Cursiter, Stanley; House of Cards; Orkney Islands Council; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/house-of-cards-167457
Coming out of the Irish government this week is a truly helpful definition of “gender”. So for all you folks out there who think gender is nonsense – educate yourselves and learn.
It’s from the CRIMINAL JUSTICE (INCITEMENT TO VIOLENCE OR HATRED AND HATE OFFENCES) BILL 2022. So now you know. Clear as a peat bog in an Irish mist.
If you intend to read this post then it might be best to understand that the statements on the left reflect my thinking on the ideological battle currently threatening our collective grasp on reason and reality.
We are in the grip of a regressive movement that reinforces conformity to sexist stereotypes, reinvigorates virulent homophobia and misogyny, and threatens the gains of the women’s and gay rights struggles.
Gender identity theory is a house of cards. How soon it will collapse is anyone’s guess but – for the sake of those it endangers – the sooner the better.
Pity the poor kids growing up today and confronted by this ideology – this post-modernist virus that leaked out from the ivory towers of academe to infect the rest of us.
Pity the poor gender non-conforming child playing with the “wrong toys” who is now in danger of being put on an irrevocable path – the pipeline from BigPharma puberty blockers to the ForeverPharma of lifetime medical treatments.
Pity the poor teenager doing the work of adolescence, mourning childhood, and trying to figure themselves out. Life used to be easier, the choices for cultural identity so much simpler.
It used to be that you displayed your identity by your style – the clothes your wore, the music you listened to, the cut of your hair.
Here’s a few of those old-timey possibilities as you struggled through the teen years. You could be a
Beatnik – hang around in a coffee bar, listen to be-bop, play the bongos, roll your own cigs, wear a beret and take a serious interest in free verse
Mod– dress sharp, spend your money on high street fashion, listen to the Small Faces and the Who, put on a parka, hang a furry tail from the back of your Vespa or Lambretta (argue about which), pop a purple heart and head to a faded seaside resort for a Bank Holiday rumble with a
Rocker – let your hair get greasy, listen to loud rock, scruff up a black leather jacket, put a down payment on a motorbike, strike a defiant pose, and score some dexies
Skinhead – shave your head, get a button-down Ben Sherman shirt, a Crombie coat, some Doc Martins bovver boots and choose between being neo-Nazi yahoo or an ant-racist rude-boy, reggae fan
Punk – stick a safety pin in your eyebrow, a stud on your tongue, thumb your nose at the pop and rock establishment sell-outs, put on a bin liner, strum a few chords, dye your mohawk crimson and work on being as offensive as possible.
Goth – gender-bend to your heart’s content in leather and lace, plaster on the dark eyeliner and nail polish, dye everything black and nod along with Joy Division.
This of course is not to mention all the other sub-cultures, crowds, gangs, and cliques that have morphed and proliferated since teenagers were invented from Teds and greasers to folkies, hipsters, hippies, emos, jocks, preppies, geeks, nerds, and all the rest.
These days kids have to contend with figuring out their gender identity and that is no simple task. Ask google how many they have to pick from and a raft of sites from serious to semi-respectable to farcical will give you the latest. Everything from 7 to 72 and 129 – so many to choose from.
Lucky for the bewildered teen, serious college resource pages will explain it all to you along with an explanation of the jargon and how to be supported on your gender journey.
Here are a few of the currently available genders. I only made up ten of them. The others are legit gender options for those on their gender quest.
Can you guess which ones I invented?
Can’t find the one for you? Never fear. There are plenty more!
The featured image is: House of Cards by Stanley Cursiter (1887–1976) Orkney Museum
In her hand is a fan, one flick of her wrist and the house of cards could all come tumbling down.
This conversation piece shows the Japanese influence of the Aesthetic Movement. All things Japanese were very popular in Scotland in the early part of the twentieth century. A conversation piece typically shows a portrait group in a domestic or landscape setting, engaged in conversation or social activity of a peaceful nature. The viewer comes across the scene at a point of psychological tension where the last card is to be placed on the house of cards being carefully built by the woman in the foreground. Will it all fall down? The other woman sits quietly watching. In her hand is a fan, one flick of her wrist and the house of cards could all come tumbling down.
https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/house-of-cards-167457
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They are seem invented to me. Each one more ridiculous than the one before. Have we all lost our minds to even contemplate this nonsense.
But as always - follow the money. There's a whole lot of it to be made selling unnecessary surgeries and creating life-long medical patients. not to mention all the new markets for cosmetics.
Got to get you wondering whether genderism is actually a capitalist plot!
