Identity: Caitlyn Jenner = Rachel Dolezal?

    By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 10:09am |

    So perhaps I don't get inclusiveness, but I'm not sure I understand why a man can feel he's really a woman and we encourage his transition to she - but a woman says she feels she's black and has certainly played the role for a number of years, but in this case it's a scandal.

    I presume Bruce Jenner could have become an unknown Caitlyn without the appearance on Vanity Fair, and there was no need to out him/herself to be accepted as a woman? (aside from not having reproductive parts, just the sexual bits - and breast augmentation or tummy tucks or butt lifts are standard fare these days)

    So why is Rachel in such hot water? I doubt she was going for any race-based scholarships or any other of the few benefits to being black - she was instead advocating for black issues, something like Barack Obama did. And speaking of which, Obama had 1 black parent. What if he just had 1 black great-grandparent or further back? If he looked pearly white despite a Kenyan dad? What is our litmus test for identification? Jews handle this fairly straightforward - if your mum is Jewish, you are too, otherwise fuhgiddaboudit. Except enough people get by on a Jewish father - whether that's kosher, you'll have to ask a rabbi. As for native Americans, we love parading our 32nd part Cherokee about - me and perhaps Elizabeth Warren? - though the US Gov might cut us off after 1/8th. Gay people don't have to be totally gay - they can be bisexual, or occasional, or in the closet, or polyamorous, or several other variants - when do we say they're not gay enough to be gay?

    These are the moments that always give me a thrill - when our karma runs over our dogma, our inclusion mudwrestles our exclusion - if you put buttered toast on a cat's back, will it land on the butter side or its feet, or rip off the bread to do both? How do we juggle racial, gender, LGBT and poverty or class issues all together? Let the intertubez decide.

    Comments

    Jews handle this fairly straightforward

    Au contraire. Defining Judaism is incredibly contentious, especially since it affects ones ability to emigrate to Israel or get married in a synagogue. Orthodox Jews have a lock hold on religious affairs in Israel, which means they get to decide who is Jewish for legal purposes. If you don't convert in a strictly Orthodox ceremony: not a Jew. If you can't prove that you mother, grandmother, or great-grandmother was Jewish (often the case for Soviet Jews): not a Jew. If you're the descendant of a pre-Roman African diaspora: not a Jew (but you can have an official Orthodox conversion in Israel).

    In short, Jews have all the same bullshit and more because religious fundamentalists are involved.

    PS Not to mention the dispute within Judaism over transgenderism and transexuality.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 11:02am

    Possibly I could skirt this by saying "in America" but there are probably 47 other issues that apply specifically to American Jews with different jurisdictions for Miami, NY, Shaker Heights or Beverly HIlls. Reading the article on transgenderism, I wondered if those gaudy multicolored lapels you used to wear got you in any trouble, being "uniquely identified with the opposite sex", but probably you can get some kind of dispensation if you're not Orthodox. At least Genghis being post-Roman Asian diaspora is acceptable.


    by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 12:17pm

    The Rachel Dolezal case is complex. When she was "white", Dolezal sued Howard University for racial discrimination. "Black" Rachel Dolezal is praised for community activism in Spokane. The local and national NAACP supported Dolezal. She has black supporters and black detractors. She is estranged from the parents who outed her. Her brother calls what Rachel is doing "blackface". The brother has been charged with sexual assault of a minor. There are many layers to Rachel Dolezal, Comments from the Spokane community seem mainly positive. There are others concerned about cultural appropriation. There are white women who are blacker than Dolezal. There are a host of issues.

    Questions about the validity of accusations of physical threats against Ms. Dolezal prior to the leaking of her true identity raises questions. Charges of plagiarism surround her award-winning art. Who is Rachel Dolezal?

    There are other whites who head NAACP chapters. The Spokane NAACP appears to have no problem with Ms. Dolezal. Hopefully she can get her life back on tract and remain active. She has a track record of action that can be used as a foundation. 


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 12:34pm

    The short answer is "no they are equal issues." Yes, they're about how one identifies one's self, but then both of these issues would be equal to someone defining his or herself by their occupation.

    The paradigms of gender and sex (referring to biological meaning, not the activity) are vastly complex in a whole other way then the complexities of identifying one's ethnicity or race. I'm 1/16 Native American, but I would say I was Native American, only that this is part of heritage. Some family members and I are going to take one of those genetic tests (my mother is adopted so there is one half of my heritage I don't have clue. Just about everybody in America is a mutt, and it is more a choice which one or two chooses to claim as being (e.g. I''m part Welsh, part Scandinavian).

    Gender and sex has more to do with cultural immersion at the time of birth. You are either boy or girl (which isn't true) and this determines how one is raised and interacts with others and society, regardless of ethnicity mix, beyond one's identity. One can talk about being Hispanic in America, but there is a difference between being a Hispanic male and Hispanic female.

    The reason the complexity is so different is that this iteration of gender/sex is cultural and psychologically based rather than biological determined. A man who wakes up in a hospital after a car accident and sees that one or both legs have been amputated. A lot of them will believe "I'm no longer a real man." At the same time he doesn't say "I'm no white" or "I'm no longer black." In other words, the mental dividing line between what is a "man" and what is a "woman" is entirely a cultural manifestation, which is constantly being threaten by those things would break down those boundaries. A black or white person don't worry about ever becoming not a black or white person.

    Rachel Dolezal's problem had to do with simple biologiical percentage.


    by Elusive Trope on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 12:49pm

    To be upfront, one time I did call myself Native American. I was trying to get into this small alternative high school and put down that I was Native American so I would jump to the top of the waiting list. When they found out i was only 1/16th rather than 1/8th, they could have booted me out, but they decided it showed my passion for getting into the school that I would lie about my ethnic label.


    by Elusive Trope on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 12:57pm

    I aint got much on this 'subject' really.

    We all wish, in one way or another, to be part of something.

    Jenner, I conclude, always was attracted to men.

    How do I know this? I don't. I cannot normally read people's minds.

    Although I know for certain that Donald Trump is a fraud. hahahah

    This 'Black' has Black children; is she nuts for associating with Blacks and Black culture?

    I am probably Irish Catholic even though I have not been in a church for fifty years and I am agnostic and my mother was Norwegian/German. There is a cultural aspect to consider.

    And we always wish to be 'accepted', one way or another.

    Sometimes 'the group' or part of that group refuse to accept us, I guess.


    by Richard Day on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 1:07pm

    I think this is a non issue.  I don't care if she wants to be part of the black community and do good work.  I don't care if Bruce wants boobs and becomes a cover girl. It isn't going to effect our lives one way or another. 


    by trkingmomoe on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 1:44pm

    It's nothing new, we have always been fascinated by successful impersonators---for example, Al Jolson. The reason we are not all dozing re Rachel is that race is an explosive subject in our culture, exacerbated by today's addiction to social media.

    Each generation has had it's own version of transgendering as well as impersonation, not to mention "social media"---which had its origins in the ancient Roman baths---where it was rumored that Cleopatius unwisely chose the eve of the battle of Actium to reveal to Mark Antony his own sexual transformation.

