This fascinating exchange starts with a Tweet by Gloria Steinem, to which biologist Heather Heying responds with a science lesson. Some legislatures are bringing this issue to a head and it remains unclear whether we will (as a society) resolve this debate with biology or ideology. Perhaps the battleground will be the dictionary. As Heying says,
Transwomen are transwomen.
Women are women.
Somehow, writing these two sentences is being construed by the Woke as bigotry, with no end in sight as to how or whether this dispute can be resolved.
And as I review this thread, I keep shaking my head, given that a Tweet by Gloria Steinem started this discussion. For many of us, one of the most important parts of feminism is the tenet that the things that you like to do (whether climbing trees or cooking or fixing cars) don't determine whether you are a fully man or woman. These things are irrelevant to your sex. You can be fully a woman even though you like to engage in activities typically associated with men. Yet I keep seeing writings by TRA's that a girl who likes "boy" things is dysphoric, potentially meaning that she should take testosterone and cut off her breasts. Jesus! This is from the same types of people who, 15 and 20 years ago railed at cultures who practiced clitorectomies because it because it is so grotesque to massacre a healthy female body. The TRA's argue that even young teenagers (who are too young to vote or drive) should be granted total deference when social pressures are appearing to be the main thing convincing them to make permanent changes to their bodies that will likely result in sterility. That that is where we are . . .
And the fringe left has pushed its ideology so hard that we are now supposed to think that there is no difference between a woman and a transwoman. There is a clear factual difference, as Heying explains.
None of what I am writing suggests that transwomen aren't entitled to legally and socially present themselves as women in most situations (though I would make exceptions for women's shelters, prisons and sports participation). Transwomen are entitled to our respect. They are human beings every bit as much as the rest of us. Because they are fully human, we owe them the respect of disagreeing with them when their claims violate basic principles of biology.
If you haven't notice, the ACLU is now proudly choosing sides politically, not so much acting on broad-based principles. Good luck trying to find any modern analogue to the ACLU 1978 Skokie litigation.
Matt Taibbi offers this quote by former ACLU director IRA Glasser.
I didn't want to be spending so much time writing about Wokeness, but it has become clear to me that this is an ideology that reverses many of the hard-earned gains we have made through the Civil Rights Movement and that Wokeness ideology leads to endless societal dysfunction. Because human flourishing important to me, I have no choice but to speak out, at a time where many of my friends and acquaintances have the exact same concerns I do, but are afraid to speak out. Their fears is are based on these things:
1. They don't want to get into yelling matches with activists, which they see as inevitable;
2. They fear being called names like "racist" for things that are not racist.
3. They fear mobs of people following them, threatening them and their families or damaging their property;
4. They fear loss of their reputations based on false accusations by mobs, and
5. They fear the loss of their jobs and/or careers based upon mass-cancellation techniques.
I realize this all sounds hyperbolic, but my conclusions are based on the many dozens of occurrences on which I have written about at this website, as well as many other articles by many other writers. Common responses to my writings have been A) ad hominem attacks, B) scoldings that I have no right to discuss certain topics, as though only certain people have the right to talk about certain things, and C) Whataboutism - Why am I not writing about something else that they would rather I write about, e.g., white supremacist groups? In response to this last point, I already see widespread ridicule over white supremacy. It is not taking root in any of our sense-making institutions such as schools (including prestigious colleges), media outlets (including STEM journals and magazines) and government offices.
I want to give special attention to James Lindsay's excellent Woke Encyclopedia at New Discourses, so very helpful in that the Woke onslaught always involves long streams of highly suspect terminology.
Benjamin Boyce was a student at The Evergreen State College as it melted down, thanks to the applications of critical race Theory on campus. There, not only did he have a first-person view of the mayhem the campus descended into as it happened, he was responsible for filming and documenting a great deal of the footage that has since come to light and found a home in documentaries. Ever since, he has been on a quest to further understand what happened at Evergreen and to document it in full, not to mention similar issues as they crop up in the surrounding Washington state communities.
Boyce has presented this Evergreen tragedy in 23 chapters. His story covers the destruction of what was, and what could still be, an excellent college. What happened in 2017, however, left Evergreen in intellectual and social shambles and resulted in dramatic reductions in the number of students attending Evergreen.
It turns out that students aren’t clamoring for the privilege of paying for an education in such a hostile environment. Evergreen accepts 97% of applications, but enrollment dropped to 2,854 full-time students last fall, compared to 3,810 the semester of the protests. Enrollment increased over the same period at other Washington universities.
The story of Evergreen College was entirely ignored by most left leaning media powerhouses. The New York Timeshas yet to write a single word about the 2017 Woke-triggered implosion at Evergreen College.
I am writing this article to provide the above links to the writers I have found most informative and instructive about the Woke movement. I am linking to these writers with the hope that those who are fearful of speaking out can read these works as an aid to finding their own voice. I am also writing this article as a warning and a prophecy that Evergreen State College was not simply an occurrence but a vision for where we are headed unless we all find the spine to stand up and draw a line in the sand. Unless we do these things together, everything will become Evergreen State.
Here are episodes 1, 2 and 3 of Benjamin Boyce's comprehensive documentary regarding Evergreen State.
I'll end with some deep pessimism. I fear that conversation is no longer productive with the Woke. This is clear in many places today as I have documented at this website. it is abundantly clear in the Evergreen videos, as numerous students demonstrated that they are incapable of having a meaningful conversation with the clear-headed, patient, politically liberal Evergreen College biology professor, Brett Weinstein.
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