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
man i love this comment i wish lemmy had awards
"X isn't just for Transphobia, it's also for racism"
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.
here's one example for you (click here) exploring igbo gender norms
here's a second report that's worth reading too (click here)
i don't have much knowledge about the other cultures suggested, others can provide info for those
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?
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.
Well, no, the way you've phrased it is super fucking wrong. You're not "born with" a social construct, how would that even be possible? Carts and horses really exist and you've put the one in front of the other. Now your horse has wandered off cuz you stuck an obstacle in front of it but you're gonna bitch at me that it's my fault, i just know it
... huh?
AKA women who no longer produce large gametes are no longer women.
As a 58 year old, JK Rowling is, by her own definition, very unlikely to be a woman any longer.
That's why she's so mad all the time!
I mean at least read what she said. "Belongs to the sex class" doesn't mean you're a man at menopause.
So as a likley post menopausal human. JK Rowling no longer belongs to the 'sex class woman' and likely has no 'sex class'.
Given she spends like 80% of her free time talking shit about a marginalized minority, she also has no class in general
Fuck that's a great burn.
Nice
"But I could in the past" or "I was meant to" or some other contrived bullshit that gets the end result she wants.
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?
Let people live and go enjoy your billions.
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.
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.
Transexuality is strange and foreign to me.
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.
would you look at that? a balanced and nuanced conversation about jk rowling's legitimate concerns and how to deal with them:
"belongs to the sex class"... The heck. Such a meaningless circular definition just to provide a veneer of justification for her transphobia.
When you have to make an argument you've already lost, make it as structural/functionalist as possible to reduce how much surface area you have to defend.
Also:
3 Ways Squidward Makes It Really Difficult To Jerk Off To Him
What the hell is this website lmao. It's awesome.
It used to be owned by The Onion, but it’s since become its own thing. But it’s basically if The Onion was clickbait/buzzfeed.
They have a youtube channel too!
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?
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.
Shame that they ARE the outsiders now then
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
Just because people are famous doesn't mean their opinions are valid.
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.
Cissexism often relies on denying the realities of intersex bodies. Or underplaying how common they are.
The reality is biological sex is clustered bimodal traits.
or knowing anything at all. about literally anything
At a fundamental level her argument appears to be "I define biological sex and gender as the same thing, no other definition may exist".
I believe a woman is a human being who belongs to the sex class that produces large gametes.
TIL my grandma isn't a woman anymore.
That depends on which sex class she attended and whether or not her teacher was accredited.
How large do gametes have to be to be considered large?
I mean human gametes aren't very large compared to chicken gametes.
BEHOLD! ROWLING'S WOMEN! Throws chicken
Are you a woman?? SHOW ME THE GAMETES!
Probably larger than pollen
A real feminist would have realized, he'd never say that to a man.
Nah he just calls them pedos when they irritate enough
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.
Naw, I think she's just a midandrist with a penis phobia and sees transwomen as trojan horses to get the penises in her presence.
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.
But your point 100% stands and I agree with it
I read it as a polite way of saying "can you ever talk about literally any other topic?"
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 get your point, but it is blaming an imagined trans person for transphobia.
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.
She wrote one of the most popular book series of all time, certainly she can think of something to tweet about other than whining about trans people
Uff
And that's Elon saying this.
"I am also a cunt, please stop drawing attention to our shitty views"
It's the first time i've seen a post of Elon's that ain't him, you know, honking defensively about cybertruck or saying anything other than crazy or defensive shit, in a long a time
To completely miss the point, I mean - there are answers to all of those questions: yes, no, and if you have both you're a classic transsexual, in the original MEDICAL sense of the original MEDICAL use of the term, which is not how the word is usually used these days (which is to say, incorrectly, like all colloquialisms - eg No, that shit's not hot, it's not cool either, it's just bad! - neither of those words are used in their technically correct sense). None of these are gotchyas or even significant in the "debate" which is entirely hysteria in the first place, sex simply does not matter this much and everyone is always free to do whatever they want, and to find likeminded individuals, and that the media has chosen to flap its jaw about it is something we all should deal with by turning them THE FUCK OFF and allowing the gibbering monkeys to have no impact on our consciousness.
That said this is the first time I've ever seen Elon make a delicate suggestion, which is kinda nice.
Ah, so it's okay for men to tell women to shut up again? I thought we had a good thing going but I guess I was wrong.
Either that, or you only want rights for those that you agree with.
