Here, Scott Barry Kaufman tells us why we need to have conversations with people who think differently than us:
Here is a long list of many of the things we have in common, a list compiled by Donald Brown in a book called Human Universals. I commented on this long list in a previous post.
And here is a good recipe for having those conversations, the HxA Way of Heterodox Academy.
J.K. Rowling is more brave than even Harry or Hermione. Those who doxxed Rowling cannot win on their ideas. That's why they resort to bully and threats, including threats to kill Rowling.
Naomi Cunningham's article is titled "Why did lawyers try to cancel me over trans rights?" She ends her article on a hopeful note: bullying tactics by trans rights activists seem to be less effective of late.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve been writing regularly on the seething controversies around biological sex and gender identity. I’m a barrister, specialising in discrimination and employment law and chair of the new human rights organisation Sex Matters, so I take a professional as well as a personal interest in the subject. My stance is broadly ‘gender critical’. I believe that biological sex is real, and that sometimes has consequences that matter; that there are exactly two sexes; and that although human beings are free to embrace the gendered behaviour associated with the opposite sex, and even to modify their bodies so that they look more like a member of the opposite sex, they cannot literally change sex.
These facts are obviously true, and the vast majority of people believe them. And yet they are now also bitterly contested. Many of those writing and campaigning in this area have suffered bullying, no-platforming, threats to their livelihoods, and even threats of death or rape. The attacks are disgraceful, but I became concerned that they were creating a chilling effect wider than was justified by the real risks in speaking up. So last month, I wrote my own story in a short blog, entitled 'Not Cancelled: I have suffered no serious adverse consequences from my gender-critical writing. The end.’
That’s still true – but in the last few days I have faced quite a serious attempt to cancel me from an event at which I was to speak.
Here's what the current climate of hyper-race-consciousness is getting us. It has derailed the career of a top-flight OB/GYN doctor who describes herself as a "bi-racial woman with multi-racial children." Her sin was to believe in the vision of Martin Luther King. She discusses what her employer, Hennepin Healthcare System (HHS), did to her in this short video.
"Dr. Tara Gustilo is of Filipino descent, the mother of black children, and a Harvard-educated physician at Hennepin Healthcare System (HHS) in Minneapolis. She was Chair of the OB/GYN Department, until HHS decided her personal views on race did not correspond with her skin color and revealed her supposed “internalized whiteness.”
Over the last decade, Dr. Gustilo has served successfully in various leadership roles at HHS. She created a program to reflect cultural differences in birthing practices to better serve her diverse patients. But over time, her colleagues transformed this program into racially segregated care.
When Dr. Gustilo voiced her objections, advocated for race-neutral care, and criticized racial essentialism on her personal Facebook page, her colleagues told her that she, as a person of color, should hold the same race-essentialist views they do and could not lead because she does not share those beliefs. HHS then removed her from her position as Chair of the OB/GYN department. Dr. Gustilo has now filed an EEOC discrimination charge against HHS."
Unfortunately, there are many more stories like this. You can read about many of them at Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism ("FAIR").