Only When It is Darkest Out Can You See the Stars

These are my summary notes from this excellent podcast from Andrea Pitzer on Next Comes What, "How We Survive This Mess." 

Pitzer previous wrote a history of concentration camps, One Long Night, and she relates much of this new US admin regime to historical cases. Some similarities: first, Hitler rose to power through legitimate means, but laws were stretched to allow him to run. Pinochet's coup used similar rhetoric, and we need to be aware of the similar tactics already on display: terror, shock, making a show of force, and trying to seize more power than they have. And Putin, who was brought in as a useful stooge, then stepped out only to return to be more powerful by removing moderates. 

The benefits to the current situation include that we have a date. It's not coming unexpectedly, but in a couple months, which provides a window to play in. The US military is officially non-partisan, so won't necessarily follow Trump's orders. Governors in key states are standing up, and it's important to build that out of the gate. There's still a partially functional court system and civil bureaucracy that can slow down any legislation. And the odds of Congress being up for grabs in 2026 are still good as there will likely be a massive backlash. She also claims that "these people are not that bright" which can help anyone trying to subvert their agenda. They got in only because it's really easy to generate hate; "it's not a sign of genius but of money and the willingness to do tremendous harm," which provides an opening for resistance and a likelihood of infighting that could decimate their control. They ran on ideas, not on governance.

Can a Slingshot Down this Goliath?

I read Andreas Malm's book, How to Blow Up a Pipeline a few months ago, then watched the movie, and then was reminded of it all again by Abigail Thorn's latest Philosophy Tube video about being plagiarized by a man.

Thorn explains how subtle sexism led to free labour in the home. Even today, women get the lion's share of household chores, even if they're working the same or more hours outside the home, through "Social Reproduction" - the reproduction of beliefs that enables the continuation of existing power structures, which go so far as to  make up "facts" about a group of people in order to further their exploitation, for instance, by propagating the notion that women are better suited for this type of work. I once dated a guy who, when I suggested he do dishes more often, insisted, "But you're better at doing dishes." This is a version of learned helplessness that serves to reinforce the status quo and keep some men firmly on the couch with their feet up. 

But Thorn further explains a bump in the road that happens when society accepts people who are trans: 

"If Mrs. Mansley can become Mr. Mansley, then the idea of an essential female nature starts to look a little bit shakey. If Burt can become Berta and be happier for it, then the idea that women are inferior also starts to look shaky. If they can both become Mx. Mansley, nonbinary partners in loving communions, then who the fuck is gonna work at the Chrysler dealership?"

I thought a discussion of Locke might come out of all this because he exposed this essentialist specialization of roles bullshit with respect to the questionable inborn ability of the royal class at the time of King Charles II and Oliver Cromwell. His epistemology, that we're all a blank slate from birth, affected his politics: there's nothing inherently special about royalty, and we should vote on the best leaders! He wrote anonymously knowing what a ruckus that would cause!! Now we're in the same situation but instead of the monarchy exploiting the peasant's labour, we're looking at a shift in men's exploitation of women's labour.

But she doesn't go that far down that particular road.

She brings up Malm's book to relate the fight against climate change to the fight against patriarchy. For both, we've been told for decades to spread the word and raise awareness, but WE ALL KNOW already!! We know that people are exploited and that the climate is being destroyed. As long as people can benefit from pretending they don't know this and that more education is all that's necessary, then there will always be people pushing the stories that tell us it's all okay. But we know it's not, and we need to make some noise. Of course, the same could be said for the Covid situation. Denial is a hell of a drug! 

An Assault on Gender is an Assault on Democracy

Here's Judith Butler on gender. She's a prof in California who teaches literature, philosophy, and critical theory, and wrote, most famously, Gender Trouble and Bodies That Matter. Abridged transcript of the video below for easy skimming and with links to more information. 

"There are many different theories of gender, and mine is just one. Sometimes, people who really hate gender name me as the one who made this up, but that's actually not true. You know, in my view, everybody has a theory of gender, and what I mean by that is that everybody has certain assumptions going about what gender is or should be. And at a certain point in life, we ask ourselves, "Wow, where'd that assumption come from?" At this point, I'm less concerned about whose theory is right and whose theory is wrong because the assault on gender is also an assault on democracy. 

Ideology and Indoctination

We've got marches and rallies surfacing, sometimes right outside of schools, with people chanting, "Leave the kids alone" in order to put an end to "gender ideology." 

What does this even mean? 

