.)
There is simply no evidence to support the "voter suppression" narrative, and plenty to refute it. It's factually incorrect, and not even particularly well-received by Democrats; 62% of whom (as of two years ago) favored voter ID laws. ( https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/monmouthpoll_us_062121/ ) It's a bit mystifying as to why this obvious lie continues to be spread around when a supermajority of even the people it's most targeted at motivating find it unpersuasive.
I read the newspapers too, you know.
You're a racist, Bob. Your arguments are the ones that are specious, not mine. Diluting the black vote via gerrymandering is a very real thing, so real that our conservative Supreme Court just ruled against it in Alabama. Requiring voter IDs (and making it hard for voters to get the IDs, which a lot of states have done) also dilutes the black vote. There are black people in several states who can't vote at all because they have no personal ID to show the state in order to get the voter ID. Older people, especially, may not have things like birth certificates, or may have lost their ID in a fire or during a move. One would think that having a flesh-and-blood human being standing right in front of you would be proof enough that that person exists, but no, ID is required to show that you exist.
Republicans have so many tricks up their sleeves to make it harder for people to vote that I can't remember them all. In some states, it's now illegal for voters to get assistance from various organizations to register to vote.
There have been instances in which a conservative state has made it so much harder to vote that black people rallied and helped each other to the polls, but after one or two election cycles, the voter ID law starts to have the effect it was intended to have, and then voter participation starts to drop.
The bottom line is that voter fraud is so rare that there is no need for voter ID cards at all. When I was young in N.Y. State, all I had to do was to duplicate my signature at the polling place, and I was allowed to vote. Today I have to have an ID, and getting that ID isn't easy because all I have is a bicycle to get to the necessary government office.
So, let's say that in a particular election, you have 55 fraudulent votes cast. Changing the laws to require voter IDs may stop those fraudulent votes, but at the expense of perhaps 1,000 people being unable to vote because they couldn't satisfy the requirements of the law. So which vote is the more accurate vote? Allowing a tiny amount of fraud is better than disenfranchising thousands of voters.
Your whole Substack is filled with specious arguments that support bad conservative policies. You're a devious person.
Thank you for providing such a clear answer to my original question, "are you willing to listen?" And the answer is no. You're just here to troll, make defamatory accusations of racism, and repeat spurious talking points that can be debunked with 5 minutes of research, all the while not even realizing how racist your own terms like "the black vote" are. (The implicit assumption contained in those words, that "all those black people are the same, they vote alike because they're black" is the very definition of racism!)
Go away. There's no point in talking to people who aren't willing to listen.
I don't think you can tell me to "go away" from a Substack that isn't yours. I've been reading about Republican voter suppression for decades -- dozens and dozens of articles and news stories over the years. I'm 72 and I've had a life-long interest in politics.
For you to paint me as the racist one here is pretty ridiculous since I support policies that would result in a larger black vote than the policies you support. Furthermore, I never said that black voters are a monolithic voting block -- you are the one who said that. I am well aware that about 10% of black voters are conservative (maybe 15%). You're the one who is making assumptions, not me.
For you to say that I'm a troll is just ridiculous. I'm passionate about what I believe, and I'm well informed. I don't think you know what a troll is.
As I said before, you are a devious one.
And by the way, I am a night owl. I spent my life working 2nd and 3rd shift. I go to bed around dawn.
Thanks for the links and thumbnail sketches. Too much to read through at the moment but I had seen Megyn Kelly's post earlier -- quite a "cri de coeur", a rather stunning volte face and profound sea change. Hopefully one which will "peak" a great many people.
However, I can't help but get the impression that there are still a bunch of misperceptions on both sides which tends to preclude an early resolution to the problems entailed by transgenderism. And first and foremost is that pretty much every last man, woman, and otherkin has profoundly different and quite antithetical definitions for both "sex" and "gender", the latter in particular. Nice summary of the problem from evolutionary biologist Colin Wright:
Wright: "Most confusion about 'gender' results from people not defining it. Many definitions are in circulation:
1. Synonym for sex (male/female)
2. A subjective feeling in relation to one's sex
3. Societal sex-based roles/expectations
4. Sex-related behavior
5. Personality traits"
https://twitter.com/SwipeWright/status/1234040036091236352
Apropos of which, I did, as you suggested, finally read Helene's post over at PITT. Quite a damning indictment of transgenderism, but seems clear that her "there are only 2 genders, male and female" puts her into those thinking "sex" and "gender" are synonymous.
In addition, I also managed to at least skim through your article there -- also quite a damning indictment -- and was intending to post a comment there on it. But one thing that kind of struck me as "problematic" is that you seem to give short shrift to the argument that there is some merit in the concept of gender, that you more or less agree with Helene that "sex" and "gender" are synonymous:
https://pitt.substack.com/p/leave-the-kids-alone
No doubt that there are many "toxic" aspects to "gender ideology", but rejecting Wright's items 3 through 5 seems to preclude being able to grapple with some aspects of the issue that are important to resolving the problem. You may wish to take a gander at my elaborations on that theme in a post on Lisa Davis' Substack:
https://lisaselindavis.substack.com/p/florida/comment/17050351
And, on the other side of the coin, you might also have some interest in a Note by a US professor and politician Robert Reich, and my response to him:
Reich: "Why has the GOP targeted transgender people? There’s not a shred of evidence that trans people are threats to anyone. All they want is to live peacefully as their true selves."