    Bruce Jenner has garnered more print space than the combined world wars and the history of Apple put together even though Caitlyn is insignificant when compared to notables such as Circe, Werner von Braun and Eleanor Roosevelt---all of whom were sheltered in the discreet societies which preceded this age of exhibitionism, narcissistic blabbing and race baiting.

      


    by Oxy Mora on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 7:03pm

    It is a complex issue and I've been struggling off and on the last few days with trying to get a handle on my own feelings about it.  I can't speak as a black woman but I can speak as a woman who has publicly accepted a man who calls himself a woman.  As a woman, I'm far from offended.  Why would I be?  Jenner's decision takes nothing away from me, does nothing to dilute womanhood.  It doesn't make any of us less female.  He isn't a usurper or a criminal.  He's a man who feels more comfortable as a woman.

    That's the way I feel about Rachel Dolezal.  For whatever reason, she feels more comfortable in black skin.  She can't have black skin but she can immerse herself in the black experience, in the black culture, and no black person will be injured in the process.

    So why the fuss?  I can understand a little sniffery going on--what nerve!  But then what?  What harm has she actually done?  On the other hand, she has worked her heart out for the NAACP and for black society in general.  What a way to thank her.
     


    by Ramona on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 8:26pm

    Pretenders are really asking for it...


    by NCD on Tue, 06/16/2015 - 10:37pm

    Caitlyn is not a women. Rachel is not black. Not biologically nor culturally. Caitlyn can call herself what ever she wants. People change their name all the time. She can dress in what is culturally normal for women in America. She can get plastic surgery to look more like a women. All those things are her right but none of them make her a women. That doesn't mean people who hate can verbally or physically attack her. Her rights should be protected as the rights of all citizens should be protected. 

    I don't have a problem if someone wants to pretend to be a gender or race they are not. The problem I have with Rachel is not that she pretended to be black but she seemed to want it both ways, as rmrd pointed out above.There seems to be a fair amount of hypocrisy in her pretense. The other problem is the amount of lying she did in creating her fictitious back story.


    by ocean-kat on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 2:46am

    But again, who are they hurting?  Both Bruce/Caitlyn and Rachel lied about their perceived identities until they couldn't lie anymore.  Most gay men and women have done the same thing at some point.  Some of them date the opposite sex, marry and have children, because living the lie is less painful than telling the truth.

      People lie all the time about who they are, both to themselves and to others.  People in bad marriages lie until they can't lie anymore.  People in jobs they hate lie until they can't lie anymore.  People with physical and mental illnesses lie until they can't lie anymore.

    There are lies and then there are lies.


    by Ramona on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 7:31am

    Dolezal makes the Spokane appear weak because she tricked the membership. It could be true that she "feels" black. It is also possible she has mental issues or is a con artist. The NAACP job is a volunteer position with no salary from what I understand. Monetary gain does not appear a primary goal.Hopefully, she has a support group comforting her. The parents do not seem to be  a good refuge.


    by rmrd0000 on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 9:02am

    How did she trick the membership, beyond her skin color?  She did her job and did it well, right up to the moment her parents outed her.  Her skin color made her a pariah.  Chew on that for a while. . .


    by Ramona on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 11:03am

    If you attend a black family reunion, you typically see a range of skin colors. They range from dark chocolate to tan to near alabaster. Debates about skin color do come up. For example should dark-skinned Nina Simone be played on screen by lighter-skinned Zoe Saldana. There are arguments about dark-skinned models rejected in favor of light-skinned models in music videos. Issues of skin tone are part of being black in America. The discussion about Rachel Dolezal is about misrepresentation of her ethnicity, not skin color. There are whites in the NAACP. There are white chapter directors in the NAACP.

    Blacks passing for white is a well-known phenomenon. There was a benefit to lying about ethnicity. The times that whites have passed for black appear limited to journalists like John Howard Griffin and Ray Sprigle taking brief excursions into masquerades in the 1950s and late 1930s to report on black life. Rachel Dolezal's experience is something uncommon. There was public shock when blacks who passed for white were exposed. There is shock as Rachel Dolezal has been exposed. If she has done good work and has a support group she will survive just like exposed black families survived. 

    Edit to add: 

    barefooted notes the case of white former Stockton, California city councilman Mark Stebbins. Stebbins won election in a majority black district in 1983. He lost narrowly in a recall race after an opponent challenged the initial election because Stebbins told voters that he was black. Stebbins remains an NAACP member and active in the community.


    by rmrd0000 on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 4:31pm

    There was a day when if you had "a drop of black blood in you," people would consider a black. "Sure ain't no white guy/gal."

    People like to have things (I can't avoid using the phrase) black and white. Nuance, ambiguity, and shifting lines of understanding make people feel uneasy, even threatened.


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 1:46pm

    Yesterday Donald Trump announced his run for the Presidency. Rachel Dolezal was interviewed by Meissa Harris-Perry yesterday as well. Trump was incoherent. Dolezal was hard to believe but more coherent than Trump. Harris met Dolezal's sons and was impressed. Dolezal has taken on the task of raising black sons in America. Trump is a racist who is allowed to have a television show on NBC and run for President. Observing the two televised events, it is clear that Trump represents the greater threat to the black community.


    by rmrd0000 on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 2:53pm

    You're right, it was Stockton, not Oakland as I stated. However, he won the first recall based on his race - it was an unrelated second recall that he lost.


    by barefooted on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 4:46pm

    Thx for the correction.


    by rmrd0000 on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 4:56pm

    So explain to me, what makes a woman a woman?


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 8:43am

    Before doing so keep this in mind from NIH

    For example, some babies may have a genetic defect that prevents their body from producing a substance called 21-hydroxylase. If a developing baby girl lacks this substance, she will be born with a uterus, ovaries, and fallopian tubes, but her external genitals will look like those found on boys. See: Congenital adrenal hyperplasia

    Ovarian problems -- A baby girl may have an extra ovary, extra tissue attached to an ovary, or structures called ovotestes that have both male and female tissue.

    As well as from Wiki

    Intersex, in humans and other animals, is a variation in sex characteristics including chromosomes, gonads, or genitals that do not allow an individual to be distinctly identified as male or female. Such variation may involve genital ambiguity, and combinations of chromosomal genotype and sexual phenotype other than XY-male and XX-female.


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 9:04am

    No. You explain to me what makes Caitlyn a women. Rare genetic anomalies or birth defects don't define gender. But even if they did they're not relevant in this case. Caitlyn is not genetically XXY nor does she have any birth defects that affect her gender. Biologically she is a quite normal XY male. Her experiences growing up were biologically the experiences of a male. You, Caitlyn and I could discuss what it was like to experience the burst of male hormones during puberty. We could not discuss what it was like to experience the burst of female hormones. By all accounts testosterone affects sex drive differently than estrogen. We could discuss how testosterone affected us but none of us, including Caitlyn, could discuss what it felt like to get a burst of estrogen and how she dealt with that during puberty. We could discuss what it feels like to experience our first erection but not what it feels like to menstruate or grow breasts.We could discuss how we dealt with  the social and cultural  issues of those male biological changes but not how we dealt with the social and cultural issues of those female biological changes.

