The expanding censorship on social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook continue to be a major issue in the United States. However, the same debate is occurring in Europe despite a long erosion of free speech values. In Spain, a far-right politician was locked out by Twitter after saying “a man cannot get pregnant” because they have “no uterus or eggs.” Francisco José Contreras, deputy to Spain’s Vox Party, made the response to an article about a transgender male who the birth of a baby girl. The remark was deemed hate speech by Twitter.
Contreras said in a Facebook post on May 11 that he had received a message from Twitter which informed him that he had violated its policies on “hate speech” and explained “The hateful tweet (which I was forced to delete) was one that said: ′’A man cannot get pregnant. A man has no womb or eggs.’ You can see this is already fascist biology. Next time I’ll try 2 + 2 = 4.”
Personally, I found Contreras’ posting to be nasty, demeaning, and gratuitous. This couple was celebrating the birth of their new child. However, this is an example of how the solution to bad speech is more and better speech — not censorship. There are many who share this view which has deep political, religious, and social foundations. Rather than simply responding to such comments, many want to stop others from speaking or hearing such views.
In response, Contreras’ supporters started #AManCannotBePregnant.
This is not the first run-in for the Vox party. The party’s account was suspended in January for claiming that high crime rates were tied to North African immigrants.
Last year, we discussed how Norway criminalized hate speech toward transgender people in their private homes or private conversations.
For free speech advocates, we need to educate the American public on where this road leads and why we need to stay faithful to our core values. What is at stake is the very right that has long defined us as a nation. Once we cross the Rubicon into speech criminalization and controls, Europe has shown that it is rarely possible to work back to liberties lost. We are moving into potentially the most anti-free speech period of American history — and possibly the most anti-free speech Administration. Many politicians are already arguing for citizens to give up their free speech rights in forums like the Internet. With the media echoing many of these anti-free speech sentiments, it will require a greater effort of those who value the First Amendment and its core place in our constitutional system.
Laws against speech are totalitarian.
A human with XY chromosomes, AKA a “man”, cannot get pregnant.
This is a question?
It’s just biology. Likewise, a woman with a hysterectomy, or a woman with certain fertility issues cannot get pregnant. Again, biology.
I thought the Left styled itself as the party of science. Obviously not.
How absurd to be so hostile and intolerant of anyone who sticks to the biological definition of sex/gender.
Nor can a transgender post-op procreate.
These are medical facts.
Yet the implication is to demean transgender folks.
The issue though is that this is a conservative party in Spain making this and other statements.
For example… Turley points out the censoring of “… high crime rates tied to North Africans…” While this could be statistically true and one could show causation… the implication was that all North African Immigrants are criminals.
Whether that was the intent or not… its a dangerous implication.
So the question is… should we censor based on implications or should we have a dialogue?
IMHO, you have a dialogue.
Anonymous, you claim that using the biological definition of a male, which is also unable to give birth, has “the implication is to demean transgender folks.”
There are a great many dysphorias, the most famous of which is lycanthropy. Someone crawling around on all fours and howling might sincerely believe that they have transformed into a werewolf. Persecuting someone who claims they are looking at a human, and not a werewolf, is unjust. Claiming that the obvious statement that a man cannot transform into an animal demeans lycanthropy patients lacks reason.
This is merely a club to bash dissent. Stymie free speech.
There are people who think they are dogs, mermaids, Vampires, or horses, trapped in human bodies. It’s real to them. They really believe this delusion. Imagine setting laws that would require the public in the force speech of affirming that they actually are dogs, mermaids, Vampires, or horses. Imagine a law that punished people who disagreed.
Because that’s where we are at today. Choosing gender dysphoria, out of the lot of dysphorias, and claiming that the delusion must be affirmed, and dissenters punished, is mad. Ironically.
“While this could be statistically true and one could show causation… the implication was that all North African Immigrants are criminals.” No, the implication is that this group commits a higher proportion of such crimes than their population percentage.
Most murderers are men. Most rapists are men. Most mass shooters are men. Most gang members are men. None of these statements in any way implies that all men are murderers, rapists, mass shooters, or gang members.
That would be an example of false logic.
If he just would have said something more measured like he was thinking about shooting white people in the head or blowing up the Trump White House it would be protected political speech and everything would be fine. Instead he spews forth literal violence by saying that men can’t get pregnant. What a far right lunatic.
She’s a woman: female sex, but masculine quasi, pseudo, or transgender a la homosexual, perhaps trans-social (e.g. transvestite).
