Who is rewriting science? Be specific and provide examples, please. Because your original example (the CDC) is not rewriting science. They used gender-neutral pronouns to include those who might have female reproductive organs but whose gender identity is not a woman. That is not rewriting science, it is an accurate and inclusive reflection of a modern understanding that sex and gender are correlated but not bound together. @sisterkathlouise referring to two men having a baby is not rewriting science. She used their identified gender to refer to them, despite their having female reproductive organs. This isn't that complicated and the hand-waving about changing science (not just from you, but from others here) is not accurate. Science evolves and our definitions change, but all that has happened here is the acknowledgement that someone's gender is flexible and may not match their sex organs. Thus the use of either neutral terms, or referring to someone's gender identity rather than their biological sex. What's so hard about this? Male = sex. Man = gender. Sex != gender. I understand that most of us have spent our lives using male and man interchangeably, but hey, new information and changing times and all that. Turns out they're not interchangeable. If everyone can agree that it's okay for someone to present a gender identity that does not match what's in their underwear, then there should be no problem here.
I think this is the part some people get hung up on. A person born with both sex organs is not really some “category C” biological gender, it’s a rare condition, affecting far less than 1% of all births. This seems like a poor basis for legitimizing the general redefining of gender. We wouldn’t caution against vaccinations if complications arose at a similar rate. Also, this doesn’t really help in terms of acceptance of transgender people that do not have this biological issue at birth. As I said in the other board, we should absolutely be treating people in an inclusive and kind way, especially if the cost is zero for doing so. I just think morality and social evolution is a much stronger basis for supporting it. I don't really have a dog in this fight whatsoever, but I would guess this is where some of the skepticism (or general revulsion) comes from.
I think we got to come up with some new words and pronouns with some concrete finality instead of trying to shoehorn wildly different concepts into well established simply defined definitions. Try reading this article on two persons assigned Retarded Whores at birth and not come out thinking the whole thing has just been high jacked by narcissistic simply attacking our good sense of grammar for attention. You’ll lose iq points. I am all about the concise language. ‘Shim’ for female to male transitioning. ‘Mer’ for male to female transitioning. How hard was that? Two easy portmanteaus that describes where you were and where you ended up. Wolfskins and the infinity other gender identities? You get nothing. Tough titty. I am interested in everyone’s take on trans females, mers in my world, entering women’s sports or invading spaces biological females have struggled decades, or millennia, to become equally footed with biological males? I agree with JK Rowling and Joe Rogan in this regard. In a philosophical sense you are watering down and erasing biological females experiences in a lot of ways by demanding acceptance for biological males in these spaces. Not that I actually care you see, the sassy Twitter feminist were right, my mind does go immediately to the misogynist schadenfreude of seeing women get their orbital sockets crushed by Fallon Fox. Also the intersection of competing victim classes such as sexual assault survivors who might be triggered by the sight of penises (by a registered sex offender no less). Didn’t think of their safe space when this cultural shift seized the initiative and ran with it did we? All very sticky.
Juice has said it more eloquently than I have so far. "The condition affecting less than 1% of people is a poor basis for legitimizing the redefinition of gender" is probably my point, better stated. There's no question that, chromosomally, people fall outside of XX and XY. Or that people can have a condition where who they think they are does not match their body; this could be a result of environmental or endocrine issues - I don't know if science has as yet identified WHY some people are trans. I'm not arguing any of the garbage you read that transgenderism doesn't exist or that it's all made up. My point is that, for almost 100% of the people in the world, the chromosomes they have at birth align with the gender they grow into as an adult and, as such, the idea that "gender is separate from biology" isn't correct. It's profoundly linked to biology in almost all cases, and the outliers don't account for enough of the population for us to reinterpret the whole. Now, the conversations we've seen in recent years demanding more rights for people who identify as trans, proper and appropriate medical care so that they can manage whatever transition they feel is warranted and allowing people to change their names and use preferred-gendered bathrooms is an absolute no-brainer for me. Never in history has there been a time when transgendered people were such a threat to society that being able to be called him or her as they wish could unhinge the rest of our safety. That's nonsense and I'm glad to see that this group of people is hopefully seeing their experience in society improve. Again, there isn't a great peer-reviewed study that I can find that attempts to count the number of people who identify as trans. A number I see brought up with the United States is somewhere around 1.4 million people which, if accurate, is an overall large lump sum but in relation to the whole population is 0.42%. Give or take some error factor in either direction, that's a REALLY small amount of people. If in 99.58% of the cases gender IS associated with sex, what is our cutoff for distinguishing between a classification that demands the system be redefined versus a small subset of people who are anomalies in an otherwise correct assumption? The argument I just made - as others have pointed out - is relatively useless to a degree, because who cares? Treat people kindly and getting hung up on definitions only hurts in the long run and doesn't advance the cause either way. My original point, though, was that people who are currently rejecting hardcore, peer-reviewed science right now for vaccinations look at other science of this nature and, because it disagrees profoundly with everything that they've ever known and doesn't seem to acknowledge the overwhelming majority that it correctly applies to and they think it's all illegitimate.