    Title IX has removed much discrimination in the education system against women, especially in sports, but there is still much overt and social discrimination against women in athletic endeavours. Caitlyn experienced those cultural constructs before Title IX and as a male. As an athletic female he would have faced discrimination, discouragement, and hate speech. As an athletic male he was encouraged and supported throughout his athletic career. Tell me what Caitlyn has in common and understands about the female experience as an athletic women in sporting competition that I, as a male, have not experienced and do not directly understand?

    I could go on, In what way has Caitlyn experienced the world as a women would? What does she have in common with women? What particular understanding of a women's experience of the world does Caitlyn have that I, as a male, do not have? Biologically and culturally Caitlyn experienced life as a male.

    The hate and and aggression that transgendered men and women face is unacceptable. Their rights should be protected, they should be protected. Transgendered individuals should be treated fairly and as kindly as all other people should be treated. I use Caitlyn as her name and use the feminine pronouns out of kindness and courtesy. But that doesn't mean I think the transgendered become women or men simply due to their clothing choices or the amount of plastic surgery they can afford.


    by ocean-kat on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:07pm

    Rare genetic anomalies or birth defects don't define gender

    Gender and sex are two different things. Until you can understand that it's not much worth going forward on this discussion.

    But I have to ask, what would call these people with these genetic anomalies (of course it just that which allows for evolution): freaks?

    There's a reason these people have support groups.


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:18pm

    Okay I did read everything you wrote. A lot to say but I throw a few things.

    Biological females in Afghanistan get battery acid poured on them because they are females trying to get an education. Since you haven't had that experience do that make you less than woman? not a woman at all?

    Men and women biologically have both estrogen and testosterone, just in varying amounts. Some biological women have higher testosterone levels than some men.

    I'm so glad that you are soooo courtliest that you use her name and use the female pronoun, which is a subtle way of saying you don't believe she should be referred to in this manner.  "Hey, I have some black friends."

    And if all one goes on is biology (XX or XY) to determine these things like the sex a person is, then you have to go all the way. Everyone should be required to turn over their DNA so we can determine their true identity.  Nurture, trauma, and the psyche has whole as nothing to do with who really are.


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:37pm

    a subtle way of saying you don't believe she should be referred to in this manner.

    That's complete bullshit and shows that you don't have a single rational counter argument for any of my points. It's just a dumb ass strawman attack meant solely to insult.  I have no idea or opinion what transgendered people "should" be called. Therefore out of kindness and courtesy I will try to call them what ever they want.

    It's no different than the terms I use for African Americans. I have no idea or opinion as to what a member of the Negro race in America "should" be called. They quite understandably don't want to be call n***** by those outside their race. There was a time when most wanted to be referred to as Negro.Then there was disagreement and most wanted to be referred to as African American. Even that sometimes is considered inaccurate. Some Negroes prefer black. I'm not implying they are confused or wishy washy. Blacks in America have been oppressed and discriminated against and words have power. Over the years they have struggled to eliminate words that disempower or oppress them and to find words that empower them. I support that effort and will attempt as best I can to follow their lead. Now they are pointing out problems with the word thug. Even though as used it is a dictionary correct term words also have connotations and colloquial definitions   I understand their complaints. I will attempt to limit or stop using the word "thug". it's the courteous thing to do. It shows respect imo.

    if all one goes on is biology (XX or XY) to determine these things

    This is more garbage. I gave several examples as to why I think Caitlyn is not a women both biologically, culturally, and socially. At no point did I say it's all biology, XX or XY. Clearly you have no counter arguments at all to descend to such distortion.

    Biological females in Afghanistan get battery acid poured on them because they are females trying to get an education.

    All of them? Or a small %? Of course fear of attacks with acid is part of the cultural experience of being a women in Afghanistan, Iran, and other countries. It doesn't take many to generate such fear. Just as fear of rape is part of the experience of being a women everywhere, even in America. When Bruce Jenner walked the streets of the world how much time did he spend worrying about rape and taking precautions to protect himself? I, as a man, never consider the possibility that I might be raped since it's such a tiny possibility outside of prison. Rape is not a remote possibility for women and from my reading it seems a substantial number of women, if not most, take it into consideration and take precautions. Do you think when Caitlyn called himself Bruce he experienced the world as a women or a man regarding fear of rape?

    I'm still waiting for you to explain to me what makes Caitlyn a women.


    by ocean-kat on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 11:19pm

    I have no idea or opinion what transgendered people "should" be called.

    You call them what they want to be called. How hard is that? If they they change their mind and don't want to be called something and instead to be called this, one does it not out of courtesy but respect for the right of a person or group to determine how they referred to. In Canada it's First Nations, here is Native American.

    Caitlyn is a woman because that identity resonates with her psyche as being who she is. Nothing more than that. I don't care about whether a person is XY, XX, or YXYYX. If the person says to me, this how I want to be referred to as, I do it not out of tolerance of difference or courtesy, but as fellow traveler who is trying to make it through this world and find some peace of mind. And you're running around going "But, but how afraid of rape were you before?"

    I'm sure your real full legal name on your birth certificate is not "ocean-kat." If you legally changed it to that, then I wouldn't be like "Oh, but that's not the name your parents gave you" or better yet "that's not your real name."


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 12:03am

    You're mixing two different questions and answers. One I agree with the other I don't. If the person who was previously named Bruce now wants to be called Caitlyn I agree that she should be referred to as Caitlyn. But if she claims that she is now a women, well no, she is not. She is not a women biologically or culturally. The experiences of her life on both a biological level and a cultural level were male. By any reasonable standard I can think of she is and has been a man.

    I asked what makes Caitlyn a women. Your answer seems to be that gender is solely what you declare. If one states they are a man they are a man. If one states they are a women they are a women. I disagree with that definition of the terms "man" and "women."

    I have several times during dangerous protest situations been on the front line advancing on cops with machine guns. I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one here who has been involved in dangerous protest situations as I've mentioned it a few times and no one else has responded with similar experiences.  I would do it again to support the rights of transgendered people. They are terribly oppressed and discriminated against. They have the right to live as they chose free from harassment and discrimination. But those rights do not include that I and all other people must believe you are what ever gender you declare yourself to be.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 1:09am

    You ask what makes Caitlyn a woman and my answer would be, because she says so.  Nobody can read someone's mind in order to know how they feel inside.  If she has always felt like a woman but her identity has been hidden inside a man's body, it doesn't matter how she still looks on the outside. 

    As a woman, I'm not threatened, nor am I revolted, by gender change.  It doesn't have to be biological.  It CAN'T be biological.  But to say it isn't cultural misses the point.  If Bruce has always been closer to Caitlyn she knows full well what it feels like to be a woman.  She has been more attuned to female feelings than to male, but even then. . .it doesn't matter.

    If she says she's a woman, she's a woman.


    by Ramona on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 8:24am

    And if she says she can fly?


    by PeraclesPlease on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 9:56am

    Then 1) she believes she can fly, 2) you acknowledge that belief because that belief is real, and 3) as with the person who believes we don't need no stinking fed tax, you warn them about the possible negative consequences of that belief.

    If they're actually standing on the ledge of a building who try to bring them back away, not by denying their belief (which based on one's understanding of gravity etc know is going to physically harm or kill the other person), but with subtleness affirm their belief while pointing out the best move right now is to move away from the ledge.

