Poison that well
This is a very bad and stupid piece of writing.
Earlier this month, the Seattle Public Library decided that it will allow a group of trans-exclusionary “radical feminists” (TERFs) to hold an event centered on rejecting the rights and identities of transgender people.
The first sentence, and already so bad. It wasn’t earlier this month, for a start, but more to the point, the library did not decide it will allow a group of trans-exclusionary “radical feminists” to hold an event centered on rejecting the rights and identities of transgender people. The library accepted a booking from a feminist group to discuss and defend the rights of women in the context of ever-broader demands from men who identify as women.
Following widespread objections and calls from the trans community to cancel the event, the library has responded with by-now predictable talking points about the value of, and need to protect, intellectual freedom, a response that self-professed defenders of free speech have praised.
Notice how casually the author takes it for granted that “the trans community” should be able to shut down a feminist event on demand. Notice the clumsy sarcasm about the value of intellectual freedom and the contempt for its defenders.
This conversation isn’t new — we’ve been having some version of it for years.
Not all that many years though. This fad for people to Identify As the sex they’re not and then bully everyone in sight on the strength of their new Idenninny has not been around all that long.
For TERFs, leaning on dogmatic conceptualizations of free speech has been a convenient way to push bigoted, pseudoscientific claims about gender. TERF ideology most basically characterizes trans women as men-pretending-to-be-women, allegedly to “invade” women-only spaces, assault women or otherwise exercise misogyny. These arguments rely on cherry-picked biology and function as dog whistles to stoke prejudice and trans panic. And, unsurprisingly, mainstream TERFs and free speech dogmatists are apparently all hanging out together.
The shocking thing? This person, Sam Sumpter, is a graduate student in philosophy.
But look on the bright side. At least he’s not the local garbage man. If he was, he would be leaving a wake of half-empty bins, broken bottles and general small-time junk up and down every street in the town.
Are graduate students in philosophy that stupid, or just more visible? Hmm.
Seems to me this bit >> “… leaning on dogmatic conceptualizations of free speech has been a convenient way to push bigoted, pseudoscientific claims about gender.” rather describes trans activists pretty well, but along with free speech, lets add free thought. I’m not sure what’s so radical about not including trans women in feminist endeavors, seems like apples and oranges to me.
Bad and stupid, yes, but this gives more coverage to GC feminist concerns (even if they have been garbled in the translation to Newspeak) than one usually sees in these items. They’ll just usually throw about decriptors like “transphobic”, “hatefull”, and “hurtfull” without any details of actual GC beliefs, ideas and points of view. As such this piece makes a useful Rosetta Stone regarding TRA claims:
“…an event centered on rejecting the rights and identities of transgender people.” = “…to discuss and defend the rights of women in the context of ever-broader demands from men who identify as women.”
“…dogmatic conceptualizations of free speech” = “women defending, and excersizing their rights to meet and discuss issues of that concerrn them.”
“…bigoted, pseudoscientific claims about gender” = “Gender is a social construct. Sex is immutible.” Woman: adult, human female. Men are not women. Women do not have penises. Lesbian: same sex attracted woman.”
“TERF ideology most basically characterizes trans women as men-pretending-to-be-women…” = “Woman: adult, human female. Men are not women. Women do not have penises. Lesbian: same sex attracted woman.”
“…allegedly to “invade” women-only spaces, assault women or otherwise exercise misogyny.” = “We categorically deny that there have been (or ever will be) any harms whatsoever to women and girls because increased difficulty in keeping opportunistic and predatory men out of female only spaces because of concern for offending TRA sensitivities.”
“… cherry-picked biology” = “biology”
“dog whistles” = “any public utterance by GC feminists”
“prejudice and trans panic” = “any publicly expressed concern for the safety and health of girls and women that might include accounts of opportunistic and predatory men who have actually, already harmed girls and women.”
“And, unsurprisingly, mainstream TERFs and free speech dogmatists are apparently all hanging out together.” = “Because of the successful demonization and marginalization of GC feminists aby TRAs as being a hateful, bigotted and “controversial” fringe group sometimes the only media oiutlets that will report on the excesses and overreach of TRA extremists are right wing, conservative ones.”
