ayase
State Alchemist
People might question why I like talking politics here, but this is why. Genuine, interesting, reasonable responses that facilitate dialogue rather than stifling it.
@Rui I would first like to say that I agree that the “fear of sexual predators” argument for segregated bathrooms is alarmist nonsense. If people genuinely believed that, wouldn't parents also be terrified of their male children using mens' public bathrooms, and be demanding separate toilets for children? That said, I'd feel as much of a prick expecting people whose beliefs include modesty around people of a different sex or gender to have to take a dump in their presence as I would demanding they all rip off their modest garments and have to walk around in skimpy clothing. Not that I would complain if they did, but that should be entirely their choice.
@Vashdaman I don't really want to get too deep into the issue of gender reassignment surgery or drugs and I semi-regret even bringing it up, because despite having my own personal beliefs on the matter those aren't decisions that will really affect me and are for the individuals concerned to take (as I believe anything concerning people's own bodies should be, whether it's getting a tattoo or a covid vaccine or an abortion). I am absolutely in favour of trans people (and all people) being or doing whatever they want (within reason, as long as it's not harming other people) but the the real core of my argument here is whether anyone has the right to acceptance in groups or spaces which were not necessarily set up or intended for them.
I might not care all that much about these things for myself, but nor do I expect other people to be a-okay with doing things my socially libertarian way. My belief in freedom of association and that no-one should be forced into the company of anyone else leads me to conclude that actually, yes, it probably is okay for both individuals and groups to exclude anyone they like for any reason. The opposite would also be fair, that no-one should be excluded for any reason, but as @Rui mentions it's not particularly enjoyable when people come into a group and (either intentionally or not) ruin it for the people already there. So as discriminatory as it might feel, I think I'm comfortable with the existence of groups that exclude other races, genders or biological sexes if that's what the people in them want. One of the major things that confuses me here is that I've never really understood why anyone would want to be in a group that didn't want them; I don't see refugees or Muslims lining up to join the BNP or the EDL (although weirdly, you do get people still wanting to be part of religions that believe they're going to Hell for a multitude of sins. Masochists, perhaps?). That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t also be accepting groups that welcome everyone. It’s probably also worth adding that I agree that sex has zero relevance on identity documents, I don’t have my passport to hand but I’m fairly confident they don’t even include height, which is surely a far more obvious proof of identity to customs officials than genitals. Not that I particularly agree with the existence of passports or customs officials either.
@Rui your stance on segregation in sport is totally fair and understandable, as long as anyone who takes that stance is okay with the majority of current top-tier female athletes being relegated to second-tier events while the top-tier is dominated by male athletes. If we were to accept that and strive for total, merit based egalitarianism, probably there should be no more complaining about men (or women, or people of any particular race or ethnicity) dominating the upper echelons of other fields either. I certainly don’t believe men are better than women, but they are different to women and I think that is bound to lead, as it already has, to certain roles in society having gender imbalances.
On that topic, I do find society’s current obsession with trying to convince/pressure women and girls into areas very few of them are interested in just to redress those gender imbalances totally bizarre (and very “middle-class problems”* given that I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone complaining that say, manual labouring is male dominated. Where’s the push to get more women into factories? I guess that’s not aspirational enough, no-one wants to be like those working class men). In my opinion every individual should be pursuing what they want out of life, rather than being told what they should want or aspire to by other people (whether that’s parents, teachers, doctors, pressure groups or the government). This doesn’t just go for women, or any particular group, I know I would probably be far happier being a stay at home father to imaginary children (who I will never have, due to my personal belief that inflicting this society on anyone else is an act of cruelty. Apologies to any parents reading, you might not have spent as much time considering this as I have, or perhaps you even think life in our society is a positive experience to gift to other humans, in which case you and your children have my sympathies) than I ever will be going to work. But once again that’s not aspirational enough; you should want to feed the capitalist machine and work yourself to death for someone else's benefit, screw parenting. Give your child a smartphone and leave their childhood development to YouTube e-celebs, who will leave them with a sense of inadequacy for not being mega rich for sitting at a webcam all day.
That went off at a bit of a tangent. My apologies, I guess I’m just even more miserable and p*ssed off at society than normal today.
*Really, I suppose I believe any inequality which is not economic is a middle-class problem. I’ve been accused of class reductionism before and I think it’s about time I started wearing that label with pride, honestly. I do think wealth is the only real privilege; when people have economic power, be they black, white, straight, gay, male, female, cis, trans, there’s very little stopping them from doing whatever they like. And the real problem is that wealth is massively concentrated in the hands of a tiny elite who then use the power of money to get everyone else to blame each other for their problems so they never band together and turn on them. I won't have much to say in favour of identity politics until groups campaigning for social justice acknowledge that a poor, straight, white, cis man is actually worse off than a rich, gay, black, trans woman. Not that they're entirely to blame for that, because I think with very few exceptions they're being manipulated by the people at the top via the media specifically to focus on divisive, trivial matters. If we increased the minimum wage, cracked down on employers exploiting immigrants, stopped outsourcing jobs overseas to exploit even poorer people, stopped wealthy people and corporations off-shoring their profits and secured a reasonable UBI, everyone could be happy forever. But no, let's quibble over language use and historical monuments and representation in consumer media and ignore all of that.