    When I worked as a mental health counselor (as opposed to now when I'm the client), all these counselors couldn't deescalate a schizophrenic client who believe she had fish in head (there was an aquarium in the lobby and she had been intensely staring at for over an hour). The other counselors problem was they were trying to make her understand the fish in her head were not real. I stepped in, having no clue what I was doing (I was History major for gawd sakes, and said "I'm sure that it feels like there are fish in your head." She immediately deescalated and had a nice talk about maybe not staring at the aquarium too much.

    How we feel and believe is more important than reality when it comes to the sense of what is our identity  and what the parameters compose that identity. Hence Obama was criticized for not being "black enough" when he engaged the media. Sometimes we can point to some disorder in the mind, as when I was panicking that people could hear my thoughts even though another part of me was saying that is an impossibility (based on my current scientific understanding). Sometimes it has nothing to do with mental health issues. If truly believe I can literally feel the life of the trees around me and they can feel mine, including the emotions, there are some who would I say I'm "crazy" (again using the scientific path) while others would believe that is so true and it is the people calling me crazy who are the crazy ones. Homosexuality was not too long ago classified as a mental disorder.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 10:44am

    And if she says she can fly?

    Then you might have a case.  Because of course she can't fly.  But she can declare herself a woman and be believed because human sexuality is based as much on emotion as it is on biology.  And because we've evolved enough as a society that we aren't threatened by people who want to change anything about themselves, including gender, as long as it isn't harmful to the rest of us.


    by Ramona on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 11:57am

    I'm not threatened not am I revolted. I'm not saying transgendered people are bad or mentally ill.  I'm just saying that I don't think gender is simply what ever a person declares. It is both biological and cultural. Caitlyn can say she has knows what it is to be a women but I don't think that's true.

    It CAN'T be biological.

    Why? There are significant biological differences both external and internal. There are significantly different biological changes throughout a male and female person's life. If there's not a biological component why do both transgendered men and women take hormones to simulate that biological difference? It seems obvious that biology is a factor in the differences between men and women.

    But to say it isn't cultural misses the point.

    Of course culture is a factor. From the earliest age culture treats male and female differently. There are experiences that women have that men never have and vice versa.

    There's no point in rehashing this since no one has considered any of my thoughts worth responding to with anything more than gender is what ever a person declares. I'll just add this article from a progressive women that makes the case more comprehensively than I have.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/opinion/sunday/what-makes-a-woman.html...

    For me and many women, feminist and otherwise, one of the difficult parts of witnessing and wanting to rally behind the movement for transgender rights is the language that a growing number of trans individuals insist on, the notions of femininity that they’re articulating, and their disregard for the fact that being a woman means having accrued certain experiences, endured certain indignities and relished certain courtesies in a culture that reacted to you as one.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 3:30pm

    But most important, will Caitlyn know how to *cry* like a woman? And if Nobelist Tim Hunt had said such stupid shit while getting a sex change, would he/she still have lost his/her position? So many bewildering questions, so little blog ink.


    by PeraclesPlease on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 3:26pm

    We're going to have to disagree here, since there doesn't appear to be any common ground.  I do believe wholeheartedly that if Jenner or any other transgender believes she's a woman, she's a woman. 

    I read the article you linked to when it was first published and I have to say, I disagreed with just about everything she had to say. I'm 10 years older than she is so it had nothing to do with age.  I'm a feminist, too, so it had nothing to do with feminism.  The writer was in fact furious, feeling threatened, and wallowing in superiority.  I don't see how she could ever say being transgender was okay when she makes it clear that only a real woman can claim to be a woman.

    To her way of thinking, the only good transgender "woman" is a silent transgender "woman".  What an insult.  Allow Jenner her giddy happiness at finally being able to openly feel feminine.  Who does it hurt?

    Well, apparently if offends the woman to end all women, the author of that awful piece:

    People who haven’t lived their whole lives as women, whether Ms. Jenner or Mr. Summers, shouldn’t get to define us. That’s something men have been doing for much too long. And as much as I recognize and endorse the right of men to throw off the mantle of maleness, they cannot stake their claim to dignity as transgender people by trampling on mine as a woman.

    Good lord, who's trampling?  More like tip-toeing.  And who's trying to define women in general?  Jenner is busy enough trying to define herself.

    And then she says:

    Their truth is not my truth. Their female identities are not my female identity. They haven’t traveled through the world as women and been shaped by all that this entails. They haven’t suffered through business meetings with men talking to their breasts or woken up after sex terrified they’d forgotten to take their birth control pills the day before. They haven’t had to cope with the onset of their periods in the middle of a crowded subway, the humiliation of discovering that their male work partners’ checks were far larger than theirs, or the fear of being too weak to ward off rapists.

    Let me tell you, her truth is not my truth.  Poor thing.  Such terrible suffering. . .

    But that's enough.  We'll just have to disagree.


    by Ramona on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 6:40pm

    Seconded


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 6:45pm

    BTW, while my comment on crying was intended as humorous, it was a bit serious as well. I think of one of these robot/artificial creation movies like SimONE where there's the basics of a female but there's something essential missing, kinda like an old Twilight Zone where aliens built a nice replica of a town but didn't know how to make it functional. The article you mention is overwrought (and I immediately thought that a female can get a partime waitressing job much easier than a male, as 1 slight advantage), but I do think being airlifted into life as a "woman" at 50+ is pretty bizarre, and I dont want it to be used to twist the common everyday challenges women have as being equivalent. Bruce/Caitlyn will never be screwed out of child support as a woman, s/he will never have to take that Vanity Fair body into a low-paying stripper job to show off for alcoholic old men just to keep the kids in diapers and pay the rent. S/he doesn't go through menopause with huge hormone changes. S/he will not deal with typical female home keepers who find they don't have much money to survive on or they typical 38-year-old actress or model who's too old to appear on Vanity Fair. And Ms. Keeping up with the Kardashians has little to do with the typical trannie - s/he's a celebrity show, working from a position of stature. Dolezal for what it's worth is a no one who built her lie/desire from total vulnerability, and now she's out. The power dynamic is completely different. Tim Hunt, a respected Nobel scientist, said 1 stupid thing and his career is done - he's not glamorous, so he's fed to the fishes, while Caitlyn's said as controversial/stpid shit and is celebrated for his/her differences. Why exactly?

    by PeraclesPlease on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 2:41am

    It kinda irked me that my girlfriend could get so many jobs as a nude model for art students at the local colleges. Even the women preferred women. The work was easy, the money was good and there was absolutely nothing sexual about it. It wasn't just that she was a beautiful Scandanavian type with long blond hair down to her ass. "Artists think the muse is feminine" is the way she put it.

    That might be part or even most of it. But I think at least some of it was most heterosexual men like to look at nude women and looking at a nude man, especially as closely as one would need to to draw him, evoked whatever small amount of homophobia that even the most liberal enlightened man as a bit of. Women, I guess, felt some discomfort looking at a naked man in a public classroom. I don't know, I'm not a women and I've never had an opportunity to question female artist to get to the bottom of it. Maybe Caitlyn could explain it, with her being a women and all.


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 3:09am

    It wasn't just that she was a beautiful Scandanavian type with long blond hair down to her ass. "Artists think the muse is feminine" is the way she put it.

