FIRE’s Greg Lukianoff: Stanford’s Approach to Speech is Like Being in “An Upper Class Finishing School.”

Greg Lukianoff, reflecting on the time he attended Stanford University: Don't confuse "upper class white liberal ways of seeing the world with truth itself.” Excerpt:

And one thing that was so clear when I got to a place like Stanford, was that people had a real tendency to confuse sort of upper class white liberal ways of seeing the world with truth itself and therefore wanted everybody to talk exactly like rich white, over educated people. And there was like this lack of curiosity about whether or not those assumptions were even correct.

And you think about people who are on the spectrum, you think about people from other countries, you think about people who come from different economic classes or different regions or who are a little bit older or a little bit younger than everybody else, and it's just a series of landmines that you're supposed to either know they're there and if you know they're there, you're supposed to pretend you believe the following five things. It's a really messed up way for a place that is supposed to be a marketplace of ideas, to teach people to interact with each other.

Continue ReadingFIRE’s Greg Lukianoff: Stanford’s Approach to Speech is Like Being in “An Upper Class Finishing School.”

Andrew Sullivan Pulls Aside the Curtain to Expose the “Transqueer” Movement

Andrew Sullivan, a gay man who was a courageous leader of the movement to legalize gay marriage, has written a thoughtful article about the "transqueer" movement. Here's an excerpt:

"The truth is: we have come a long way in understanding and respecting the unique human experience of being transgender. In the US, trans people are protected by the gold standard of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. They are everywhere in our popular culture. An entire generation has even been told that being trans is the most glamorous thing you could possibly be. But none of this is sufficient for the transqueers. What they want is an abolition of biological sex for everyone; the end of men and of women as separate categories; the sex reassignment of children on demand; the destruction of the nuclear family; an end to the Hippocratic Oath; the abolition of homosexuality; the presence of male bodies in women’s showers, prisons and shelter; the creation of fantastical post-everything genders and pronouns; and the criminalization of anyone who would ever question this cultural revolution.

They are not winning, but it is not for lack of trying. The pseudoscience behind child transition is beginning to be exposed and puberty blockers are now banned in the UK outside clinical trials. A new lawsuit is being filed against the NCAA for destroying women’s sports. Public opinion has responded to the transqueer ideology by moving in the opposite direction, and now gay people are being caught in the queer crossfire."

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JK. Rowling’s Recent Statement on the Contested Meaning of “Transphobic”

J.K. Rowling is often accused of being "transphobic." She is repeatedly threatened with physical harm and death in response to her views on transgender ideology. And see here. Why? What are her views? In this March 7, 2024 Tweet, she succinctly states her views, which are also my own:

The word ‘transphobic’, as used here, does not mean an irrational fear or dislike of trans people. It means refusing to use gender identity ideology’s jargon, refusing to parrot its slogans, refusing to accept that sex doesn't matter when it comes to sport and single-sex spaces, refusing to believe a bearded heterosexual man becomes a lesbian when he declares himself one, and refusing to believe an abusive, misogynistic male is a woman because he likes to wear mini-dresses and pout in selfies.

Like every other gender critical person I know, I believe everyone should be free to express themselves however they wish, dress however they please, call themselves whatever they want, sleep with any consenting adult who wishes to sleep with them, and that trans-identified people should have the same protections regarding employment, housing, freedom of speech and personal safety every other citizen is entitled to.

But this isn’t nearly enough for the dominant strain of trans activism, which asserts that unless freedom of speech is removed from dissenters, unless trans-identified men are permitted to strip away women’s rights, with particular reference to single sex spaces like rape crisis centres, prison cells, hospital wards, changing rooms and public bathrooms, until we all bow down to their neo-religion, accept their pseudo-scientific claims and embrace their circular reasoning, trans people are more oppressed, and more at risk, than any other group in society.

This is nonsense. 99.9% of the world knows it's nonsense. The emperor is naked. He might be wearing lipstick, but his balls are swinging in plain sight.

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Related topic: I recently had my eyes opened on the psychology of autogynephilia. . And see here.

Continue ReadingJK. Rowling’s Recent Statement on the Contested Meaning of “Transphobic”

Women Athletes Sue NCAA Seeking Damages and Restoration of their Awards Based on NCAA Transgender Policies

Excerpt from the Free Press:

Over a dozen female athletes are suing the National Collegiate Athletics Association for letting transgender athletes compete against them and use female locker rooms in college sports.

At the center of the class-action lawsuit is Lia Thomas, the trans athlete who dominated the 2022 NCAA Swimming Championships while a student at the University of Pennsylvania. The suit states that both the NCAA and Georgia Tech, which hosted the event, knowingly violated Title IX, the federal statute that guarantees equal opportunity for men and women in college education and sports.

The lawsuit, the first federal action of its kind, seeks to change the rules, rendering any biological males ineligible to compete against female athletes. It demands the NCAA revoke all awards given to trans athletes in women’s competitions and “reassign” them to their female contenders.

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Newly Disclosed Memo Shows that State Department is Policing the English Language at the Behest of Gender Ideologists

Is it in the job description of the U.S. State Department to police the English Language? From National Review:

Making assumptions about another person’s gender identity based on their appearance or name “can be problematic” and send a “harmful, exclusionary message,” Blinken wrote in a February 5 cable, which instructed State Department employees to avoid using common terms like “mother/father,” “son/daughter,” and “husband/wife.”

National Review recently obtained the text of the cable and confirmed its authenticity. Some State Department staffers have questioned why Blinken is spending time promoting far-left gender activism at critical junctures in the raging wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

Continue ReadingNewly Disclosed Memo Shows that State Department is Policing the English Language at the Behest of Gender Ideologists