https://substack.com/profile/21792752-steersman/note/c-16959278
"true selves" -- 🙄. Seems like a rather serious misunderstanding of the situation, one which is apparently predicated on a serious lack of any sort of agreement on what we actually mean by "sex" and "gender". As philosopher Will Durant put it in commenting on Voltaire's quip:
Durant: “ 'If you wish to converse with me,' said Voltaire, 'define your terms.' How many a debate would have been deflated into a paragraph if the disputants had dared to define their terms! This is the alpha and omega of logic, the heart and soul of it, that every important term in serious discourse shall be subjected to strictest scrutiny and definition. It is difficult, and ruthlessly tests the mind; but once done it is half of any task. — Will Durant"
https://quotefancy.com/quote/3001527/Will-Durant-If-you-wish-to-converse-with-me-said-Voltaire-define-your-terms-How-many-a
For whatever it's worth, "sex" to me is 1. "Gender" to me is 1, 3, 4, 5. "Gender" just has broader uses. 2 sounds to me like "gender identity", and I'm not decided whether or not I believe in it. If I do, then certainly only SOME people feel it.
I should go over to Reich's site and give him a scolding. That's the nice thing about being liberal on most issues: I can scold other liberals.
Agree that 2 is more or less equivalent to "gender identity". However, some reason to argue that there is still some merit in the concept, although as a "gendered soul", it is clearly a bridge too far, so to speak.
But you might take a gander at an article from the Stanford Encyclopedia Philosophy [SEP] on "personal identity" which bears some resemblance to what people might mean by "gender identity":
SEP: "Outside of philosophy, ‘personal identity’ usually refers to properties to which we feel a special sense of attachment or ownership. Someone’s personal identity in this sense consists of those properties she takes to 'define her as a person' or 'make her the person she is', and which distinguish her from others."
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-personal/#ProPerIde
Certainly somewhat subjective, but not entirely so.
But agree also that "... 'gender' has broader uses", though I think it is untenable to argue that it encompasses sex -- which seems to be what you're saying. Some reason to argue that -- as suggested by Wright's 3, 4, & 5 -- "gender" consists of a rather murky bunch of "sexually dimorphic" traits.
However, to say that "sex" is to be included in "gender" is to argue, in effect, that sex is sexually dimorphic. Does not compute; virtually equivalent to saying "2+2=5". Sex is the trait by which we are able to ascertain degrees of dimorphism in the first place; it can't possibly be sexually dimorphic in itself. Sex and gender, from that point of view, are entirely different kettles of fish, if not of organisms from different genera or domains: fish and fowl or mammals.
However, part of the problem there is a great deal of confusion -- if not willfully pigheaded blindness ... -- as to exactly what it is we mean by "male" and "female" as sexes (NOT genders). You might have some interest in the standard biological definitions stipulated in the Glossary of this article in the Journal of Molecular Human Reproduction [MHR]:
MHR: "Female: Biologically, the female sex is defined as the adult phenotype that produces [present tense indefinite] the larger gametes in anisogamous systems.
Male: Biologically, the male sex is defined as the adult phenotype that produces [present tense indefinite] the smaller gametes in anisogamous systems."
"Gamete competition, gamete limitation, and the evolution of the two sexes"
https://academic.oup.com/molehr/article/20/12/1161/1062990
By those definitions, ALL it means to have a sex is to have functional gonads of either of two types, those with neither being, ipso facto, sexless. As ALL it means to be a teenager is to be between 13 & 19, even though there are a great many other "properties" associated with being in that category.
Trying to mash a bunch of other traits and properties into the definitions for the sexes -- as far too many insist on doing -- is basically to try turning the sexes into genders.
In any case, I wish you well if you go "fourth" on Reich -- so to speak 🙂 -- to show him the errors of his ways. He seems rather remarkably clueless about the rather odious consequences of transgenderism.
Helene does use sex and gender synonymously, yes. While I don't agree with that (biological sex is one thing, societal roles influenced by that sex is another, and I find the term "gender" rather overall problematic), I still find her testinony quite powerful. Detrans stories are incredibly important because they show the immense damage this ideology can cause and can hopefully be a cautionary tale for others. They also help understand why children would fall prey to such an ideology (something that I couldn't quite understand at the beginning). And I try to understand that so I can do my part as a teacher to help them.
Re: "true selves": This narrative was invented to shut down any criticism of trans ideology as being against someone coming into their own. Emotional manipulation, grounded in no argument whatsoever. There is no "true self" and no "untrue self".
Thanks for reading and sharing!
> There’s not a shred of evidence that trans people are threats to anyone.
Reich is, as usual, full of nonsense. Even if you discount the direct harm that trans ideology does to those who follow its teachings, it is quite impossible, without engaging in rank dishonesty, to separate the ideology from the activists who wage social (and occasionally physical) warfare against dissenters. To see threats to "anyone" and indeed to everyone, you need look no further than the *actual threats* of doxxing, job termination, lawfare, and occasionally even criminal charges for doing nothing more than disagreeing with the activists' lies.
Megyn Kelly’s repeated invocation of "I didn't see the harm," culminating in finally seeing the harm once it's right out there, obvious and in everyone's face and too big and harmful to ignore, is a tragic illustration of the value of conservative notions of morality. This is precisely why conservatives tend to discount the "harm" standard in favor of the neglected but more important "conservative virtues" outlined by Moral Foundation Theory. By the time the harm becomes big and clear enough to see, the damage has already been done.