Althouse: "Anyone born a man retains male privilege in society; even if he chooses to live as a woman — and accept a correspondingly subordinate social position..."

July 28, 2014

"Anyone born a man retains male privilege in society; even if he chooses to live as a woman — and accept a correspondingly subordinate social position..."

"... the fact that he has a choice means that he can never understand what being a woman is really like. By extension, when trans women demand to be accepted as women they are simply exercising another form of male entitlement."

From "What Is a Woman?/The dispute between radical feminism and transgenderism," by Michelle Goldberg.

75 comments:

Donna B. said...: The battle of the sexes has become absurd.; 7/28/14, 9:27 PM
Revenant said...: It is amusing to me that the myth of male privilege has endured so long.; 7/28/14, 9:34 PM
glenn said...: More fart noises; 7/28/14, 9:35 PM
Job said...: If only there were some sort of contest for the stupidest debate, this would be a gold medal winner.; 7/28/14, 9:38 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: Undoubtedly, 99% of the people in the world, men and women, gay and hetero, would find this laugh-out-loud ridiculous. The constant need of the Left to drill down on the absurd gives me great comfort. They lost the great struggle of the 20th century. Screaming at their shadows is all they have left.; 7/28/14, 9:47 PM
Captain Ned said...: Qu'est-ce que ****?; 7/28/14, 9:47 PM
Michael said...: Ye gods and little fishes! Is it really necessary to take these people seriously? By which I do not mean women or transgendered people, of course, but I do mean these little fissiparous knots of radical this and thats. We would do much better with simple common courtesy.; 7/28/14, 9:52 PM
Sorun said...: One male privilege is to not give a rat's ass about a dispute between radical feminists and transgenders except to wonder who would win a fist fight.; 7/28/14, 9:54 PM
James Pawlak said...: This is an example of "mental masturbation" by those without any purpose in this world.; 7/28/14, 10:11 PM
Anonymous said...: Is rejecting the idea of a "female brain" really considered all that radical within feminism?; 7/28/14, 10:12 PM
Fernandinande said...: Which reminds me - how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

Gender Differences in Personality Are Larger than Previously Thought (by Which reminds me - how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

Gender Differences in Personality Are Larger than Previously Thought (at least by "Radical feminists [who] reject the notion of a 'female brain'”); 7/28/14, 10:17 PM
Chuck said...: The Onion must be so pissed that the New Yorker got this one.; 7/28/14, 10:20 PM
NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...: So that's the feminist ideological cover for "go away, you creep me out."; 7/28/14, 10:21 PM
Anonymous said...: Commenting on the Wrong Post Drunk Guy says:

When I am dressed as a woman I don't give a damn about what any other woman says: if I beat you at your own game that is your failure, not mine. When you stride down the street in high heel shoes and strapped testicles you own the street from anyone so simply male or female. Don't bother with feeble efforts to explain: I will shove a thick green plastic penis in your mouth until you come to your senses. Choke on my truth, ladies.; 7/28/14, 10:29 PM
Gahrie said...: Wow...so even if a man wakes up to his patriarchal guilt, and atones by sacrificing his genitals and becoming a woman, he will still be rejected and attacked.

There is literally nothing a man can do without being attacked by feminists.; 7/28/14, 10:43 PM
Mike (MJB Wolf) said...: Boring! You know the participants are STEEPED in privilege when the arguments are this dumb.

"You're more privileged."

"No. YOU'RE more privileged."

Get a fucking life ladies. Make something more tangible than an argument for a change.; 7/28/14, 10:52 PM
Scott said...: "Explaining female-to-male transition is fairly easy for her (and for other radical feminists): women seek to become men in order to raise their status in a sexist system."

I've heard the stories of a couple FTM transgendered people; and I was under the impression that they underwent the gender change because that's how they felt they were intended to be. I would have remembered if they had mentioned status or oppression as a motivator.

Shit, transgendered people of either type are generally regarded as social pariahs. For a feminist to believe that a desire for improved status is a factor in a FTM sex change is delusional.

Feminism must be pretty facile as epistemologies go.; 7/28/14, 10:53 PM
Scott said...: "Explaining female-to-male transition is fairly easy for her (and for other radical feminists): women seek to become men in order to raise their status in a sexist system."

I've heard the stories of a couple FTM transgendered people; and I was under the impression that they underwent the gender change because that's how they felt they were intended to be. I would have remembered if they had mentioned status or oppression as a motivator.

Shit, transgendered people of either type are generally regarded as social pariahs. For a feminist to believe that a desire for improved status is a factor in a FTM sex change is delusional.

