Just my alternative conclusion is: you can't fix anything by compelling people to play along with someone else's delusion, whether the source is social, psychological, biochemical, sexual, whatever.
Just because we cannot see the physical manifestation of suffering or understand someone's experience when put through the lens of our own experience does not mean that their suffering does not exist or is irrational or delusional. Many chronic pain sufferers understand this.
One thing I can't understand is the assertion that simply respecting another person, usually by doing nothing other than accommodating some alternative pronoun use is such an incredible burden so as to cause apparent extreme mental anguish among the people being asked for this accommodation.
If I have an acquaintance who is transgender, using their preferred pronouns that match their outward appearance and identity is:
1) Not difficult - what is more difficult and socially strange is referring to a person who is trying to present as a woman a "man" or a person who is trying to present as a man a "woman".
2) Not a self-delusion - or any kind of determination at all, really - about their biological sex. I have encountered non-transgender people in my life who are androgynous. You either make a mistake with their pronouns, or ask. There is no way of knowing what their biological makeup is, and I don't experience any kind of internal consternation over it. You take what they say at face value and move on.
3) Is simply offering a modicum of respect.
So much of all of this is tied up in the fact that a lot of people, for whatever reason, just really want to be mean. It seems their default is to be sneering, judgemental, and offer behavior that is more indicative of the worst instincts of high school students rather than well-adjusted adults.
That seems to really wind people up but since the executive order today (I'm not American incidentally), everyone is going to have to get used to it.
I don't sneer, by the way. Never have, never will! I'm more of a smirker. ;)
See, this is where you guys get it twisted. This is not a matter of playing along, it's not a game. It's a matter of social practicality. Example:
If you meet a new person who clearly appears to be a woman, do you use female pronouns with that person? What if that person is biologically male and has transitioned, and you simply don't know that? Presumably you don't do genital inspections on every new person you meet to ensure that you are not "playing along with childish games", right?
1) should institutions that have female only spaces or events be allowed to exclude pre-op transwomen? Post-op? For example, the women's only nude spa in Seattle that got in trouble for excluding a transwoman -- https://www.courthousenews.com/after-banning-trans-women-was...
2) If a coworker of mine who I know to be a biological male (he has sired children, etc.) socially transitions (no surgery), should I be forced to call him "she" and say that he is a woman? What if he makes almost zero effort to pass as a woman? What if he medically transitions?
3) Should I be able to make an argument on social media (Reddit etc.) such as "Men cannot get pregant" or "trans women are not real women" without getting banned for hateful conduct?
All three of these things are really happening, and are the real issues getting me freaked out (also, that and transitioning kids who very obviously are not "girls in a boys body")
I'm not sure how such a thing is strictly enforceable. Even in states that have banned trans people from using the bathroom that they prefer, it seems to operate mostly on the honor system.
> If a coworker of mine who I know to be a biological male (he has sired children, etc.) socially transitions (no surgery), should I be forced to call him "she"
What does "forced" mean? The reality is that if you cannot make this basic accommodation that most people consider to be a matter of social etiquette in 2025, other people may not perceive you in a positive way and that can have unintended consequences.
You mentioned in another reply that you feel its important to respect cultural norms and expectations when it comes to things like what you are expected to wear. Well, basic respect of pronouns and not antagonizing transgender people are increasingly a 'cultural norm'.
> Should I be able to make an argument on social media (Reddit etc.) such as "Men cannot get pregant" or "trans women are not real women" without getting banned for hateful conduct?
People seem to make comments like this on reddit without getting banned now? A search of reddit for that term brings up many results.
There seems to be a resurgence and re-normalization of plain LGBTQ+ hate and antagonization these days. Twitter/X is full of people thrilled that "gay" and "retarded" are acceptable adjectives for them to use again.
So, in January 2025 I am not really buying any arguments about "I'm not allowed to even discuss basic issues around gender" because those discussions are absolutely happening and the rules seem less restrictive than they have in a long time.
Exhibit A: Mark Zuckerberg's latest announcement that you are allowed to post vile garbage about LGBTQ people without restriction.
I said 'gender identity' not 'gender'.
Up until the early 1900s, the word "gender" did not apply to people. It applied to words. The word "libro" has a masculine gender, but obviously the object itself has no gender or sex. Rarely, "gender" was a synonym for sex, but this was generally considered to be informal or a mistake. As Henry Watson Fowler, a teacher of English usage, wrote in 1926:
> "Gender...is a grammatical term only. To talk of persons...of the masculine or feminine gender, meaning of the male or female sex, is either a jocularity (permissible or not according to context) or a blunder."
Then in middle-1900s academics began defining gender in various new ways. Money used it as a word to describe the way a person presents their sex. Other academics invented the term "gender role" to describe the things a culture associates with men and women. These academics did not believe that "gender" was some innate characteristic of a person's mind. In fact, many of them were arguing there was no difference between men and women in the head, and "gender" roles were social constructions. Even here, though, the concept of gender applied to things, not to people (eg the gender of pink clothes is feminine).
At the same, time the word "sex" began to more commonly be used to refer to coitus, and so normal, non-academics started using gender more commonly as a synonym for biological sex to avoid using the word "sex."
Then in the last thirty years, the term "gender identity" has arisen to describe one's own internal sense of being a boy/man or woman/girl in one's own mind (see the genderbread person), and furthermore the claim is that this is immutable and if there is a conflict between your "gender identity" and biology or how society sees you, it is your biology and/or society that should change. It is only in the last thirty years that people are considered to have something called "gender" that is different than biological sex.
Interestingly this new sense of "gender" almost seems to be a mutant child of the two, completely separate previous definitions of the word gender (gender as biological sex, a property of a person, man or woman and gender as ones presentation and expression more masculine or feminine).
I do not believe that "gender identity" is a meaningful concept. It is an anti-concept, it mashes together unlike things and makes it harder to think and reason about the underlying phenomena. I do not believe that someone has a fixed gender identity that can be distinguished from their biological sex. I do not believe believe that "gender" (as opposed to biological sex) is a property of a person.
"I am a woman, but I don't always like to act or dress as a stereotypical woman, my self-expression is fluid" is a banal and unobjectionable statement.
"I don't like to act or dress as a stereotypical woman, therefore I am not a woman, my gender identity is genderqueer/non-binary" does not make any sense. It is making a mishmash of concepts.
If you believe the modern idea of "gender identity" is real and valuable then you need to properly define it, explain why it is useful, and what is your evidence that it really exists.