The New Statesman (July 2022) has a boring anti-transgender article. As of 16 July, the online article has the headline "The Tories are right to debate the trans issue – it’s not a distraction," but in the social media preview, it's "trans question," not "trans issue." Also, they put the term "trans question" in the URL, "the-tories-trans-question-essential." Because the phrase "the trans question" parallels "the Jewish question," that word choice got a little attention on Twitter. But the article itself is boring.
The article begins by saying that "a single issue – where the candidates stand on the definition of a woman" is the top priority in the British contest for Conservative leadership. We should "debate gender," says Joan Smith. The problem? "Changes to language and public facilities...have happened with next to no consultation...raising questions about democratic consent."
Consultation of whom?
If someone says they're from Dallas or that they've converted to Catholicism, I treat them as the expert on their identity, and I let them live their life. There is such a thing as truth or falsehood. If I find out that they only spent a week in Dallas and they've never been inside a Catholic Church, it seems I've debunked their claim and I may be skeptical of what they tell me in the future. But the meaning of truth here has got nothing to do with "democratic consent." There's no consultation or consent involved in someone actually being from Dallas or actually being Catholic. They don't need to ask my permission to be who they are.
Smith goes on: "So much of what has happened, from organisations like Stonewall arguing against single-sex spaces to the creation of an atmosphere where feminists are thrown off Twitter for 'liking' gender-critical tweets, has occurred by stealth." No further context is provided, and as it stands, this statement is nonsense, since it implies that it's quite important to be able to have a Twitter account and yet it's not very important to refrain from approving of others' bad tweets. Exactly what is meant by being "thrown off Twitter" is, of course, not stated. (If the original tweet didn't fall afoul of Twitter policies, then Twitter wouldn't penalize others for "liking" the tweet.) If it means the freedom to have controversial interactions that publicly demean a group of people with no one from that group publicly criticizing you in reply — no.
It is an "overdue debate," she says, though it has been going on for years. Tthe Conservatives are doing the right thing by openly debating what has happened to women’s spaces, rights and free speech," and "they are right to insist that biological sex matters," while Labour "refus[es] to give clear answers to questions about biological sex." So "the Tories are limbering up to campaign as a right-wing party that knows what a woman is, up against a bunch of centre-left politicians who are terrified to give a clear answer."
The whole article is disingenuous because she implies there is a clear answer to the question of what qualifies someone as a woman or man (and that answer is their biological sex), yet she says it needs to be "debated" in the political arena, chiefly by forcing the center-left to say it.
Confirmed at "Britain's Conservative party leadership race is turning into a transphobic spectacle." Tara John, CNN. July 17, 2022:
"Britain's Conservative leadership contest kicked off this week, a weeks-long process that will result in the country's next prime minister. Besides the standard pledges of tax cuts or a slimmed down state, there has also been an enthusiastic promotion of anti-trans positions, potentially marking an intensification of the current government's "war on woke."
Leading the pack of hopefuls is Rishi Sunak, Britain's former Chancellor of the Exchequer whose resignation from the government last week contributed to the resignation of Prime Minister Boris Johnson. After the second round of voting among Conservative Party lawmakers earlier this month, Sunak topped the list of the five candidates who remain in the running.
One of Sunak's first policy pledges, after he announced his intention to run, was protecting "women's rights," he wrote in a Twitter post, linking to an article in which an unnamed Sunak ally was quoted as saying the lawmaker was "critical of recent trends to erase women via the use of clumsy, gender-neutral language.""
The CNN article also talks about junior minister Penny Mordaunt:
Mordaunt has spent a lot of time this week rowing back on her past pro-trans views. She told online newspaper Pink News in 2018, for example, that "trans women are women."
In a 10-part Twitter thread posted last Sunday, Mordaunt u-turned, stressing that trans women might be legally female by law but "that DOES NOT mean they are biological women, like me." She added: "I am biologically a woman. If I have a hysterectomy or mastectomy, I am still a woman. And I am legally a woman."
No comments:
Post a Comment