SOMEONE PLEASE “WOKE” THE SLEEPING GIANT
HE’S BEEN ABSENT FOR FAR TOO LONG NOW
_______________________________________
Who benefits from this current global madness, from BLM to the irrationally and forcibly imposed perversion of freaks of nature (God Bless ‘Em)?
Communist China and global communism.
The inmates have taken over the asylum, at China’s behest.
How long are the good, patriotic, actual Americans going to allow this newspeak and anti-American insanity, a subset of Chinese psychological political/warfare operations, to dominate their country?
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
– Declaration of Independence, 1776
Transgender spectrum, perhaps homosexual, or a divergent state or process. And what of medical, surgical, and psychiatric transgender conversion therapy? Genderphobia is a clear and progressive issue. Normalize, tolerate, or reject?
That said, is it a baby or a fetus. Under the Twilight Amendment and the principle of political congruence (“=”) or inclusive exclusion, the female can vicariously identify it as the former and life, or the latter and death.
Can they abort the baby, cannibalize her profitable parts, sequester her carbon pollutants, and have her, too?
A Twilight faith. A Pro-Choice religion. A liberal ideology. A progressive path and grade.
Good for Contreras speaking the scientific proof. Many of us are tired of this trans crap being stuffed down our throats. I don’t give a fig which pronoun you use or want used. Dead giveaways include chromosomes, Adam apples, etc.
The left wants to follow the science as long as they can claim the science supports their agenda. Obviously, that is not the case where those two pesky chromosomes are concerned.
“those two pesky chromosomes” aren’t always two chromosomes.
Here are some of the known variations in human sex chromosomes:
xx
xy
x0
xxx
xxxx
xxxxx
xxy
xyy
xx/xxx mosaic
xx/xxy mosaic
xy/xxy mosaic
xx/xy mosaic
x0/xx mosaic
Do you want to follow the science here?
Percentages next to those is what matters.
Why is that “what matters”?
The percentages in the population don’t tell us about any single individual.
Of course, exceptions matter. However, it does to speak to normal and normalization, tolerance, and rejection. Most people do not subscribe to the Pro-Choice religion.
Your comment would have been more strongly fact-based if you had attached the frequencies in the global population. One of the trends I’m encouraging is bringing quantitative thinking into political discussion.
I’d also add that gender in human embryo development is most affected by the absence of genes located on the y-chromosome (results in female), and the presence of any y-chromosome bearing these genes (results in male).
However, many genes on the y-chromosome interact to develop maleness, and if some are missing or fail to express at the correct time during development, you don’t get complete maleness, but rather something along the spectrum between female and male.
Even that is an oversimplification. But at least it points not to the mere presence of the y-chromosome as determinative, but rather the presence of specific genes located there and their timely activation as the factors that work to develop a boy baby and later a masculinized adult male.
Pbinca– well put comment and it makes clear that development is a chain of events, any one of which might be altered to direct later stages down different paths. It isn’t a simple on/off switch going male or female or straight or gay. Life is complex. And it has to be in shifting environments.
How deep is the gene pool there? There is male and female and everything else is a mutant.
Those are anomolies and are extremely rare. They also have nothing to do with Trans, being Trans or Trans issues.
No, they’re not extremely rare. Here’s one discussion of estimates for their frequency in the population –
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4981345/
They’re relevant to the comment I responded to about “those two pesky chromosomes.” My point was simply that biology is not as dichotomous as many people want to make it out to be, and following the science involves discussing it in its complexity.
I’d say those numbers are still very low considering the overall population. That being said, their condition is still a biological one. Trans is not a biological issue, it is psychological issue.
Julie– I am not sure that is true in every instance. Studies of the anatomy of the brains of M to F transsexuals have shown them to be more similar to female brains than male brains both of which are visibly distinct. In those cases Trans appears to be biological.
Sex is determined in humans by the presence or absence of a Y chromosome with a functional SRY gene . Once the SRY gene is activated, cells create testosterone and anti-müllerian hormone which typically ensures the development of a single, male reproductive system that produces testosterone. It isn’t determined in the brain.
Julie– “It isn’t determined in the brain.”
***
Assume your brain was transplanted to a male body. Would you think of yourself as male or female?
You cannot transplant your brain in another body. People are not born in the wrong body. That’s an ideological position, not one based in reality.
It used to be you couldn’t transplant a heart or kidney. Someone was working on a head transplant a few years ago, probably without success, but the concept is almost within reach. Imagine your head moved onto Fanio’s body. Would you think of yourself as male or female.
The image is kind of funny, but not necessarily impossible.