Thanks for the translation key, Sam! It will come in handy for future researchers trying to make sense of this twisted ideology and how it gained so much traction and power amongst such a surprisingly wide range of official bodies and institutions in such a short period of time. Your concentrated use of hackneyed phrases and TRA talking points in describing and distorting the actual, known positions of gender critical women will help to decode the otherwise unitelligible dog’s breafast of contradictions, gaslighting and misogyny that passes for trans “thought.”
Keep it with you at all times! You never know when you will need it.
There is a danger to misrepresenting your opponents’ views. Republicans spent decades calling ordinary Democrats like Barack Obama “socialists,” to the point that the charge has lost some of its sting and young people are supporting an actual socialist candidate.
Pretending that every feminist with concerns about the trans rights movement is a hateful, transphobic bigot who wants them all dead only works until someone hears the actual arguments being made. Then people are going to notice that they’ve been lied to. Which, of course, explains the imperative to try to shut down events like this.
As an aside, I found a piece of writing on the subject that looks a lot more like actual philosophy than Sam Sumpter’s social commentary malarkey above. Kind of refreshing after suffering through that article. >>
https://medium.com/@aytchellis/a-philosophical-perspective-on-gender-identity-9fac2dccb6fb
Not just a philosophy grad student.
https://crosscut.com/author/sam-sumpter.
“They” need to do more work. I’m afraid this “public engagement” has not impressed me with the depth or truthfulness of the “ethics” that have been “applied” in this piece. “They” failed to mention axe-grinding, gaslighting, distortion and speaking untruths. Maybe “they” read Rachel McIvy Whatshisname’s dissertation.
As a union rep, “they” are going to have some impact on the how any gender critical faculty (assuming there are any) are treated at UW. Given the breathtaking dishonesty of the mischaracterization of WoLF’s event, I wouldn’t count on “them” to be in the corner of any GC feminist colleagues. In fact I think “they’re” more likely to be wrapping baseball bats in barbed wire and leading the charge against any GC faculty rather than defending them.
I know, I saw that – union VP. Siiiiiiiigh. There’s no escape.
twiliter – Holly Lawford-Smith is excellent. I’ve shared her work here often.
OB, thanks for the heads up, I searched her name on the site here and found additional interesting reading.
Not Bruce, thanks for the link, I noticed the “(they/them)” thing on there. I’m learning a lot! (mostly about how out of touch I am)…
Don’t be too hard on yourself; I think there are a good number of things that are well worth being out of touch from.
I confess to being in curmudgeon mode while writing the above posts. My use of scare quotes around Sam Sumpter’s “they” is similar to my use of “he” for misogynist TIMs like Oger and McKinnon. Sumpter has earned this by willfull misconstruction and untruthful reporting about the real, legitimate concerns for the health and safety of women and girls which for which the WoLF event is being held. Sumpter does not deserve the courtesy of the unqualified use of “their” preferred pronouns as “they” (like Oger and McKinnon) has deliberately and callously mocked and discounted the real concerns of women responding to dangers that are not just conjectural, hypothetical, or rhetorical exaggeration, but which have actually happened. I feel no compunction at my own impoliteness, however petty and childish it comes across as. Am I sometimes petty and childish? Yes, indeed I am. I can live with that. Dishonesty earns disrespect.
I didn’t find it petty or childish, more illustrative and educational from my perspective. I can relate to curmudgeon mode, I mean the outrageousness of some of this stuff is really provocative.
As someone who narrowly avoided being a philosophy grad student, I’d have to say that no, most aren’t. Like any field, though, philosophy has its eejits. There’s also the problem that, since it isn’t a STEM field, it tends not to attract the wrong sort of person. The majority of the most brilliant philosophers I’ve read or met have been those whose interests and training intersects with the TEM part. They are the ones who don’t opt out of the various logic courses in pursuit of their degree. Because yes, it is even possible to avoid taking Intro Logic in some philosophy undergrad programs, never mind Symbolic Logic, Formal Logic, Modal Logic, Metalogic, etc.
Unfortunately, as I said, these philosophy students are the exception to the rule. You’re far more likely to encounter philosophy students who have never taken a course outside the humanities that wasn’t required. There’s often overlap between philosophy and literature students. This might contribute to the tendency of people like this Sam Sumpter to consider the persuasiveness of an argument to be a reliable indicator of its soundness.
Russell said something to the effect that a knowledge of science is the most important element in the practice of philosophy. He was also a mathematician, but that idea always stuck with me.