Feminism must be pretty facile as epistemologies go.; 7/28/14, 10:57 PM
YoungHegelian said...: Under the leadership of the Comintern, the Communist Parties of the world had to tightly (and I mean tightly) hew to the Party line as it came from Moscow.

This kind of tight ideological control from above drove many lefties of a more independent mindset absolutely batty. Indeed, the zigs & zags of the Party Line did more to doom the American Communist Party to being niche players than anything its enemies ever did to it.

But, when you look at the tendency of Left-wing groups to balkanize into squabbling factions & to waste their energies issuing mutual anathemas, it's hard not to entertain the idea that maybe those old commies knew exactly who they were dealing with, after all.; 7/28/14, 11:02 PM
Bob Boyd said...: Anyone born a star belly sneech retains star belly status even if he runs through the machine and comes out a plain belly sneech.
The fact that he has a choice means that he can never understand what being a plain belly sneech is really like. By extension, when trans belly sneeches demand to be accepted as plain bellies they are simply exercising another form of star belly entitlement.; 7/28/14, 11:02 PM
Lucien said...: Makes me think of John Irving's "Ellen Jamesians" in Garp.

So much rage, angst & righteousness on all sides.; 7/28/14, 11:16 PM
Gary Rosen said...: "The battle of the sexes has become absurd"

It's gone from one-on-one to tag team.; 7/28/14, 11:16 PM
Jupiter said...: So, when a man thinks he would be happier as a woman, he is mistaken. Because actually, he's better off as a man. But he doesn't know that. Because he isn't a woman. If he were, he would know how much better off he would be as a man.

Have I got that right?; 7/28/14, 11:17 PM
Craig Landon said...: Ridiculous is in sight, and I'm sure absurd is just a hill away.; 7/28/14, 11:32 PM
chuck said...: Tell them to take it outside, I want to enjoy my dinner.; 7/28/14, 11:42 PM
Anonymous said...: When Cher's daughter demanded to be accepted as a man, did she exercise a form of female entitlement, or did she despise women and aspire to be a man to claim male privilege in society?

"... the fact that he has a choice means that he can never understand what being a woman is really like."
A woman who has never been a man would understand what being a man is really like?

What would radical feminists call trans women?; 7/29/14, 12:18 AM
Quaestor said...: This is like a dispute between two contending camps of flat-eathers. Is it turtles or elephants all the way down?; 7/29/14, 12:27 AM
Left Bank of the Charles said...: The phrase "made for each other" comes to mind.; 7/29/14, 12:28 AM
Anonymous said...: Can I be black?

I want my reparations.; 7/29/14, 12:34 AM
jr565 said...: Its no longer a battle of the sexes but a battle of the fake sexes. And the rule of patriarchy still apply.; 7/29/14, 12:45 AM
jr565 said...: The feminists are right. Not about the patriarchy. But that a man pretending to be a woman by taking hormones and having a fake vagina does not suddenly become a woman. They are right to be outraged, becuase transgenderism flies in the face of science and the very idea of gender that feminists hold so dear.

I saw a really thing on Facebook. It was a picture of a Chinese product called Vegetarian Ham. It looks like a sausage. But on the label it says "chicken flavored" fake ham that tastes like chicken.
That's transgenderism in a nutshell. Its fake gender tring to emulate fake gender based on notions of gender that are stereotypes of gender.; 7/29/14, 12:52 AM
Moose said...: Feminists are reaping the fruit of their efforts to redefine how people are addressed in the gender roles. They're finding out how useless and how powerful it is to take a common referent (man, woman, Mr., Mrs.) and either strip it of its common meaning or scramble who it applies to. Enjoy your time in the sun, ladies!; 7/29/14, 1:09 AM
fivewheels said...: I'm not a New Yorker devotee and I don't romanticize its good old days or anything, but they're publishing Michelle Goldberg now? How terribly sad.

I mean, not (merely) snarking ... when I clicked the link and saw it was to the New Yorker my first thought was, "Awww."; 7/29/14, 1:58 AM
Fen said...: Its become a farce. They now have an 8 page checklist to see who is more privileged.

"Minority lesbian with orange hair? Congrats! Your points are valid! Keep speaking... oh wait, minority transgender with a wooden leg trumps you! Sit down and shut up, minority lesbian."; 7/29/14, 3:21 AM
hoyden said...: Some folks still believe "Biology is destiny"; the "Flat-Earthers" of feminist debate.; 7/29/14, 4:54 AM
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of New York said...: What Donna B. said.; 7/29/14, 5:14 AM
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of New York said...: To elaborate on the absurdity comment, I just watched Stephen A Smith apologize profusely for suggesting that maybe women shouldn't hit men either.; 7/29/14, 5:24 AM
ddh said...: Once that demon testosterone runs in your veins, you forever have male privilege. Oh, wait. I'm mixing bluenose impulses.; 7/29/14, 5:40 AM
Tank said...: X or Y.