If my head moved from my body to someone else’s body then it really would be on the wrong body. But that is not the same as being born in a body and psychologically thinking you are born in the wrong body because that is physically impossible.
Fabio not Fanio.
If the body were the only one to keep you alive it would be the right body just as a heart transplant would be the right heart for you whether male or female. If you would take a male heart to stay alive why not take the rest of the body if you need it? You might like having big muscles. But would you be male or female?
I think your mind would still be female and you would be in the same quandary as men who developed brains with the gross anatomy of a female due to some accident in development.
You’re comparing apples with tri-tip steak. Your sex is coded in ever DNA strand in your entire body and brain. No one is born in the wrong body. Men are not women. They have absolutely no idea what it is to live in a female body and never will. They may not be able to stand living in their own body but it doesn’t mean they were born in the wrong body. Nor does it mean they are female. Men can not have babies, nor can they have periods. That’s fact. They will never know what it is to be a woman no matter how much make up they wear, or how many hormones they take, or how much they mutilate themselves to try to be one. They may feel better doing it but that still doesn’t make them women.
I, too, noticed she didn’t answer. I don’t mind. She is emotionally invested in a particular point of view making it difficult to follow the line of thought to its inevitable conclusion. For many people it is a difficult hurdle, just as many people refuse to accept differences between races despite the overwhelming evidence. I imagine all of us have things we just can’t think about without overbearing emotion. I am dropping it.
“many people refuse to accept differences between races despite the overwhelming evidence”
You don’t say what differences and evidence you’re talking about. Seems to me that most people accept some differences and dispute others, and people may or may not agree about what races exist and who belongs to which race.
So what? I said people have trouble with it.
Gender and sex aren’t synonyms, and sex is not as dichotomous as you suggest.
According to you, what sex is a hermaphrodite?
According to you, what sex is someone with XX/XY mosaicism? or with XX/XY chimerism?
Someone with XX/XY chimerism STILL has MALE AND FEMALE chromosomes. There is no third sex expressed here. Again, this chimerism has nothing at all to do with Trans issues. Again trans are not chimeras, nor are they any other intersex possibilities.
“Someone with XX/XY chimerism STILL has MALE AND FEMALE chromosomes.”
And ___? Your claim is true, but what’s your point?
You avoided answering the question I asked you: “According to you, what sex is someone … with XX/XY chimerism?” and you didn’t attempt to address the other two questions at all: According to you, what sex is a hermaphrodite? According to you, what sex is someone with XX/XY mosaicism?
“There is no third sex expressed here.”
I’ve never talked about a “third sex” and don’t even know what you mean by it. What DO you mean by it?
“this chimerism has nothing at all to do with Trans issues.”
You claim that as if it’s a fact, but it’s not a fact. We don’t even know how common chimerism is: “Experts aren’t quite sure how common chimeras are in the human population, as only 100 cases have been documented so far. However, the prevalence of natural human chimeras is hypothesized to be as high as 10%.” (genetics.thetech.org/ask-a-geneticist/how-common-are-chimeras) It’s certainly possible for someone to have XX cells in their brain and XY cells in their reproductive organs, or vice versa, so you’d actually have to make an argument for why you think that “chimerism has nothing at all to do with Trans issues.” You haven’t done that. I’m curious to hear your argument.
No one cares how common Chimera is. That is not the point of the discussion. Trans people are not Chimeras. My god please try sticking to the point of the conversation.
Julie: “You still have not proved that men are women. Nor have you proved that men can be women (adult human females). Because they can’t.”
***
I never tried to do, Julie. You may recall from one of my earlier posts that I said it is unfair for trans women [men] to compete in women’s sports because whatever cosmetic modifications may have been made almost anyone raised as a male will have more muscle, stronger bones, and greater lung capacity and more. They can never actually be women. That is not an issue I have disputed.
On the other hand, I think it is likely that developmental mishaps can cause unusual problems, one of those being that at least some male to female transsexuals have been discovered to have physical brain structures that are more female than male, sometimes much more, and that tends to impact how they see themselves. They are roughly in the same position that you would be in if your head were grafted onto a male body. You said it would be the ‘wrong body’ which, oddly, sounds very much like what transsexuals often say: “wrong body”. Their female brains have not been grafted onto male bodies but have grown there because of biological accidents. There is no reason to assume that is impossible. Practically everything about us can go wrong during development. Some babies, anencephalics, have neither male nor female brains; they have no brains at all. Given that hazard, getting a brain, even on the ‘wrong body’ is a treat.