    Really. Considering the context of the conversation, I assume you were "irked" because nude modeling is a well-paying job more available to women than men. But do you really believe a short, fat woman with a buzz cut would have been as successful at it as your girlfriend? That's not an example of an advantage for women as an artist's "muse", it's an example of a timeless stereotype. And, frankly, so was Jenner's Vanity Fair photo spread. Yet in the realm of perceived feminine sexual allure, there's little difference between them.

    You've noted in other comments that a man isn't a woman, in part, because he lacks a vagina and often keeps his penis. If he chooses to have it surgically altered to a working vagina, is he then a woman? No? Even if he develops breasts larger than a "natural" woman born with an A cup size? Still no? Is a woman who has a double mastectomy or has her uterus removed still a woman? Yes? Then I guess it boils down to what you were born with. But what do you say about those born with defects corrected by surgery? Missing organs, unformed limbs?

    The question of culture is interesting, and I agree with you that life experience plays a large part in our psychological development. I agree that a man cannot have the cultural background or experiences of a woman, at least not while living as a man. If he transitions while still relatively young, and lives the rest of his years in the female subset of society, does that make him a woman? No? Suppose he immersed himself in the history of feminism and was ridiculed as a male for being effeminate? Still no? Is a woman who transitions to a man still a woman? I'm guessing that's a yes. Even if she played sports with the boys, was called a tom-boy or "butch", wasn't born attractive to men and didn't want to be? Still yes?

    Then there are the parents who recognize their children feel differently than their body allows. They let them be who they are, up to and including legally changing their name. Sometimes changing schools - always disrupting the accepted norms. The children will make their choices more or less clear for themselves as they mature, but what does that do to the "culture" argument? If she's born a female but is raised and then lives as a man ... who is she then?


    by barefooted on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 4:25pm

    But,  but, but.... .... what if... ?

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0805564/


    by A Guy Called LULU on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 5:13pm

    Ya gotta problem with a boy and his doll? Take it up with Christopher Robin.


    by barefooted on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 6:15pm

    It wasn't just that she was a beautiful Scandanavian type with long blond hair down to her ass. "Artists think the muse is feminine" is the way she put it.

    You're missing the part where I posted, "is the way she put it." And that in the following paragraph I explained some of the ways I disagreed with the way she put it. I was responding to PP's statement, "I immediately thought that a female can get a partime waitressing job much easier than a male, as 1 slight advantage)" with nude modeling for artists as another slight advantage among all the disadvantages.

    There will always be a few on the edge of any bell curve. I explained my views so often I just can't rehash it. I'll just say for me it's not any one point. It's the preponderance of the evidence.

    Here's a story I'm embarrassed to tell. I'm ashamed of my behavior. I was about 14 and one of my female classmates came to class with a loose baggy shirt and no bra. I was consumed with lust, high on testosterone. I didn't just look, I leered, obviously, I tried to see down her shirt. I knew I was being rude but I couldn't tear my eyes away. Of course she noticed and with shock and reprimand in her voice she said, "Michael!" as she gathered in her baggy shirt and covered her breasts. I don't know why I remember these things.

    I was 14, I plead youth. I learned quickly and that was the first and last time I behaved like such an ass. She was young too. Just developing female sexual characteristics. That might have been the first time she was so blatantly sexually objectified by a male. But for her it was certainly not the last. How did years of similar experiences affect her behavior, her clothing choices, her psyche.

    Caitlyn says she was always a women in her brain. I wonder, if I shared this story with her would she relate to the lust filled boy I was or the sexually objectified girl?

     


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 6:29pm

    Any reasonably intelligent adult would relate to both. You don't have to be a man to understand a young boy ogling a young girl's breasts, nor do you have to be a woman to relate to her embarrassment. You've proven that by your own statement.

    By the way, don't be so hard on yourself. It's called growing up, and we all do it as awkwardly as humanly possible.


    by barefooted on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 6:59pm

    I think this is another of those disagreements over premis that can neither be refuted nor proven. You think I understand, I don't. You see I understand the male side viscerally, by both experience and by reading in later years. I understand the female side intellectually and that's a very different level of understanding. Some parts of the female experience are easy to grasp, others difficult to understand and some parts no matter how much I study and read I just don't get at all.

    I think the same is true for a women's understanding of the male experience.


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 7:31pm

    To paraphrase what a Chinese friend told me when I asked him what the Chinese thought about George Bush, there are over 3.5 billion women in the world. I think it's difficult to accurately pinpoint the female experience. One woman's experience might be more "masculine" than the average man's, and one man's experience might be more "feminine" than the average woman's if we ever were able to quantify such a thing.


    by Verified Atheist on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 8:01pm

    I don't think he's talking about "intelligence" or "relating" - I think he's referring to feeling it, the reptilian brain as Hunter S. Thompson refers to it.


    by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 06/21/2015 - 1:52am

    At that primal level, we can't feel what we don't personally experience ourselves. Understanding and empathy may be the best we can hope for.


    by barefooted on Sun, 06/21/2015 - 2:25am

    The experiences of her life on both a biological level and a cultural level were male. By any reasonable standard I can think of she is and has been a man.

    You get to sneak around the biological issue by tossing in the "cultural level" of being a man. We all make generalization, including myself. If we went into all the nuances everything we tried to explain something, we would never get to the point. So I'll write the "...that he or herself believes..." standard, which reinforces the notion that there are men and there are women, end of story.

    But this is the part that really sticks in my craw: How do you know how she experienced life at a cultural level because of his genetic XY.  Talk to gay men who spent a good part of their entire life pretending to be "heterosexual male." Being a heterosexual male, I can't even begin to know what that experience is like, just like I have no idea what the young American people who found themselves in places like Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq.

    I talk and write all the time growing up male immersed in the culture of  patriarchy. There are thoughts and feelings that are there because television and teachers and peer groups and parents etc put them in their. The other day I posted a little "commercial" that I found inspiring, and in the comment part said "To be honest, I started weeping..."  I threw that "to be honest" in there without thinking, but what it says is that it some kind of huge admission or confession, that I, a male, had some emotional reaction beyond aggression etc.

    Wrapping up, explain to me how you know any other person's "experience" with the world? We can't even figure ourselves out on personal level, yet somehow you know what her experiences were inside her psyche.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 11:05am

    We don't know how she felt about her experiences but we do know what many of those experiences were. There is an abundance of studies on the significance of puberty for both boys and girls. There are reams of essays by both men and women discussing their experiences and the effect of those experiences on their psyche. I've read dozens of essays and books by women and feminist authors and the development of breasts and menstruation is always addressed as a significant event in their life. We do know that Caitlyn did not have the experiences during puberty that many women feel were significant. We know that the experiences Caitlyn did have were the experiences that many men feel were significant. Puberty is just one example of the different experiences of men and women.

    We do know that Bruce Jenner was an extremely aggressive athlete who was nicknamed "Bruiser." We know it was meant as a compliment and as encouragement. We know that at that time if there was an equally aggressive female athleteit's highly unlikely she would have been encouraged and her nickname would more likely be "butch"  We don't know how Jenner felt about that nickname but we do know that his experiences as an athlete were different than the experiences he would have had if he was a female.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 5:12pm

    I agree with Ramona above, we just have to agree to disagree.

