Blog
Can an identity be true and not true?
On ‘constitutive tension’ in our concepts. Picking apart someone else’s identity? First ask: Why do you want to? What would be gained? And lost? What happens to your own identity in the process?
Gödel is sure Bach, and trans people are sure their gender
Reflections on the Pulitzer-winning ‘Gödel, Escher, Bach’ (1979). Their objection is an infinite regress. They’re laying a trap. If we needed rules about rules about rules, none of us could ever use language at all.
How do we know who we are?
Do we learn it from a crystal ball—or from our guts? How do others state with certainty that they know who they are? Do they have a crystal ball? Of course, we’re jealous. How can we know ourselves, too?
‘We are in trouble,’ but not for the reason you think
Douglas Murray defends prejudice in ‘The Madness of Crowds’. If he were inclined to support trans people, he wouldn’t find basic affirmation ‘the hardest part.’ He wouldn’t say we need to argue more.
If we have a fundamental moral disagreement, why are we still talking?
Holly Lawford-Smith shows up for the self-appointed ‘heterodoxy’ at Colorado State University. The Heterodox Academy supports ‘gender-critical feminism,’ whose entire purpose is to exclude trans women and misrepresent trans men.
Barnes: ‘Just think why’ some don’t want their marriage to turn gay!
Journalist Hannah Barnes gets in a dig against same-sex marriage. Why does it matter whether one spouse’s gender change happens before or after the couple’s legal split? This anti-trans article is homophobic.
Books like this cause ‘Irreversible Damage’
Even if you see through it, it wastes your time. What definition of “traditional gender dysphoria” is invoked here? It’s politicized misinformation about transgender identity, using kids as a punching bag.
On Kathleen Stock’s ‘Material Girls’
My reality matters too. She claimed to ‘enthusiastically support’ protecting ‘trans people against violence,’ yet she wants to funnel us into a transgender bathroom.
Helen Joyce’s anti-trans messaging is predictable
She was interviewed by Jay Fantom on ‘The Story Box’ podcast. Every Helen Joyce interview has this basic content. This one’s from 2023. She works from her principle that cis people’s feelings matter most.