Boys being treated like girls when very young seems to have no impact on identity. In Victorian times it was common to put boys in dresses and curls and in the old photos they are hard to distinguish from girls. I think there is an old photo of Winston Churchill like that.
One thing that is very interesting is a group in Santo Domingo among whom boys are born and look like girls until about puberty at which time their male genitalia become visible. It doesn’t seem to cause big identity problems or homosexuality because they keep reproducing and there is only one way that can be done.
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34290981
I think there is a similar phenomenon among some African people.
These days we take so many novel chemicals that we never know what exactly they might do during development. Thalidomide is a great drug but is a tragedy when taken during pregnancy. A few decades ago women having trouble with pregnancy took a hormone that helped them bring a healthy baby to term. It also masculinized female babies to some degree. It has been a long time since I read of that accidental experiment but my recollection was that they were not prone to homosexuality beyond the norm for women but they did tend to be tomboys and engage in sports beyond the norm so something subtle was changed by the use of those drugs. Viral infections may have an impact as well.
I think that we too often use drugs to control children in school, particularly boys who, oddly enough to some, usually act like boys. Drugs during developmental stages have uncertain long-term risks and we shouldn’t give them lightly because a boy is a pain in the rear…most boys are.
These are complex, but interesting, issues and they can never be understood when approached dogmatically or judgmentally, and perhaps not even then. You must watch and ask yourself, “What’s going on here?” and be ready to change your opinion several times.
Oh boy, you are all over the map on this one. First off, our culture does overmedicate children (and adults for that matter) and does so more and more. Second, I did not read any of your previous posts where you said that trans should not compete in women’s sports. And finally, I’ve changed my opinion many times on this and other issues. But when it comes down to it, men are not women and women are not men. We are biologically very different. Millions of years of evolution and women giving birth tells us this. And they are the only ones still giving birth. I’m not as dogmatic as what your argument told me, of which I’ve read before at other sources. I find the trans arguments incredibly dogmatic and cultish if not down right in denial of evolutionary and biological science. That’s why I’m not buying it.
I find it incredibly ironic that you demand sources from me but provide none for your assertions on trans being biological. Seriously, I’m done with this conversation.
If a radiologist looks at an MRI of a brain and recognizes it is a female brain from its physical structure and it turns out to be the brain of a man, then what?
A radiologist is going to say “oh look, this man’s brain is 10% smaller than a man’s brain, he must be a she.”? Every person has a variation of brain size and brain matter, you’re not going to be able to determine anything with a radiologist visit.
Some psychological issues have a biological component. For example, in some people depression is partly linked to problems with folate metabolism and subsequent insufficient production of serotonin. You shouldn’t be so certain that being transgender has no biological component. Twin studies suggest otherwise (see, e.g., Diamond M (2013). “Transsexuality Among Twins: Identity Concordance, Transition, Rearing, and Orientation”. International Journal of Transgender Health. 14 (1): 24–38.), as do some brain studies.
I agree. There is an abundance of evidence for your point. As for my comment to Julie I thought I was being courteous and, more importantly, clear and logical. Apparently I didn’t provide enough courtesy, clarity, or logic. Oh well.
“Trans is not a biological issue, it is psychological issue.”
Well said.
The attempt to root trans in biology is the attempt to portray as “natural” what is in fact a psychopathology. Any therapist or physician who participates in the “reassignment” con game is guilty of malpractice.
As I pointed out and she was unable or unwilling to address, that’s a false dichotomy.
Psychological variations may have a biological component to them (depression is an example). They are natural in that they arise from nature. Biology is more complex than many are willing to discuss.
Being a female is not a psychological condition. It’s a biological one, we are born female. Again, men cannot be female no matter what their psychological condition. And gender identity is nothing but an ideology held onto by trans activists.
‘I found the post to be nasty, demeaning, and gratuitous.’
Wish this same standard applied to 21st century Democrats in America, because they are no better; in fact, they are worse. Much worse. i fully appreciate dialogue, modern dems refuse to engage in it. Take a knee or suffer. That’s it.
Do many women want males to be allowed 8n the public bathrooms, restrooms or poop and pee rooms?
Do most women not want men watching them sit on the toilet or washing their breasts at the sink?
Stand up for your rights to privacy!
A human with a dong is not a female. Even if he puts on female makeup and wears a dress.
A simple sign on the door needs to be enforced:. No dongs allowed!
Women’s toilet stalls all have doors. No one can watch you on the toilet. I’m a woman, and in all my many decades, I’ve never seen a woman wash her breasts at the sink.