Why do we even need to declare a gender when speaking about someone? To me that comes from the historical concept of males treating females as second-class citizens. None of our first- and second-person pronouns, singular or plural, indicate gender - I, you, they, we, me, us, them. Why do we need to do it with third-person singular pronouns? We just need neutral third-person pronouns to replace he/she and him/her and the problem would go away. In Latin-derived languages there is a gender assigned to inanimate objects along with associated articles - le and la in French, el and la in Spanish, etc. But in English we just use "the" as an article without gender, and we can do the same with pronouns.
If stupid people are rejecting peer-reviewed scientific literature because the CDC is being gender-inclusive in its pronouns, and that's really the crux your point here, then I guess I just don't care. There's nothing to discuss, and I find nothing useful in that observation. I honestly don't believe for a minute that a meaningful number of people are rejecting scientific literature solely because the CDC has "they" instead of "she" in a paragraph about pregnancy. Either those people are looking for a reason to reject the science, and would find one anyway, or they are simply so wildly ignorant that it's almost irrelevant what they believe - they're swayed by such trivial bullshit that their opinion is liable to change with the wind. Redheads are like 2% of the population. Gay people account for 1-4% of the population. I don't know where your cutoff is, but as far as I'm concerned if we can keep half a percent of the population from wanting to kill themselves because they have no words to express who they are and no place in society, then the people who have a problem with that can go fuck themselves. I don't even think we disagree on that point. The medical community generally agrees that sex and gender are not the same thing. The fact that people don't have an experience outside of sex and gender being linked is not something I care about. I'm happy to talk to them about it, try to explain it, try to help them understand, but at the end of the day it's easy to be inclusive and you don't need to understand in order to do so. I'm not gay. I don't understand being attracted to my same gender. It's never been a thing I've experienced. And yet, I find it amazingly easy to just accept that this is A Thing That Happens and support the people who feel that way. It didn't fundamentally change my perceptions of sex or gender. I wasn't forced to throw out everything I know. I didn't start looking suspiciously at authorities who agreed that gay people exist and should be included in our discussions. The rest of us will progress forward and they can get left behind. I think of them the same way I think of someone's grandparents think blacks and whites shouldn't marry. If those people want to reject peer-reviewed literature on the basis of this idiocy, that's cool with me. But let's not pretend for a minute large swaths of the population were happily willing to follow government-recommended guidance right up until the point that the government acknowledged that trans people exist.
My overarching point, in this regard, is that people see a thing that trips their bullshit meter, and then tend to discount any other information that may also be produced by that thing. Take Alex Jones, as an extreme example of this. He was technically correct that there was an island that the wealthy traveled to in order to sexually assault young women; his theories are irrelevant, though, in the face of all the other hateful lies that he spews. He's been dismissed as a quack and sued (successfully) for what he's said, and rightly so. It's the same principle at play here, I think. Maybe I'm out to lunch on this one. I'm trying to figure out why people are acting the way that they are. You're right; we don't disagree that they should be treated equally and fairly in society. I don't know that we understand why the suicide rate and suicidal ideations are so high amongst transgendered people, though. Some part of it would likely be society's treatment of them, but the full mechanism for their high mortality rate isn't cut-and-dried. Does body dysmorphia contribute to suicidal thoughts? Is it lack of access to treatment? I don't know, and I worry that just thinking it's how they're treated by society won't do enough to answer that question or fix the problem of trangendered suicide. And the discussion we've had here is that there are people who disagree with the medical community, given that it's in reference to such a small percent of the population. I guess I bring it up because I think if we can answer the question, "Why are people rejecting such well-backed science in the face of this global crisis?" we can go a long way to bridging the gap to those people who refuse to get a shot - at danger to themselves and to others. The idea that, in certain areas, science seems inaccurate (because it contradicts a lived truth for so many people) erodes its credibility, which in turn gives it less clout when it really matters. The answer most people here seem to be pushing is, "Fuck those idiots, get the shot or die in a ditch and don't take anyone else with you when you go." I don't really think that's going to move anyone to change their position, even if their position is incorrect. Asking, "How did we get here?" is useful to try and answer some of these issues. But, hey, if you don't give a shit about why "stupid people" think the way that they do, then yeah, we have nothing to talk about.
