A Letter on Justice and Open Debate
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 12:34 last edited by Doctor Phibes 7 Oct 2020, 12:34
"the weaponization of victim status by vindictive, sophomoric busybodies who cannot bear the fact that someone else sees the world in a different way"
Nicely put
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 12:57 last edited by
As far as I can tell, Rowling’s big sin is feeling that guys that biological males that identify as females should not be included in the rewards that feminism has won for women. And for this, her legacy is ruined.
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 13:09 last edited by
She's also managed to elevate herself to being discussed alongside Salman Rushdie, which was no mean feat.
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 13:24 last edited by Horace 7 Oct 2020, 13:26
I imagine trans folk are fierce and fearless combatants. They've already established that they're willing to self-mutilate to solve their emotional problems. Just what sort of clear headed response and self control do you suppose they'll have in the culture wars, which they now see as an extension of their life long psychological pain?
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 13:28 last edited by
The real problem in this debate is that everybody takes everything so personally. And that includes Rowling.
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 13:51 last edited by
Without Rowling the trans folks would have freaked out about Jesse Signal but not as much.
But had neither of them been there you might have heard some complaints about blacks on the list that don’t toe the woke line. In fact I’ve seen some of that but the trans women are more aggressive per Horace’s point.
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 13:59 last edited by
The apparent lack of any conception of irony when it comes to free speech is nothing new.
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Without Rowling the trans folks would have freaked out about Jesse Signal but not as much.
But had neither of them been there you might have heard some complaints about blacks on the list that don’t toe the woke line. In fact I’ve seen some of that but the trans women are more aggressive per Horace’s point.
wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 14:41 last edited by@jon-nyc said in A Letter on Justice and Open Debate:
trans women
When you say "trans women", does that refer to the origin or destination gender? Women who pretend to be men or men who pretend to be women?
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 14:43 last edited by
Men who want to be thought of and seen as women.
It took me a while too to get them, er, straight.
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wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 17:54 last edited by
I'm so old, I remember when our identities weren't supposed to be based on our gender.
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I'm so old, I remember when our identities weren't supposed to be based on our gender.
wrote on 10 Jul 2020, 18:06 last edited by@jon-nyc said in A Letter on Justice and Open Debate:
Men who want to be thought of and seen as women.
It took me a while too to get them, er, straight.
What a queer thing to say....
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wrote on 12 Jul 2020, 11:03 last edited by
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wrote on 13 Jul 2020, 01:44 last edited by
Chomsky on the reaction the letter has generated.
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wrote on 13 Jul 2020, 02:07 last edited by
Yes it's well known that cancel culture is already a powerful force in our most important institutions. It's nice to see this data. It will be disgusting to watch the Ezra Kleins of the world continue to deny its existence.
Rogan had on recently the guy who wrote the nonsensical -studies papers that got accepted and published. He said that the last time a feminist studies (or any -studies) academic paper got seriously peer reviewed was in the 90s.
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wrote on 13 Jul 2020, 02:28 last edited by
Yeah. James Lindsey. I preordered his book.
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wrote on 15 Jul 2020, 17:25 last edited by
I listened to Klein's podcast about this. He discussed it with Yascha Mounk, who was on the free speech side of the debate. It really did come down to Ezra just saying that while he understands why free speech is important, trans people's feelings have to be taken into account and if free speech can hurt them, then free speech needs to be reconsidered. If asked to reflect on that trade-off, he would just dig deeper into how important the feelings of trans people are, and how they face legitimate danger every day, because people want to murder them.
It's clear that those sorts of arguments can be used eternally by those who have an interest, based on the power dynamics as they see them, in shutting down free speech. If it's not trans folk it'll be some other group. It does not appear to matter how large the group is.
One thing Klein and Mounk agreed on was that the White Fragility book was bad. Klein thought it made some good points though. They mentioned something that I've noticed, too. That "white supremacists" share common beliefs with the ideas in that book - that white people are different and privileged. It's just that one group feels pride about it, and the other group feels shame.
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wrote on 15 Jul 2020, 17:40 last edited by
I’m surprised Klein conceded that much about the book.
Look for McWhorter’s review in the Atlantic.
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wrote on 4 Aug 2020, 22:05 last edited by Horace 8 Apr 2020, 22:06
Yglesias had McWhorter on his podcast today. Good discussion. Oh, the cognitive dissonance that must be managed by high status progressives when they listen to a guy like McWhorter.
Just kidding, I know they'd never listen to a guy like McWhorter.
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wrote on 5 Aug 2020, 00:34 last edited by
Seek out McWhorter’s last visit to Glen Loury’s podcast, maybe a week ago. (He’s on regularly)
How did Yglesias react to him?
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wrote on 5 Aug 2020, 00:59 last edited by
They never disagreed much. Yglesias is attempting to publicly embrace being not-totally-woke. He commented a couple times in the interview that the stuff they were discussing would seem heretical to many of his friends. I think like a lot of people on the left who are capable of doing some thinking, he thinks the direction is good and justifies a ton of disingenuousness in messaging to that end. But he's smart enough to know how absurd some of it is getting and has chosen not to consider all the opposition evil.
McWhorter enjoys a privilege of being taken seriously thinking what he thinks and saying what he says. Identical thoughts and words from a person with the wrong skin color would not make it onto Yglesias' show. (Of course.)