tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post4730949916959451469..comments2024-03-28T10:40:24.166-05:00Comments on Althouse: "[W]hat we really take issue with is that some of the behaviors she thinks are 'what it means to be a woman' are offensive, such as constantly apologizing for her appearance..."Ann Althousehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01630636239933008807noreply@blogger.comBlogger34125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-61231387240787300532016-08-07T23:20:59.721-05:002016-08-07T23:20:59.721-05:00Yes, I believe that what Wesley called 'Almost...Yes, I believe that what Wesley called 'Almost a Christian' can apply equally as 'Almost a Woman'. Posing isn't being. Therein lies the problem with the transgender issue, IMO.mockturtlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10507310332014103437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-36061674314456996272016-08-07T19:37:06.951-05:002016-08-07T19:37:06.951-05:00Mockturtle, your comment on grace did get me think...Mockturtle, your comment on grace did get me thinking how it is a fitting analogy. A person cannot earn the grace to be a woman. They are given this grace. But a good many can try to pose as a woman, trying to earn it or mimic what they think it is like. <br /><br />Maybe double predestination has a place in gender discussions. One or the other, without choice of being (coram deo) but still choice of living it out (coram hominibus). But of course there are always those complications that keep it from being so neatly tied up. Paddy Ohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10442537362540160512noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-34536219931952990372016-08-07T19:30:12.396-05:002016-08-07T19:30:12.396-05:00"There is nothing we can do to earn it."..."There is nothing we can do to earn it."<br /><br />True. But that's a different discussion. Works-salvation is one thing, what Wesley was suggesting was what it means to live out the Christian life. First God works, then we can work. First God works, then we must work. Grace is not deserved or earned but neither is it passively experienced. That's all through the letters of Paul, cf. Romans 8 and onwards. <br /><br />Molly, I don't think that's the issue with everyone. I see it as the one saying, "I feel like acting like this, therefore I identify as a woman" with the response being, "that's not what being a woman is like." <br /><br />The issue is whether the correlation of feeling is genuinely equivalent to the nature of womanhood, or if the feeling being experienced can only be a caricature or stereotype of what the person assumes it is like to be a woman. Paddy Ohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10442537362540160512noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-70761247679931691332016-08-07T13:56:46.079-05:002016-08-07T13:56:46.079-05:00Everyone is getting the direction of causality wro...Everyone is getting the direction of causality wrong. It's not, "I feel like identifying as a woman, therefore I act like this." Rather it is "I feel like acting like this, therefore I identify as a woman."Mollyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12620510049808301698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-20083614580153254252016-08-07T12:48:06.925-05:002016-08-07T12:48:06.925-05:00Apparently the kind of woman he has always wanted ...Apparently the kind of woman he has always wanted to be isn't the kind of woman she wants him to be.<br /><br />Jupiterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13008508862847561845noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-59789586816932675102016-08-07T12:47:01.697-05:002016-08-07T12:47:01.697-05:00mockturtle: I've known a few drag queens and, ...mockturtle: <i>I've known a few drag queens and, though not transgender, they certainly do exaggerate the prototype.</i><br /><br />The drag queens showed their honest, sincere affection for what was, in the very early 90s when I saw a show, the essentially lost art form of burlesque, some five years or so before Dita Von Teese started reclaiming it. I thought it was delightful—a very healthy restorative against the heroin chic of the day. I mean, I remember when Brooke Shields modeled for Calvin Klein. When you manage to make Brooke Shields look like a boy with long hair, you've gone too far.Paul Snivelyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08176093036690144698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-27127411367782031172016-08-07T04:27:31.353-05:002016-08-07T04:27:31.353-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Clydehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16736461252925227611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-44099638938350090142016-08-06T23:09:27.349-05:002016-08-06T23:09:27.349-05:00Thank G-d my late stage COPD & my canine compa...Thank G-d my late stage COPD & my canine companion, at 15 years, demise will preclude the insanity of "gender choice" impacting my life. Alluha Akhbar, on the other hand, will directly effect psychological problem trans with, as the Red Queen said "off with their head" joining all the other alphabet soup losers!MikeDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02470183737660481980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-16499353268623248412016-08-06T23:00:50.802-05:002016-08-06T23:00:50.802-05:00Re Paddy O 11. May we all thus experience what it ...Re Paddy O <i>11. May we all thus experience what it is to be, not almost only; but altogether Christians; being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Jesus; knowing we have peace with God through Jesus Christ; rejoicing in hope of the glory of God; and having the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost given unto us!