So now according to Turley saying that a man is a man and a women is a women is demeaning and nasty. To speak the truth is now demeaning and nasty. The thing that is becoming so tiring is the declaration that the importance of one thing or another should be considered and then ending the statement with a virtue signal. An example would be saying that Fauci gave us bad information but Trump was a bad orange man. This virtue signaling can be found throughout a Vanity article on the lab leak possibility. Now we find the omnipresent virtue signal by the host of the Turley blog. It’s okay Professor Turley. Your friends on the left will like you more now. Cheap tricks.
“brains don’t give birth”
True but irrelevant, since no one is arguing that they do.
“Follow the science…”
Paying attention to people’s minds IS following science. Our species name, H. sapiens, was chosen for a reason.
“you need female plumbing”
Odd that you suggest people “follow the science,” when you’re choosing not to discuss it scientifically. Sex organs aren’t “plumbing.” More to the point, it doesn’t address the question: why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
“If I decide I have the mind of a kangaroo …”
Plant and animal species are scientifically classified by Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species.
Not only are kangaroos a different species, they’re a different genus. Different family. Different order. You have go up to the class level (Mammalia) before you reach a classification level we share with them. Science tells us that we are not kangaroos. Science does NOT tell us that humans cannot have a mind of one sex and sex organs of a different sex, just like science doesn’t tell us that it’s impossible for a person to be a hermaphrodite.
If you want to “follow the science,” then discuss the actual relevant science instead of deflecting to a scientifically inaccurate comparison. (There’s that if-p-then-q again. The question is: is the conditional clause “If you want to ‘follow the science'” true? I guess we’ll find out by how you respond.)
Anon above was responding to my post which appears to have stung.
Returning to my example, if I am convinced that I am a kangaroo can I hop better?
No, but can I insist that all of society pretend that I can hop better?
That is what is happening when were are told to pretend that ‘males’ can have babies.
If they really could this would not be such a heated issue with so much coercion to go along with the delusion.
I wonder when society went so insane?
“my post … appears to have stung.”
Not at all, despite your desire to imagine otherwise.
“if I am convinced that I am a kangaroo …” it’s still a false analogy, since kangaroos are not human.
Again: if you want to “follow the science,” then discuss the actual relevant science instead of deflecting to a scientifically inaccurate comparison.
Twitter circa 1610:
“Galileo: Your Twitter account has been locked. You Tweeted — ‘The Earth rotates around the Sun.’ We do not permit hate speech.”
“P.S. In a few decades, we will also lock Newton’s account, for his piling-on hate speech Tweet: ‘The Sun cannot rotate around Earth.'”
Tell me, again: Which is the “party of science?”
“There are many who share this view which has deep political, religious, and social foundations.”
Errrr, it’s not a view, it’s biology, a scientific fact which cannot be disputed in an reality-based conversation. They only way to “dispute” this fact is to suspend reality and play make-believe, which of course most liberals have no problem doing.
I’ll ask you the same question I asked Olly:
Humans have complex biology. What most makes us human are our minds. That’s why a brain-dead person with a beating heart is considered legally dead. If someone has a uterus but their mind is telling them that they’re male, why do some other people insist that they know better? It’s possible for someone to be a hermaphrodite, so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
“so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?”
***
It isn’t impossible, but brains don’t give birth. For that you need female plumbing. Follow the science and the anatomy. If I decide I have the mind of a kangaroo I still will not be able to hop very well.
This is a response: https://jonathanturley.org/2021/06/07/spanish-politician-suspended-on-twitter-after-responding-to-transgender-story-with-a-man-cannot-get-pregnant/#comment-2096586
I don’t know why WordPress sometimes splits responses off from the comment they’re posted in reply to.
Pursuing the same nonsense, notice that trans females sweep the board in women’s sports but trans [F to M] men never seem to win anything in men’s sports.
If you present some actual evidence to back up your claim, I’ll be happy to look at it. I’m not going to take your word for it, and I’m not going to look it up on your behalf.
Anon- I don’t care what you look at or what you believe.
Your burden of proof exists regardless of whether you care.
A burden that I’m sure he has satisfied to himself.
That you think he has a duty to satisfy that burden to you (which would be impossible) is, yet again, the height of presumption.
People don’t insist it is a female, biology does. It’s a fact. There is no debate.
“People don’t insist it is a female”
What does “it” refer to? (The person’s mind? If so, no biology doesn’t insist that a mind is female just because the body has a uterus.)
“It’s a fact.”
If you clarify what you’re referring to by “it,” we can discuss the biology and whether you’re correct or mistaken.
“There is no debate.”
That’s clearly false. Not only is there a public debate, there’s a debate in the scientific literature. Would you like me to give an example of discussion in the scientific literature?
