The Right to Have an Exclusionary Identity

[Purple Knight]

Question for Debate: Is it immoral to have an exclusionary identity?

Let's start with the premise that woman and man are (at least primarily) self-labeling identities which people should have a right to choose for themselves.

We've now established that people may self-identify.

Now, can I have an identity that is gatekept, either by myself or someone else? Is that permissible?

At first glance it seems mean to be so exclusionary, but the fact that Suzie is allowed to gatekeep the group identity of "people who are friends of Suzie" and this is accepted as valid by our entire social consciousness, suggests that yes, people may have exclusionary identities that are gatekept, either by themselves or others.

This may be confusing because words are not anyone's personal property and although I may identify as a gorp, and I may define that to exclude others, I can't stop someone else from identifying as a gorp and having it mean something completely different. But if I define gorp as "member of a group of people Purple Knight believes are gods" then as far as this describes my identity, it is just as wrong to impose on me to force me to acknowledge someone else as a gorp, as it is to force Suzie to acknowledge someone she does not like as a member of the group of people Suzie considers to be friends.

In other words, I can identify as a bat, and you can't stop me, but as far as other bats, if their identity includes themselves and not me, this isn't wrong either. I can't force other bats to accept me as a bat, because when they define that identity, for them, it means what they want it to mean and not what I want it to mean, and they can, if they wish, define it to exclude me. I'm still a bat as far as I'm concerned, but I can't force them to call me a bat as far as they're concerned. If I could, that would be trampling their identity.

So far so good?

If so, a group of people born with vaginas may call themselves women and define it to exclude other women. I don't see this as any more wrong for them to gatekeep that identity as far as they're concerned than it is for Suzie to gatekeep the group "friends of Suzie" as far as Suzie is concerned.

This does not mean policy should be written to placate Suzie and disqualify people who are not her friends from competing against those who are to earn real rewards like scholarships. Policy should be fair to all and should not concern itself with what Suzie wants or who she acknowledges.

This only means that Suzie has a right to say who the friends of Suzie are. And if she wishes her friends to be only those who were born with vaginas, and she wishes to call that group "women" then she can. It's only as far as she's concerned and it has no bearing on anyone else's identity or how policy should treat them.

[Purple Knight]

The only reason I accept a trans woman being defined as a woman is based on science. I wouldn't be okay with the self-identification you are describing if or when it's random, leads to confusion (also refer to Diogenes's post), or if it goes against logic and science.

This isn't really a matter of science though; it is one of simple definition. Should the term woman be more or less synonymous with biological woman, or should it describe whatever scientific accuracy you're referencing?

I'll just grant for the purposes of this discussion that "the science" doesn't simply follow the politics, as it has proven to do in the past. If trans women have fully female brains, so what? The detractors were never talking about whether they had any solid scientific basis to identify that way or not. The detractors have always used the word woman to mean biological woman and they don't see why they should change their usage of words because someone is upset.

If a BMI of over 16 on a woman is what I call fat, then it's what I call fat. It's not clinically overweight and I never said it was. If someone with a 20 BMI starts insisting I say they're not fat, do I have to? The science says they're within a healthy weight. I don't dispute that. I think they're fat.

How can there be clear science that calls it wrong to use an unscientific term in a particular way?

[boatsnguitars]

The only reason I accept a trans woman being defined as a woman is based on science. I wouldn't be okay with the self-identification you are describing if or when it's random, leads to confusion (also refer to Diogenes's post), or if it goes against logic and science.

This isn't really a matter of science though; it is one of simple definition. Should the term woman be more or less synonymous with biological woman, or should it describe whatever scientific accuracy you're referencing?

I'll just grant for the purposes of this discussion that "the science" doesn't simply follow the politics, as it has proven to do in the past. If trans women have fully female brains, so what? The detractors were never talking about whether they had any solid scientific basis to identify that way or not. The detractors have always used the word woman to mean biological woman and they don't see why they should change their usage of words because someone is upset.

If a BMI of over 16 on a woman is what I call fat, then it's what I call fat. It's not clinically overweight and I never said it was. If someone with a 20 BMI starts insisting I say they're not fat, do I have to? The science says they're within a healthy weight. I don't dispute that. I think they're fat.

How can there be clear science that calls it wrong to use an unscientific term in a particular way?

I think there is something to this. Really we are talking about labels for the sake of making rules for people. Traditionally (before sex changes, etc.) it was easy to categorize people in different camps: "You, sir, can be a doctor, lawyer, or architect and you, little missy, can be a nurse, secretary or teacher."

If we fast-forward 100 years, imagine each person is given a full dna analysis that doesn't define whether they are a "man or woman" but the whole concept is out dated. You have a height, weight, genetic profile, one particular stat may be that you are unable to bear children at all, another might be that you can procreate at all, another might be your muscle mass, etc. To the world you are "a person" - not defined as male or female - but given some long list of stats that, then, each sport says: "People with x muscle:weight ratio may run in this race."