</i><br /><br />I know how Wesley struggled before reaching this rightful conclusion, as do many Christians. Grace can be a difficult concept. But, in essence, it means unmerited favor. There is nothing we can do to earn it.mockturtlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10507310332014103437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-84646083686748888632016-08-06T22:43:16.170-05:002016-08-06T22:43:16.170-05:00With this, I think the narrow constraints of cultu...With this, I think the narrow constraints of cultural gender expression are part of the historic problem. In our era where we're bursting conceptions of gender roles and assumptions about what it means to be a man or a woman, we're going to see more conflict between those who want to be a stereotypical gender and those who want to blow up those stereotypes. Paddy Ohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10442537362540160512noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-58892970326600177802016-08-06T22:38:41.541-05:002016-08-06T22:38:41.541-05:00"If the sought-for abstraction is different f..."If the sought-for abstraction is different from what the person happens to already and naturally be, then why is the person seeking?"<br /><br />This is, I think, the key question. There's a <i>something</i> being sought, and even if imperfectly, I think they are still a person who is seeking and I see that as a very important part of being a person. So, I'm not dismissing the person's quest. Though, in any realm of life, those that already are a thing tend to be less gracious to those who are posing at what those people are. There's a sense of established comfort in an identity that leads people to resist those who aren't quite there. The strong urge to push back against heretics. Which is often overdone. <br /><br />Every identity does have its limits to acceptance, which seems to be the debate these days. If I said I was a law professor, as imperfect as I may be and as earnest as I sought to be, I still wouldn't be allowed to teach a law class at a law school. And if I tried, I would likely teach a caricature of the law. I don't understand it enough, and the real issue is that I may think I understand a lot more than I do. <br /><br />Students do this a lot, they assume they know more or as much and respond in an arrogant way to issues. We don't know what we think we know and so aren't fulfilled in our own assumption of identity. "I deserve an A," students sometime tell me. In their perception of their work and the topic they might, but I know more and can gauge them against a broader understanding of what it means to be an A student. One cannot simply believe oneself into an A, even if it is a heartfelt belief.<br /><br />Christianity is another level of conversation. We are all, to be sure, incomplete Christians, but there historically, from the very beginning has been a point at which people were or were not actual Christians. The creeds offered some guidance on that. John Wesley has a very interesting (to me at least) with the title <a href="http://www.umcmission.org/Find-Resources/John-Wesley-Sermons/Sermon-2-The-Almost-Christian" rel="nofollow">"The Almost Christian"</a> on just this theme. <br /><br />Sometimes the "almost" exaggerates some elements of what they are seeking as a way to compensate. <br /><br />In Christian anthropology (doctrine of humanity), we'd of course say that what is being sought ultimately isn't going to be fulfilled through taking on another gender identity or other such pursuits. There's a quest for an ultimate sense of meaning and selfhood at work. Affirm the quest, suggest the temporary targets aren't quite on track. Paddy Ohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10442537362540160512noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-16061122195212055002016-08-06T21:58:19.020-05:002016-08-06T21:58:19.020-05:00Being annoying isn't considered by most of us ...Being annoying isn't considered by most of us to be a government protected right. If you call a heteronormative person annoying they don't call you a bigot over it. bagoh20https://www.blogger.com/profile/10915174575358413637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-57111375417662669012016-08-06T21:50:46.863-05:002016-08-06T21:50:46.863-05:00I don't think it's possible for someone to...I don't think it's possible for someone to feel that they ought to have two X chromosomes rather than XY -- too abstract. Transgender has to be about the shared social idea of "woman" (or man) rather than the underlying genetics. It could just be the physical manifestations, like a feeling that one ought not have a penis, or one ought to have larger breasts, just as some people feel they ought to be amputees, but it could also extend to the individual's concept of "woman", in terms of social role and behaviour. <br /><br />But in the present day, at least among Whites in the US, gender is not particularly heavily marked. Women are not particularly dainty, and for all the complaints that aggressive speech from females is read differently from aggressive speech from males, plenty of women speak aggressively (and coarsely) so that as a matter of social reality, gender behaviours are not strictly delineated. It's a cline, with some men (like me) falling pretty clearly on the dainty, effete side of the line. Sticking our pinkies out as we sip our tea. Under such circumstances, it should not be surprising that a man seeking to display "female" behaviours as an expression of his transgender identity should end up way on the extreme edge of "feminine" behaviour -- in the realm of caricature. That's the only place the gender marking is unambiguous.<br /><br />And of course, the gender identity he associates himself with won't be one he has grown up with. If he seeks to transition as an adult, he likely won't have grown up with people treating him as a woman. He will have been on the outside only, looking in. No magic will give him an authentic feminine perspective, not until people start reacting to him as a woman.Balfegorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08012196656096263507noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-69561642984429188872016-08-06T21:37:18.015-05:002016-08-06T21:37:18.015-05:00I've known a few drag queens and, though not t...I've known a few drag queens and, though not transgender, they certainly do exaggerate the prototype.mockturtlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10507310332014103437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-77151820068921535712016-08-06T21:32:41.271-05:002016-08-06T21:32:41.271-05:00Althouse is right.