End of story.; 7/29/14, 6:18 AM
Tarrou said...: Feminism - Not at all about hating men, just equality!; 7/29/14, 6:25 AM
Brando said...: How does the old saying go--"if you want to see who rules you, look at who you cannot criticize". If that's the case, then men clearly aren't ruling anyone as it seems they can be criticized all day long with no consequences.; 7/29/14, 6:32 AM
Brando said...: And does this mean that if a woman chooses to live as a man she gains male privilege? Or does being born a woman mean being marked forever with lower status?

I'm just trying to keep up with this whirlpool of absurdity that modern leftism has devolved into.; 7/29/14, 6:34 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Can I be black?"; 7/29/14, 6:50 AM
Ann Althouse said...: I think the point is: If it's a choice, that changes the whole argument.

It's kind of the old free will question, no?; 7/29/14, 6:52 AM
Anonymous said...: And how does all this play for the Taliban?; 7/29/14, 7:01 AM
Paco Wové said...: "to wonder who would win a fist fight."

The trannies, no question.; 7/29/14, 7:05 AM
Larry J said...: elkh1 said...
When Cher's daughter demanded to be accepted as a man, did she exercise a form of female entitlement, or did she despise women and aspire to be a man to claim male privilege in society?

After her sex change, did she register for the draft? Women have rights and men have responsibilities. Did the newly-minted he accept the responsibilities that go along with being male?

"... the fact that he has a choice means that he can never understand what being a woman is really like."

A woman who has never been a man would understand what being a man is really like?

That's it in a nutshell. Men can't understand what being a woman is really like. Women can't understand what being a man is really like. How much can anyone really understand someone else's life? Novelists attempt it but they're just putting their own subjective opinions on paper.

What's amusing is that these radical feminists have a fantasy about what being a man is like that they swear is true. They're deluding themselves and making themselves look absurd in the process. They are the worst sort of sexists and despite their small numbers, they wield an inordinate amount of influence in academia, government, and the workforce.; 7/29/14, 7:19 AM
Anonymous said...: Donna B: The battle of the sexes has become absurd.

Not the battle being fought here. (And not just because Tranny v Rad-fem doesn't have squat to do with the vast majority of men and women.)

AA: I think the point is: If it's a choice, that changes the whole argument.

It's kind of the old free will question, no?

The latest round of forcing people to kowtow to the lunatic's new clothes? Yeah, I'm sure questions of choice and free will are the most salient here.; 7/29/14, 7:23 AM
Mark said...: Popcorn.; 7/29/14, 7:44 AM
Witness said...: "I think the point is: If it's a choice, that changes the whole argument."

Is there some reason why it's not a choice both ways now? I'm pretty sure we have the technology.; 7/29/14, 7:49 AM
rhhardin said...: Cherchez la féministe; 7/29/14, 7:52 AM
gerry said...: This is an example of "mental masturbation" by those without any purpose in this world.

Yes. And the mental ejaculation results merely in grey matter in the gutter. Infertile, unliving, swirling into the drain.

The culture of death.; 7/29/14, 8:05 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: I think the point is: If it's a choice, that changes the whole argument.

But don't women have the same option of transitioning to become men? The fact that they do not choose to does not make it any less of a choice.; 7/29/14, 8:27 AM
Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...: An article of compelling interest to 0.0001% of the world at large - and perhaps a larger fraction of The New Yorker's readership.; 7/29/14, 8:43 AM
kcom said...: "the fact that he has a choice means that he can never understand what being a woman is really like"

So, by analogy, women can never understand what being a man is really like. But that idea never seems to be discussed, does it? Yet, if true, it seems pretty important and has some very serious implications about "gender politics".; 7/29/14, 9:03 AM
Henry said...: No run-of-the-mill Scotsman can ever understand what being a true Scotsman is really like.; 7/29/14, 9:07 AM
Peter said...: "D.G.R. [Deep Green Resistance] is defiantly militant, refusing to condemn the use of violence in the service of goals it considers just."

This stuff would be funnier if the lunatics weren't dangerous.

Here you've got a group that represents the views of perhaps 0.01% of the population (if that), talking about imposing their views by violence instead of asking themselves if maybe, just maybe, the other 99.99% might actually have a more realistic worldview.

What phrase could possibly describe such a PoV, other than "dangerous lunatic"?; 7/29/14, 10:06 AM
chillblaine said...: "We would do much better with simple common courtesy."

YES! We don't need constitutional amendments. Everyone deserves to live a life free of abuse, but there is room for both Joan Rivers AND Chaz Bono.