The cool thing about it is that you might get much more balanced since you'd pool all the similar body types and attributes into one competition. For example, instead of some kid dominating High School sports, he'd have to compete against similarly gifted people. Meanwhile, all the 5'6" 120lbs people would have a place to test themselves against people like them.

I'm not saying it's easy, right or the answer, I'm just proposing that we are probably looking at this in terms of traditional roles and not how we could. Imagine soccer was divided by height, weight, muscle mass, etc? Or football? Or rugby? Etc?

Again, it wouldn't stop people from forming other rules for other sports or mixing body types (like American football). Just food for thought. We won't see the change in our lifetimes, so it's all academic.

[AgnosticBoy]

Of course, a trans woman is not a biological woman. But I think in this case, there's no harm in adding to the definition of women. I only say this because of the trend of medical research as opposed to just to simple choosing of what to identify as.

From a scientific perspective, what has medical research established that is contrary to the distinction between males and females, men and women, based on biology? The so-called trend you mention is the outcome of the aggressive and oppressive way in which transgender ideology is being being imposed on people. There is no need to add to the definition of woman. The majority of the world has no problem with the established definition. If something is needed, it is a new word for biological men who are expressing themselves as women.

Oppressive? Well I'll give you this. It does seem that all or most people that question the transgender ideology tend to be demonized or called bigot. In some cases, I think that is warranted, but in other cases, it is being used to silence opponents. In the latter case, it puts such ideologies in a place to where they can't be questioned.

I stand with you when it comes to being able to question it, as I don't think ANy ideology, science or whatever it may be, should be viewed as unquestionable. But to not be naive, I'm also on the lookout for those that only have all negatives to say, or their questioning is always negative, like questioning if it will lead to confused and valueless society or something always like this (not to say it should always be on positive things either).

I think all of our problems on bigotry could be solved if we just focus on being open-minded, rather than just teaching everyone about individual lifestyles.

[Purple Knight]

I think there is something to this. Really we are talking about labels for the sake of making rules for people. Traditionally (before sex changes, etc.) it was easy to categorize people in different camps: "You, sir, can be a doctor, lawyer, or architect and you, little missy, can be a nurse, secretary or teacher."

If we fast-forward 100 years, imagine each person is given a full dna analysis that doesn't define whether they are a "man or woman" but the whole concept is out dated. You have a height, weight, genetic profile, one particular stat may be that you can bear children, another might be that you can procreate at all, another might be your muscle mass, etc. To the world you are "a person" - not defined as male or female - but given some long list of stats that, then, each sport says: "People with x muscle:weight ratio may run in this race."

The cool thing about it is that you might get much more balanced since you'd pool all the similar body types and attributes into one competition. For example, instead of some kid dominating High School sports, he'd have to compete against similarly gifted people. Meanwhile, all the 5'6" 120lbs people would have a place to test themselves against people like them.

I think the goal should be that people allowed to compete against one another should be similar enough in ability that effort and training would make the difference. This is giving the People what they say they want: A fair game. If they balk at this, it'll just prove they're all self-deluded Nazis at heart, and the only reason they want a category for females is that it tests genetic fitness and it's a breeding thing, so that's the only distinction they would want to draw.

But if, instead, they start to understand that for every female athlete pushed into obsolescence by a trans woman, there are hundreds of thousands of female athletes who couldn't play because of their female betters, and that's just as unfair, well then, the detractors were never worthy of ridicule, and it may have just been a spotlight issue, because they never saw all the people who couldn't play simply because they weren't naturally gifted.

Keep a close eye on who actually wants a genderless world, where everyone is just a person. Some trans women don't want that; they want lower car insurance rates, to win overwhelmingly at sports, or to exit an unprotected class and enter a protected one. This is why we never hear about trans men. Trans men don't cause trouble because every last one of them is just genuinely following their heart, not grubbing for privilege. The vast majority of trans women are like this too, but you get one unscrupulous person who's out to hoover up privilege and use it to dominate people, and they can ruin it for everyone else. Fake trans women generate transphobia.

I've definitely had the thought that there is trans privilege, and it's riding on the backs of everyone who just follows their assigned gender role and doesn't make trouble. If the vast majority of people just discarded the idea that people should behave a certain way because of their genitals, everyone would just be people and that would be the end of it. The bits you have would be irrelevant, and a penis you don't want would have no excuse to bother you more than an unsightly mole on your face. I've thought, "Why do you get to be protected? Why are you special? Well, you wouldn't be if there weren't gender roles for you to flout. He'd do him, she'd do her, you'd just do you, and there wouldn't even be a word for it, let alone special legal protections for nonconformists."