First off, check out this 8 minute TikTok on indoctrinating kids (also here if embedding doesn't work):

@headonfirepod Replying to @Katie ♬ original sound - Don Martin

"I was just a kid trying to be a kid but your kids wouldn't let me."

On one side is the belief that people like Don Martin need to be protected from harassment and assault that might come from other children (and adults) who don't understand that people can be different yet equal to us. We're no better or worse than one another because of our interests, or our clothing, or who we date. But on the other side, there's a belief that the children are right to do everything to let him know that he's not living the right way. They're saving him, and no teacher should intervene to indoctrinate children in that first belief, as if that kind of difference is in any way acceptable. 

So, which belief system is an ideology, what does that even mean, and how can we sort our which is the better system?

I'm going to get into the weeds here for a bit, but then I'll come to the issue further down. 

Trans Rights are Human Rights

The trans community isn't safe in Canada, that's why Pride month is necessary. And there's no straight month because nobody has ever been discriminated against for being straight! Last week I said, "a glance towards Florida should be enough for the rest of us to recognize this anti-pride position as absolutely terrifying!" But I should have looked closer to home.

A pastor in my city recently told his congregation, "If you're going to live a lie to the point where you're willing to mutilate your own body, it's going to send you into dark despair." 

He was referring to the death by suicide of a Redeemer University student, Bekett Noble, back in November 2022. Noble had fought with the school about the climate of intolerance there. Shortly after their death, over forty students came forward with complaints about Redeemer, calling their time there "the darkest period of my life" and calling the culture there, which included policies "forbidding same-sex intimacy," "agony" and terrifying for 2SLGBTQIA+ students. The students at the school believe the school's climate of intolerance is what led to the suicide, not their trans identity. 

Here's what I've seen in my many encounters with people who are transgender and from working with students in general. Being trans can be part of a happy, fulfilling life. Being ostracized, humiliated, and discriminated against on an ongoing basis can lead to depression and self-loathing. Try to meet up with and listen to at least ten trans men, trans women, and/or non-binary people before committing to condemning them or preventing them from having access to care. 

This is going to be a long one.

On Keeping Kids "Safe" From Pride

Student Trustee Kenzy Soror wrote an excellent, brief thread on the problem with parents keeping their children home because it's pride day or month:

"I take great concern with the decision of some families to 'keep' WRDSB students at home on June 1st. I hope that those who made this decision realize that LGBTQ+ students will still exist in schools on June 2nd and going forward. We should all realize how unfair it is for students to be left with the task of justifying their own families' choices to their peers - some of which who are inevitably feeling targeted by said choice. Students are not pawns to be kept or released in an effort to make a point."

It was followed by a bunch of comments that more or less say: 

"Your concern is valid, but their choice and right to keep kids home during prime month is also valid. Respect parents' right to say 'no' to minor children."

And one good comment reacting to the haters:

"Seriously? And what if their children actually turned out to be LGBTQ? Might actually be hiding that from their parents? This has become so wrong. So much progress undone by bigots."

Absolutely! Suggesting that it's reasonable to keep children away during pride month when being gay/bi/trans.. is celebrated is akin to suggesting it's reasonable to keep kids away during Black history month, when Black people throughout history are celebrated. It reeks of unfettered prejudices that some see as acceptable. A glance towards Florida should be enough for the rest of us to recognize this anti-pride position as absolutely terrifying! 

Transphobia is the New Homophobia

Natalie Wynn, one of my favourite YouTubers, came out with a 2-hour long video, basically a feature-length film, her first in 10 months. This one is on J.K. Rowling, whom she discussed two years ago (and I wrote about here if you need to catch up on the controversy). 

This time she goes further into the connections between the homophobic and transphobic movements, comparing Anita Bryant in the 70s to Rowling now, to show that the more things change, the more they stay the same. I remember Bryant's commercials for orange juice from my childhood and my parents' reaction to her religious campaign to save children from the gays: Religion shouldn't be used to perpetuate hatred against a group of people; that misses the whole point! Bryant's argument is that gay people get special privileges if they are given extra rights (like, to live free from discrimination) that go against the rights of "normal Americans," and since they can't procreate, they "reproduce through recruitment." They hold hands in public to get your children to try to join them!! 

But then Bryant was blacklisted for "defending children from being recruited by homosexuals" and lost her job as spokesperson with Florida Orange Juice. Wynn questions, Was she cancelled?? Or was she just reaping the consequences of being a bigoted person in a progressive society?

