Tag: gender

The War on Sex

In his 1973 book The Inevitability of Patriarchy, the sociologist Steven Goldberg described sex as “the single most decisive determinant of personal identity.” Today, one wonders if such a book could even be published. Even if it were, it would certainly face a massive assault by the scholarly establishment, the “news” media, and much of the rest of elite culture, including that of many self-styled conservatives. The state of accepted pedagogy on this matter in our nation’s schools, including our universities, is now nearly the opposite of Goldberg’s argument that intrinsic biological differences irreducible to socialization exist between man and woman, differences that make the radical feminist dream of a society where men and women are functionally indistinguishable impossible to achieve. Increasingly, many in authority now take it as a matter of doxa—beyond any possible argument or demonstration of contradicting data—that sex is not a binary with two categories but a spectrum with many, and that gender is completely disconnected from sex, defined only by the whim of the individual.

The book that most fully demonstrates the radical angle of attack on Goldberg’s scientific view is one that might have had the most influence on elite thinking about gender and sex: Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble (1990). The Berkeley professor’s book celebrated drag as a culturally revolutionary act that reveals what she asserts is the fact of gender’s unreality. Gender, Butler claims, is no more than a performance, and drag is a form of radical action against the illegitimate patriarchal system of power. Through this deviant practice, individuals can create alternative identities and subvert heterosexual power. If a biological man can lay claim to the female gender simply by changing clothing, applying some makeup, and altering his speech or mannerisms, the link of gender to anything biologically real is broken and we are in a (liberating) world of mirrors and drama.

Butler’s anarchist attack on “the compulsory order of sex/gender/desire,” that is, the cultural enforcement of the sex and gender binary, is consistent with the French poststructuralism of especially Michel Foucault, who saw society as a set of controls  to prevent the free expression of sexuality. This high priest for the sex/gender radicals died of AIDS after having almost certainly contracted the disease frequenting bath houses in the San Francisco area during the 1970s and 1980s. Here, Foucault tested his philosophical principles of sexual freedom in acts of anonymous, sado-masochistic, unprotected carnality with many other men.

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Female Prisoner Allegedly Raped By Male Identifying As Female

Last year, an inmate at an Illinois women’s prison alleged that she was raped by a transgender inmate who was transferred into her housing unit. According to PBS affiliate WTTW, that inmate filed a federal lawsuit claiming that officials of the Illinois Department of Corrections conducted a “sham investigation” to help cover it up.

“The transfer of transgender inmates from male to female prisons has been a contentious policy within IDOC,” the plaintiff’s attorneys wrote in the complaint. “In an attempt to justify the transfers, Defendants Sexton, Calhoun, Keeler and currently other unknown IDOC employees covered up the sexual assault of Plaintiff and tried to falsely classify it as consensual, to keep it from being considered a PREA violation.”

The policy of housing inmates based on their gender identity is becoming more widespread, and Democrats seek to enshrine the policy in federal law through the so-called Equality Act. This week, independent journalist Abigail Shrier cited both these violent incidents during her testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee as examples of the dangers of passing the Equality Act.

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Jailed father fighting to block gender transition of his child denied bail

A father, Robert Hoogland, who is fighting in the family courts for the right to speak publicly in opposition to the medical and social gender transition of his child was denied bail in a hearing at Vancouver Supreme Court on Friday.

The court found him in contempt of previous orders which sought to restrain his speech with regard to the medical and social gender transition of his child by medical and legal authorities. Robert Hoogland opposes this process on the grounds that it is causing irreversible physical and psychological harm to his child.

This process of seeking to defend his child from iatrogenic medical harm—ordinarily something we would associate with positive parenting—has been characterised as “family violence” and harassment by the court and by the child’s trans rights activist legal advisers.

In Canada, protective parenting is a criminal offence.

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Father jailed after referring to biological female child as his daughter

The warrant was issued by a judge for the arrest of a father after calling his biological female child his “daughter,” and referring to her with the pronouns “she” and “her.” Hoogland was found to be in contempt of court.

Hoogland is a father to a gender non-conforming biological female 14-year-old who identifies as transgender and prefers the use of male pronouns. Hoogland has repeatedly called this person his daughter, though the court has forbade it.

On Tuesday at 10 am Vancouver time, Hoogland surrendered himself to the court in response to the Attorney General of British Columbia’s warrant his arrest for contempt. He was the arrested and jailed. The warrant was issued by Judge Tammen on March 4, 2021.ADVERTISEMENT

Hoogland opposes his child’s undergoing “gender affirmative” medical procedures, and has stated this opposition again and again, in the hope of saving his child from irreversible harm. The Canadian medical system, the legal system, and the child’s mother press ahead with social and medical transition of the child.

On December 14, 2020, Hoogland was compelled by Justice Mazari’s court to collude in the gender “transitioning” of his fourteen year old daughter and told not to call his biological female child his daughter. In response, Hoogland made a Charter challenge engaging his right to freedom of speech.

When he appeared in family court, the judge forced him to sit in the prisoners’ dock, said Hoogland’s lawyer Carey Lind said, even though he was guilty of no crime. The judge referred to him as “the accused.” Lind made an application for the judge to recuse himself on the basis that all of this was prejudicial.

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In Scotland, saying that sex is binary could soon be a crime

In Scotland, claiming sex is binary could result in criminal charges, a policy analysis group warns. The warning follows a “flawed and rushed” change to an upcoming hate speech legislation.

In January, Humza Yousaf, the justice secretary in Scotland, proposed an amendment to the upcoming hate crime legislation that would have protected free speech around transgenderism. However, the amendment was met with heavy criticism from the trans lobby.

The backlash from activists was so bad that Nicola Sturgeon, the First Minister of Scotland and leader of the ruling Scottish National Party (SNP), had to record a video imploring LGBT members of SNP not to leave the party. Consequently, Yousaf withdrew his amendment to the hate crime bill.

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