@Rui I would first like to say that I agree that the “fear of sexual predators” argument for segregated bathrooms is alarmist nonsense. If people genuinely believed that, wouldn't parents also be terrified of their male children using mens' public bathrooms, and be demanding separate toilets for children? That said, I'd feel as much of a prick expecting people whose beliefs include modesty around people of a different sex or gender to have to take a dump in their presence as I would demanding they all rip off their modest garments and have to walk around in skimpy clothing. Not that I would complain if they did, but that should be entirely their choice.
@Vashdaman I don't really want to get too deep into the issue of gender reassignment surgery or drugs and I semi-regret even bringing it up, because despite having my own personal beliefs on the matter those aren't decisions that will really affect me and are for the individuals concerned to take (as I believe anything concerning people's own bodies should be, whether it's getting a tattoo or a covid vaccine or an abortion). I am absolutely in favour of trans people (and all people) being or doing whatever they want (within reason, as long as it's not harming other people) but the the real core of my argument here is whether anyone has the right to acceptance in groups or spaces which were not necessarily set up or intended for them.
I might not care all that much about these things for myself, but nor do I expect other people to be a-okay with doing things my socially libertarian way. My belief in freedom of association and that no-one should be forced into the company of anyone else leads me to conclude that actually, yes, it probably is okay for both individuals and groups to exclude anyone they like for any reason. The opposite would also be fair, that no-one should be excluded for any reason, but as @Rui mentions it's not particularly enjoyable when people come into a group and (either intentionally or not) ruin it for the people already there. So as discriminatory as it might feel, I think I'm comfortable with the existence of groups that exclude other races, genders or biological sexes if that's what the people in them want. One of the major things that confuses me here is that I've never really understood why anyone would want to be in a group that didn't want them; I don't see refugees or Muslims lining up to join the BNP or the EDL (although weirdly, you do get people still wanting to be part of religions that believe they're going to Hell for a multitude of sins. Masochists, perhaps?). That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t also be accepting groups that welcome everyone. It’s probably also worth adding that I agree that sex has zero relevance on identity documents, I don’t have my passport to hand but I’m fairly confident they don’t even include height, which is surely a far more obvious proof of identity to customs officials than genitals. Not that I particularly agree with the existence of passports or customs officials either.
@Rui your stance on segregation in sport is totally fair and understandable, as long as anyone who takes that stance is okay with the majority of current top-tier female athletes being relegated to second-tier events while the top-tier is dominated by male athletes. If we were to accept that and strive for total, merit based egalitarianism, probably there should be no more complaining about men (or women, or people of any particular race or ethnicity) dominating the upper echelons of other fields either. I certainly don’t believe men are better than women, but they are different to women and I think that is bound to lead, as it already has, to certain roles in society having gender imbalances.
On that topic, I do find society’s current obsession with trying to convince/pressure women and girls into areas very few of them are interested in just to redress those gender imbalances totally bizarre (and very “middle-class problems”* given that I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone complaining that say, manual labouring is male dominated. Where’s the push to get more women into factories? I guess that’s not aspirational enough, no-one wants to be like those working class men). In my opinion every individual should be pursuing what they want out of life, rather than being told what they should want or aspire to by other people (whether that’s parents, teachers, doctors, pressure groups or the government). This doesn’t just go for women, or any particular group, I know I would probably be far happier being a stay at home father to imaginary children (who I will never have, due to my personal belief that inflicting this society on anyone else is an act of cruelty. Apologies to any parents reading, you might not have spent as much time considering this as I have, or perhaps you even think life in our society is a positive experience to gift to other humans, in which case you and your children have my sympathies) than I ever will be going to work. But once again that’s not aspirational enough; you should want to feed the capitalist machine and work yourself to death for someone else's benefit, screw parenting. Give your child a smartphone and leave their childhood development to YouTube e-celebs, who will leave them with a sense of inadequacy for not being mega rich for sitting at a webcam all day.
That went off at a bit of a tangent. My apologies, I guess I’m just even more miserable and p*ssed off at society than normal today.
*Really, I suppose I believe any inequality which is not economic is a middle-class problem. I’ve been accused of class reductionism before and I think it’s about time I started wearing that label with pride, honestly. I do think wealth is the only real privilege; when people have economic power, be they black, white, straight, gay, male, female, cis, trans, there’s very little stopping them from doing whatever they like. And the real problem is that wealth is massively concentrated in the hands of a tiny elite who then use the power of money to get everyone else to blame each other for their problems so they never band together and turn on them. I won't have much to say in favour of identity politics until groups campaigning for social justice acknowledge that a poor, straight, white, cis man is actually worse off than a rich, gay, black, trans woman. Not that they're entirely to blame for that, because I think with very few exceptions they're being manipulated by the people at the top via the media specifically to focus on divisive, trivial matters. If we increased the minimum wage, cracked down on employers exploiting immigrants, stopped outsourcing jobs overseas to exploit even poorer people, stopped wealthy people and corporations off-shoring their profits and secured a reasonable UBI, everyone could be happy forever. But no, let's quibble over language use and historical monuments and representation in consumer media and ignore all of that.
