A valuable post, a keeper. There was a lot here I did not know about that boxing episode. I should not be surprised to find that mainstream media kept certain things out of their accounts. Thanks for this information and for the larger perspective.
It was so easy to miss and dismiss, Allen, I nearly didn't bother. But I was chatting with a friend who mentioned that it wasn't the usual trans story, so I started poking around.
This is a nice balanced take on a horribly intractable issue that is not going to give way any time soon, alas.
This Gordian knot cannot be cut through by intelligent discourse around the issues, mores the pity. In so much as I have followed this from its early days, this disaster all kicked off more than a decade ago in a spat between the Lesbian feminists and the trans activists that escalated badly, quickly, and brutally, and shows no signs of letting up. I still contend that resolution to these issues requires an armistice over that original battle line. (I am also aware of the 'third front' i.e. the anti-feminists, but I do not believe this front can contribute to resolving this issue either because of the nature and history of the original conflict, which isn't to suggest that there isn't a separate set of important issues on that other side...).
I have written far too much on this and expended far too much goodwill trying to broker peace but this is not coming any time soon and while I have not 'washed my hands' of the whole affair, all I can do now is wait for the conditions of armistice and resume negotiations then.
For what little it's worth, the original flashpoint had nothing to do with gender or sex per se, these issues came in after the initial conflict, which I won't get into here, and to be honest won't be of much interest to you, or I suspect anyone. But all battlefields have histories, and these histories are inevitably disputed precisely because they are battlefields.
Teasing apart 'sex' (biological dimorphism and its edge cases) and 'gender' (social roles and their edge cases) would, on paper at least, have resolved most of the metaphysical issues relatively effectively (and to my eyes that's what you're exploring here too, rather saliently). But maddeningly it's not so much about these conceptual disputes as it is the entrenched bitterness and hatred that shattered the rainbow alliance and never let up since. Like it or not, a solution may have to come from within this context too. Saying this doesn't of course eliminate the worth of intelligent discourse around the issue, such as this piece of yours... but it limits the practical influence of any such discussions. I wish this were not the case.
One more small point:
"At its best, the spirit of inclusiveness (which has unfortunately run amok) is all about overcoming our biases so as not to marginalise and abuse our fellow human beings."
Aye, as I may have mentioned to you before, diversity and inclusion are opposing values and cannot be united without baking metaphysical pretzels. The amok inclusiveness you flag up here has not obviously ever been involved in the process of overcoming biases - this was, however, the raison d'etre of the diversity movement, which I was involved in for the first decade of the twenty first century. And nobody cared! Seriously, the only talk of mine that got zero attendance was in Atlanta in the 2000s and that was expressly about diversity. It seriously didn't matter to anyone at that point in time.
Ironically, what made it matter wasn't the worthwhile goal of overcoming bias and abuse but rather the rising tide of hatred and recriminations in the wake of the rainbow civil war. The invocation of 'inclusion' as a value after this battle was joined is laughable, indeed, it is disgusting, because what is largely meant is incorporation, 'we welcome all people who subscribe to our ideology'. Ugh, an inherently anti-diverse value in the way it has been wielded. (This dovetails with the discussion of 'intolerant tolerance' in my 2014 book Chaos Ethics, for what little it's worth... the situation has barely moved in the decade since I wrote that.)
So my thanks for taking the time to engage intelligently with these issues which have not, as you correctly say here, been helped by invocation of either 'biological fact' or 'social construction' (both deeply problematic frameworks that interpenetrate each other since facts are 'socially constructed' and social constructions are indeed factual). What a mess! How I wish there was another path here, or at the very least that people could stop hating long enough to exercise the compassion that is repeatedly claimed to be lacking from those being despised.
May we both live to see a richer discourse than the ones we currently have to endure on gender metaphysics.
Thanks for taking the time here, Chris. I haven't seen "rainbow civil war" before. Me likie. No doubt the history here is of interest. And boring or not, I love histories, so any light you shine on that is well received.
My goal in writing this piece has not necessarily been to resolve the conflict amongst activists, but rather to provide folks like ourselves with decomplicated conversational devices that disarm our one-on-one conversations with those perhaps caught up in the virtue performance arts but who like ideas. I feel that if I can get a wee brain worm into your head, something you can stew on, it may well eat away at some of the rigid notions making us miserable. And with the fall of one domino, an awakening can take place.
Provoking thought is always worth the attempt, Asa!
As for the history: if we ever end up on barstools next to each other, I'll gladly share it verbally. For various reasons, all related to prudence, it's not something I'm willing to record in a searchable text. It is not, after all 'my war'.
Suggested retitle:
Socially Constructed: "Deal with the whole shebang"
<sophmoric chortling>
But really, it was a great little side pun (albeit, i'm sure unintentional.)