    But to say all males or females experience puberty the same way is untrue. The differences of how it is internalized is whole ball of wax compared the exposure and pressure of cultural experiences.

    But one thing to think about aggression some woman said once in a speech: What's the difference between a pitbull and a hockey mom? Lipstick.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 6:52pm

    But to say all males or females experience puberty the same way is untrue.

    Of course it's untrue. And of course I never said that. And of course you made up this strawman to argue against because you have no good argument to make about the things I've actually said.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 7:14pm

    Okay let me be more nuanced using your athlete example. To say that every male experienced athletics and the culture around it (it could be verbally brutal in the showers etc) in some kind of remote general way is impossible. We can talk about the culture and subcultures in which these experiences occurred, but that is all. To draw a line down and say males athletes had a different experience that female athletes is as telling as saying that awkward males had a different experience than naturally gifted athletes. In this last example one will find such a vast array of personal experiences and internalization of those of experiences. Some of the most caring and grounded kids I knew were some of the jocks, although I viewed them as an exception at the time. Some of the most cruel and uncaring were the awkward "geeks."

    Again, you're drawing a solid line between the experience of athletes based on whether they were female or male. And this experience based upon this solid line is the primary key to understanding why a former male athlete cannot be a woman because he didn't grow up as a female athlete.


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 12:36am

    Why is any of this important?  Who, really, is Caitlyn Jenner hurting by announcing that she is acting on the feelings she's had all her life?  Who is it hurting??  How can any woman feel threatened by her to such a degree that it requires whopping carloads of scholarly analysis about absolute womanhood? 

    Honestly, I just don't get it.  And I'm an absolute woman.  Have been all my life.


    by Ramona on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 8:39pm

    Oh come on Ramona. You disagree, that's  fine. I don't think there a single issue discussed here or anywhere that every women, or every man, agrees on. People disagree all the time. But many women have written clear articles with clear explanations as to why they think this issue important. You said you read at least one of those articles, before I even linked it. It's fine that you have a different opinion then her, or me, but don't pretend you don't know her reasoning if you actually read the article. You're a smart person. I don't think you need me to excerpt quotes from an article you read to answer these questions.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 11:05pm

    Not true.  I went to your link and realized I had read it before.  I have no idea what you mean by pretending I don't know her reasoning.  I'm not pretending.  I don't know her reasoning.  I think her article is dumb and overblown.  It makes no sense to me as a feminist.  And obviously I read the article since I quoted from it. 

    I've also written about this issue for a feminist website, so I'm pretty sure I've thought about it and know just a little about the story. 

     


    by Ramona on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 8:52am

    I have no problem that you disagree with Burkett's or my views or that you find the article dumb. When Troup and you claim that gender is what ever a person declares I have the same feeling. I'm used to being  on opposite sides with you when discussing issues on dagblog. I've come to expect it. We disagreed about the Confederate flag, Snowden, the use of the word "thug" and now transgenderism. As I've often felt you've treated my views with derision I'm not surprised to see you characterize Burkett's views as "dumb."

    As I'm sure you know the issue for Burkett is not mainly the harm that Caitlyn does to the women's rights movement. Caitlyn is merely the famous transgendered person whose elevation in the media sparked a debate. You remember from the article that Burkett's larger issue is transgendered entering the debate on women's issue as women with what she sees as a different and destructive view for women who have lived their life as women.

    For some years the Vagina Monologues has been considered an iconic feminist play. You recall from the article you read that Burkett is not happy that transgendered women forced the cancelation of the play because it offered an “extremely narrow perspective on what it means to be a woman,” Clearly it does since it excludes so many women who have not yet had a vagina constructed and many women, like Caitlyn, who quite enjoys her penis and has no intention of making a complete transition to what used to be considered female anatomy.

    Words have power and at one time women reclaiming the word vagina was seen as empowering. It has now become a divisive issue for men women who have no vaginas, many who instead have a very feminine penis. Women, with vaginas, feeling that abortion rights are being lost in red states are trying to fight back. When Martha Plimpton, an abortion-rights advocate, sent out a tweet about a benefit for Texas abortion funding called “A Night of a Thousand Vaginas.” she was swamped with criticism for the use of the term "vagina."

    “Abortion rights and reproductive justice is not a women’s issue,” wrote Emmett Stoffer, one of many self-described transgender persons to blog on the topic. It is “a uterus owner’s issue.” Silly feminists spending time and energy fighting an issue that isn't even about women.

    Trivial? Perhaps, but not so trivial in my opinion that there isn't grounds for push back.You don't have a problem with what I see as an intrusion by men masquerading as women diverting the aim of the feminist movement. I'm cool with that, it's not the first time we've disagreed. Experience leads me to think it won't be the last. In truth I don't have a problem either since I think these transgendered women are men. Male by biology. culturally male. Male by the life experiences that molded them. Women in the women's movement should listen to men who are transgendering into a transgendered women and consider their views. Just as they should listen to men. It's the polite thing to do and a good political strategy. But decisions made for women in the end should be made by women and a man sculpted into a likeness of a women is not a women. Of course that view isn't PC and it's hard for anyone to actualize it.

     


    by ocean-kat on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 5:21pm

    it's fine that you disagree with me.  I write opinions and I put them out there for discussion.  I don't expect everyone to take my side.  You obviously never have, and that's okay, too.  I feel strongly about what I believe and it's obvious you do, too.  But derision?  That's not my intent and I'll work at watching that in the future.

    I believe a person who outwardly appears to be a man or a woman can feel differently inside and feel it so strongly they're willing to take drastic steps to change who they are.  You don't, and you keep trying to produce evidence that you are right. When it's a difference of opinion there is no right or wrong.  I could, if I wanted to, produce a dozen articles that would refute what you're offering as an opinion.  But what's the point?

    When you say they're men masquerading as women, you've insulted the entire transgender movement.  That's not trivial.  You agree with Burkett and that's fine.  But you should know that not everybody does.  I could find many more articles from feminists upset with Burkett and disputing what she says, but why would I?  it wouldn't change your mind.  Would it?


    by Ramona on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 7:16pm

    Oh I know. I sometimes read the comments on an article and there is a large amount of disagreement on this issue. I actually expected much more push back here on a mostly liberal site since my views are not pc liberal.

    Transgenderism is a null value topic for me. Some people think they are in the wrong gender body. They're getting plastic surgery and hormones to look more like the body they want. it's none of my business. Until other people are physically attacking them and discriminating against them. Then they need protection and they get my support. But when they want to speak on women's issues and have their voices respected as women I can't support that. They can speak as much as they want about women's issues, as I can speak, as a male who lived as a man and had a lifetime of experiences of the culture treating them as a man. 


    by ocean-kat on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 8:01pm

    I guess I haven't heard many transgenders attempt to speak on women's issues.  Most of them are too busy trying to figure out where they fit in.  I want to give them that chance without judging them more harshly than I would anyone else who says something I don't happen to agree with.  They have a hard enough time without having to walk on eggs every time they open their mouths.