A late-stage capitalist plot before the coming of the end times?
Or he dying gasps of colonial white imperialist heteronormative hegemony?
Perhaps the rapid onset of the phenomenological ideology of lived experience induced by literal violence.
This ideology is setting back all the progress we thought we had made.
Sigh! And the lies. The constant lies.
I really feel for kids these days. They are being sold something that is not in their best interests.
Kids have always been confused. We need to give them time to sort it out not drugs to turn them into patients for life!
If anyone reading this cares I beg you to check the facts on any of this. It is a House of Lies.and kids are paying the price and will be for the rest of their lives. this is a tragedy.
How is it that so many schools and institutions have bought into this utter nonsense. I know money talks - but ...surely there is integrity too?
Such a good Post. Thank you.
Gwen.
Its all about people with power and money making more. Its called product differentiation….creating a demand because most people want to conform. I mean some women have been led to believe that hobbling around in high heels is attractive and so desirable. Despite the damage to their body and alreadt thin self esteem they ‘willingly’ spend and harm themselves..and all those who don't. Look at that and you see how it undermines all rational thought if people are made to feel socially and psychologically insecure. Gender fluidity mantra when examined that way support men, money and division. Iwoukd write more but index going numb,,,
Sums it up!
Its quite the opposite of what it presents itself to be…inclusive sensitive blah blah…its the ultimate con trick.(finger revived a bit).
The destruction of language is a whole other aspect. And yes - it is the opposite of "inclusive". And makes a mockery of "diversity". "gender affirming" means supporting locking-in delusions to the exclusion of all other health issues. Supportive exploratory care is called "conversion" and so on through a whole long list of words with the meanings turned upside down. Well - when you start with lies then that is probably what has to happen to keep the whole house of cards from collapsing. It has some powerful props in BigGender and BigPharma with a heavy dose of patriarchal misogyny and homophobia but it is still hollow and rotten to the core.
A woman after my own heart. I don't care how a person wishes to identity or what label they attach to themselves, there are only two sexes. We women must be allowed to retain our single-sex spaces and sports, and that means excluding men who self-identify as women. The utter nonsense being taught in universities now about sex and gender, which has no relation at all to the real material world, is now seeping into all our policies via the students who graduate with a degree in this bollocks. They then get jobs in government, or corporations which go along with it to virtue-signal their woke credentials for the 'progressive' brownie points it gives them. As you can tell, I'm fired up about this :-)
I am the co-spokeswoman for Speak Up for Women New Zealand, and I and the other spokeswoman, Suzanne, will be recording a podcast tomorrow with some American women on their YouTube channel called An American Conversation Podcast. We'll just be chatting about the state of things around gender-identity ideology in both our countries. Check it out, if it appeals to you :-)
Thanks. "Speak-Up" and the podcast sound interesting. Will follow up with that. Thanks for the comment and the head-up info.
I believe people can feel uncomfortable with "assigned" gender--after all there are many people's genetics that aren't exactly clear--and that gender can be part of your identity, just like nationality if that's important to you--but to make it your entire identity seems in a way to belittle yourself. Gender fluidity has been around as long as humans have. As my daughter said when required to sign her work emails with her gender identity--"I worked hard not to be judged in a certain way because I am female". Would you require everyone to not only put she/her by their name but add their race and religion? Their age? It's the same thing. Just a new way to discriminate.
Interesting discussion, and I enjoyed the categories! However, I refuse to get involved in any online discussions about gender, intersex, asexuality, trans politics and so on, on the basis that I don't know enough about it – I almost can't even joke about it because of my ignorance.
My position is that how a person sees themself is up to them, and that it's none of my business. Sure, I may at times feel uncomfortable with how that individual may express themself in dress, behaviour or whatever, but the bottom line is, is that individual a nice person? Are they respectful, generally tolerant, lacking belligerence, compassionate, willing to engage positively? If so, how they dress, how they wish to be addressed, is worth acceptance providing they accept me as I am.
I know of the biological and social roots of the fear of difference that lies behind much of the intolerance and expression of hate; I also know that my apprehensions have changed over the years for many reasons. But I believe that compassion, respect and humanity are at the heart of being the human I am and would like to be.
Very reasonable comments Chris. Most people are very happy to have a live and let-live attitude toward all kinds of human expression. Prejudice still exists of course but marriage equality evened the field when it came to some basic human rights.