I've found that when peo...Althouse is right. <br /><br />I've found that when people undergo massive changes in their life, aspects of their personality change drastically too. It has been rather annoying, because it does seem as if the person is playing a part. Most of the time the changes die down after a few months and they become bearable again. Bircheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00045640752795693223noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-81534467699535157542016-08-06T21:28:40.754-05:002016-08-06T21:28:40.754-05:00"Maybe the women are ashamed of their own urg..."Maybe the women are ashamed of their own urge to primp and fuss and the by-choice woman is embracing what they have as-yet failed to come to terms with."<br /><br />Well, I suspect the women are upset because either they think their trans friend is portraying a woman how a non-woman has seen them in reality, and they don't like what that seems to entail, or they are upset because they think their trans friend is portraying a distilled, idealized form of womanhood and they don't like that. Either way I think the trans friend is acting as a mirror for these ladies. Because the behavior they describe of their trans friend doesn't really come off as some sort of intolerable social nightmare. The Vault Dwellerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16446904205700574185noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-17862182749047638762016-08-06T21:19:24.714-05:002016-08-06T21:19:24.714-05:00You didn't credit yourself with being a Christ...<i>You didn't credit yourself with being a Christian. It was an aspiration.</i><br /><br />"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." Ephesians 2:8,9mockturtlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10507310332014103437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-56389382889630661542016-08-06T21:00:10.403-05:002016-08-06T21:00:10.403-05:00"Maybe these actions seem exaggerated and off..."Maybe these actions seem exaggerated and offensive to her because she subconsciously views the actions as being performed by a man."<br /><br />Maybe the women are ashamed of their own urge to primp and fuss and the by-choice woman is embracing what they have as-yet failed to come to terms with.Ann Althousehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01630636239933008807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-89077441162064804912016-08-06T20:56:15.831-05:002016-08-06T20:56:15.831-05:00"You might be totally misunderstanding Christ..."You might be totally misunderstanding Christianity."<br /><br />Maybe, but I think of the hymn, heard many times, in Christian churches, "Lord, I want to be a Christian..."<br /><br />You didn't credit yourself with being a Christian. It was an aspiration.Ann Althousehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01630636239933008807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-5394469099863653902016-08-06T20:19:53.168-05:002016-08-06T20:19:53.168-05:00The woman writing in seems to think that her frien...The woman writing in seems to think that her friend's behavior is exaggerated and offensive but I wonder what an objective male observer would make of the behavior. The woman and her friends say they have known the transitioning person while the person was still a man. My hunch is they probably still think of the person as a man. Kind of like how if you have had a long-time friend from childhood many still think of that person as how they first knew them.<br /><br />Maybe these actions seem exaggerated and offensive to her because she subconsciously views the actions as being performed by a man. The real test would be to see if an objective male observer views the actions as within the normally expected range of behavior of a woman. My hunch is the neutral male observer wouldn't think the actions are too odd.The Vault Dwellerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16446904205700574185noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-23694964381171784982016-08-06T20:16:37.107-05:002016-08-06T20:16:37.107-05:00Ambrose, you magnificent bastard, that was my firs...Ambrose, you magnificent bastard, that was my first thought, too, except <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Psm96Dn9KII" rel="nofollow">this version!</a><br /><br />Also, I've wondered this from time time about the strong drag queen culture/subculture (among homosexual men, I think)--aren't those offensive portrayals according to the standards of the day? Feminist PC culture is not something I pretend to fully get...but consistency doesn't seem to be on of its strong suits. <br /><br />HoodlumDoodlumhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17591221162603652473noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-76782735046211457992016-08-06T20:05:15.847-05:002016-08-06T20:05:15.847-05:00In the old days they would put these people in a m...In the old days they would put these people in a monastery, and they would try to behave like monks. <br />They usually got pretty good at it I think.<br />What they want to be seems to be a matter of fashion. <br />Modern fashion is stupid and expensive. buwayahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02369134902650235470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-25451220819917844152016-08-06T19:57:44.450-05:002016-08-06T19:57:44.450-05:00Sometimes t's hard to be a woman.
https://www...Sometimes t's hard to be a woman.<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WoP039FxH4Ambrosehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12186326715874648232noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-29181645691487538222016-08-06T19:46:30.966-05:002016-08-06T19:46:30.966-05:00"shouldn't she act however she feels?&quo..."shouldn't she act however she feels?" Umm, no. Not if she is 1. crazy and/or 2. drives her friends crazy and/or 3. a tactful adult who wants to be treated as such. <br /><br />How long before the exaggerated stereotypical behavior of transwomen is revealed and reviled as sexism?.Sebastianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00505631054204611033noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329595.post-61637666792123969572016-08-06T19:45:54.445-05:002016-08-06T19:45:54.445-05:00"I know my voice is terrible, it irritates pe...<a href="https://youtu.be/Gzx33O65ZdQ?list=PLV8rV90b1xBSjMfrhhEXCwGPVECedbZ7H&t=34" rel="nofollow">"I know my voice is terrible, it irritates people so much they just want to kill me."</a>Fernandinandehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11253225431705407699noreply@blogger.com