I think if we've learned anything from recent history, it's that a good chunk of the population has bullshit meters that are so miscalibrated as to be utterly worthless.
You know, that's a fair point. I wonder how to reach a person who has a way of thinking or perceiving that is fundamentally different than what is required for the situation.
I mean, that's basically the purpose of a lot of science. It's intent is to explore the boundaries of what we know, and by definition it doesn't give a shit whether that lines up with the "lived truth." The fact that a lot of people look at peer-reviewed findings discovered and validated by experts in the field and think to themselves, "that doesn't feel right so I reject it," is - in itself - a big problem we have in society. The experts are not seen as experts, and people believe that their research on the internet is somehow equivalent.
Congratulations. You've just discovered that humans are stupid and will do any kind of mental gymnastics they can to avoid making themselves uncomfortable. The difference between the two, of course, is one is a vaccine that is designed to keep people alive. The other is a group of people who want to be treated like everybody else. There are literally people dying of covid who deny that they are dying of covid. There are people who have had it and managed to not have gotten seriously ill who are downplaying the effects. Short of turning the clock back to 1993 and relegating the internet back to nerds again, the horse is out of the barn. At this point, the only way you can reach idiots like this is to materially affect them directly. This is the only way to get people to act who otherwise wouldn't. The question we should be asking is "Are you vaccinated?" instead of "Why won't you get vaccinated?"
Most of society is too stupid to know they're stupid, so think and act like they're smart. The biggest mistake we've made as a society is not telling them to STFU more, and teaching people that their opinions matter.
also known as the dunning-kruger effect, best exemplified currently by everyone who still won't get the goddamn shot because of "reasons" I swear to god this shit would resolve itself if people got punched in the face more.
Can you think of a time in your life where you got punched in the face* and it made you reconsider your position, rather than hate the puncher? *literally or metaphorically
i meant that more in a metaphorical sense, as people are getting away with being assholes and not seeing the repercussions. But yes, I have gotten into physical confrontations and people do tend to back off once they see that they can’t get away with being assholes. Does that answer satisfy you? what I meant in the literal context of that example, is that all these anti mask/anti vax Karens need to get arrested for trespassing rather than simply told to leave or, worse, tolerated. See some real consequences for their actions.
Might not change your opinion, but it very well may make you change your behaviour. Repercussions have that effect sometimes.
to be fair, it's probably also how I grew up a bit. We'd get in fights, kick each other's ass, shake hands afterward and you knew not to do that shit again. Nothing like getting your ass beat, or having to beat someone's ass, to make them reconsider. Maybe not change their minds, but certainly keep their mouth's shut or not do that again. A relevant example for this thread, in high school we used to play a game called "smear the queer" which was essentially fucking destroy whomever had the ball. It rhymed and was funny and we were all laughing, but not in a mean way and not at anyone. One person, though, took this as an opportunity to call an obviously gay dude "faggot" and not in a joking manner. That line was crossed, and he got his ass beat. Guess who didn't do that again? but now everyone is so stupidly sensitive and lawsuit happy, the moment something doesn't go their way they either wanna go at you financially, or try to go after your livelihood with doxing and Internet lynch mobs and the like.
I initially read this as "if they have the last word then they're more male than female," figured that ego thing and I agreed with you. Because it honestly seems like for all the karen memes, it's the dudes who are the real pricks lately. The lack of sympathy, empathy, have-to-be-right-at-all-costs attitude, which I fully admit I'm guilty of sometimes, especially the former two. But I've noticed more and more, I only have so much patience. I'll try to use logic and respond in a calm manner, and after the initial outburst I'll give you a moment to calm down. But beyond that? You wanna be right and me be wrong? Okay fuck nuts, go for it. Not worth my time arguing with an idiot or asshole, I got more important shit to do.