“If someone has a uterus but their mind is telling them that they’re male . . .”
Then they need psychotherapy — ASAP!
(I don’t recommend Dr. Aruna Khilanani.)
Why are you certain that they need psychotherapy?
It’s possible for someone to be a hermaphrodite, so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
“. . . but a mind of a different sex?”
Because the doctrine of innate ideas is false.
Sam– I think that is not entirely correct. Socrates claimed he was only teasing out knowledge people already had.. Kant rejected Hume’s Blank Slate dogma and argued for a priori knowledge. More recently in The Blank Slate Steven Pinker presented s strong thesis that we are not born with blank slates that can have anything written on them. An accidental experiment on gender identity involved David Reimer. As an infant genital surgery was botched and, since gender is a social construct, it was decided to raise him as a girl without his ever knowing otherwise. He acted Male in some respects and even tried to urinate standing up. The dissonance was so troubling they finally told him he was a boy and he immediately adopted a Male role. We are not blank slates. We have innate notions of the world and of ourselves.
“We have innate notions of the world and of ourselves.”
I disagree.
Human beings are born with free will and with a *capacity* for acquiring knowledge. Those “notions” you mentioned, which vary wildly, are acquired by a young person over a period of years and innumerable encounters. If such “notions” were in fact innate, then the specific meaning and content of them would be universal (which clearly they are not). Some have a malevolent view of the world, fused with a self-loathing. Others have a sense that reality is open to their efforts, fused with a healthy self-esteem.
It may seem like such a “notion” has always been with you, and has no particular origin in one’s choice of values. But it hasn’t; and it does. It’s just very complex and often tricky to identify. It is also noteworthy that such “notions” can be changed (over, of course, a long time).
Sam– If you read Pinker’s ‘A Blank Slate’ he mentions a remarkable phenomenon. That is that people who have had limbs amputated still feel as if they are there, they can even itch, and are called phantom limbs. So much is known.
What is really astonishing is that there are cases of individuals born without limbs who still experience phantom limbs. They never had them, but they feel as if they are somehow there.
That suggests that with our body we are also born with an image or idea of our body and that image remains intact even when one is born without limbs.
That is innate. There are other things that appear to be common such as a prohibition against incest between siblings and between mother and sons. Not quite so strong between fathers and daughters. There are exceptions but they are almost universally a cause for outrage.
There are others, but you get the idea.
Here is an interesting thought: what if a man’s body is normal but somehow through an accident of development his internal body image is female? Pretty much everything that can go wrong in development does go wrong sooner or later so there is no reason to suppose that this would not happen. It could explain some, but not all, cases of transgenderism.
It would also partly explain why even though David Reimer was raised as a girl and always told he was a girl and pressured by experts to be a girl, he could never shake the sense of maleness that he innately possessed. Innate.
There also unusual cases of otherwise normal people wanting amputations of parts of their bodies. They are convinced that, for example, a hand doesn’t belong there. I wonder if this is another instance of the mental image of the body not matching the actual body? I don’t know, but it is a thought.
There are many innate components to human beings.
The issue of ‘free will’ is also problematic. What is it and how do you distinguish it from ‘will’?
In fact, I think it is a nonsense expression. One of the nice things to come out of the school of English Philosophy and its focus on language is the recognition that there can be nonsensical statements that are grammatically correct but meaningless. “George is raining,” is an obvious example. “Free Will” is another, but less obvious. I suspect it was made up to address the religious problems with predestination. If predestination is valid, why did a kind God made people He knew would sin, inevitably, and go to Hell, inevitably? Free will was the ‘answer’ but it is nonsense that will not sustain examination. I doubt that non-Western societies that haven’t obsessed over predestination have similar notions.
Your will is your will. If you are thirsty you will to get a drink. If you are hungry you will to eat. If you are cold you will to get warm. Your will is responsive to the demands of the environment and how you have learned to cope with it. It is not complicated. Your will is probably free by definition. It just can’t always get what you want (as the song goes).
“hermaphrodite” is an outdated term. It’s called Intersex and it is a biological anomaly not someone who thinks they are a man or a woman and it comes in different forms. Yet they are not Trans at all. They have elements of both sexes and yet there is no other sexes involved. The chromosomes are still X and Y. There are no Z chromosomes or P chromosomes. Trans is not intersext by any definition. So you conflating the 2 is a fallacy to begin with.
I didn’t conflate them. I noted that it’s possible for someone to be intersex, so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
You didn’t answer that question. Perhaps you cannot.
