A much darker truth
James Max is still digging.
What is the “much darker truth”? He doesn’t say. I guess we’re supposed to surmise that she wants them all killed, or something. Very respectable way to argue.
So he thinks the “physicalities” don’t exist? So, what, then? We’re all just spirits?
Really not a clever man.
He seems to have a lot of trouble with wording. I’m guessing that his “you have trouble with those who don’t fit those … physicalities you … seem to think exist” is a reference to impossible stereotypically perfect bodies. Who doesn’t fit? Amputees; people with DSDs; the overweight; the elderly; those with Down’s Syndrome, folks with moles — and of course the transgender.
Why does Max think the terven have a problem accepting all those people who don’t fit the Ideal Physicality of their Dreams? It’s inferred from their prejudiced view that males can’t be women. Obviously. All of a piece.
It is of course no surprise that he is also a ratlicker who was an enthusiastic proponent of the Great Barrington Declaration.
Naif:
Thanks for the timely reminder about that bit of sophistry-plus-bullshit. NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard said a few days ago everyone in NSW “is probably going to get Omicron at some stage.” Great.
I’ve got a basic problem with the whole concept of “dog whistles” in general, and this I think illustrates it quite well.
That problem being, we aren’t dogs. “Reading between the lines” just as often means taking a dramatically uncharitable reading of a statement in order to strawman what the person is actually saying, because a straight, and generally more honest, reading is much harder to refute, as it is actually spotting some sort of flaw.
It is a form of intellectual laziness. Admittedly I say this because I’m an insensitive ass, if I mean something offensive I’ll generally just say it.
And just because you’ve made a claim about there being some darker truth behind the words, doesn’t mean you don’t have to deal with the words themselves. If someone is saying factually true stuff, imputing bad intentions doesn’t magically make the facts any different.
At least with a dog whistle there’s an appeal to known, however this vague. This strategy is just an open invention to his audience to imagine what they will. It’s an extremely effective technique – just point out that because this a BAD PERSON, they are malicious and must want to do BAD THINGS. Your audience does all the work and you are not left with any falsifiable claims to defend. It’s such a common technique that it must have a name but that escapes me at the moment.
I think the name is “lying.”
Yes, but a specific kind of lying.
I think “poisoning the well” fits.
“Poisoning the well” certainly applies but this is more specific – a bit like the Emperor’s new clothes but in reverse.
Referring to the perceived gender non-conformance to their own sex and blazing a big neon sign by adding and demanding pronouns, creating neologisms such as “genderqueer” and 3xx gender identities based in quibbling differences in personalities is a big red flag signaling non-acceptance. Asexuals who seek validity for a hidden perceived difference in desire levels (basically telling us they are superior to all the rest of us who will rut at a moment’s notice like pigs in the dirt) is a big red flag for non-acceptance. He is defending and supporting people who don’t accept women as people, and have found a way to subjugate women in a cool way, protected by scores of liberals who just want to be kind.
Yeah, we are kind and accepting of non-conforming men and women, and especially children. It’s a matter of standing up to those who demand that they be accepted as something they are not, to those who demand the blessings to medically deform children who don’t understand the implications of sex, gender, and non-conformance, to those who demand that female athletes give way to those who have found a way to game the system to get glory and adulation.
He’s either very thick, or invested in this agenda to subjugate women. Perhaps both.
And yes, poisoning the well is very common in this miasma of misinformation. This troll @takedownMRAs always seems to find my twitter handle and tries to convince me that radical feminists and gender critical skeptics are on the same side as MRAs. I just mute him. But India Willoughby with his “Putin is a transphobe” shtick is the silliest of them all.
The argument from JM is a textbook case of innuendo:
James Max:
Liar. “Views,” such as that sex is real, people can’t change their biological sex, and males pose a risk of harm to females in intimate spaces. Those “views,” otherwise known as facts.
Also, “views” such as “People should be able to dress however they please without suffering discrimination. People should be able to call themselves whatever they like without suffering discrimination. People should be able to have an intimate relationship with any mutually consenting adult who agrees. People should be able to live the life that best makes them happy, all without losing their jobs or housing — the same kinds of protections that other groups of people enjoy.” Those “views,” which accord the same civil rights to transgender people as are accorded to other protected groups of people.
Yes, it would have to be “untold” harm, damage, and bullying, because you can’t articulate any harm, damage, or bullying attributable to such “views.”
If you think there’s “harm, damage, and bullying,” what, specifically, does it consist of? The people who harm, damage, and bully transgender people are NOT gender critical women. Any “harm, damage, or bullying” is not caused by or attributable to gender critical “views.”
Francis at #5,
In debate it’s a trick known as “Motte and Bailey” — alluding to the architecture of northern European early medieval fortifications. Basically, it’s a dishonest tactic whereby someone says something ugly but vague, and when challenged, retreats to a narrower, milder position, and accuses the objector of being uncharitable. Richard Carrier (say what you like about him, he knows his onions) wrote an excellent essay about it a couple of years ago.
And I also meant to say that it’s not gender-critical “views” that judge people for not fitting stereotypes. Feminism has endeavored to do away with stereotypes. It’s T who are actively enforcing stereotypes. As a gender critical feminist, I don’t believe those stereotypes should exist. You don’t bwant to confirm to stereotypes? Great. Our “view” is that you shouldn’t have to. There’s nothing particularly real or useful about stereotypes. Break ’em all.
“Physicalities,” on the other hand, do exist. I don’t know why you think they don’t. Nevertheless, physicalities are not a reason or justification for harming anyone; that’s not a “view” that gender-critical people hold. The physicality of sex can’t be changed. We don’t just “think” that men don’t have the physical characteristics of women. It’s simply a brute fact that the physicalities of men are different from the physicalities of women. Get over it.
I know some people who would argue against that. Many writers I know rely on stereotypes when building a character so the character they build will be “believable”. They will lament how it cannot be otherwise, while putting a field ecologist in a white lab coat and a doctor with a stethoscope around his neck at all times. It’s the same thing that accrues to gender stereotypes. It is easier to get people to accept your work if the characters conform to expected type.
It is a lazy man’s (or woman’s) argument, though. It is perfectly possible to draw up women who don’t fit the stereotypes and persuade your reader to believe it if you’re willing to do the work.
I actually agree that there is nothing particularly real or useful about stereotypes, but that does give me a lot more problem getting my works produced. It’s hard to be the pioneer.
I’m far from the first person to point out that Max himself was born through one of those “physicalities” and is talking out of another.