Serious PC thread

[mrzz]

Sorry, and a.)

Oh, that I knew already.

 

[mrzz]

At the risk of derision, it should be noted that there is an experiment going on...a penguin chick is being raised by a same-sex penguin couple, so they're trying to see what happens if they don't make a strong gender assignment to the chick. You all, presumably, don't mind that experiments get done on lab rats, etc. It's an experiment, and these people know a lot more than you do about animal behaviors. A little bit too much "hair on fire," imo.

This clearly belongs to the bullshit PC thread. You have a point about making a fuss about anecdotal occurrences, and I really get that (even if some times those things could be the tip of the iceberg).

But it is not only us that give attention and have the hair on fire about it (to steal your expression). Those things reach mass/social media before they get here. One thing, among others, that really baffles me is how people don't see the risk of a huge backfire... those are fucking penguins, right? What if Rocky the Penguin one day wakes up and do some random stuff, like devouring its egg, for some odd reason such as the temperature was too high or someone gave the penguins too much sugar the night before?

I can see the Fox news headlines already:

"ADOPTIVE GAY PENGUIN PARENTS DEVOUR OWN BROODING. THE SQUAD TRIES TO BLAME TRUMP."

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

At the risk of derision, it should be noted that there is an experiment going on...a penguin chick is being raised by a same-sex penguin couple, so they're trying to see what happens if they don't make a strong gender assignment to the chick. You all, presumably, don't mind that experiments get done on lab rats, etc. It's an experiment, and these people know a lot more than you do about animal behaviors. A little bit too much "hair on fire," imo.

Moxie, can you think of an experiment that is more unnecessary than this? Because I could not, just saying

 

[Federberg]

A friend of mine dismissed the whole transgender thing by simply saying, they’re entitled to their feelings but I’m entitled to the facts. Hard to disagree.

Apparently a 70yr old guy is suing to pass as a younger guy because he feels young

 

[Moxie]

Moxie, can you think of an experiment that is more unnecessary than this? Because I could not, just saying

Murat, scientists make a living out of conducting ridiculous experiments or studies, not to mention the comedians who make a living out of making fun of them.

Here are some examples, since you asked for them. I don't think the one Britbox brought up is anywhere near as useless.

 

[Moxie]

A friend of mine dismissed the whole transgender thing by simply saying, they’re entitled to their feelings but I’m entitled to the facts. Hard to disagree.

Apparently a 70yr old guy is suing to pass as a younger guy because he feels young

I don't see how you think those two things are comparable. I'm also not clear why the whole transgender thing bothers you so much, since it doesn't affect you.

 

[Federberg]

I don't see how you think those two things are comparable. I'm also not clear why the whole transgender thing bothers you so much, since it doesn't affect you.

Perhaps you can explain to me why you think they’re not comparable

 

[mrzz]

I don't see how you think those two things are comparable. I'm also not clear why the whole transgender thing bothers you so much, since it doesn't affect you.

Moxie, I actually think this is a great example, because it shows the can of worms that is being opened. We know that there is "gender" and "biological sex", but exactly which one should we use to call someone a man or a woman? We know that there is "physical age" and "psychological age", but exactly which one should we use to record what we call "age"?

In both cases there is a valid and meaningful distinction between both categories, in both cases one is clear cut and the other is subjective. In both cases both possible categorization contains meaningful information. The only apparent difference between those cases is that nowadays we question gender/sex and we don't question age. 100 years ago it was precisely the same thing.

The question in both cases is which category type we use to categorize people (and, we do categorize people). Point is some people don't deal so well with being categorized (no wonder there is the term "non binary", which actually makes sense, but it is probably applied to waaay more people that it actually should be). I can feel personal sympathy in some cases, but... it is still their personal problem/issue.

I am not saying that we should ignore those questions. On the contrary, but recognize the excesses is part of the "solution". And to expect that the individual arbitrarily decides how the rest of society should categorize him, IMO, is quite an excess.

 

[mrzz]

Here are some examples, since you asked for them

Top one is about penguins as well. They must be up to something.

 

[Federberg]

Moxie, I actually think this is a great example, because it shows the can of worms that is being opened. We know that there is "gender" and "biological sex", but exactly which one should we use to call someone a man or a woman? We know that there is "physical age" and "psychological age", but exactly which one should we use to record what we call "age"?

In both cases there is a valid and meaningful distinction between both categories, in both cases one is clear cut and the other is subjective. In both cases both possible categorization contains meaningful information. The only apparent difference between those cases is that nowadays we question gender/sex and we don't question age. 100 years ago it was precisely the same thing.

