Gender theory and transactivism: It fails at the first step
I may come back and polish this up, but for now I just want to get some thoughts out…
I've spent a lot of time in the past discussing the critical difference between gender theory (the engine underlying transactivism) and gender dysphoria. The difference in these concepts is central to every aspect of transactivism; that being, the social and political activism push to mainstream gender theory and codify transgender rights into law. Gender dysphoria, as I'm sure all know, is a mental-health condition we diagnosed long ago, which has remained in the DSM-5 diagnostic manual of mental-health disorders. I'm quite confident in asserting that the vast majority of Americans view a transgender person as a human male/female of the sex they were born, with a mental-health condition that has led to them electing to live their life as the opposite sex. On the other hand, and truly in a universe far far away, is the notion of gender theory. This concept put most plainly is that humans are neither born male nor female, their ultimate classification undeterminable at the time of delivery. That male/female categorization of humans is not static and/or not determined by our reproductive process. This is the idea of being “born in the wrong body”.
I described that a bit clunky because I avoided using the theorists' favorite term “gender identity”. And this is where we run into the title of this piece, that first step. See, the entire premise of gender theory rests on one first bifurcating sex from gender. And I'm no scholar of this shit (you couldn't pay me enough!), so I'm not attempting to refine and one-up previously hashed-out definitions. I'm speaking logically of how these terms are used and applied. To even open the spellbook of gender theory, one must first separate the notion of gender as something completely separate and distinct from a human's sex. While I've read many historical references and am aware of cultural doctrines like “two spirit”, etc, I make no such separation myself. I don't believe in phantoms either.
“Gender identity”. The very term itself reveals the hand. I'm by no means saying there aren't humans who genuinely believe they possess an identity that is not consistent with their male/female categorization. (See how I used those terms? I'm defending that line. But what bizarre times we live in, as I'm merely stating the sensical. Objective reality has been turned into heresy.) However, the determination of a male or female human WAS made at delivery. The attending doctor can quite literally tell whether a boy or girl was just born. In fact, the parents likely knew that by ultrasound months ago. On the other end of the life cycle, they don't grapple with gender theory in a coroner's office either. This ideology simply requires an initial step of abandoning reality; an initial leap of faith. The scientific reality is, at the moment of delivery the male/female categorization of that child is set. From there, anything else is in the mind.
“In the mind”. Gender identity. Again, I don't doubt that much goes on in many minds. I’m actually respectful to the existence of this mental-health condition. The human record reveals it goes back millenia. Unlike gender theorists (transactivists), I defend the notion of gender dysphoria. I've even written of being kind to those who have dysphoria and how I advise handling those situations while maintining your own lines. I fully reject the conclusion of transgender people being an entire new subset of humans for male/female categorization, and view them as of the sex they are born, with a mental-health condition leading to them living as the opposite sex. Nowhere is this “gender identity” magic required. The only gender identity is the one the individual has elected to construct for themselves. And while that avatar might exist strongly inside that mind, it doesn’t exist anywhere outside of it.
And see, that's where the rubber meets the road. For themselves. No one has the right to tell me I am to subscribe to their (what I view as wacky) way of seeing the world and living their life. I will choose how I view the world and how I live my life. That's a critical component of the framework above. That is only where this becomes an issue. When it turns into demands on the speech of others, or daughters losing sports titles to boys, or children being taught ideology, or male prisoners housed with women by claiming a female gender identity in their minds. Because I will also stand up for principles and values I believe in. One of which is taking care of our women, our mothers. This is not “inclusive”. 👇 At least it's not any form of inclusivity I will support or stand for.
It's truly surreal that we could be at that point. At a place where society is being required to suspend reality and objectivity itself to placate the feelings and ideology of an artificially empowered and self-righteous sect. That we are to turn away from protecting our daughters, medical ‘experts’ stopping using “mother” and “women”. The most Twilight Zone part is not even 1% of our people subscribe to this fringe ideology. It's batshit crazy! But it's become part of “Pride”, and now that's become part of DEI. So you can just wake up and choose an avatar to live as (maybe bisexual or pansexual today!) and suddenly move into a growing federal legal and administrative structure. I asked this question today, really think about it…
I got off-track, but it's important to see how transactivism is merely a spearhead for something much more. Back to that first step…
I've tangled with gender ideologues and actually the discussion is usually much further down the line. But really the point of writing this is I've realized the cut-off point is way earlier, all the way back at the beginning. For every aspect of what is discussed later down the line rests on the assumption humans possess a gender identity separate from their biological sex. If you don't split sex and gender, you never get to gender theory or transactivism. Period; game over before it begins. And why would anyone have to subscribe to that? I'm a man of logic, to me it is just patently absurd. If you ever ask an ideologue to describe gender identity and really make them drill down on what specifically defines one against another, the screaming irony is that it ends up landing on the same gender roles and norms which presumably it set out to abolish!
“You're a young boy who likes dresses and dolls instead of tractors and footballs? That's because you're actually a girl.” Tomboys getting told they are boys and being sent down a path of puberty blockers, hormone ‘treatments' and ‘therapies', finishing with removing their healthy breasts. It's hard to even write those words. Everyone should read Andrew Sullivan's piece below. There is another cruel irony in who this is preying on.
“Pride”, huh?
This entire ideology needs “gender identity” to exist as almost part of the anatomical body. Some talk about embryo baths in development, desperately trying to make the mythical real. To me, I see it more in the vein of a spirit. Those religious overtones. But it's really nothing more than a condition of the mind. Gender theory dissolves quickly when you put it in anorexia. Those are the kind of discussions that people are afraid to have. Understandable, those are the kind of discussions leading to people getting banned. If you analyze gender dysphoria against anorexia, the biggest difference you'll land on is treatment. Horrifying. Especially when you realize it's being seeded to children.
This is a line we must hold. And we do it at the root. You refuse to take that first step.
John Money invented the "gender identity." His theory was that this spirit-essence of gender has malleable qualities and all of us have a "gender identity" that is shaped by society. It was a varation on the "blank slate" or tabula rasa. Money's famous sick experiment with the Reimer twins should stand as profound evidence he was wrong.
Today, gender identitarians reject Money's experiment, as they must. They believe that "gender identity" is innate, that Money went wrong by going against David Reimer's magical, mystical, invisible, ineffable "gender identity" (which, we must note, remains undetected by modern scientific laboratory methods). According to the reigning theory, the innate gender-being must be allowed to express itself through hormones and surgical intervention or else it will intevitably commit suicide like the Reimer twins did.
Normies like us understand that the Reimer twins were subject to a cruel experiment, and that "gender medicine" for kids is an equally cruel experiment.
What's especially funny is watching trannies start to extend their line of "reasoning" to its logical end.
That is, the even-more-activist ones are starting to question why they feel the need for surgery, long hair, or to shave their beards to present as "women". That is, they're starting to realize they're full of shit and are SO CLOSE to admitting that the whole thing is merely a surface-level imitation of women because they find this appealing (possibly due to sexual paraphilia), but of course they'll never get there.
So we'll reach an end-state where trannies look like guys and talk like guys, but claim to be women "in their heart" still. It's kind of fun to watch them squirm as they struggle to fit in the definition of what a woman is into their worldview in which nothing can be defined except that which is subjectively experienced.
We're in for a wild ride, and if they don't relent we're headed straight to 2+2=5. Hopefully you won't have to board an airplane or drive over a bridge in the near future.