    Transgenders aren't any more saintly than anybody else.  They're going to piss people off.  But they shouldn't be judged by their choice of gender, as if, now that they've made the choice, our expectations of them have been raised.  Women, of all people, should be aware of the unfairness of unreasonable expectations.  We've been fighting it all our lives.


    by Ramona on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 8:27pm

    reply at bottom of page


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 1:16am

    And I felt to need to put out there

    Biologically she is a quite normal XY male.

    You're the one that brought science and genetics into it. But it seems now it's all about the cultural experience.

    And what does "quite normal" mean?


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 11:09am

    Gay men are XY. There should be no big surprise that XY includes males who view themselves as female. Sexual orientation is carried on the X chromosome and the non-sex chromosomes according the current state of knowledge. The genetics are complex. A set of male twins may have the same genetic makeup, but one can be heterosexual and the other homosexual. Being XY is just the starting point.

    http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/feb/14/genes-influence-male-sexu...


    by rmrd0000 on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 11:24am

    You're the one that brought science and genetics into it.

    No, you're the one that brought science and genetics into this discussion. In your very first post that began this thread. I simply responded to your post.

    You get to sneak around the biological issue by tossing in the "cultural level" of being a man.

    I didn't sneak around anything. I addressed both because I think it's clear that both biologically and culturally Caitlyn is a man. What's the point anyway. You have not addressed in any way any of my points. This isn't a discussion. I post, you ignore what I post. I think I've made my case pretty well. You have not offered any counter argument.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 1:44pm

    You started a whole new thread, making the XX and XY front and center.  You didn't say science is irrelevant, but critical determiner. I was stating that gender/sex is complexity. You have basically "agreed" with what I asserted in my first post, but then slide in, but it's not really true.  XY=Male, XX = Female.

    And as if I was the first person in the world to discuss science's relevance to the issue.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 7:01pm

    Oh jeezz, here is the first sentence of my first post on this thread.

    "Caitlyn is not a women. Rachel is not black. Not biologically nor culturally."

    It has always been my contention that Caitlyn is not a women for both biological reasons and cultural reasons. Did you even bother to read my posts before you replied? I gave numerous reason why I think Caitlyn is a man in this thread for both biological reasons, cultural reasons, and some of the ways biology and culture interact.

    You think biology doesn't matter. You think culture doesn't matter. You think life experiences don't matter. All that matters is what a person declares. I think all those things matter, biology, culture and life experiences. There's nothing to discuss since I fundamentally disagree with your premise, that the only thing that matters is what a person declares. There's nothing to discuss because everything I post about biology, culture, and life experience doesn't matter to you and is dismissed out of hand as irrelevant.


    by ocean-kat on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 12:20am

    In no way have I made your case:

    The experiences of her life on both a biological level and a cultural level were male. By any reasonable standard I can think of she is and has been a man.

    I've argued that one cannot really define "man" or "woman." It is a personal thing that is the result of so many variable to make a blunt statement about what a "reasonable standard" is the opposite of what I am saying, which is that having a "reasonable standard" is the problem.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 7:07pm

    "I've argued that one cannot really define "man" or "woman." It is a personal thing that is the result of so many variable "  - must be tough to find a bathroom when you need to go. Presumably your maternity ward didn't have such trouble placing you. Life ain't *that* tuff.

    Anyway, I enjoyed some of the discussion this provoked, but now we're at a level of one-with-everything can't-decide-anything mushiness that I hate, so I'll have to bow out.


    by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 1:48am

    "I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one here who has been involved in dangerous protest situations"

    Been there, done that....


    by Lurker on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 7:04pm

    Likewise.


    by Elusive Trope on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 7:07pm

    Oh, and one more thing. Biologically, in order to reproduce, the male must have sex (the activity) with a woman. The two are attracted to one another because they are biological programmed to be in order to ensure the species survives. That's how nature works. So what do we do with people who are attracted to people of the same sex?

    Are gay men not really men? Are lesbians not really women?


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:41pm

    A lot of extraneous issues here - certainly many gay men procreate children. Boys before puberty and men after fertility are still male, including testosterone levels. There are dozens of different ways males and females encounter in that "biological programming", and certainly 2015 we've got far beyond needing that programming to survive - so much so that we have mass programs to stop procreation even as attraction and sex flourish. But biologically some people are way into sex, some are turned off by it, etc.

    Then is a gay man who then gets a sex change a non-gay woman? Is that bit of surgery and hormone implants all there is to the difference? Are there quantifiable differences between a gay person and a prospective transsexual?  (i.e. I rather doubt most gay men want to stop being men).


    by PeraclesPlease on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 4:38am

    Ah, but does a straight man who becomes a woman also become gay? Or does the once-a-he who preferred sex with women become a she who prefers sex with men? Is it possible that sexual preference isn't gender specific? Is everybody really bisexual at heart?


    by barefooted on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 3:45pm

    Rachel isn't the first and won't be the last, she's just the latest anecdote. Mark Stebbins, an Oakland man who won a city council seat in a majority black area - but faced (and won) a recall when his opponent "outed" him as white - still maintains his black racial identity 30+ years later. Mark wasn't the first either.

    Far more interesting than the individual circumstances is the much broader social conundrum. Fear of diluting "purity" of race has led to some pretty horrific history, so how do we handle the idea of personal racial choice? Assuming we don't annihilate the human race, will we one day consider checking a box for "race" as antiquated and unconstitutional as one for religion or sexuality? Maybe ... but apparently not any time soon.


    by barefooted on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 2:25pm

    Agree, good points.

    This entire blog is the sort of BS that could only be on a blog.

    Who cares what a person calls themselves ethnically or sexually? What matters is how they conduct themselves and relate to others. If that part is Ok, then that is all that matters to you and people around them!

    I sincerely doubt that anyone here, if they had a neighbor, a teacher, a doctor who was an exceptional caring and  decent person, who helped out without asking, who took particular attention to your kids or your educational needs or was a caring and very competent physician, that anyone here would one day and say to them , face to face, something like:

    "Well, you did a great job educating my kid, curing my sickness or helping me out when the storm wrecked my house, but I don't think you are who you think you are (black/white/woman etc)".

    You wouldn't give a crap what sex or race they thought they were, because it makes no difference. What counts in this world is how they have treated you, how they do their job, what good they do for others.  That Daggers, is all that counts in life.


    by NCD on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:32pm

    I think that an initial reaction to finding out the black activist you told about race-based harassment in the past was actually white, would be a sense of betrayal. You confided things on the basis of trust. The trust was one way. The black activist you sought out was actually white. White is not the problem. The person you confided in lied to you. The organization hosting the activist is ridiculed for being duped. After reflecting individuals and the organization may decide to support the activist ( as the local and national NAACP did). The initial reaction might reflect hurt. For those who are not members of the local NAACP, your first introduction to the activist is as a liar. Things go downhill from there. One would expect a lot of negative response nationally.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Wed, 06/17/2015 - 5:54pm

    I yield to Tom Toles above, does it really make a difference if a person is really( ------fill in---) or not if they were harassed?

    Of course if you file false reports of harassment you should be penalized for it. But otherwise who cares what ethnicity someone thinks they are?


    by NCD on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 12:28am

    Maria von Trapp would sort this shit out.


    by Q (not verified) on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 6:30pm

    OH YEAH?