Human sexuality is clearly not as neatly dichotomous (i.e., XX/female sex organs/cisgender and XY/male sex organs/cisgender) as some like to pretend. There are sex chromosome variations, sex organ variations, gender identity variations, sexual orientation variations).
“Human sexuality is clearly not as neatly dichotomous (i.e., XX/female sex organs/cisgender and XY/male sex organs/cisgender) as some like to pretend. There are sex chromosome variations, sex organ variations, gender identity variations, sexual orientation variations).”
Except even in Intersex there is a propensity for being male or female no matter the sex chromosome variations. There are sexual orientation variations and sex organ variations. There is also a variation on masculinity and femininity when it comes to both men and women as in effeminate men and masculine women. However, they are still men and women. But “gender identity” does not belong in the same list as those other variations which are based on biology because gender identity is an ideology.
You’re dodging the facts by bringing up hypotheticals. What Francisco José Contreras wrote was 100% factual. It’s amazingly stupid that this is even brought up. When will “the sky is blue” become hate speech? Also, there is no such thing as hate speech.
No, it’s not hypothetical that someone has a uterus but their mind is telling them that they’re male. There are people in the world with this gender dysphoria, even if you deny it.
Sounds like a case of the mind/body split.
“Sounds like a case of the mind/body split.”
That’s an astute identification.
Science!
I support freedom of speech as represented in the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech …”
Twitter is a private company, so the First Amendment simply doesn’t apply.
Don’t like Twitter’s rules? Move to Parler or start another alternative.
There are simple people and then there are people that think. Do you wish to remain with the former?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-constitution-can-crack-section-230-11611946851
The Constitution Can Crack Section 230
Tech companies think the statute allows them to censor with impunity. The law is seldom so simple.
Good reason to nationalize the company.
Just don’t ask to rent space on Amazon’s servers such as requested by Parker. You will be subject to renter discrimination. We need not assume that the ACLU will provide pro bono assistance with your lawsuit against Amazon. Some renter discrimination is more equal than other renter discrimination.
“We need not assume that the ACLU will provide pro bono assistance with your lawsuit against Amazon.”
What law is Amazon breaking that the ACLU is supposed to fight for? You haven’t said.
Anon, Discrimination in the availability of access based on race or dogma is settled law. If you don’t like that we limit your access to our water fountain you can get your own water fountain. Sometimes you hate discrimination but other times you accept it if it furthers your agenda. They said, “We are a private business so we can limit the access to our water fountain by people we don’t like for any reason”. They can’t use the water fountain and they can’t say what they think about it in our newspapers.
Again: what law are they breaking?
It’s my gas station and I can say who can use the water fountain and who can’t. It’s a private business so the laws do not apply. I can discriminate all I want and you can’t do a thing about it. Some animals (Anonymous) are more equal than others animals.
Personally, I found Contreras’ posting to be nasty, demeaning, and gratuitous.
Really? Which posting would that be, the one he made prior to the suspension, or the one he made in response to the suspension?
JT, compare your posting to another version of the same story in The Federalist. There is a significant contextual difference.
JT: “The hateful tweet (which I was forced to delete) was one that said: ′’A man cannot get pregnant. A man has no womb or eggs.’ You can see this is already fascist biology. Next time I’ll try 2 + 2 = 4.”
Federalist: “The hateful tweet (which I was forced to delete) was one that said: A man cannot get pregnant. A man has no womb or eggs,” Contreras tweeted in response to the suspension. “You can see this is already fascist biology. Next time I’ll try 2 + 2 = 4.”
https://thefederalist.com/2021/05/17/twitter-suspends-spanish-politician-for-saying-a-man-cannot-get-pregnant/
So Turley, you left out that very important detail. So tell us, personally what part of the following did you find nasty, demeaning, and gratuitous?
A man cannot get pregnant. A man has no womb or eggs.
The body of a trans man may have a womb and eggs, though they may be also be surgically removed.
A womb and eggs is not what determines whether someone is male or female. My mother did not stop being female after she had a hysterectomy.
Humans have complex biology. What most makes us human are our minds. That’s why a brain-dead person with a beating heart is considered legally dead. If someone has a uterus but their mind is telling them that they’re male, why do some other people insist that they know better? It’s possible for someone to be a hermaphrodite, so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
The body of a trans man may have a womb and eggs, though they may be also be surgically removed.
What trans man means biologically is: a genetic female whose mind identifies as a male.
Now try to make the same statement without using the qualifier trans like Contreras did. He said: A man cannot get pregnant. A man has no womb or eggs.
so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?
