What did JK Rowling do wrong?

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it makes them sound like a stepford wife . it makes them feel like a thing rather than a person . like a machine that reproduces

Unlike some of her other claims, this one should be easy to double-check.

Do you know of a good source on the current procedure for getting a Gender Recognition Certificate in the U.K.? So far I've found:

- This official U.K. government page about the paperwork that one would need to submit.

- This page on an activist site listing the legal requirements -- Do you know of a similar page on an official government site?

Indeed this doesn't look super-easy.

I hate to say “watch this very long video” but ContraPoint’s video is very good if you want a deeper engagement with what she says: https://youtube.com/watch?v=7gDKbT_l2us

Dress however you please.
Call yourself whatever you like.
Sleep with any consenting adult who'll have you.
Live your best life in peace and security.
But force women out of their jobs for stating that sex is real?
#IStandWithMaya #ThisIsNotADrill
7:57 AM Dec 19, 2019

"Sex is real " is a pretty dishonest summary of what Maya said in her discrimination complaint, namely:

"I believe that it is impossible to change sex or to lose your sex. Girls grow up to be women. Boys grow up to be men. No change of clothes or hairstyle, no plastic surgery, no accident or illness, no course of hormones, no force of will or social conditioning, no declaration can turn a female person into a male, or a male person into a female." Para 23

- If Joanne had said Maya had been fired for claiming that a person born male can never be a woman, and a person born female can never be a man, that would've been more accurate. But it would also sound contentious, and obviously anti-trans.

"Sex is real" is a euphemism designed to present Maya Forstater's transphobia as a simple statement of fact, basic common sense, which only crazy activists and ideologues would oppose.

Transphobes love to play this game where they pretend that trans people just don't understand basic biology, that's our problem!

As if I didn't start taking female hormones because I'm acutely aware that my body is not the same as a cis woman's body, that sex is real. [...] No trans person thinks it's possible to change chromosomal sex, and to pretend otherwise is to argue in bad faith. When we say that someone is a trans man or a trans woman we are talking about psychological and social identity.

So when transphobes say "Sex is real," they are not actually contradicting anything most trans people believe, except by implication.

When transphobes say "Sex is real," what they mean is that only chromosomal sex matters. They mean they don't believe in transgender identity, which they trivialize by calling it "dressing up," "fashion choices," "whatever you wanna call yourself."

When Joanne says, "Dress however you please," "call yourself whatever you like," she's belittling what it actually means to be trans, reducing it to a change of name and costume.

It's similar to the language of casual homophobes. For example, the homophobic equivalent of Joanne's tweet might read:


Homophobes trivialize what it is to be gay. They refer to it as "sexual preferences" or "a lifestyle" or "what you do in the bedroom." We don't tell straight people to keep their lifestyle in the bedroom. (laughs)

[...]

Being gay is more than what you do in the bedroom. It's also who you love, it's part of who you are, part of your humanity, and that's something that stays with you outside of the bedroom. So to dismiss it as "sexual preferences" is homophobic.

Likewise, being trans is not a costume I take off at the end of the night. It's not a fashion choice. It's not a pet name some people call me. It's part of who I am as a person, you know? It's part of my humanity. And it's also the kind of body I have, a transsexual body.

Mmhmm, and referring to cis-gendered males as men, or boys, or people with penises, or anything else that identifies the reproductive organs in their bodies reduces them to feeling like sperm donors.

Just kidding; that's also ridiculous.

It seems ridiculous to you because, as a lifelong male, you've never had the experience of feeling like your body was being objectified by society as a whole -- at least not to anywhere near the extent that women/females have commonly experienced this.

I don't claim to know the best solution to this issue in terms of further language changes. Going back to older, trans-exclusionary terminology is not the best solution. But I think it's important to acknowledge the reasons why many women apparently feel triggered by some of the current terminology.

As a gay man, we sexually objectify each other’s bodies all the time.

Yes, but you can much more easily take a break from this sort of thing than (most) women can. It's not nearly as ubiquitous as the sexual objectification of women.

The ubiquitousness of the sexual objectification of women is what makes it so oppressive.

When gay men objectify each other, it's much more likely to be consensual.

It’s evolutionary. Without sexual objectification of women being built into heterosexual men, our species would not perpetuate.

Apparently you don't even understand what I mean by objectification. Attraction is not the same thing as objectification. Objectification is a cultural phenomenon.

"Sex is real " is a pretty dishonest summary of what Maya said in her discrimination complaint, namely:

"I believe that it is impossible to change sex or to lose your sex. Girls grow up to be women. Boys grow up to be men. No change of clothes or hairstyle, no plastic surgery, no accident or illness, no course of hormones, no force of will or social conditioning, no declaration can turn a female person into a male, or a male person into a female." Para 23

- If Joanne had said Maya had been fired for claiming that a person born male can never be a woman, and a person born female can never be a man, that would've been more accurate. But it would also sound contentious, and obviously anti-trans.

"Sex is real" is a euphemism designed to present Maya Forstater's transphobia as a simple statement of fact, basic common sense, which only crazy activists and ideologues would oppose.

Transphobes love to play this game where they pretend that trans people just don't understand basic biology, that's our problem!

As if I didn't start taking female hormones because I'm acutely aware that my body is not the same as a cis woman's body, that sex is real. [...] No trans person thinks it's possible to change chromosomal sex, and to pretend otherwise is to argue in bad faith. When we say that someone is a trans man or a trans woman we are talking about psychological and social identity.

So when transphobes say "Sex is real," they are not actually contradicting anything most trans people believe, except by implication.

When transphobes say "Sex is real," what they mean is that only chromosomal sex matters. They mean they don't believe in transgender identity, which they trivialize by calling it "dressing up," "fashion choices," "whatever you wanna call yourself."

When Joanne says, "Dress however you please," "call yourself whatever you like," she's belittling what it actually means to be trans, reducing it to a change of name and costume.

It's similar to the language of casual homophobes. For example, the homophobic equivalent of Joanne's tweet might read:


Homophobes trivialize what it is to be gay. They refer to it as "sexual preferences" or "a lifestyle" or "what you do in the bedroom." We don't tell straight people to keep their lifestyle in the bedroom. (laughs)

[...]

Being gay is more than what you do in the bedroom. It's also who you love, it's part of who you are, part of your humanity, and that's something that stays with you outside of the bedroom. So to dismiss it as "sexual preferences" is homophobic.

Likewise, being trans is not a costume I take off at the end of the night. It's not a fashion choice. It's not a pet name some people call me. It's part of who I am as a person, you know? It's part of my humanity. And it's also the kind of body I have, a transsexual body.