The Dread Slender Gnome on Nostr: Well, screw the poll. Turns out I'm actually interested in this exercise for its own ...
Well, screw the poll. Turns out I'm actually interested in this exercise for its own sake.
So here comes, commentary on Contrapoints' video on GC, where he purports to be fair and balanced. I doubt this'll be a proper deep philosophical dive, merely a point-by-point hit job, but we'll see.
Tearing Down Contrapoints (GC video), Ep. 1.
Emphasis mine.
First of all, a reminder that this video is a female-only space. So if there are any men here today, get out! I mean, unless you enjoy watching the very interesting things women do on our own, in which case: like, comment, subscribe!
Fallacy: begging the question. Contra is supposedly addressing GC arguments in good faith (more of that later, no doubt), but here he's already setting out his conclusion that these arguments are invalid as truth, in the very beginning of his video. All right, all right, it's just the intro. But I just couldn't let that slide.
So look, it's 2019 and I think most people have heard about TERFs: Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists. You know, these fanatics like Germaine Greer who call trans women "it", and think trans men are lost lesbian sisters.
By that definition, I'm not a TERF, or indeed GC. Unless I'm speaking Finnish, because then I would be calling all people "se" (="it"), but then that would hardly be proof of me being a fanatic towards TIM.
Fallacy: poisoning the well. Contra is, even before getting into actual arguments, presenting the GC side as unreasonable, horribad, no-good fanatics. This clearly shows that he is not approaching the topic in good faith (I told you there'd be more of that).
You guys do know about trans men, right? Male-to-female is not the only type of transgender person. There's also people who were born– well, people who were assigned– people who were always– people who identify.
Contra's trying to be cute here with language. But all this is fundamentally irrelevant. I suspect he's trying to hint that "TERFs" are so focused on TIM that they ignore or forget about TIF entirely. This is more evidence that he's not engaging in good faith, since if he had actually looked at GC content, he would've run into commentary about TIF in no time.
TERFs don't like being called TERFs, they think it's a term of disparagement which… it is. They call themselves radical feminists, RadFems, or lately "gender critical".
Some don't like being called TERFs. Many, very many, don't give a rat's proverbial, because our concept of ourselves is not tied to the language others use about us. Unlike some people I could mention.
The idea is that gender– femininity, masculinity, gender roles, all that– it's all a patriarchal construct, and biological sex is the only thing that makes a person a man or a woman.
Patriarchal or not, gender roles are by definition cultural constructs. The hint is in the term itself, they're "roles"- not qualities. As for the second part, he is absolutely correct. The core view is that the only thing that makes a person a man or a woman, is biology.
In the past on this channel, I've always caricatured TERFs as being like angry, man-hating bigots whose only real tactic is accusing trans women of being creepy men. And there definitely are some people who are really like that, but I want to be fair, I want to be balanced.
Snort. Contra "wants" to be "fair" and "balanced"?
Pfft.
Having said that, since I take a stance against pretending to know the motives of others, I'm just going to say that considering the content Contra has put out himself, I find this claim hard to believe. At the very least, if this indeed is his goal, he is miserably failing at it.
But hey, small blessings. At least he admits he's been disingenuous in the past.
Although that is a also a favoured strategy of the continuously dishonest, admitting to an earlier, bigger offence, so that one might pretend one's present behaviour is above the board.
So here comes, commentary on Contrapoints' video on GC, where he purports to be fair and balanced. I doubt this'll be a proper deep philosophical dive, merely a point-by-point hit job, but we'll see.
Tearing Down Contrapoints (GC video), Ep. 1.
Emphasis mine.
First of all, a reminder that this video is a female-only space. So if there are any men here today, get out! I mean, unless you enjoy watching the very interesting things women do on our own, in which case: like, comment, subscribe!
Fallacy: begging the question. Contra is supposedly addressing GC arguments in good faith (more of that later, no doubt), but here he's already setting out his conclusion that these arguments are invalid as truth, in the very beginning of his video. All right, all right, it's just the intro. But I just couldn't let that slide.
So look, it's 2019 and I think most people have heard about TERFs: Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists. You know, these fanatics like Germaine Greer who call trans women "it", and think trans men are lost lesbian sisters.
By that definition, I'm not a TERF, or indeed GC. Unless I'm speaking Finnish, because then I would be calling all people "se" (="it"), but then that would hardly be proof of me being a fanatic towards TIM.
Fallacy: poisoning the well. Contra is, even before getting into actual arguments, presenting the GC side as unreasonable, horribad, no-good fanatics. This clearly shows that he is not approaching the topic in good faith (I told you there'd be more of that).
You guys do know about trans men, right? Male-to-female is not the only type of transgender person. There's also people who were born– well, people who were assigned– people who were always– people who identify.
Contra's trying to be cute here with language. But all this is fundamentally irrelevant. I suspect he's trying to hint that "TERFs" are so focused on TIM that they ignore or forget about TIF entirely. This is more evidence that he's not engaging in good faith, since if he had actually looked at GC content, he would've run into commentary about TIF in no time.
TERFs don't like being called TERFs, they think it's a term of disparagement which… it is. They call themselves radical feminists, RadFems, or lately "gender critical".
Some don't like being called TERFs. Many, very many, don't give a rat's proverbial, because our concept of ourselves is not tied to the language others use about us. Unlike some people I could mention.
The idea is that gender– femininity, masculinity, gender roles, all that– it's all a patriarchal construct, and biological sex is the only thing that makes a person a man or a woman.
Patriarchal or not, gender roles are by definition cultural constructs. The hint is in the term itself, they're "roles"- not qualities. As for the second part, he is absolutely correct. The core view is that the only thing that makes a person a man or a woman, is biology.
In the past on this channel, I've always caricatured TERFs as being like angry, man-hating bigots whose only real tactic is accusing trans women of being creepy men. And there definitely are some people who are really like that, but I want to be fair, I want to be balanced.
Snort. Contra "wants" to be "fair" and "balanced"?
Pfft.
Having said that, since I take a stance against pretending to know the motives of others, I'm just going to say that considering the content Contra has put out himself, I find this claim hard to believe. At the very least, if this indeed is his goal, he is miserably failing at it.
But hey, small blessings. At least he admits he's been disingenuous in the past.
Although that is a also a favoured strategy of the continuously dishonest, admitting to an earlier, bigger offence, so that one might pretend one's present behaviour is above the board.