BTW nice to see that my alma mater, the UC system, offers gender reassignment. Would it be too much to ask for mandatory psychiatric counseling beforehand?; 7/29/14, 10:28 AM
dbp said...: "They believe that if women think and act differently from men it’s because society forces them to, requiring them to be sexually attractive, nurturing, and deferential. In the words of Lierre Keith, a speaker at Radfems Respond, femininity is “ritualized submission.”"

And yet, this woman is not deferential. So, how effective is "society" at forcing anybody to act in any way? The fact that they feel free to speak-out is proof that most of what they claim is false.; 7/29/14, 10:39 AM
Sam L. said...: A plague on both their houses. Idjits!; 7/29/14, 10:48 AM
paul a'barge said...: Ah, Michelle Goldberg.

Here you go, Michelle; 7/29/14, 10:49 AM
paul a'barge said...: Receptionist: How do you write women so well?
Melvin Udall: I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability.; 7/29/14, 10:50 AM
John henry said...: Eric and Ann asked if they could be black.

The legal answer is yes, they can.

The legal definition for qualifying as black is to say you are. "Self-certification" Don't know about Eric but Ann certainly could certify as black if she wanted, as can I.

There was a case in San Francisco in the 90's where white parents of 2 white girls requested AA preference for their 2 daughters for some special school. They claimed they were black. When they were asked to prove it they sued saying that if they said they were black they were black.

The girls got into the school.

So Ann, Eric, you can both be black like me if you wish.

And while we are at it, Crack, you claim to be black. The pictures on your blog, if they are of you, appear to be of a black man.

But how can you prove you are black?

Why should you get reparations and not Ann, Eric and me? Seems like if there are going to be reparations, they should be for all blacks regardless of skin tone.

Maybe we can form a movement "White blacks for reparations"

John Henry; 7/29/14, 10:55 AM
jr565 said...: So, by analogy, women can never understand what being a man is really like. But that idea never seems to be discussed, does it? Yet, if true, it seems pretty important and has some very serious implications about "gender politics".

by the same argument, how then does a transgendered person know he is a different gender. He has no frame of reference as to how being a woman feels so can't say that he is that.; 7/29/14, 11:29 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: So, by analogy, women can never understand what being a man is really like. But that idea never seems to be discussed, does it? Yet, if true, it seems pretty important and has some very serious implications about "gender politics".

My experience is that a lot of women don't have any more conception of how men think, than men do of women. Someone essentially suggested the other day that this is part of why so many of us prefer opposite sexed children, because we see right through the subterfuges of the same sexed children.

Why do women dress showing off their sexual allures? And, even some of these feminists? They do it because it gains power over males in the most instinctual way. So many females go through life manipulating males in this way, and others, and don't think twice about how easy it is. And, then whine and moan about how unfair it is that men have so much power.; 7/29/14, 11:34 AM
n.n said...: Men will never know the "burden". The confused "man" will never be accepted in the feminist clique, nor should he. S/he should form his own club.

That said, transgenderism is boring. It is yesterday's cause. Today, it is more chic to exhibit a constant state of confusion or active opportunism: hypergenderism.; 7/29/14, 11:55 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: "I was born a poor black child."; 7/29/14, 11:59 AM
Anonymous said...: This reminds me of something Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members."; 7/29/14, 12:14 PM
Anthony said...: I recall reading about a case which challenged the laws of Mississippi and Alabama which defined what "black"was - both states said that anyone with African ancestry was black. The court (federal, but not supreme, iirc) struck down both states' laws, leaving "black" undefined.; 7/29/14, 12:29 PM
SGT Ted said...: Funny how radical feminist women get to tell us what being a man is all about (privilege), but no man can EVER understand what being a woman is really like.

That's rather convenient, isn't it?

What the fuck would any woman know what being a man is like, much less some insane, radical feminist bigot?; 7/29/14, 4:39 PM
SGT Ted said...: But, this IS a very good reason to get some more popcorn and a cold one.; 7/29/14, 4:40 PM
retired said...: Maybe they'll adopt the Muslim practice of literally slaughtering each other en mass rather than just rhetorically. I'm sure those ISIS gals will help out.

And what is the ratio of addadickechomy to cutadickoffofme?; 7/29/14, 5:22 PM
phantommut said...: One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in his bed he had been changed into an inauthentic woman of non-northern European ethicity.; 7/29/14, 6:16 PM
phantommut said...: Or, to be more true to the psychology of the original, "One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in his bed he had been changed into exactly what he had been; a pale European male."; 7/29/14, 6:19 PM
phantommut said...: Those ISIS girls really knock me out
They'll leave my head behind
And Hamas girls make me sing and shout
That Jihad's always on my mi-mi-mi-mi-mind.; 7/29/14, 6:20 PM