Again, it wouldn't stop people from forming other rules for other sports or mixing body types (like American football). Just food for thought. We won't see the change in our lifetimes, so it's all academic.

I do have hope that this trans fad brings this issue to light and we either become Moclans, or start genetically engineering ourselves so we all have maximum genetic advantage, or we at very least understand that sports was never fair and take a few token steps to correct that. There are weight classes in boxing. If people can understand, oh, that makes it more fair, they should be able to understand the logical conclusion of biological males playing against biological females is not separating people by genitalia, but by genetic advantage.

[LittleNipper]

I believe everyone should be treated equally; however, that would end special protection and special groups. Equal mean equal not selectively protected.

[Purple Knight]

I believe everyone should be treated equally; however, that would end special protection and special groups. Equal mean equal not selectively protected.

That's my goal too. Instead of crying about how certain groups are oppressed, and taking measures to make up for that, how about pointing to the oppression and making it illegal? I don't care if it's a million small things that add up. Start with 1. Make that thing illegal. If you have the power to make up for oppression, you have the power to criminalise the oppression.

Here's the 1 thing: Make the hiring process public. Let everyone see what candidates you got, and what credentials they have. Let everyone see why you chose a particular one. You're not getting away with it if you got 30 Black candidates with better credentials and you hired the white guy because "personality" and "he fits with our company culture" - that will show for exactly what it is. And if everyone somehow gets away with it, make it illegal. The best qualified candidate gets the job, by law. This should already be the law anyway in a world where work is our lives and we want equality.

[brunumb]

You're not getting away with it if you got 30 Black candidates with better credentials and you hired the white guy because "personality" and "he fits with our company culture" - that will show for exactly what it is. And if everyone somehow gets away with it, make it illegal. The best qualified candidate gets the job, by law.

But if you've got 30 black candidates and you hire the one white guy because he had the best credentials, you know exactly what the reaction will be. You can't legislate to mitigate against human nature.

[Purple Knight]

You're not getting away with it if you got 30 Black candidates with better credentials and you hired the white guy because "personality" and "he fits with our company culture" - that will show for exactly what it is. And if everyone somehow gets away with it, make it illegal. The best qualified candidate gets the job, by law.

But if you've got 30 black candidates and you hire the one white guy because he had the best credentials, you know exactly what the reaction will be. You can't legislate to mitigate against human nature.

If that happens, we have to go from there. Why do the 30 Black candidates not have the credentials? Are they not getting access to education? Well then, provide it. Address each injustice. Make people point to it, not talk about "a million small things" and not mention one.

If we attain a society where you do X, you get Y, nobody will be allowed to complain anymore. This is against human nature but it's the next level of society and will make everyone better off. The problem is, we have a society of smell wolves deciding that the wolves with the best smells belong at the top, and it comes to hideous light when that also results in discrimination. And why would you listen to somebody saying oh, you didn't do X so you didn't get Y? I wouldn't, because I know the guy with Y did not do X. In fact, he dropped out of high school half the time.

So make the hiring process open. Force them to hire on a solid basis and declare their criteria as they open a position. Don't let people lie on applications. Don't let people put charismatic rubbish: Just their objective credentials. Will this stop discrimination? No. But this is not one of those infinite first steps - this is actually progress. You want less oppression? Point to it and it gets gone.

In the meantime people can be happy because the hiring process became transparent and the kind of discrimination they said was rampant, is now gone. If we do it one thing at a time, we can catch the cockroaches and kill them. I'm sick of living in a roach-infested house with racists and anti-racists alike trying to protect the roaches. We're living in this weird Hellish equilibrium of everyone intentionally safeguarding bad behaviour they know is there, where white people think they won't get hired without privilege, so they're trying to protect it, and Black people think that if they let me lift up the fridge and kill the #@&&@(*)& roaches, they will lose their special catchup goodies they get from everyone acknowledging the roaches exist, and that they will be the ones who die off.

I'm the only one who just wants to live in a clean house.

[brunumb]

If that happens, we have to go from there. Why do the 30 Black candidates not have the credentials?

That's another issue. Even when it is obvious that the hiring of the white guy over 30 black guys is legitimate, there will always be those who will only see the situation through their own distorted lens of bias, discrimination or whatever. I don't believe there is anything you can do to overcome that. Even when we provide the necessary resources and pathways for everyone to have an opportunity to succeed, there are those who prefer to choose 'easier' paths in life that ultimately lead nowhere. It's just human nature.

[brunumb]

If we attain a society where you do X, you get Y, nobody will be allowed to complain anymore. This is against human nature but it's the next level of society and will make everyone better off.

You are going to prevent people from complaining? Not a hope in hell. You are proposing a society where everyone is in step and toes the party line. I don't believe it is remotely possible and it certainly would not result in everyone being better off. Maybe when we are replaced with emotionless AI that will be the case.