Who has said it’s impossible? The mind can believe an infinite number of things about the body it resides in. What the mind has yet to do however is change the the biological sexual organs in the body from that of a female into a male, or a male into a female.
Many people would argue that trans men are a subset of men, so if Contreras makes a claim about men, that claim also applies to trans men.
As for “What the mind has yet to do however is change the the biological sexual organs in the body from that of a female into a male, or a male into a female,” I agree, but gender identity isn’t determined solely by sex organs.
Many people would argue that trans men are a subset of men, so if Contreras makes a claim about men, that claim also applies to trans men.
What “many people” are you talking about? Logically and scientifically, if trans men were a subset of any sex, it would be the female of the species.
The man spoke the truth, and the truth will set you free. Sadly, that is no longer recognized by politicians, academics, lawyers and social media.
These days saying the truth is more likely to land you in jail than ‘set you free’.
If not jail you risk being beaten senseless while castrated police stand by with thumbs up their rears hoping Antifa hasn’t burned the donut shop down yet. No safety there.
Hate crimes and hate speech are poison to liberty.
Just further evidence that Lefties lie to us, each other, and themselves.
We know that many Lefties are dishonest (just read some of the Lefty posts on this blog).
Turley is right; more speech is the answer.
Look at Anonymous the Lefty’s many, many posts.
He certainly enjoys the torrent of BS that he delivers, but does he convince anyone?
Based on responses from other bloggers, his posts engender contempt rather than respect or adherents.
Most stupid posts generate the response that they deserve (there is a reason that Anonymous doesn’t want to be identified).
I agree with what you say about Anonymous The Lefty, but don’t we all wish not to be identified?
I have posted my name twice when I felt compelled to insult someone.
I don’t hide my name, especially when I am being offensive.
Try not to make personal attacks, but occasionally (twice), the poster was so offensive that I responded in kind (signing my name).
There are many different people who post anonymous comments, as should be obvious from the varied political views, foci, etc. demonstrated in their text. If you think all liberal anonymous comments come from a single person and all conservative anonymous comments come from a single person, then you’re mistaken.
THis particular Anonymous is missing the point with the point being that one guy calling himself Anonymous comments 100 times a story and he even replies to his own comments. Not only that but his comments are irrationally nasty. The guy hates Turley, hates the site and hates the majority of us that chose to be happy here.
What needs to be done is for the site (Professor Turley) to not eliminate people being anonymous, as I am, but make it so only one person can have a name, i.e. not 5 people calling themselves Anonymous.
If this clown that is the pain in the neck Anonymous had any honesty or courage he would at least separate himself from the other Anonymous people and create some name for himself that would allow us to more easily ignore his moronic comments.
“THis particular Anonymous is missing the point with the point being that one guy calling himself Anonymous comments 100 times a story and he even replies to his own comments.”
How do you know that it’s all “one guy”?
There’s zero reason to think that, and plenty of reasons not to (e.g., some anonymous comments represent liberal views and some represent conservative views).
“not eliminate people being anonymous, as I am”
You’re pseudonymous rather than anonymous.
Anon– “so why would people assume that it’s impossible to have sex organs of one sex but a mind of a different sex?”
***
Good point. There could be an open computer in a nuthouse.
Hullbobby– Perhaps he could adopt 666 for a moniker.
” one guy calling himself Anonymous comments 100 times a story and he even replies to his own comments. Not only that but his comments are irrationally nasty. The guy hates Turley, hates the site and hates the majority of us “
Allan a long time ago named your anonymous *Anonymous the Stupid*, because it separated ATS from the pack. Another called him ATS for the same reason. It’s not a nice name but it neatly fits him.
“Persecution for the expression of opinions seems to me perfectly logical. If you have no doubt of your premises or your power and want a certain result with all your heart you naturally express your wishes in law and sweep away all opposition…But when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas. . . .The best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out.” (J. Holmes dissent in Abrams)
Professor Turley, I enjoy reading your posts as much as anything on the internet. You set aside your personal biases better than anyone. HOWEVER, saying that ” Personally, I found Contreras’ posting to be nasty, demeaning, and gratuitous” to say that a male cannot give birth is over-the-top. It is a tautology that men do not have the organs necessary to have a baby. Perhaps there should be a different terminology to account for the common wave of transgenderism and its concomitant confusions would be welcome.
“The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias.”
― Learned Hand, The Spirit Of Liberty: Papers And Addresses Of Learned Hand
Words of wisdom but they come from a dead white man and must be discarded by current standards.
We can’t all be racist. Some of us are not Democrats.