Freedom of Expression in Academia and Employment - formerly the Trans Issues.

[garbon]

What is actually 'new' in the discussions of sex and gender? Most of what I've seen in this thread seem to be topics that were being debated and discussed back when I was still in college.

[Malthus]

Both could be true.  The point is to deepen the divide to the point that no flaw of your side would ever make you consider doing anything that would in any way aid the other side.  I can see how it would be tempting for a conservative to perform as much mental gymnastics as necessary to not see anything fatally wrong with Trump, when the alternative is to put people in power who will earnestly believe in any insane raving if it goes viral enough.

It is very counterproductive to blame everything on Russian trolls.

It wasn't Russian trolls who introduced silly shit like this throughout history, like iconoclasts vs. the other dudes, the debate and killing over the exact nature of Christ, etc. It's who we are.

Iconoclasts vs. Iconodules.

What strikes me above all is the smallness of the stakes in this particular controversy. It affects relatively few people and the accommodation (using their preferred form of address) is so small, why not simply do them this courtesy, whether you think they are right to ask for it or not?

Reminds me of Howard Cosell's reaction to Cassius Clay renaming himself Mohammed Ali: 'you have a right to be called anything you want'.

[Josquius]

What is actually 'new' in the discussions of sex and gender? Most of what I've seen in this thread seem to be topics that were being debated and discussed back when I was still in college.

It did largely seem to go away for a bit as people recognised transgender people could be who they wanted to be.
In recent years the hate has really picked up again though, reigniting previously settled issues.

[Tamas]

Both could be true.  The point is to deepen the divide to the point that no flaw of your side would ever make you consider doing anything that would in any way aid the other side.  I can see how it would be tempting for a conservative to perform as much mental gymnastics as necessary to not see anything fatally wrong with Trump, when the alternative is to put people in power who will earnestly believe in any insane raving if it goes viral enough.

It is very counterproductive to blame everything on Russian trolls.

It wasn't Russian trolls who introduced silly shit like this throughout history, like iconoclasts vs. the other dudes, the debate and killing over the exact nature of Christ, etc. It's who we are.

Iconoclasts vs. Iconodules.

What strikes me above all is the smallness of the stakes in this particular controversy. It affects relatively few people and the accommodation (using their preferred form of address) is so small, why not simply do them this courtesy, whether you think they are right to ask for it or not?

Reminds me of Howard Cosell's reaction to Cassius Clay renaming himself Mohammed Ali: 'you have a right to be called anything you want'.

I personally don't mind accommodating them at all. But it shouldn't be a legal requirement. I mean this as a general comment and not referring specifically to the second case in the original post here, that lady just sounds like an arsehole whom I am sure her colleagues were happy to be rid of regardless of her stance on transgender people.

[DGuller]

Both could be true.  The point is to deepen the divide to the point that no flaw of your side would ever make you consider doing anything that would in any way aid the other side.  I can see how it would be tempting for a conservative to perform as much mental gymnastics as necessary to not see anything fatally wrong with Trump, when the alternative is to put people in power who will earnestly believe in any insane raving if it goes viral enough.

It is very counterproductive to blame everything on Russian trolls.

It wasn't Russian trolls who introduced silly shit like this throughout history, like iconoclasts vs. the other dudes, the debate and killing over the exact nature of Christ, etc. It's who we are.

Iconoclasts vs. Iconodules.

What strikes me above all is the smallness of the stakes in this particular controversy. It affects relatively few people and the accommodation (using their preferred form of address) is so small, why not simply do them this courtesy, whether you think they are right to ask for it or not?

Reminds me of Howard Cosell's reaction to Cassius Clay renaming himself Mohammed Ali: 'you have a right to be called anything you want'.

I don't think the stakes are small.  The issue is death of critical thinking by a thousand cuts.  Each cut may be minor, but death certainly isn't.  The attitude of "just let it go" may have its uses, but it certainly doesn't facilitate open debate.  When letting it go becomes mandatory, the marketplace of ideas becomes a planned economy of ideas.