The trouble starts when rights are asserted that are in direct conflict with the established rights of others. A simple example here would be participation in sports and the undeniable advantages of male puberty in developing male strength, speed, and stamina. A male will have a built-in advantage in any sport that calls for those strengths, rendering the competition unfair. If men can be declared women, what happen's to the same-sex rights of, and protections for, women?
A second problem resides with what is happening with children and young people some of whom are being told they must be born into the wrong body - that they are really the opposite sex - because they have a predilection for the clothes and toy and activity choices stereotypically associated with the opposite sex. For example, the girl who hates to wear dresses and plays with soldiers and trucks and builds dens, and generally runs about. Or the boy who loves fairy tales and wants to learn ballet and play with dolls. Sometimes these children grow up to be gay. Sometimes they don't. But none of them are in the wrong body. For a while there we became a little more accepting of the diversity of not conforming to sexist stereotypes. Let kids be kids and let them grow up as they are. But with gender ideology that understanding and tolerance is gone. And out of that has developed what is very clearly a dangerous pathway for children. This is why the interim Cass Report is so important. It lays out the facts based on serious research. https://cass.independent-review.uk/publications/interim-report/ It also presents a way forward. What is happening to too many children right now is nothing short of scandalous medical malpractice.
Like Chris, I believe that it's important that children experiencing gender dysphoria are given acceptance. Their lives are difficult enough already. Josie, you're quite right that many, many young people feel uncomfortable in their assigned gender at one time or another and push the boundaries of rigid definitions. But the data show clearly these feelings are extreme and persistent in only a tiny percentage of them--0.6 to 1.4 percent. These young people, among whom the suicide rate is very high, desperately need the support and understanding of the adults in their lives.
It's true that the number of teens self-defining as transgender has risen in recent years. There are a number of theories as to why this is, but they remain theories. It seems to me that too much pushback from older adults may have the opposite effect on young people, only hardening their positions. Puberty blockers are temporary and reversible, allowing for the young people to change their minds. There are also criteria that must be met beforehand, including a long and persistent gender dysphoria and parental consent. But not enough is known about their longterm effects. And from what I've read about the Cass Review in the UK, among other things it does take to task the dominant "affirmative approach" to children experiencing gender dysphoria, saying that other causes are not fully explored. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/20/observer-view-cass-review-gender-identity-services-young-people. I agree with you that such powerful drugs should not be administered lightly.
Transgender surgeries are much more complicated, of course, but they are also very uncommon (not to mention expensive). From what I've read, about 9,000 of these surgeries are performed in the U.S. annually; but 90% of people who identify as transgender make the transition without surgery.
As for the fear of transgender girls competing unfairly with cisgender girls, this 2021 article in Scientific American argues that "there is no epidemic of transgender girls dominating female sports" and that the harm to the transgender girls if forced to play on boys' teams would be far greater. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trans-girls-belong-on-girls-sports-teams/.
Sorry that this is so long. I am a recently retired educator (as are you, I think), and I have experienced the greater visibility of transgender and nonbinary teenagers in my classes. I have had a harder time with this phenomenon than the student body, who, in general are much more accepting of this form of difference than are their elders.
Sorry, I got on some kind of hobbyhorse there and it rayher ran away with me!
You're absolutely right about gender ideology and the extremes some people go to protect their perceived rights. And of course sport has brought out all kinds of problems and anomalies. Definitely ongoing scientific research has a crucial part to play in what could so easily become (if it hasn't already) a messy and emotionally charged tribal war in which more heat than light will be discharged.
Thanks for the link, I'll have a look at that presently.
"Gravygender"! This one is definitely me. Also, I think I may be on the honeygender spectrum - I'm a devil with it on my toast in the morning. 🐝
What in the world has happened to common sense and why has it been lost over understanding the definition of words that are straightforward? And no, I can't pick out your ten, I swear I've come across all of them on Twitter...
Hmm. I take note of your bigotry as I consider my measured response. Meanwhile, your literal violence is duly noted. Stunning and brave it is not.
Now I see what my problem has been. I am Jamigender. Where do I go for the gender change?
Well - It's fluid. So wash out your jar first and then consider your options.
Please let me know if you are in need of further support on your journey.
Meanwhile please know that the allegations about catgender in schools and litterboxes are grossly exaggerated.
Although it is true that the university of Bristol (UK)) did recognize that catgender people may use nya/nyan pronouns" (meaning 'meow' in Japanese)
I believe they have now removed this from their website.
(This is an example of academifluid: The total capture of otherwise sane people and respected institutions by the bonkerdom of gender ideology.)
This is all so crazy.
Out of nowhere comes this ideology that sterilizes kids.
WTAF is this all about?