     


    by Richard Day on Thu, 06/18/2015 - 6:34pm

    That's Julie Andrews - the real one was tough as nails, like a drill sergeant. Yodelay-yodelay with fatigues and 60-pound rucksacks up and over the Alps. Kids today.... pups.


    by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 1:50am

    Well fine.

    hahahahahah

    CLIMB EVERY MOUNTAIN!

    I just came to the conclusion as an old man, that this is one of the funniest stupid songs I have ever heard.

    hahahhaah

    There is other history here that I have no time to get into, I entered Richfield MN elementary school when I was 8? and there on the walls were representations of these Austrian children.

    That is it.

    hahahha


    by Richard Day on Fri, 06/19/2015 - 11:59pm

    Well perhaps you've missed it. I've seen many articles over the last dozen or so years  about transgender activism written by feminists who were unhappy at what they felt was a forced inclusion by transgendered into women spaces. It's not a strong interest and I don't look for the articles. But I read enough that I see a few a year. A good portion of Burkett's article addressed the issue which is why I said, agree or disagree, you should know her reasoning because she clearly stated how she felt transgenderism was hurting the women's movement. There was quite a controversy about transgendered women wanting access to Women's colleges like Holyoak. This is the last year for the 40 year old annual Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. 

    Transgender activists have a term for feminists that want to maintain women's spaces for women. TERF, trans-exclusionary radical feminists. Many transgendered women celebrated when they shut down the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival claiming they had finally ended the last terf safe space in America.

    Keep in mind that these were mostly physically intact men as most transgendered women don't make the final cut to become women. These men celebrated when they shut down a women's space. Perhaps transgendered women have finally proved Freud right, all women do want a penis since most of the women who have one don't chose to give it up when they make their biological transition to female.

    It's not my decision to make, women get to decide. But I support the women who feel they want and have a right to Women's colleges with women who were born women and lived their life as a women. They have a right to exclude men and men who feel like women in their brain. I support the women who feel they want to have private spaces and festivals without including men and men who really really feel like a women. The transgendered women will not allow this. This type of transgendered activism is the problem and why I say they are not women.

    edit: I did a quick search and found a wiki page about the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival and transgenderism.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Womyn%27s_Music_Festival_and_tran...


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 2:09am

    Your argument isn't made any clearer by picking and choosing incidences that involved transgenders.  There are militant people in every movement and they make it bad for the rest.  I was around for every moment of the Women's Liberation Movement and I can tell you there were times when I was ashamed of what they were doing in the name of so-called justice for women.  They made plenty of mistakes and it hurt them.  There was a schism in the movement and it set them back until they finally came to terms with the real issues and worked to bring dignity and parity to the workplace, worked to bring attention to families and child care and poverty, worked to legitimize pro-choice.  They went from militantly excluding men to accepting that men can be feminists, too.  They eventually moved away from their legitimate but blind anger, and when they did that it changed everything.

    I'm seeing that same militant huffiness again, and the article we're discussing brought it all back.  If a transgender group broke up the Michigan music festival, that's obviously wrong.  It doesn't help their cause one bit.  But why condemn every transgender, including Caitlyn Jenner, who had nothing to do with it and shows no signs of militancy?

    It would be more honest to just say there shouldn't be such a thing as transgenderism, but Burkett can't quite go there completely.  She attacks throughout her entire article and then at the end pays puny lip service to the idea.  It's okay, evidently, if those people just keep quiet and don't bring attention to themselves.  I remember when the same kinds of attacks were made against feminists.  Apparently, Burkett doesn't.

     


    by Ramona on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 8:54am

    It would be more honest to just say there shouldn't be such a thing as transgenderism, but Burkett can't quite go there completely. 

    It wouldn't be more honest, it would be a lie. Both Burkett and I think transgenderism is fine and they should be free to live their life without fear of attacks and discrimination. Caitlyn talked about how she wants to wear nail polish until it chips instead of only in private around the house. Great. She wants to wear clothing that is stereotypical female. Fantastic. As Burkett said, "Men are, comparatively speaking, more bound, even strangled, by gender stereotyping." It would be great to broaden the behavior options for men, as women have broadened theirs. If some men want to increase the size of their breasts go ahead. Just as a women can get breast enlargement plastic surgery so can you. You have the right to do all those things and walk the streets free from harassment. You get to go into restaurants and stores wearing "women's: clothing, high heels if you want, with your hair done in some "feminine" arrangement and rent an apartment free from harassment and discrimination. I'll support you in all of that.

    What you don't get is to tell women who were born women what words they can use to refer to their female anatomy. You don't get to shut down feminist plays like the Vagina Monologues because you think "vagina" is exclusionary since you are a women and you don't have a vagina, you are a women with a penis. You don't get to decide for women and women's groups and feminist groups what women's issues are and how women should speak about them. You don't get to define what a women is and what a women thinks. You don't get to go to a women's college and you don't get to force your way into spaces set aside for women.

    If that's seen as condemnation so be it. You say Caitlyn hasn't done any of that but again, for Burkett and me, it's not about Caitlyn. She is just a famous person elevated by the media that sparked a discussion. You say, "I guess I haven't heard many transgenders attempt to speak on women's issues." Well then, you should educate yourself on the issue before you spout off because there are numerous examples of what Burkett and many other women see as extreme transgender activism out there. There are many feminists, not just Burkett, that are unhappy about it.


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 2:18pm

    And there are many feminists who aren't happy with Burkett and those who follow her line of thinking.  They're out there in droves and they've made it known. You act as though she's the be-all and end-all of feminism.  She isn't.  Neither am I.  Neither are you.

    You use this as your argument:

    What you don't get is to tell women who were born women what words they can use to refer to their female anatomy. You don't get to shut down feminist plays like the Vagina Monologues because you think "vagina" is exclusionary since you are a women and you don't have a vagina, you are a women with a penis. You don't get to decide for women and women's groups and feminist groups what women's issues are and how women should speak about them. You don't get to define what a women is and what a women thinks. You don't get to go to a women's college and you don't get to force your way into spaces set aside for women.

    How many actually do this?  Not many.  Not enough to cause this kind of outrage.  So what else is going on here?  Why so many comments saying the same thing over and over?  You say you and Burkett aren't against transgenders yet you use language that diminishes them, you cite examples that affect only a tiny portion of the transgender population and you tell me I'm "spouting off" if I dare to disagree with you.

    I'm on to another subject now.  You're on your own here.

     


    by Ramona on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 5:42pm

    How many actually do this?  Not many. 

    And you know this because you've never even heard about the huge controversy over more than  a dozen years over a music festival held in the state you live in. That's the kind of informed analysis I can trust.

    Why so many comments saying the same thing over and over? 

    Because people keep commenting to me. Why is it ok for Troup to comment to me but wrong for me to comment to him. It was a back and forth with each making about the same number of comments. And I deliberately gave him the last word. Why are we talking? Because twice you initiated dialog with me. I dropped out of one sub=thread with you and let you have the last word and you started it up with me again in another sub-thread. When I reply to you there's something nefarious about it, when you initiate dialog with me and reply to my comments it's what?


    by ocean-kat on Sat, 06/20/2015 - 7:48pm

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