The question in both cases is which category type we use to categorize people (and, we do categorize people). Point is some people don't deal so well with being categorized (no wonder there is the term "non binary", which actually makes sense, but it is probably applied to waaay more people that it actually should be). I can feel personal sympathy in some cases, but... it is still their personal problem/issue.

I am not saying that we should ignore those questions. On the contrary, but recognize the excesses is part of the "solution". And to expect that the individual arbitrarily decides how the rest of society should categorize him, IMO, is quite an excess.

If I could have given you multiple "likes" I would have

 

[britbox]

At the risk of derision, it should be noted that there is an experiment going on...a penguin chick is being raised by a same-sex penguin couple, so they're trying to see what happens if they don't make a strong gender assignment to the chick. You all, presumably, don't mind that experiments get done on lab rats, etc. It's an experiment, and these people know a lot more than you do about animal behaviors. A little bit too much "hair on fire," imo.

Actually, I think she's talking nonsense. You see gender roles throughout the animal kingdom because it's nature by design. It has a purpose. What she is doing is creating an artificial environment and artificial circumstances. Why?

Dominant Male lions force young maturing lions (their sons) out of the pride for a reason. It prevents incest and promotes survival of the fittest. Take that gender role out of the equation, and you'll have no species.

 

[mrzz]

Actually, I think she's talking nonsense. You see gender roles throughout the animal kingdom because it's nature by design. It has a purpose. What she is doing is creating an artificial environment and artificial circumstances. Why?

Dominant Male lions force young maturing lions (their sons) out of the pride for a reason. It prevents incest and promotes survival of the fittest. Take that gender role out of the equation, and you'll have no species.

Gender roles are a very serious preoccupation among Praying Mantises. PM malenists have long been denouncing that abusive situation.

 

[Moxie]

Moxie, I actually think this is a great example, because it shows the can of worms that is being opened. We know that there is "gender" and "biological sex", but exactly which one should we use to call someone a man or a woman? We know that there is "physical age" and "psychological age", but exactly which one should we use to record what we call "age"?

In both cases there is a valid and meaningful distinction between both categories, in both cases one is clear cut and the other is subjective. In both cases both possible categorization contains meaningful information. The only apparent difference between those cases is that nowadays we question gender/sex and we don't question age. 100 years ago it was precisely the same thing.

The question in both cases is which category type we use to categorize people (and, we do categorize people). Point is some people don't deal so well with being categorized (no wonder there is the term "non binary", which actually makes sense, but it is probably applied to waaay more people that it actually should be). I can feel personal sympathy in some cases, but... it is still their personal problem/issue.

I am not saying that we should ignore those questions. On the contrary, but recognize the excesses is part of the "solution". And to expect that the individual arbitrarily decides how the rest of society should categorize him, IMO, is quite an excess.

I don't agree with you that it's a good example, and here's why:

I looked up the guy who wants his age changed...because he wants to do better on Tinder. Here's the thing...I don't believe he's always been unhappy with his age, or non-identifying with it. He's unhappy now to be thought of as "old." Well, get in line, buddy. Whereas, a person who feels they don't conform to a gender assignment from birth, and the societal norms that proscribe it is a completely different thing. They presumably feel this way for their whole lives. It's a box they feel the need to get out of.

Incidentally, I think you're wrong that 100 years ago people didn't occult their gender, or other societies didn't accept non-binary people. It's just that it wasn't so widely recognized in the West as it is now. (OK, by a long shot.) Also, as an aside, some people were born without records, in some cases, and never knew their exact ages, so even then age wasn't a precise thing...if that's what you meant.

Here's where I think I differ from you guys on this, and I hope you (or Federberg, particularly) won't see this as my judging you: I think you guys tend to see the "excess" in this, the anomaly, the notion that people take things too far. The "age" guy is a weird one-off, if you ask me. Anyway, I tend to believe that most people who subject themselves to the ridicule and the dangers of being gender-nonconforming or transgender do so because they genuinely feel different from the way they got assigned at birth. You guys, IMO, tend to look at the exceptions to the general rule. Again, not a judgment, but just to say that this, I think, is why we see it differently.

 

[Moxie]

Actually, I think she's talking nonsense. You see gender roles throughout the animal kingdom because it's nature by design. It has a purpose. What she is doing is creating an artificial environment and artificial circumstances. Why?