Thanks RDM, I did notice the pun and chuckled myself. Shebang is an odd looking word. Nice that you caught it.
A valuable post, a keeper. There was a lot here I did not know about that boxing episode. I should not be surprised to find that mainstream media kept certain things out of their accounts. Thanks for this information and for the larger perspective.
It was so easy to miss and dismiss, Allen, I nearly didn't bother. But I was chatting with a friend who mentioned that it wasn't the usual trans story, so I started poking around.
Well worth doing, then. I missed the most important elements, but I think that was the media plan. Thanks for the note.
Dear Asa,
This is a nice balanced take on a horribly intractable issue that is not going to give way any time soon, alas.
This Gordian knot cannot be cut through by intelligent discourse around the issues, mores the pity. In so much as I have followed this from its early days, this disaster all kicked off more than a decade ago in a spat between the Lesbian feminists and the trans activists that escalated badly, quickly, and brutally, and shows no signs of letting up. I still contend that resolution to these issues requires an armistice over that original battle line. (I am also aware of the 'third front' i.e. the anti-feminists, but I do not believe this front can contribute to resolving this issue either because of the nature and history of the original conflict, which isn't to suggest that there isn't a separate set of important issues on that other side...).
I have written far too much on this and expended far too much goodwill trying to broker peace but this is not coming any time soon and while I have not 'washed my hands' of the whole affair, all I can do now is wait for the conditions of armistice and resume negotiations then.
For what little it's worth, the original flashpoint had nothing to do with gender or sex per se, these issues came in after the initial conflict, which I won't get into here, and to be honest won't be of much interest to you, or I suspect anyone. But all battlefields have histories, and these histories are inevitably disputed precisely because they are battlefields.
Teasing apart 'sex' (biological dimorphism and its edge cases) and 'gender' (social roles and their edge cases) would, on paper at least, have resolved most of the metaphysical issues relatively effectively (and to my eyes that's what you're exploring here too, rather saliently). But maddeningly it's not so much about these conceptual disputes as it is the entrenched bitterness and hatred that shattered the rainbow alliance and never let up since. Like it or not, a solution may have to come from within this context too. Saying this doesn't of course eliminate the worth of intelligent discourse around the issue, such as this piece of yours... but it limits the practical influence of any such discussions. I wish this were not the case.
One more small point:
"At its best, the spirit of inclusiveness (which has unfortunately run amok) is all about overcoming our biases so as not to marginalise and abuse our fellow human beings."
Aye, as I may have mentioned to you before, diversity and inclusion are opposing values and cannot be united without baking metaphysical pretzels. The amok inclusiveness you flag up here has not obviously ever been involved in the process of overcoming biases - this was, however, the raison d'etre of the diversity movement, which I was involved in for the first decade of the twenty first century. And nobody cared! Seriously, the only talk of mine that got zero attendance was in Atlanta in the 2000s and that was expressly about diversity. It seriously didn't matter to anyone at that point in time.
Ironically, what made it matter wasn't the worthwhile goal of overcoming bias and abuse but rather the rising tide of hatred and recriminations in the wake of the rainbow civil war. The invocation of 'inclusion' as a value after this battle was joined is laughable, indeed, it is disgusting, because what is largely meant is incorporation, 'we welcome all people who subscribe to our ideology'. Ugh, an inherently anti-diverse value in the way it has been wielded. (This dovetails with the discussion of 'intolerant tolerance' in my 2014 book Chaos Ethics, for what little it's worth... the situation has barely moved in the decade since I wrote that.)
So my thanks for taking the time to engage intelligently with these issues which have not, as you correctly say here, been helped by invocation of either 'biological fact' or 'social construction' (both deeply problematic frameworks that interpenetrate each other since facts are 'socially constructed' and social constructions are indeed factual). What a mess! How I wish there was another path here, or at the very least that people could stop hating long enough to exercise the compassion that is repeatedly claimed to be lacking from those being despised.
May we both live to see a richer discourse than the ones we currently have to endure on gender metaphysics.
With unlimited love,
Chris.
Thanks for taking the time here, Chris. I haven't seen "rainbow civil war" before. Me likie. No doubt the history here is of interest. And boring or not, I love histories, so any light you shine on that is well received.
My goal in writing this piece has not necessarily been to resolve the conflict amongst activists, but rather to provide folks like ourselves with decomplicated conversational devices that disarm our one-on-one conversations with those perhaps caught up in the virtue performance arts but who like ideas. I feel that if I can get a wee brain worm into your head, something you can stew on, it may well eat away at some of the rigid notions making us miserable. And with the fall of one domino, an awakening can take place.
Provoking thought is always worth the attempt, Asa!
As for the history: if we ever end up on barstools next to each other, I'll gladly share it verbally. For various reasons, all related to prudence, it's not something I'm willing to record in a searchable text. It is not, after all 'my war'.
Stay wonderful!