[Malthus]

I don't think the stakes are small.  The issue is death of critical thinking by a thousand cuts.  Each cut may be minor, but death certainly isn't.  The attitude of "just let it go" may have its uses, but it certainly doesn't facilitate open debate.  When letting it go becomes mandatory, the marketplace of ideas becomes a planned economy of ideas.

Compared with the truly big issues of the day - global warming, the drying up of social mobility, etc. - the stakes seem to me tiny.

Yet the emotions they generate are equivalent.

This is one of my concerns - that folks are dividing themselves up into tribes, based on emotional reactions to issues such as this. The "tribe" that rejects the labelling of transgendered folks as they wish, is also the "tribe" that rejects (say) global warming.

[Josquius]

Yep. You can't just be a fuckwit on one thing anymore. It has to be on everything.
What's disturbing is its working in the fuckwits favour. You'd think being associated with stupid beliefs would turn people away but no. They're only too keen to take the associated positions of the thing they actually care about

[DGuller]

I don't think the stakes are small.  The issue is death of critical thinking by a thousand cuts.  Each cut may be minor, but death certainly isn't.  The attitude of "just let it go" may have its uses, but it certainly doesn't facilitate open debate.  When letting it go becomes mandatory, the marketplace of ideas becomes a planned economy of ideas.

Compared with the truly big issues of the day - global warming, the drying up of social mobility, etc. - the stakes seem to me tiny.

Yet the emotions they generate are equivalent.

This is one of my concerns - that folks are dividing themselves up into tribes, based on emotional reactions to issues such as this. The "tribe" that rejects the labelling of transgendered folks as they wish, is also the "tribe" that rejects (say) global warming.

I still disagree.  I think the left losing its way is making every issue of significance worse.  Critical thinking and rejection of authoritarianism are the founding principles of liberals.  I for one am a liberal because I think these two principles are crucial for effectively addressing the problems we face.  I think it would be a disaster for humanity if the liberals just became ideologues in a different rabbit hole.

[Tamas]

I still disagree.  I think the left losing its way is making every issue of significance worse.  Critical thinking and rejection of authoritarianism are the founding principles of liberals.  I for one am a liberal because I think these two principles are crucial for effectively addressing the problems we face.  I think it would be a disaster for humanity if the liberals just became ideologues in a different rabbit hole.

[The Brain]

I don't think the stakes are small.  The issue is death of critical thinking by a thousand cuts.  Each cut may be minor, but death certainly isn't.  The attitude of "just let it go" may have its uses, but it certainly doesn't facilitate open debate.  When letting it go becomes mandatory, the marketplace of ideas becomes a planned economy of ideas.

Compared with the truly big issues of the day - global warming, the drying up of social mobility, etc. - the stakes seem to me tiny.

Yet the emotions they generate are equivalent.

This is one of my concerns - that folks are dividing themselves up into tribes, based on emotional reactions to issues such as this. The "tribe" that rejects the labelling of transgendered folks as they wish, is also the "tribe" that rejects (say) global warming.

I still disagree.  I think the left losing its way is making every issue of significance worse.  Critical thinking and rejection of authoritarianism are the founding principles of liberals.  I for one am a liberal because I think these two principles are crucial for effectively addressing the problems we face.  I think it would be a disaster for humanity if the liberals just became ideologues in a different rabbit hole.

Elaborate on the rabbit hole.

[Tamas]

Ewwww

[garbon]

Is that what they are calling it these days? Elaboration?

[The Minsky Moment]

This is one of my concerns - that folks are dividing themselves up into tribes, based on emotional reactions to issues such as this. The "tribe" that rejects the labelling of transgendered folks as they wish, is also the "tribe" that rejects (say) global warming.

I'm not sure that's true - for example right here, I'm pretty sure Otto takes global warming seriously but his views on transgenderism clearly are on the other "side".