Dominant Male lions force young maturing lions (their sons) out of the pride for a reason. It prevents incest and promotes survival of the fittest. Take that gender role out of the equation, and you'll have no species.

I don't think there are any Animal Behavioralists amongst us 5, so I'm not sure why your making an example of lions when we're talking about penguins makes sense. If you read the crawl while that woman talked about the experiment it actually does make more sense than just listening to her speak. Look, I'm not backing whether it's a good/interesting idea or not. I'm just saying I don't think any of us is qualified to say why it's not. Scientists ask questions, and they see if they can control for an answer. Not everything is worth generating a PC kerfuffle.

 

[britbox]

I don't think there are any Animal Behavioralists amongst us 5, so I'm not sure why your making an example of lions when we're talking about penguins makes sense. If you read the crawl while that woman talked about the experiment it actually does make more sense than just listening to her speak. Look, I'm not backing whether it's a good/interesting idea or not. I'm just saying I don't think any of us is qualified to say why it's not. Scientists ask questions, and they see if they can control for an answer. Not everything is worth generating a PC kerfuffle.

Listen to what she says again. She says we "don't really see it (gender roles) in the animal kingdom", and then touches on the fact we "might see it" among some higher level primates. This is flat out incorrect. We see gender roles all over the animal kingdom. As for "maybe" seeing some evidence of gender roles in higher-level primates... There is no "maybe". Show me a female silverback gorilla.

I'd be interested in who is funding this garbage when there are far bigger priorities out there in the animal kingdom.

 

[Federberg]

Whereas, a person who feels they don't conform to a gender assignment from birth, and the societal norms that proscribe it is a completely different thing. They presumably feel this way for their whole lives. It's a box they feel the need to get out of.

we don't know how they feel Moxie. Please don't represent their feelings as fact. That's the fundamental problem we're dealing with here. Why should society demote facts because of feelings? Why should someone with XX genes be able to reassign their gender to male? The more I think about this issue the more it feels like the left are also getting into the anti-science anti-fact brigade that we've been so critical of some on the right for promoting. It's ironic that the more advanced society seems to become the more we are being asked to leave our scientific reasoning behind. It's really disturbing

PS, and by the way if you want to support the primacy of their feelings, there are many groups in society who don't get all they want. Society at it's best does all it can to help them cope with their lacking. Society doesn't lie and tell a blind man they can see or a deaf man they can hear

 

[mrzz]

@Moxie

As for your first paragraph, naturally if you compare the peculiarities of this "age guy" with an honest, or genuine, transgender, you will find differences. Because, as you said, we are looking at different things. The point is that you can find examples of supposedly transgenders that are completely parallel to the age guy.

About the "box" you mentioned... I go back to my original point: deal with that. The individual does not control the "boxes" that society comes up with. And a lot of times the only "box" is some you tick on a piece of paper or in an online form.

My point about 100 years ago was exactly that the issue wasn't as widely recognized. Nowadays it became, for some, a behavioral thing. That is precisely the point, there is no reason to believe that there were less transgenders 100 years ago. There were, obviously, less assumed transgenders. The fact that people nowadays have the freedom (even if not all over the world) and the conditions to assume whatever they want to assume it is obvious quite a good thing (surely not perfect yet, but without a doubt better now than then).

But when you say "exceptions to the general rule" is exactly where we disagree. They are not exceptions to a general rule, because there is no rule. Nobody is saying that transgenders are sexual predators, not even that a small percentage of them are. I am saying that non transgender sexual predators can pretend to be transgenders. Those are two completely different groups of people. Some people out there (not you) use this confusion to label everyone who raises this question as a bigot.

Of course that, just as in any other human group, there will be transgenders who will commit crimes and do all sort of bad things that people do. But, just like in any other group, just a small fraction will behave like that. So a small fraction of a small group is really something negligible -- those are the exceptions to the general rule that you mentioned. I completely agree with you that this is statistically insignificant.

But you know better than me that rape is a statistically significant problem, all over the world. I know the statistic of rapes here in Brazil, at least. The whole problem here is that, because of some real and actual needs of one group, you just give a giant breach for another group to explore. If you really think that there are so much more actual transgenders than crazy motherfuckers out there, I think that you are seriously underestimating the number of crazy motherfuckers (whom, I repeat, are not transgenders, but may pose as so. Take that testicles waxing guy for example. I don't buy for a second that he is an actual transgender. He is much more likely some smart ass crazy motherfucker who saw an opportunity). Of course that people with prejudice will explore those things to bolster bigoted narratives. This clumsy approach just gives them the perfect set up.