Wynn looks more deeply at Bryant's effect on society, quoting Lillian Fadermen, from The Gay Revolution:

"A mass movement can get along fine without a god, but it won't get along at all without a devil. For gay people all over the country, Anita Bryant became that devil."

On Claims of Porn in Schools

There's a call to arms on a social media from a few people who think the memoir in graphic novel form, Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe (e/em/eir pronouns), should be removed from shelves in school libraries for being pornographic. For the uninitiated, "graphic novel" means it's a cartoon, not that it's graphic in its content. My former school was named as one of the offenders who dares to carry such smut, so of course the post had the ironic effect of making me curious enough to go out and buy a copy of the book to see what all the fuss is about. 

Content Warning: Kobabe's drawing of a sex act is further down. Don't scroll down if you think you might be offended.

The original social media poster suggested parents call Family and Children's Services with their concerns about this bit of pornography in our schools, which is a horrible idea that would put undue stress on a service that has much more important needs to tend to than mediating quibbles around which ideas and images teenagers should be privy to. She doesn't seem to understand the scope of the organization. She also doesn't seem to understand what pornography is or what might actually harm teenagers today. 

My only criticism with the book is that, while it shows the main character, Maia, incrementally more courageous as e finds eir voice, illustrating specifically noteworthy events in eir life, the telling doesn't have a strong story arc. A graphic novel memoir that does this brilliantly, for comparison, is Persepolis, which is also a series of true events, but Satrapi crafts scenes together with a trajectory and more elements of storytelling, making good use of foreshadowing for instance. Gender Queer didn't end as much as it just stopped when e got to the present. But that's besides the point here.  

On Trans Shitposting and Cancel Culture: Applying ContraPoints to J.K. Rowling

I was going to just ignore all this, but it came up in a discussion on my social media feed, so here's the thing:

Free speech is absolutely vital in a democracy, especially the freedom to question and criticize elites: people who craft the laws or, maybe more importantly, who provoke the dominant belief system through their pronounced effect on the zeitgeist. You know, like J.K. Rowling.

There is some concern that Rowling has been unfairly dismissed by the dreaded cancel culture since her most recent explanation of her position on the transgender population is very articulate, as if being articulate makes for a solid argument. This illuminates a serious problem in our society: many people don't know how to recognize and counter a bad argument. We're running on the notion that, if it feels like it makes sense, then it must. Nope.

Last January, YouTuber Natalie Wynn was also denigrated online. In a feature length video, she explains cancel culture as, "online shaming, vilifying or ostracizing prominent members of a community". It's a vigilante strategy to topple people in power who can't be held to account in any other way, which can morph into an absolute reign of terror against the person instead of their argument. It's "character assassination disguised by the rhetoric of honest conflict." The collective has terrifying powers that they don't realize as individuals. And we all know what comes with great power.

It doesn't further society when the goal is no longer to reach a better understanding between people, but to destroy people. Instead, we need to take the most charitable understanding of Rowling's claims and scrutinize them for weak reasoning:

On Maintaining Firm Categories: Do Labels Matter?

This link about people on the spectrum came to my FB feed as "Sponsored Content," so I'm wary at the get go, but they present this argument to be addressed: "Autism is a neurological difference in processing, and simply having a collection of traits or quirks without this difference in processing does not make someone autistic." They argue that "there does need to be some clarity, to get away from the ‘We’re all a little bit autistic aren’t we…’ phrase."

My position: But, why?

And, right before that came one of ContraPoint's latest video in which Natalie's characters argue about who counts as trans with a gender dysphoria anti-trender argument countered by a more fluid gender performativity stance.

I'm going to mesh the issues together here because of some similar arguments. I lean towards 'why does it matter?'. Whether someone's got dysphoria or is trending, it takes minimal energy to use whatever pronouns they asked to be used (while, of course, forgiving the forgetful who mean well). What's the harm in letting people try on the other gender or non-gender to see if it fits better? What's the benefit of doing brain scans on people to get some illusion of certainty about how people feel instead of just trusting how they say they feel? Similarly, who is harmed when people acknowledge their struggles with adhering to behavioural norms by latching on to a recognizable diagnosis? With ASD or ADHD or any other checkbox of symptoms that we've rolling into together under a label, why is it important to delineate who is in and who must stay out via an often expensive and sometimes questionable process? When one of my kids was diagnosed (incorrectly, I believe), the very reputable psychometrist badgered me to find that one thing they're obsessed with when one didn't immediately come to mind. Curious.