The OP posts seem to confirm that - I don't really know what Selina Todd thinks of global warming, but as a professor of modern history at Oxford focusing on working class life and social work in postwar Britain I'm going to take a wild stab she is not likely to be on the Trumpy side of lots of other issues. . .

Anecdotally, I know of people who are "nice" liberal types on other issues but express some degree or other of dissent on these issues.

Part of the problem involves the edge cases of differentiation between biological sex and gender.  Common sense and courtesy suggests that if a person prefers a particular form of address or gendered identification in the social sphere, it costs nothing to extend that recognition and respect - or at least that is the classically liberal view of things.  More tricky are issues like male/female separation in sports leagues and competition - are these separations due to a social convention against mixing in a sporting context or because of the sense that being of one biological sex confers certain advantages?  I think in the contemporary context it is probably more the latter.

[Malthus]

This is one of my concerns - that folks are dividing themselves up into tribes, based on emotional reactions to issues such as this. The "tribe" that rejects the labelling of transgendered folks as they wish, is also the "tribe" that rejects (say) global warming.

I'm not sure that's true - for example right here, I'm pretty sure Otto takes global warming seriously but his views on transgenderism clearly are on the other "side".

The OP posts seem to confirm that - I don't really know what Selina Todd thinks of global warming, but as a professor of modern history at Oxford focusing on working class life and social work in postwar Britain I'm going to take a wild stab she is not likely to be on the Trumpy side of lots of other issues. . .

Anecdotally, I know of people who are "nice" liberal types on other issues but express some degree or other of dissent on these issues.

Part of the problem involves the edge cases of differentiation between biological sex and gender.  Common sense and courtesy suggests that if a person prefers a particular form of address or gendered identification in the social sphere, it costs nothing to extend that recognition and respect - or at least that is the classically liberal view of things.  More tricky are issues like male/female separation in sports leagues and competition - are these separations due to a social convention against mixing in a sporting context or because of the sense that being of one biological sex confers certain advantages?  I think in the contemporary context it is probably more the latter.

Clearly, it is not universally true that people must think in lock-step on all issues. There are lots of people, here and elsewhere, who are capable of thinking of issues on their own merits. That may even be a sign of intelligence, and presumably your "nice" liberal types fall into that category.

However, I would argue that there is a tendency, particularly notable these days, for people to identify with one side or the other, and issues such as this are the types of issues over which people tend to divide. They allow a battle of competing negative stereotypes.

I agree with your last observation.

[Duque de Bragança]

I think this is an anglo world issue.

How does the French language deal with pronouns?

edit, or I should say, this pronoun issue.

In French, everything has a gender, there is no neutral. Somethings are ambiguous wether they are feminin or masculin. Doesn't seems a big deal to change from one to the other for a person. A neutral person pronom has been created for non-binary persons but I know no francophone non-bionary.

Actually, masculine in French can also include neutral cf. quelqu'un. Masculine plural is even more encompassing.
That's something neo/post-feminists cannot fathom for ideological reasons. Thing is, masculine and neutral were already pretty close in Latin, only accusative was different. This happens in other Indo-European languages such as German where the only difference now is den vs das.
One can emphasize by saying toutes et tous or the reverse but that's a stylistic or rhetorical choice.
There is something of real neutral but it is more for inanimate objects, again like neutral in theory in Latin.

Btw, Homme can mean human, not just male, as well " Un Homme sur deux est une femme" albeit now feminists would not agree though it used to be a feminist slogan.
Homme/homme : the former like Mensch in German or Homo in Latin the latter like Mann or Vir.
Thing is, feminine forms are a bit harder to form than in other romance languages which cause all sorts of barbarisms such as "auteure" when there is an acceptable and attested form such as autrice. I tend to use auteur for everybody though, out of habit.

Genders in French (grammatical) are sometimes arbitrary cf. personne, sentinelle or estafette but only post-modern feminists get outraged and start demanding – impractical– newspeak.

If you want a gender-neutral language, try contemporary Persian/Parsi. Hence I am afraid that language is not the decisive element in sex equality.