I am not saying that we should shut our eyes to the problem (the problem being how society deals with the needs of this group of people). I am saying that the current solutions being proposed are pretty bad ones.

 

[mrzz]

Listen to what she says again. She says we "don't really see it (gender roles) in the animal kingdom", and then touches on the fact we "might see it" among some higher level primates. This is flat out incorrect. We see gender roles all over the animal kingdom. As for "maybe" seeing some evidence of gender roles in higher-level primates... There is no "maybe". Show me a female silverback gorilla.

I'd be interested in who is funding this garbage when there are far bigger priorities out there in the animal kingdom.

I openly admit that I am largely ignorant in this question, but I always could sniff non-scientific drives in science, which quite often leads to pseudo-science. Ok, everyone has some kind of bias, but the way that ideological bias previously shapes your conclusions is particularly extreme.

 

[Moxie]

@Moxie

As for your first paragraph, naturally if you compare the peculiarities of this "age guy" with an honest, or genuine, transgender, you will find differences. Because, as you said, we are looking at different things. The point is that you can find examples of supposedly transgenders that are completely parallel to the age guy.

About the "box" you mentioned... I go back to my original point: deal with that. The individual does not control the "boxes" that society comes up with. And a lot of times the only "box" is some you tick on a piece of paper or in an online form.

My point about 100 years ago was exactly that the issue wasn't as widely recognized. Nowadays it became, for some, a behavioral thing. That is precisely the point, there is no reason to believe that there were less transgenders 100 years ago. There were, obviously, less assumed transgenders. The fact that people nowadays have the freedom (even if not all over the world) and the conditions to assume whatever they want to assume it is obvious quite a good thing (surely not perfect yet, but without a doubt better now than then).

But when you say "exceptions to the general rule" is exactly where we disagree. They are not exceptions to a general rule, because there is no rule. Nobody is saying that transgenders are sexual predators, not even that a small percentage of them are. I am saying that non transgender sexual predators can pretend to be transgenders. Those are two completely different groups of people. Some people out there (not you) use this confusion to label everyone who raises this question as a bigot.

Of course that, just as in any other human group, there will be transgenders who will commit crimes and do all sort of bad things that people do. But, just like in any other group, just a small fraction will behave like that. So a small fraction of a small group is really something negligible -- those are the exceptions to the general rule that you mentioned. I completely agree with you that this is statistically insignificant.

But you know better than me that rape is a statistically significant problem, all over the world. I know the statistic of rapes here in Brazil, at least. The whole problem here is that, because of some real and actual needs of one group, you just give a giant breach for another group to explore. If you really think that there are so much more actual transgenders than crazy motherfuckers out there, I think that you are seriously underestimating the number of crazy motherfuckers (whom, I repeat, are not transgenders, but may pose as so. Take that testicles waxing guy for example. I don't buy for a second that he is an actual transgender. He is much more likely some smart ass crazy motherfucker who saw an opportunity). Of course that people with prejudice will explore those things to bolster bigoted narratives. This clumsy approach just gives them the perfect set up.

I am not saying that we should shut our eyes to the problem (the problem being how society deals with the needs of this group of people). I am saying that the current solutions being proposed are pretty bad ones.

It makes me quite sad that even you can't say that I made a decent point about the "age" guy. He didn't always feel the way he does now about his age. That is not nearly the same as identifying your whole life as different than your gender assignment. If that's something that none of you guys can recognize, then I think we're done. I guess we have been for a long time. Be well and prosper. I still think there was a more interesting conversation in here, but you guys already know what you think, or are paranoid about.

 

[mrzz]

It makes me quite sad that even you can't say that I made a decent point about the "age" guy. He didn't always feel the way he does now about his age. That is not nearly the same as identifying your whole life as different than your gender assignment. If that's something that none of you guys can recognize, then I think we're done. I guess we have been for a long time. Be well and prosper. I still think there was a more interesting conversation in here, but you guys already know what you think, or are paranoid about.

Moxie, I acknowledged that in the first paragraph of post #577. If I say that the "age guy" is not comparable to a transgender, but instead to a, let us say, "fake transgender", I am agreeing with your point.

In my particular case, my issue is never about transgender themselves, is about the idea that you can simply raise your hand and declare yourself what the hell you supposedly want to be at any point in time. And, yes, this is "not nearly the same as identifying your whole life as different than your gender assignment". We are in much more agreement than you believe, I guess.